Tip:
Using software to help increase participation in your music program.

The issue:
You wish to increase the participation level of people in both rehearsal and service contexts.

Solutions:
1.) Take note of important days in the lives of your people.
People will care about you and your goals if you show that you care about them. Enter your people into administration software such as Church Musician 5.0, including their birthday and anniversary dates. Then once a month, run birthday and anniversary reports from the software for the upcoming month. You may either observe the birthdays and anniversaries of each week in rehearsal, or get a stack of greeting cards and hand-write a note to each person with a birthday or anniversary. Print your labels for the birthday/anniversary folks from the software, then mail close to the date of the event.

2.) Track attendance and create reward systems.
If you show that attendance is important to you by keeping track, your people will know that too and will reward you. Use the attendance tracking function in music administration software such as Church Musician 5.0 to compile attendance for rehearsals and services. Designate a person in each choir or ensemble as attendance secretary, if choir size warrants. Once attendance is tracked, use something already present in most choirs to your advantage: inter-sectional rivalry! Setup a 90-day contest for best attendance for a section: sopranos, altos, etc. and establish a reward. The people in those sections will then reinforce each other to increase attendance so that the section wins the prize!

3.) Establish and communicate your goals clearly in multiple ways.
Use the e-mail and formletter tools in music administration software such as Church Musician 5.0 to communicate with your people. Let them know what your goals are in multiple forms of communication: posters, e-mails, letters to sections, etc. A good rule of thumb for attendance in a choir is 80% for success. Let your people know what your expectations are, then show that you care about them by communicating with them! Post an attendance graph from the software each week on your choir bulletin board to show that you are following attendance and showing them where they are in relation to your goals. Then when they meet it, reward them!