Updating Church Communications with GenZ and Millennial Values

In any consultation with church communications teams, I always advise leaders to consider the needs of everyone in their approach to information flow protocols, and not just follow old patterns that worked in the past with new forms of technology.

To communicate in ways that enhance relational health in today’s congregations, churches can benefit from adopting new approaches inspired by members of GenZ (the under-age-26 crowd), who highly value transparency because of their deep distrust of institutions including churches, and Millennials (ages approx. 27-42), who overwhelmingly seek available, responsive leaders and who push within organizations for flattened hierarchies of leadership that empower everyone to answer their callings.

That means dropping the old top-down communications approach that created an information flow from pastors and leaders down to the congregation, and instead creating paths of communication that work side-to-side and shoulder-to-shoulder, enhancing intra-congregation collaboration among all members.

It also means stirring up flow to create a circular pattern, wrapping a full and continuous loop of feedback from congregants to leaders and back again.

The great thing about these newer concepts of communication flow is that they not only build trust and strong relationships, they can also open opportunities for collaboration like never before between pastoral leaders and their congregations. This dynamic creates real teamwork where everyone is ‘in the know’ and is putting in the effort, not rehashing the old, exhausting pull-along approach from the pulpit.

Don’t get me wrong: the old model with the pastor pulling along the church like a carthorse does still work, but it’s hard work that strains and drains any ministry leader. In today’s world where 42% of pastors are in dangerous risk of total burnout, creating space for a new, mutually supportive working relationship is vital to protecting a pastor’s energy reserves! As a bonus, the newer communications models cultivate healthy discipleship all around by enabling spiritual maturity and leadership growth to flourish in the congregation itself.

Here is my updated checklist for healthy church communications. What elements have you adopted? Are any missing? What do you need to change in the new year to come?