Participants or Members
An overview of the Participants or Members page in MinistryPlatform, including general information and record fields.
Note: If you have a Catholic instance of MinistryPlatform, you'll see the term Member. Otherwise, you'll see Participant.
- This page lists Participant or Member records, which hold information about how people participate in your church. Each person at your church should have one Participant or Member record.
- This record is an extension of the Contact record. With it, you can emphasize church-specific involvement information and separately secure this information from generic contact data.
- When you create a Participant record, you automatically add a reciprocal link to the corresponding Contact record. You can edit this information using the Add/Edit Family Tool.
- Various applications automatically create Participant records, including the Add/Edit Family Tool, Assign Participant Tool, Check-in, and Batch Manager Tool (if you opt to create one).
- Many Users can work primarily from the Participant record.
- Use the Add/Edit Family Tool to add a new Participant that isn't already in the system.
- You rarely need to delete a Participant record. Instead, use the Combine Contacts Tool to remove a Participant record.
- For the Attendance fields on the Participant record, the routine looks at Event Participant records with a status of 03 Attended or 04 Confirmed and selects the first three records to enter into the Attendance fields. These records may or may not have the same date.
Tip: To walk through an exercise of readiness and considerations, check out the Participants - Prepare webinar in the MinistrySmart Academy!
Record Fields
The Participant record is one of the most customized forms in MinistryPlatform. Churches often add fields to this form to assist with key processes like Guest Outreach & Follow-up and the Membership Process. To customize your Participant page, a SPoC can contact Support.
Note: The Participant Engagement routine uses some fields on the Participants page, including In Group Life, Is Leading, Is Serving, and Recent Events.
- Red Flag Notes
- Any notes that your staff should be aware of regarding this Participant. For example, "not cleared to volunteer with children". Also see Record Facts to learn how to visualize data about a person.
- Contact
- The Contact record associated with this Participant.
- Participant Type
- This Participant's relationship to the church. For example, "guest", "attendee", "member". SPoCs can customize this drop-down list in . See Participant Tracking for details.
- Member Status
- A formal categorization for your church family. For example, "member", "registered", "former member", "faithful non-member", and so on. Use a coach to ensure this list reflects the categories you need for your denomination or church polity without redundancy. See Participant Tracking for details.
- Participant Engagement
- How engaged someone is with your church. For example, "Fully Engaged", "Observing", "Lapsing", and so on. Set and updated automatically by a nightly routine. See Participant Tracking for details. Warning: Do not edit this field.
- Participant Start Date
- The date this person started to participate at your church.
- Notes
- A generic text field where the church can explain changes in this individual's participation over time.
- First Attendance, Second Attendance, Third Attendance, and Last Attendance
- A read-only field that populates every evening and you can use to create views.
- Background Check Type and Background Check Status
- Read-only fields that update in real-time from the most recent Background Check record for the Participant. You can use this field to create views. Status values include:
- Needed: The Background Check Status field on the Participant record is blank. This means there is no previous Background Check record for the Participant and the Participant currently serves in a role where they're required to have a Background Check (in a Group with a Group Role with Background Check Required set to Yes).
- Still Needed: The Background Check Status field on the Participant record is expired. This means the Participant has a previous Background Check and the Participant currently serves in a role where they're required to have a Background Check (in a Group with a Group Role with Background Check Required set to Yes).
- Clear: The latest Background Check record for the Participant has a status of All Clear set to Yes.
- Not Clear: The latest Background Check record for the Participant has a status of All Clear set to No. To customize this value, use the COMMON, BackgroundCheckNotClearStatus Configuration Setting.
- Expired: The Participant's latest Background Check record for has expired based on the date of the Background Check compared to the value set in the COMMON, MonthsTillBackgroundCheckExpires Configuration Setting. Note: A Not Clear status takes precedence over an Expired status. A Not Clear status will remain after the Not Clear Background Check expires.
- Incomplete: The Participant started their latest Background Check record, but they haven't completed it. The All Clear flag is not set yet.
- Background Check Date
- A read-only field that updates in real-time from the most recently started Background Check record for the Participant. You can use this field to create views. If there is no date the last Background Check was returned, the system will use the date it was most recently started instead.