If you’re a regular reader of this blog, you know that I’m a believer in measuring things.

In fact, we like to keep track of all sorts of measurements at The Journey – from Connection Card completion rates to how many first-time guest books are given away each week.

So, it seems natural that one of the questions I’m frequently asked about Small Groups is:

How do you measure the weekly attendance of your small groups?

And it comes as a shock to many when my answer is… we don’t!

(take a deep breath – it’s OK – still with me?)

Let me qualify.

The best measure of the health of your Small Groups system is Leader Retention (how many leaders come back and lead again and again).

With that in mind, we don’t add one more task to the weekly routine of our group leaders by having them count, record and send in their group attendance every week.

We check in with group leaders throughout the semester to assist and encourage them and to find out how their groups are going.

And as the semester draws to a close, we ask each group leader this question:

On a good week, what was your average attendance?

And that, combined with the feedback we’ve been collecting throughout the semester, gives us a good gauge of the health of that group.

Hope that helps!

P.S. If you’re ready to develop your semester-based Small Groups System to its maximum potential – and involve 100% of your church in groups – check out The Small Groups Intensive!