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Willow Creek Community Church Uses DayPoint Enterprise to
Help "Spread The Word"

By 2002, Willow Creek Community Church's dynamic youth ministry begun in the early 1970s had grown into nearly 100 ministries serving the spiritual, physical, and relational needs of over 17,000 members - and a massive communications challenge for staff and volunteers. According to Mike Gold, Chief Technical Officer, just sharing documents, calendars and schedules among employees and members, not to mention other churches and mission organizations worldwide, was testing the good will of all involved.

"We tried e-mailing documents to people at home and work, but that presented timeliness issues," explains Mr. Gold. "Not only did it take hours to send, but many recipients couldn't access personal e-mail at work so we would have to wait longer for responses. As a result, people in other time zones and even other countries often waited days to receive needed information."

"Further complicating this issue was our sheer growth," states Gold. "Our technical and church service production staffs were e-mailing other churches looking for ideas and activities that would respond to the increasing number of participants we were attracting. We had great ideas, but were hampered by the inability to share them. Bottom line, the information congestion we were experiencing was having a dramatic impact on our ability to serve our population."

The church technical team began exploring collaborative options, but found the application tools didn't fit their needs. That is, until a board member recommended TeamPoint Systems' DayPoint Enterprise.

"One of our board members had successfully implemented DayPoint Enterprise in his own company to handle the sharing of information with associates worldwide," Gold says. "When he explained how he was now able to seamlessly facilitate interactions among his employees and customers, we knew we'd found the answer."

Within a few days, Willow Creek had installed DayPoint on its server and was using the application to expedite daily information sharing. Two years later, the church maintains 12 active portals for users logging in from home, work or even on vacation 24/7.

"Our Executive boards post meeting minutes and agendas on DayPoint Enterprise, the technical and production staffs post ideas on the DayPoint discussion boards, and everyone uses the calendaring function to schedule events and activities," affirms Gold. "In fact, each time we bring another department on DayPoint, the new users are amazed at how much time they save and how easy it is to use whatever their level of technical proficiency."

The church's Adults Ministries have also joined in, customizing DayPoint to manage each of its more than 2,700 small groups so they and the 100-plus extension ministries/missions in the US and around the world can share files and calendar information with ease. This translates into dramatic savings in long distance, teleconferencing, and international calling fees.

Even the music/production department is singing DayPoint's praises. Song clips and music score files that were once too large to e-mail can now be posted on the portal and shared with choir or theatrical groups, as well as with other churches.

"The portal offers a secure place to keep the original music, scores, and scripts we use in the weekly church productions," explains Gold. "Therefore, while the users are able to open the file in the portal and review the music right online, we can still maintain the legal rights, security, and use of the music or plays."

Most recently, Willow Creek began using DayPoint Enterprise to post curriculum for children's Sunday school classes. The staff develops the worksheets and teaching materials and posts it to DayPoint. Volunteer teachers then can go on-line at their convenience and print out the number of copies they need for their class.

"We've eliminated the need to make photocopies or even pick up printed materials at the church," says Gold, "and the response has been overwhelming. Each of these uses has saved us dollars; made it easier to access information from work or home, offered us a level of security for shared files and, basically, simplified our lives. I don't know how we survived before."

Willow Creek Community Church, located in South Barrington, IL, is an interdenominational church of over 25 thousand members that welcomes people from all backgrounds.

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