Welcome to the Information Page for Jim Heist's Church IT Management Survey.

2/21/2011: Church IT Management Survey Results - Top 8 Findings **Updated**

Now that my dissertation has been approved, I want to publish some key findings of the survey. Analysis of the top eight questions based on the lowest mean score of the answers suggests the following situation at churches.

1. Information technology leadership does not regularly participate in spiritual ministry strategic planning (Question 11).
2. No or little information technology performance metrics are collected; this suggests that information technology resource management and planning maybe missing important performance data that could help support funding or staffing requests (Question 8).
3. Information technology business processes are not used consistently; therefore, procedures and processes may not be consistent (Question 4).
4. Information technology funding is not sufficient to meet the needs of the church’s spiritual mission, therefore, the mission maybe limited and possibly does not meet its goals (Question 14).
5. Not all of the church’s technology resources are included in an IT management plan, therefore, the church may not have a holistic view of their technology resources and possibly lack support capacity for some technology resources (Question 17).

6. Documentation of information technology resources is not performed; this suggests that there is room for improvement in terms of maintenance of information technology resources in terms of service restoration (Question 7).

7. IT strategic planning is not taking place on a regular basis, therefore, the church may possibly be missing opportunities to align IT to the spiritual mission (Question 10).

8. The ministry side of the church is not working closely with the IT staff, therefore, they maybe missing opportunities to maximize the use of technology resources (Question 12).

2/11/2011: FINISHED! Now I can release the results of the survey, look for details over the next week as I post some of the findings.

2/5/2011: I'm now only waiting on the Chief Academic Officer for final approval!

1/14/2011: I got my dissertation back from the Form and Style Review that requires some minor updates. My dissertation defense should be within the next two weeks and then the dissertation goes back to the University Research Reviewer and then to the Chief Academic Officer for final approval. What a long journey, but the end is in sight!

1/4/2011: I finally achieved approval from the University Research Reviewer, only three more steps left on this long journey! I hope to do my final defense by the end of January.

10/19/2010: I have completed all the statistical analysis and am working my way through the University's approval process. This continues to be a long journey (longer than I ever expected) that has required extensive updates to meet my dissertation committee's requirements. Unfortunately I will not be able to attend any of the Fall 2010 National Church IT Roundtables, but I am planning on attending the Spring 2011 National Church IT Roundtable in Florida and hope to present all of my findings there.

6/14/2010: 72 surveys completed! Thank you all for your participation in this survey. The survey is now closed and the analysis will begin. Stay tuned here for the results.

6/10/2010: 52 surveys completed, just 8 more needed! The comments being provided are very useful, especially in terms of making some of the questions clearer, giving the ability to go back, and who the sample population might be next time.

6/7/2010: 45 survey completions! I need 15 more to meet the desired confidence level for the research study. Thank you all who have participated in completing the survey, providing comments, and expressing interest in my research. If you have received an email invitation to take the survey, please do so by 17 June.

6/4/2010: 22 survey completions; thank you! I need at least 60 survey completions in order to meet my desired confidence level, 38 more to go. Thanks for the comments at the end of the survey, I hope to incorporate some of them in future research that looks at church IT from the perspective of the church leadership team.

6/2/2010: The actual research survey starts on 3 June and closes on 17 June. Emails will be going out soon.

If you attended the 2010 National Church IT Roundtable at Saddleback Church in March, you probably heard me talk about my graduate studies and my research in church IT management. The objective of the research study is to determine if church IT professionals are using IT strategic planning and IT business processes in performing their IT management responsibilities. 

There are three parts to this study:

1. Pilot Study, Part 1 (completed April 19, 2010)

2. Pilot Study, Part 2 (completed April 30, 2010)

3. Research Survey (start date on June 3, 2010)

Thank you to all those who have participated in the Pilot Study.

If you have any questions or comments concerning this study, please e-mail me at:  jim.heist at stjohnmd.org or jheis001 at waldenu.edu

I will be posting the conclusions of the study on this page once it's completed and approved for release.