MLS As a missionary tool

I want to discus how MLS can effectively help find, track, retain investigators through the conversion process.

In small branches and in the wards where the the members are spread out, its hard for missionaries to get the Wards to help fellowship/Retain these people. In our area the missionaries teach and baptize these people in less than three weeks.
This problem come from that.
We as a ward are expected to give them/ assign them Home teachers. How do you assign them HT if they don't have a Record(Instructions in MLS Help section say that nonmember records are for Non Member Spouse only). Assigning them Ht gets them good fellowship.

Will there be any features in MLS to help tracking and the retention of Recent Converts in MLS?

I hope this is easy to understand.

Emartskier wrote:I want to discus how MLS can effectively help find, track, retain investigators through the conversion process.

I don't know it for a fact, but I tend to suspect that the church will never create a tracking system (beyond referral cards) for investigators. That idea that the church tracks them would scare some away and would create negative publicity for the church.

Informal ones created at the local level is one thing, but something codified by CHQ is another.

Emartskier wrote:In our area the missionaries teach and baptize these people in less than three weeks.

That short of time period suggests they haven't been socially integrated yet. That does pose challenges for retention.

I'm not sure how long it takes from the time the data is entered into the Mission MLS before you get your record, but I'd expect it shouldn't take very long at all. By next weekend doesn't seem unreasonable. Unfortunately some missionaries (and missions) are not punctual with their paper work. You may have to sit them down and emphasis that the baptism is not official until it's recorded in the church's records and any delays affect your retention.

Emartskier wrote:We as a ward are expected to give them/ assign them Home teachers. How do you assign them HT if they don't have a Record

It would certainly be easier and more organized if the assignment could be made in MLS, but I don't see any prohibition on creating assignments outside of MLS if conditions warrant.

All of my experience has been that I have a record, entered by the mission office, within 2-3 weeks at the most. Once the baptism has been recorded in MLS, the record should be available for download within a couple of days. If you are not getting them by about that 3 week mark, I would ask my bishop to talk with the stake president, who can (and should) have a chat with the mission president.

Tracking through the investigation process is done via your ward mission leader, who should be meeting with the missionaries frequently (used to be weekly but may have changed with the latest CHI). Additionally, the ward mission leader is responsible to set up the baptism so a new member should not be a surprise to anyone in the Bishopric or Ward Council.

MLS also has some reports for tracking new members through the new member discussions and other things. These are a specific area of reporting on the quarterly report as well. Male members will show up on the Action and Interview report for Priesthood Ordination.

In a nutshell, most of your concerns have been addressed by the Church - its just a matter of getting the appropriate people in your ward and mission trained and on the same page.