Workshop Track
Leadership
Lead with Confidence: Strategies for Church Creatives
Empower your team and improve collaboration with our Leadership track. Learn effective strategies for guiding creative teams in a church environment, fostering communication, and building a positive team culture. Gain insights on conflict resolution, aligning creative vision with your church’s mission, and inspiring your team to excel. Whether you’re a seasoned leader or stepping into a new role, this track provides actionable tools to help you lead with confidence and clarity.
Effective Team Leadership & Communication
Develop skills to lead a creative team with vision, clarity, and purpose.
Conflict Resolution & Team Dynamics
Learn how to navigate challenges and build a culture of collaboration and innovation.
Aligning Creativity with Church Mission
Ensure your creative projects and initiatives reflect and enhance your church’s vision.
WORKSHOPS
Maximizing Your Team Potential: From Morale Metrics to AI-Driven Insights
Darrel Girardier
This breakout session will explore practical strategies for measuring and fostering team morale. We will discuss different methods to build team chemistry and keep the lines of communication open between team members. The session will also delve into how AI can be utilized to identify knowledge and chemistry gaps within teams, offering insights on how your team can work better together.
Key Takeaways:
1. Practical Morale Metrics: Learn effective methods for measuring team morale and translating those metrics into actionable improvements for your team’s dynamics.
2. AI-Driven Team Insights: Discover how AI tools can identify hidden knowledge gaps, chemistry issues, and opportunities to enhance team collaboration and performance.
3. Building Chemistry and Communication: Acquire strategies to promote a culture of open communication and strong interpersonal relationships, ensuring your team operates cohesively and with mutual trust.
Darrel Girardier currently oversees digital and creative for Brentwood Baptist Church and its seven campuses. Previously he was a Creative Director at LifeWay Christian Resources. He’s married to Amy-Jo and has two amazing boys.
Establishing Leadership on a New Team
dennis choy
Inheriting a church staff team can be one of the most exciting and intimidating leadership transitions you’ll ever face. You didn’t build the team, but now you lead it. You walk into a system already in motion, with personalities, rhythms, and maybe even a few unwritten rules. The question is: Where do you start? Dennis will share a wealth of advice from his experience to give you the road map to transition in leadership well.
Key Takeaways:
– Learn how to listen and understand your new staff
– Learn how to understand the culture you just inherited (pros and cons)
– Learn how you should be strategic in where you start leading.
Building teams, especially for behind-the-scenes ministries, is what Dennis Choy has done for over 30 years. For 25 years Dennis was at North Coast Church in San Diego as Executive Pastor and Production Pastor. After that, he was the Global Production Pastor at Saddleback Church in California for years and moved on to be Executive of Creative Arts at Skyline Church in San Diego. He is currently the General Manager of Design and Projects for Houseright.com. Creating and developing production, creative and communications teams are his favorite ways to lead and serve, and he lends real-life perspective on how things really work in the church world. Having taught classes at NAB, INFOCOMM, SALT, NAMM, and other conferences around the country, he is excited to share his experiences—good and bad—with anyone who wants to hear. He loves Jesus, Technology, and People. Dennis resides in Oceanside, California, with his wife, Michelle, three amazing kids, and daughter-in-law.
How to Host Effective 1:1’s with Your Team
Dustin Pead
A transformative workshop that explores the art of meaningful one-on-one meetings in creative environments, no matter if you have staff OR volunteers that report to you. Participants will learn proven strategies for turning routine check-ins into powerful moments of connection, growth, and creative development. The session includes practical frameworks for structuring conversations and building trust through intentional leadership.
Key takeaways:
1. Master the Four-Part 1:1 Structure that balances personal wellbeing, progress review, growth planning, and creative inspiration.
2. Learn how to craft powerful questions that unlock creative potential and adapt your questioning style to different personality types.
3. Create effective pre-meeting practices that ensure productive conversations and respect different thinking styles.
After 20 years of full-time creative ministry, Dustin Pead now seeks to help other creatives through coaching, consulting, and fractional services. He resides in Atlanta, GA with his wife Sarah, and their two children, Ethan and Aubrey. Dustin’s mission is to help creatives know themselves, their process, and their teams so they can create greater things together.
How to Build a Disabilities Ministry
Mary Tatum & Ellie Axford
Disability, Autism, Special Needs, Behavior Plans – it all seems like too much for our staff to handle. Let us give you the tools and resources so you can be a church that meets the unique needs of people impacted by disability. Special Needs Ministry is possible for any church, any size, any budget.
Key Takeaways:
1. Explore easy to use – and often free resources that are available to begin engaging people with special needs in your congregation.
2. Develop a network of others who are ministering to and with people impacted by disability.
3. Understand how becoming an accessible church opens the doors to your community in unique ways.
After 20 years of full-time creative ministry, Dustin Pead now seeks to help other creatives through coaching, consulting, and fractional services. He resides in Atlanta, GA with his wife Sarah, and their two children, Ethan and Aubrey. Dustin’s mission is to help creatives know themselves, their process, and their teams so they can create greater things together.
Effectively Recruiting & Onboarding New Volunteers
Jessical Bealer
Healthy teams ebb and flow, but operating from a volunteer deficit for a prolonged period of time will limit your ministry’s growth and impact. In this session we’ll be discussing practical steps to help you keep your rosters full.
Key Takeaways:
1. Systemize your recruitment strategies to ensure a consistent influx of volunteers.
2. Make your ministry attractive.
3. Effectively communicate the value of serving.
4. Find alignment in onboarding and acclimating new volunteers.
Jessica Bealer has been leading in ministry for 25 years. Six of which were spent overseeing standards, systems, staffing and atmosphere for the family ministry of Elevation Church. She has overseen the launch of twenty-five locations, and is considered a specialist in multisite. Jessica currently oversees Ministry Engagement at Generis, an organization dedicated to helping churches see their mission accomplished. Jessica is a mother of six, published author and host of the Women’s Leadership Workshop podcast. She is married to Frank, the Director of Strategy at Generis and Executive Pastor at Home Church Roswell.
7 Traps for Teams & Leaders
Phil Bowdle
Every creative team faces setbacks; some we can’t control, and some we accidentally create for ourselves. In this session, we’ll cover the seven traps that can trip up even the best teams, and share practical tips to help keep your team focused, effective, and healthy. This is a conversation best tackled together; bring your team, or come ready to build one!
Key Takeaways:
– Identify the 7 traps that creative teams and leaders are most likely to fall into, and how to avoid them.
– Help your team refocus on what’s worth pursuing (and what’s not).
– Grab some practical tips and tools you can apply to your ministry right away.
For 18+ years, Phil has been serving in the trenches of creative ministry. Most recently, Phil served at West Ridge Church in NW Atlanta as the Creative Arts Pastor overseeing worship, production, video, and communications teams. Phil released a best-selling book “Rethink Communication: A Playbook to Clarify and Communicate Everything In Your Church” that has helped shape the communication strategy for churches all over the world. Through is work coaching church leaders and as VP of Marketing at Slingshot Group, Phil’s passion is to find clarity in the chaos of ministry and to equip church leaders to put Jesus on display.
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