The Effective Christian Workplace Group
Workshop Leader: Ros Turner
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Living for God where He puts you has always been a passion for Ros. Having spent a year in India and 3 at university she took employment as a youth worker in Reading before catching the vision of workplace mission. In 2003 Ros organised her first House of Commons meeting bringing together Christians from Professional and Workplace groups to look at Changing the Values of the Nation through Workplace Associations. The vision took off and as it gathered momentum she was asked to coordinate this growing network of relationships amongst the Christian groups. From this emerged the Christian Workplace Forum which has now developed into Transform Work UK. Ros loves visiting workplace groups to encourage and inspire them to grow and be a tangible benefit to their company. |
Panellists
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Adrian Holloway
Borough Hall Christian Fellowship (Bedford)
• CWG has been going 40 odd years as Bedfordshire County Council.
• 1993 Adrian joined the Council
• 1996 was elected into the committee and really due to leadership skills/Vision for the Fellowship is known as the leader / coordinator
• 2000 CWG took over the Carol Service from the council communications team, which gave opportunities for CWG to talk with senior leaders, and thus engagement with senior staff grew.
• 2004 was a big turning point for CWG – ‘Transforming Bedford’ agenda from new Chief Exec. CWG could have carried on as they were BUT they chose to get behind the council’s values and actively support and prayed for this transformation.
• To date 80 members and have ‘planted’ two other CWG in other council buildings. They have just become two unitary authorities so lots of changes that are still being worked through which will have further effect on the group next year when the two Unitaries part company. |
Annette Davis
Department of Health Christian Network Group
• 2006 Annette took on the leadership of a depleting Christian Group at the DH
• 2006 Annette joined Christians in Government UK committee as departmental rep
• 2007 TWUK met Annette at a steering group meeting in Whitehall where we encouraged Annette to go for formal recognition
• 2008 April they asked for Staff Network Group status • 2008 Sept recognition was granted • 2008 Dec had a Christmas launch – which was a lot of fun!
• To date there are CWGs in 4 of the London DH buildings, and one in Leeds supporting 102 people |
Peter Davies
BT Christian Network
• 2003 Peter felt God on his case to do more in the workplace
• 2004 Peter and I were put in touch and we had our first ever Growing Christian Group seminar through diversity.
• March 2005 BT Christian Network received formal recognition from BT as a staff support network means they have access to funding, to the intranet for BTCN pages, to HR to talk about issues / BT policies with HR & give a Christian viewpoint.
• April 2005 BTCN launch
• To date; 1,100 members, 15 countries, 20 plus independent CWGs, 60 intercessors; prayer cover daily
• Have run Alpha courses with HR approval
• Given away over 800 bibles to colleagues who have requested them
• Have specialist groups e.g., worship team, young professionals group –> led to BTCN summer camps |
The following panel discussion took place at the 2009 Transform Work UK National Conference. To view the answers of the panelists or to add your own comments, select the 'Notes' icon beside each question.
Prayer
1. It goes without saying that prayer is key. How has the prayer life of your CWG affected your group?
Purpose
2. How can I tell if my group is making any difference - am I achieving anything other than another small group people should be part of in their own church? Is your CWG simply another small group for Christians to meet together OR a church activity done at work? What is it’s purpose?
People Christians
3. How do you maintain unity amongst a group of Christians from very diverse church backgrounds & cultures?
4. How do you get more regular committed members into the group (big distribution list, small physical group)? How do I increase buy-in from group members so I'm not driving everything along on my own?
Employer
5. Annette tell us why you chose to be formally recognise as a staff support network?
6. Peter, what is your relationship like with BT Diversity / HR. What concerns / issues have you received? What did you do? What was the outcome?
Colleagues
7. I received lots of questions about outreach, how to do it, how to advertise it, got any good resources etc… Is the role of a CWG to put on out reach events, what is your experience? Again the same can be done here with the option of delegates writing their own
Your Questions for the Panel
On the day there wasn’t time for questions from the floor. If you had or have a burning question to address the panel please enter it here here. Lets learn from each other and share good practice.