Home teaching statistics on how/why?

In my most recent two callings, I've been in a position to observe how home teaching works and doesn't work in our Elders Quorum. The Bishop wants to have a meeting to discuss it.

There has been enough turnover in our ward, that I'm now seeing the same old ideas tried again as new ideas in an attempt to improve home teaching. They didn't work last time so I don't think they'll work this time. I think it is time for new ideas.

I know the church has a research department. I am curious how to contact them because I bet they've studied home teaching and what causes it to work in some wards and not in other wards.

Anybody know how to contact the research department AND how to get somewhere on this?

Home Teaching Reporting
Have you looked at a very good 3rd party HT/VT reporting tool called Return and Report? We have implimented in our ward with improving results. Take a look....google returnandreport.org
good luck
Kirt

chriswoodut wrote:There has been enough turnover in our ward, that I'm now seeing the same old ideas tried again as new ideas in an attempt to improve home teaching. They didn't work last time so I don't think they'll work this time.

It seems you've become the institutional memory of the ward. While the idea didn't work before, perhaps it was the execution that failed, not that the idea was bad.

chriswoodut wrote:Anybody know how to contact the research department AND how to get somewhere on this?

I don't know, but there's a couple of ways to try. One, you can ask you Bishop to go the Stake President and work up through the lines. Or, you can call Church Headquarters and ask the operator. See if anyone there will talk to you.

kirt1 wrote:Home Teaching Reporting
Have you looked at a very good 3rd party HT/VT reporting tool called Return and Report? We have implimented in our ward with improving results. Take a look....google returnandreport.org
good luck
Kirt

I was the EQ secretary previously and we originally thought that the HT was higher than it was simply because it wasn't being reported. We may have picked up some improvement by better reporting, but it didn't get to the root cause. I have talked to various wards about how they handle home teaching, and if I were to point to one thing that seems to make a difference it would be a constant verbal contact with each home teacher. Things I have seen or heard about influencing home teaching; a mid-month verbal contact with home teachers and regular PPIs.

While I'm a geek and love tools, I have concerns about automated reporting methods. I think they remove the burden of collecting the stats but they don't provide the verbal prodding that seems to influence home teachers.

RussellHltn wrote:It seems you've become the institutional memory of the ward. While the idea didn't work before, perhaps it was the execution that failed, not that the idea was bad.

Most of the ideas seem kind of a like a gimmick or are just not effective. Things like: have the bishop/high counselor/somebody with authority give a talk in EQ about home teaching, have a Saturday morning PPI with donuts and basketball, have random 100% home teaching months, and the most common is to just change companionships around hoping somehow that causes the home teaching to improve.

I have about 5 years of EQ home teaching statistics and each year the stats are between 60%-64%. One family visit counts for about 2%. So, all the attempts in the last 5 years have not caused more than 2 additional families (on a yearly average) to get home taught.

Elder Perry came to our stake last year and said the one thing he sees that we can improve is our home teaching. So, it is a big push now in the stake.

I'm really curious about the "why" EQ stats are so different than HP stats. I know Elders are at a different point in their life, priorities, jobs, etc.

chriswoodut wrote:Most of the ideas seem kind of a like a gimmick or are just not effective. Things like: have the bishop/high counselor/somebody with authority give a talk in EQ about home teaching, have a Saturday morning PPI with donuts and basketball, have random 100% home teaching months, and the most common is to just change companionships around hoping somehow that causes the home teaching to improve.

Personally, I've always thought the most damaging thing to HT was the end-of-month phone call to gather stats. "How many did you teach? 'ppreciate you brother. <click>". Kind of undoes the whole importance thing when in the end all that's gathered is a check mark. If it was a quick PPI, going over each of the families and asking questions, then I think the teacher would be more likely to follow up. Assuming this was a consistent pattern and not a one-time thing.

chriswoodut wrote:I have talked to various wards about how they handle home teaching, and if I were to point to one thing that seems to make a difference it would be a constant verbal contact with each home teacher. Things I have seen or heard about influencing home teaching; a mid-month verbal contact with home teachers and regular PPIs.

