Tutorial: Church Admin "First Sunday" Walkthrough

Audience: Brand-new church administrator setting up volunteer scheduling for the first time Time needed: About 30 minutes You'll need: A list of your worship team members with their email addresses

What You'll Learn

By the end of this walkthrough, you will have:

• A real Worship Team with positions and members in TimelyChurch
• Smart scheduling settings configured so the system suggests good fits and auto-fills replacements when someone declines
• A Standard Worship Setup schedule template that automatically populates positions on every new worship event
• A Sunday Worship recurring event series with the next several months of occurrences ready to fill
• Confidence inviting your first volunteer and watching the auto-fill happen

This is the same setup we recommend for every church on opening Sunday. Once it's done, you maintain it rather than rebuild it.

Step 1: Create Your Worship Team

Time: 4 minutes

1. Log in to your admin panel.
2. In the sidebar, expand People and click Groups.
3. Click + New Group (top right).
4. Fill in:
   • Name: Worship Team
   • Type: Team
   • Description: "Sunday morning worship band, vocalists, and tech"
5. Click Save.

You'll land on the new team's detail page with tabs across the top: Group details, Members, Templates (plus a few more depending on the group type). The Group details tab is where you manage positions and scheduling.

Step 2: Add Positions to the Team

Time: 5 minutes

Positions are the roles you fill each Sunday — Worship Leader, Sound Tech, Vocalist, etc.

1. On the Worship Team page, open the Group details tab.
2. Scroll to the Positions card.
3. Click + Add (top right of the card). In the Add Position dialog, type the Position Name, then click Add position. Repeat for each role:
   • Worship Leader
   • Vocalist
   • Acoustic Guitar
   • Electric Guitar
   • Bass
   • Drums
   • Keys
   • Sound Tech
   • ProPresenter Operator
4. Verify all nine positions show in the list.

Tip: Don't worry about getting positions perfect right now. You can delete any position or add more later — nothing breaks.

Step 3: Add Team Members

Time: 5 minutes

1. Click the Members tab.
2. Click + Add Member.
3. In the Search person box, start typing a name and pick the person from the results list.
4. Click Add member.
5. Repeat for each team member. Aim for at least 5–8 people on opening Sunday.

Tip: If you want the scheduler to suggest people only for the roles they actually play, turn on Require permanent position assignments at the bottom of the Positions card (Group details tab). Once it's on, each member row in the Members tab shows position chips you can toggle to assign that person to specific positions. With it off, any team member can be suggested for any position.

Step 4: Configure Smart Scheduling Settings

Time: 3 minutes

1. On the Worship Team page, open the Group details tab and scroll to the Scheduling Settings card.
2. Set:
   • Rotation Strategy: Fair Rotation (based on who served least recently) — everyone serves about equally
   • Max Times Per Month: 2 (no one gets burned out)
   • Check Enable auto-scheduling
   • Check Auto-pick replacement when someone declines
3. Click Save Scheduling Settings.

Tip: The other rotation options are Round Robin (fixed order) and Manual Only (disable auto-fill). Fair Rotation is the right default for most teams. When a volunteer declines, the auto-pick feature gives the slot to the next person in rotation; after a few failed attempts it falls back to a sub request.

See Scheduling Volunteers for Events for the full breakdown of each option.

Step 5: Create a Standard Worship Setup Template

Time: 4 minutes

This schedule template tells TimelyChurch which positions every new worship event should automatically include.

1. Still on the Worship Team page, click the Templates tab.
2. Click New Template.
3. In the Create Schedule Template dialog, fill in:
   • Template Name: Standard Worship Setup
   • Description: "Default position list for Sunday worship"
   • Check Set as default template for this team
   • Under Auto-apply to event types, check Worship
4. Click Create Template.
5. The template now appears in the list. Click the chevron to expand it, then click Add Position to add each position with how many you need:
   • Worship Leader — Number Needed 1
   • Vocalist — Number Needed 2
   • Acoustic Guitar — 1
   • Drums — 1
   • Keys — 1
   • Sound Tech — 1
   • ProPresenter Operator — 1

The template is now flagged as default and set to auto-apply. Any worship event you create from this point forward will pull these positions in automatically.

Step 6: Create the Sunday Worship Event Series

Time: 5 minutes

In TimelyChurch, single events and recurring series are created from the same place — you just flip on Repeats.

1. In the sidebar, expand Planning and click Events.
2. In the top-right of the Events page, click New event. The Create event drawer slides in.
3. Pick the Worship event type, then fill in the basics:
   • Event title: Sunday Worship
   • Date: next Sunday
   • Start / End: e.g. 10:00 AM to 11:30 AM
   • Location: Main Sanctuary (or wherever you meet) — and pick a Room if you use rooms
4. In the Repeats section, turn the switch on. Choose Weekly, then select Sunday in the day circles. Under Ends, leave it on Never (or set an end date / number of occurrences).
5. Click Create series.

TimelyChurch generates the occurrences as actual event records you can open and edit. The Create button reads "Create event" when Repeats is off and "Create series" when it's on.

Tip: To manage all your recurring series later, open the More (⋮) menu in the top-right of the Events page and choose Event Series.

Step 7: Verify Positions Populated on Each Event

1. Open one of the upcoming Sunday events (from the Events calendar/list, or from the Event Series page).
2. Click the Serving tab.
3. Verify the positions from your Standard Worship Setup template are listed, grouped by team, each showing how many are filled out of how many are needed (for example, 0/2 on Vocalist).
4. Spot-check a second event to confirm the auto-apply worked across the series.

If an event is missing positions, use Add position on the Serving tab to add them by hand, or Assign team to pull in a whole team at once.

Step 8: Invite Your First Volunteer (and Test Auto-Fill)

1. On any upcoming Sunday event's Serving tab, find the Worship Leader position and click Assign.
2. In the Find Volunteers panel, pick a teammate to assign them. They'll receive an email + in-app notification.
3. To watch auto-fill in action, click Auto on an open position (or Auto-fill all at the top of the tab) — the system picks the best available teammate automatically.
4. When a volunteer declines, the auto-pick replacement feature you turned on in Step 4 hands the slot to the next person in rotation, so open slots keep filling themselves.

What to Do Next

• Walk your team leaders through Tutorial 02: Manage Your Team so they own their roster.
• Send your volunteers Tutorial 03: Set Your Availability before they get their first invite.
• Bookmark Tutorial 04: Need Attention Sub Invite for the inevitable Saturday-night sub scramble.
• Read Volunteer Management Overview to see everything else this module can do.

You're set. Opening Sunday is going to feel calm.