Hey Fletch … I send out emails to our staff and don’t get a response. What should I do?
DRF—First, make sure that your emails ask for a response. Keep each email with just one focus item. In other words, don’t ask four complicated questions in one email. That won’t work.
If you have staff who don’t respond, send them a text message. “Hey, I haven’t seen a response to my email. Could you get back to me in 24 hours?” If that doesn’t work, do a tongue-in-cheek follow up, “Hey, if you don’t respond to my emails, are you responding to people in the congregation?”
Finally, bring down the gavel, “If I don’t hear from you in 24 hours, I could have the accounting department forget to issue you a paycheck.”
I had a missionary one time who was “too busy” to respond to our annual questionnaire. He said he could get it to me in 60 days or so. Yet, the information was vital to the church. I let him know that we could hold up his support until the information arrived in the church office. He sent in the questionnaire the next day.
