4/15/2023
The Great Plains Annual Conference of The United Methodist Church has added a handy way to store their people- and church-related files right in the contact record. By adding custom fields to both contact views, administrators can upload relevant files and view old files right in the record.
Currently, the Conference's important files section includes clergy compensation, leadership assessment, appointment recommendation, waivers, charge conference, and Board of Ordained Ministry files for pastors. For churches, there's options for charge conference forms, fund balance files, insurance records, Safe Gatherings information, minutes, and property- and deed-related files. Both contact types have a generic files option for records falling outside the preestablished categories.
When an admin selects the green add new file button, a screen with fields for file name, date, file category, and the file itself appears. Saving the file adds it both to the full repository, located in a content view called Important Files, and ties it to the people or church record.
The staff at Great Plains has taken it a step further by implementing a naming convention for all their files. They created abbreviations and a key, so the file name clearly states when it was due, what type of file it is, and who or what church it relates to.