Elders Quorom President

Elders Quorom Presidents are very much like serving on a mission. You have a defined region of responsibility, you are visiting members of the church often and inspiring them to attend church and make habitual changes in their homes. The rewards are tremendous and at times you will wish you had the time to simply home teach every family within your stewardship. Below are a few simple tactical suggestions I found helpful while serving as an EQP in my ward. If you have other suggestions please click contact us above and share your thoughts with us.

Assigning Home Teachers: The Church handbook has excellent suggestions on this subject. Always clear assignments with the Bishop first. Some additional thoughts on the subject include assigning experienced home teachers with inexperienced home teachers. I also recommend assigning families in similar geographic locations. It is helpful to leaders of other organizations to assign them to families over whom they have stewardship...for example the Young Men's president can be assigned to families that have Priests in the family. Similarly, families with youth enjoy going home teaching to their friends houses. Ultimately however it is best to feel a spirit of confirmation from the Lord before finalizing the assignments.  Mentioning having felt this inspiration during the assignment process helps the newly assigned brother to have a sense of purpose and confidence in what he is to do.

Helping Home Teachers: Each Quorom has members who visit 100% of their assigned families no matter what, those who visit 50% no matter what and lastly those who don't do it at all. This is a real challenge for you as you are responsible for ensuring that 100% of the families are visited each month. The reality is that many members will go unvisited for large stretches of time if the assignment goes unwatched and is unfulfilled. The other reality is that many of the elders who have a companion who isn't willing to go will end up going alone or taking a spouse or children with them. Consult with the Bishop regarding those who are not willing to go home teaching at all. For those who are willing but just forgetful, I offer these suggestions. First, make an appointment to go with them. Many brethren are nervous to make that first contact with a new family and feel awkward. You can help them overcome this by going with them. On more than one occasion this resulted in the brethren performing at above 75% after that time with the assigned families. Secondly, understand the time constraints and personalities of various brethren. I had one brother who I noticed did everything based on what was on his phone calendar. I pulled him aside and asked him to put home teaching on his phone calendar for a specific day each month on a recurring appointment. He soon became one of my best home teachers. I very rarely recommend doing the home teaching for the brethren but rather going with them.

Visiting Quorom Members: Besides your normal home teaching visits, you are to visit each member on a regular basis. Some visits you make will be instinctual based on known or perceived needs, but it also makes sense to take a practical approach too. Step 1, how many quorom members are in your responsibility? Step 2, divide that number by 52 weeks in a year. That will give you the number of families you need to meet with each week in order to visit each family annually. Step 3, assign your secretary to identify which weeks you will visit each family and then have him call the family to set up an appointment. Step 4, visit the assigned families on the designated weeks. As a quorom president I found this to be a valuable tool to get into the homes of the families and truly get to know the members of my quorom. It is much easier to serve people once you know them and what their needs are. In some cases I noticed that some of the brethren felt like they were in trouble or nervous because I was visiting them. I simply blamed it on the Church handbook as the reason for my visit and they loosened right up. When there simply ask find out questions about their employment, their family, their interests, their conversion story, their faith etc. Share a lesson if inspired to do so and bless their homes. You can also pull the brother aside and follow up on his home teaching progress.

Quorom Instruction: From a practical standpoint, a teaching schedule should be devised. It is generally known well in advance what lessons will be taught so it should be well known who is going to teach them as well. However, things happen that may prevent the assigned instructor from being able to fulfill the teaching assignment. I have found it worthwhile to ensure that a member of the presidency is always scheduled in as the backup for any given week. Here is a sample:

Date	Lesson #	Instructor	Backup Instructor
1/1/01	JS 1	Smith	EQP
1/8/01	JS 2	Johnson	First Counselor
1/15/01	NO LESSON - STAKE CONFERENCE

With a schedule like this you can pass it to all who are assigned as teachers. The entire presidency should have read the lesson to be able to contribute. Additionally, the secretary should make a follow up phone call or email to the assigned instructor by Thursday to ensure he is actively preparing and alert you to any red flags. For first time teachers it is a good idea to call them after their lesson to thank them and encourage them regarding what they did well.

Training your Presidency:Not every member of your quorom presidency will have your same background and experience. Some of your presidency including yourself may never have served a mission or served in other leadership callings. In this case, your quorom presidency meetings should include some training on things such as how to conduct a PPI, how to approach a new move-in to the ward, how to ask find out questions and build a relationship of trust, how to handle tough questions etc. There are many suggestions in the Church Handbook but I would also suggest using Preach My Gospel as a reference for this training. Each of your presidency members should have turns conducting PPI's and Quorom meetings to further develop their leadership. Feel free as well to call upon your High Council representative to assist in training your presidency.

Activities: Our quorom liked to do some activities a couple of times a year that turned out to be great experiences. Below are some of the activities and descriptions:

Activity	Description
Pinewood Derby	That's right, pinewood derby, the brethren had a lot of fun with this one. It was not unusual to have a couple of rocket powered cars entered into the contest.
Ultimate Frisbee	We had a group of brethren organize some Saturday morning ultimate frisbee games. We got a lot of brethren out that didn't enjoy softball or basketball.
Holiday Bread Baking	The EQ would bake some Pumpkin Spice Bread in December and take a loaf to every family in the ward while it was warm. It really generated a great feeling in the ward and quorom.
Service Projects	Home teachers would often identify needs of families large enough to be service projects such as tree trimming.
Write Missionary Letters	Can be done as a quorom activity or be assigned to specific brethren to write letters to missionaries or servicemen. Great reminder of missionary work as well as reminding them of their own missions if they served one.