Which ties into what I've suggested above. The EPQ sets the tone by how they interact with the home teachers.

RussellHltn wrote:Personally, I've always thought the most damaging thing to HT was the end-of-month phone call to gather stats. "How many did you teach? 'ppreciate you brother. <click>". Kind of undoes the whole importance thing when in the end all that's gathered is a check mark. If it was a quick PPI, going over each of the families and asking questions, then I think the teacher would be more likely to follow up. Assuming this was a consistent pattern and not a one-time thing.

Which ties into what I've suggested above. The EPQ sets the tone by how they interact with the home teachers.

I've made those phone calls after people ignoring emails, etc. I remember going to a stake priesthood leadership meeting and all they talked about was why HT was important and that HT needed to be improved. As rude as this sound, my thought going out of the meeting was "You got me to a 7am Sunday meeting to tell us that HT is important? I already knew that. You didn't tell us how to improve the HT in the EQ." We were left with the same frustration and inability to improve the HT after the meeting that we had before the meeting.

At the end of the first three weeks of my mission, I remember the absolute frustration of realizing we had spent three weeks trying to talk to people and nobody had talked to us. I hit that wall of frustration wondering if there wasn't a better way. That is how I feel about HT -- there's got to be better way and I'm sure there are people out there doing it successfully in an EQ.

Maybe if I get time I'll try running the phone gauntlet at church headquarters.

One of my goals is to have me (bishop) and my counsellors go home teaching with various priesthood holders kind of 'splits' thing. What I hope we will achieve is:
• Get them out home teaching!
• Show an example (hopefully) of a good quality visit.
• Help them to feel the spirit, and have an increased desire to do it again.
• Allow the bishopric to get a closer look at each family in the ward - and identify directly anything that needs to be addressed at an executive level.

I figure that people won't not bother to turn up for visiting, if one of the bishopric is going with you?

chriswoodut wrote:I bet they've studied home teaching and what causes it to work in some wards and not in other wards.

Yes, and they put it in Handbook 2: 7.4. It works if a quorum leaders instruct the home teachers personally on their assignments and ask them to report back each month.

lajackson wrote:Yes, and they put it in Handbook 2: 7.4. It works if a quorum leaders instruct the home teachers personally on their assignments and ask them to report back each month.

Yeah, that doesn't really make it happen.

dannykos wrote:One of my goals is to have me (bishop) and my counsellors go home teaching with various priesthood holders kind of 'splits' thing. What I hope we will achieve is:
• Get them out home teaching!
• Show an example (hopefully) of a good quality visit.
• Help them to feel the spirit, and have an increased desire to do it again.
• Allow the bishopric to get a closer look at each family in the ward - and identify directly anything that needs to be addressed at an executive level.

I figure that people won't not bother to turn up for visiting, if one of the bishopric is going with you?

That's an interesting idea. I schedule visits for the bishopric with families occasionally. A more systematic approach such as this could be interesting.

I've been wondering if there is a rule that says Elders only have Elder companions and HP only have HP companions. I've been reading a book that talks about peoples phases of life and it says younger people (<40) are so caught up in careers that they naturally have to neglect some things. They eventually get to the point where their focus changes to more spiritual things. I think this explains the difference between the percentages between EQ and HP. Would mixing the companionships be such a bad thing?

chriswoodut wrote:I've been wondering if there is a rule that says Elders only have Elder companions and HP only have HP companions.

No, there is no such rule, either in the Handbook or in MLS. MLS has no problem at all with combining a High Priest and an Elder as home teaching companions. You do have to decide which quorum the companionship reports to (it can't report to both), but that's no big deal.

Handbook 2, section 7.4.2 says that elders "usually" home teach households headed by an elder, and HPs "usually" home teach households headed by an elder, but all sorts of adaptations are possible if it will best meet the needs of the families being taught.

Having served as an EQ President for several years, finding a "successful" method of encouragement to get Elders to Home Teach is a daunting task.

