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Setting Up Your Organization

A step-by-step guide for new administrators to set up Ministry Steward for their church or ministry.

This guide walks a new administrator through the complete process of setting up Ministry Steward, from creating your account to publishing your first schedule.

Step 1: Create Your Account

  1. Visit the Ministry Steward sign-up page and create your account.
  2. You will be prompted to create a team account — this represents your church or organization.
  3. Choose a name for your organization (e.g., "St. Carlo Acutis Church") and complete the setup.

You are automatically the Owner of the organization, which gives you full administrative access.

Step 2: Set Up Your Ministries

Ministries are the service areas in your organization. You need at least one ministry before you can schedule volunteers.

  1. Navigate to Ministries in the left sidebar.
  2. Click Add Ministry and fill in the name and description.
  3. Repeat for each service area (e.g., Worship Team, Ushers, Greeters, Children's Ministry, Audio/Visual).

See Adding a Ministry for detailed instructions.

Tips for Setting Up Ministries

  • Start with your most active ministries — you can always add more later.
  • Use the Allow Overflow Assignment option for ministries where extra help is always welcome.
  • Consider how ministries interact — the scheduler can reduce requirements for one ministry when another is present.

Step 3: Invite Your Team

Bring your volunteers into the system by inviting them as team members.

  1. Go to Settings > Members in the left sidebar.
  2. Click Invite Members and enter their email addresses.
  3. Assign each person an appropriate role:
    • Administrator — can manage all aspects of the organization.
    • Ministry Lead — can oversee specific ministries they're assigned to.
    • Member — standard volunteer with access to their own schedule and availability.

When a person accepts the invitation, they automatically appear in the Volunteers list.

Managed Accounts

For volunteers who don't need their own login (typically children), you can create managed accounts instead. These are linked to a parent or guardian who manages their schedule. See Adding a Volunteer for details.

Step 4: Qualify Volunteers for Ministries

After volunteers join, you need to specify which ministries each person is qualified to serve in.

  1. Navigate to Ministries in the left sidebar.
  2. Click the people icon next to a ministry to open the Manage Volunteers dialog.
  3. Add the volunteers who are qualified for that ministry.

A volunteer can be qualified for multiple ministries. Only qualified volunteers can be scheduled for a given ministry.

Step 5: Create Your Events

Events represent the services and activities your organization holds.

  1. Navigate to Events in the left sidebar.
  2. Click Add Event and fill in the details (name, date/time, location).
  3. Enable Recurring if the event repeats on a schedule (e.g., every Sunday).
  4. Add Ministry Requirements to define how many volunteers from each ministry are needed.

See Scheduling an Event for detailed instructions.

Step 6: Ask Volunteers to Set Availability

Before running the scheduler, encourage your volunteers to set their availability:

  • Volunteers can mark dates when they're unavailable (vacations, conflicts).
  • Volunteers can set event preferences — indicating which events they prefer, are available for, or cannot attend.

This information helps the scheduler create better assignments. Share the Setting Your Availability guide with your team.

Step 7: Schedule Volunteers

There are two ways to assign volunteers to events:

Option A: Use the Scheduler

The Scheduler automatically generates volunteer rosters based on availability, qualifications, and preferences.

  1. Navigate to Scheduler in the left sidebar.
  2. Select a date range (e.g., next two weeks or next month).
  3. Choose which events to schedule.
  4. Click Generate to create a preview.
  5. Review the assignments and make any manual adjustments.
  6. Click Publish to finalize the schedule.

See Scheduler for detailed instructions.

Option B: Assign Volunteers Manually

You don't have to use the Scheduler — volunteers can also be assigned directly to individual event occurrences from the calendar. This is useful when you want full control over who serves at a specific event, or when you only need to fill a few slots.

Step 8: Communicate with Your Team

After publishing a schedule, let your team know:

  • Volunteers can view their assignments on the My Events page or the Calendar.
  • Use Announcements to broadcast messages to all volunteers, specific ministries, or specific events.

Next Steps