I found that the most successful method was frequent (at least quarterly) short Home Teaching Interviews (sometimes mislabeled as PPIs), to specifically discuss their assigned families.

Do not let Home Teaching Interviews "cross over" as PPIs. Too often these two important and separate meetings get combined which decreases the effectiveness and purpose of both meetings.

Keep the faith President!

Today is ReturnAndReport.org's five year anniversary. I can't believe it has been five years!

I received a call from someone in the Priesthood Department last month who was checking out ReturnAndReport.org and had questions about it, which I answered. I don't know if this means the Church is considering investing some resources in this or not.

Anyhow, my point for posting here was to say that RAR is a tool for Presidencies to use. It doesn't replace face to face communication. If a Presidency uses the tool properly, it will assist in increasing Home/Visiting Teaching numbers and decrease the amount of time the Presidency spends doing administrative work. Presidencies can focus that extra time on performing additional service for Church members.

In the past five years, I have learned that Relief Socities seem to get the greatest benefit from RAR because they are more likely to use the tool properly. I have received countless letters from RS Presidents and VT Coordinators who have told me how the tool is a life saver.... how they couldn't even imagine going back to the old way they were doing things. My wife is a VT Supervisor right now, so she has also expressed how much time it has saved her.

We need to find a way to get the Brethren to follow up on Home Teaching as well as the sisters follow up on Visiting Teaching. I hate to admit it, but I see a distinct difference.

Brad O.

brado426 wrote: We need to find a way to get the Brethren to follow up on Home Teaching as well as the sisters follow up on Visiting Teaching. I hate to admit it, but I see a distinct difference.

It's true. When we get to that point in Ward Council where we need to know what is happening in the ward and who needs help, we all turn to the RS president. She knows -- the priesthood quorums don't most of the time. Is that a societal thing where men just don't talk about anything important with each other?

chriswoodut wrote:It's true. When we get to that point in Ward Council where we need to know what is happening in the ward and who needs help, we all turn to the RS president. She knows -- the priesthood quorums don't most of the time. Is that a societal thing where men just don't talk about anything important with each other?

Yes, that's probably part of it. As a general rule, men are less inclined to talk about themselves and their problems than women are. That's ok, it's a learning process for all of us.

A boss I once had was fond of saying, "The checker gets what the checker checks." In other words, if there is not constant, regular followup, results will become continuously worse. It is an unfortunate fact of life that for most of us, if there is no accountability, we have a tendency not to fulfill whatever duty we need to fulfill.

sachsen wrote:Yes, that's probably part of it. As a general rule, men are less inclined to talk about themselves and their problems than women are. That's ok, it's a learning process for all of us.

I think that this is part of it, but is not the whole story. As a husband and father of four, as well as a Ward Clerk and occasional community cub scout pack volunteer, I find that I don't have time to talk to anybody about anything meaningful, other than the occasional quick "hello how are things going" with various church members before Priesthood meeting starts. I do have more meaningful conversations with people I home teach. My wife does not have a wage-paying job and stays with the children at home but routinely gets together with other women and their children for play groups, and they do get a chance to talk at more depth. Plus they have their weekday Relief Society meetings once a month which I imagine gives them another opportunity, and visiting teaching, etc. So I think that women generally have more of an opportunity to share these things with others than men do, in addition to having a greater inclination to share their troubles with others.

I was an Elders Quorum President for almost four years and it was difficult to motivate members in my quorum to go out and visit people, even to visit the active members, even with personal invitations, home teaching interviews, etc. Our current Elders Quorum President faces the same challenges.

"Teach with the spirit, and then invite them to act." Elder Bednar, 2011.

I think a quorum leader should very carefully and prayerfully consider companionships. I know that my companion has had an influence on my motivation to do HT. If my companion is someone I genuinely enjoy being with, I am more likely to go home teaching. The other big factor for me has been having a good home teacher. I know that I sometimes have thought my active families are doing well, so I should focus on less-active families in my home teaching effort; however, as I reflect on how home teachers visiting my home has influenced me and contrast that with times when I don't even know if I have a home teacher assigned to me, it becomes clear to me that home teaching active families is vital to improving home teaching. I also agree with the sentiment that the quality and timing of follow-up from quorum leaders would make a big impact—too often it is just the phone call a week into the month to get the prior month's numbers—leaders showing a genuine interest in families takes time, but it also shows that they really care. Last night I ran into my quorum president at the church building (he arrived shortly after us as my wife went to get VT reports in), he had a great positive reply to my poor report, encouraging to move forward and improve in October.

I found this blog from a bishop who has some good ideas on how to improve home teaching:

http://www.leadinglds.com/my-blog/2011/ ... art-1.html

The concept of return and report seems to be an effective motivational practice. Here are two examples.

1) The HP group leader in my ward, who's quorum achieves high 90's or 100% HT regularly, implemented the same approach as a young EQ pres decades ago that he uses now. That practice is to interview everyone quarterly about home teaching. He does that by having each district (3 in this case) interviewed on 1 set Sunday a month. All of quorum leadership meets with each companionship from the designated district (the objective but both don't always show up together). This improved constistanly low percentages around 30% to around 90%.

2) Another friend was involved with the concept this way. Each fast Sunday all the home teachers were asked to stay after church for a quick HT report on the families (no more than 5 minutes and easily much less time). This was accomplished with 1 member of the EQ leadership per HT report so 3 or 4 HT reports/interviews were occurring simultaneously. Once again the low percentages turned into high percentages.

So different methods can work to improve home teachers actually getting out. Effective returning and reporting seems to be key. The second example provides the additional benefit of getting stats back early in the month for unit reporting w/o hounding those that need to get the stats into performing.

As always, the Lords concern is with each one of us whom he loves and care about. The stats just help leadership see if we are tending the flock or leaving the gate open for wolves so to speak. Stats are a tool. Service opens the windows of heaven for blessings as each representative of the Lord (HT) enters a home, ministers, fellowships and leaves with a prayer (optimal but just going opens windows for blessing). That blessing is the same as if the Lord Himself were visiting. The family gets blessed. The home teacher gets blessed. He becomes a better priesthood holder and in so doing becomes a blessing in his own family. Lots of blessings if we just get about doing. "I the Lord am bound when ye do what I say; but when ye do not what I say, ye have no promise." D&C 82:10

jegbert wrote:I found that the most successful method was frequent (at least quarterly) short Home Teaching Interviews (sometimes mislabeled as PPIs), to specifically discuss their assigned families.

ToddBallantyne wrote:1) The HP group leader in my ward, who's quorum achieves high 90's or 100% HT regularly, implemented the same approach as a young EQ pres decades ago that he uses now. That practice is to interview everyone quarterly about home teaching. He does that by having each district (3 in this case) interviewed on 1 set Sunday a month. All of quorum leadership meets with each companionship from the designated district (the objective but both don't always show up together). This improved constistanly low percentages around 30% to around 90%.

Sounds like ministering!

I know all of these are several years old, but from a RS point of view, we start with making sure each of the RS presidency is doing real, quality ministering and being a good example. Bringing other members with us as we visit and meet new people also shows them the level we are trying to achieve with ministering. All the talks in the world will not motivate you as much as a real example and hands on teaching. Perhaps you could practice this in a classroom setting and ask about good, better, best home teaching (ministering). Being able to name those you teach is good, praying about them is better, contacting them is even better, becoming real friends with them is best.

I’m amazed to read this thread, which seems to imply that some people care about ministering to people in their wards. Why not take the approach many of you probably take at work, if you’re in a technology field like I am: user experience. Why not interview ward members to find out what they need, what works, and what doesn’t? Ask single and divorced members in particular. Have older single men? Anyone in the LGBTQ community? Whether and how ward members minister to them is a good measure. The majority of single people I know (both genders) report a dramatic dive in “ministers” even contacting them. But clearly we have a minority group of earnest ministers hoping to leaven the loaf, so good on you!