FIGURE 1 Keep all your discussions in one place!

It really doesn’t have to be this hard, does it? 37Signals has made a simple, cost-effective solution that can definitely make a difference. Backpack is an online tool that helps you organize your ministry and share information with your team.

You can create Pages to quickly share information, upload frequently used forms and other assets, add your next meeting agenda or a quick idea you had about the upcoming meet & greet. Then the entire team can collaborate through the centralized discussion board (FIGURE 1).

Backpack is also a very cost-effective communication system. With the basic plan you can have up to 6 users, 4gb of space for files, 1000 pages, the Group Calendar, and Online Message boards.

Find out more about Backpack at backpackit.com.

I’ve been involved in Worship ministry for just about 10 years now and communication is always an issue. From not knowing when I play to the media team getting together the wrong slides.

FIGURE 1 A Backpack Page can have any combination of to-dos,
notes, images, and files.

After playing with Backpack for awhile, I’m finding that this could really be a great solution for many worship teams.

One of the most intriguing features has got to be File Sharing within Pages (FIGURE 1). For example, you could create a new page — let’s call it “This week @ Newsong” — and then create a list of the songs for this week, add any to-do item’s for the multimedia team, and upload your files right to the page! You could then open up discussion right there in one centralized place instead of having a mess of emails.

Worship teams would benefit from the group calendars. All events are color coded, and each calendar can have it’s own color. This would give the administrator the ability to set up seperate calendars for each team making it super simple for you to see when you’re on at a glance.

Read more about how you could use Backpack at backpackit.com!

Backpack is an online collaboration tool that allows groups of people to get organized and have fun doing it! To-dos, announcements, files, and calendars. It has it all.

FIGURE 1 Backpacks Simple Calendar Interface.

You can use Backpack’s simple color-coded group calendar to keep everyones schedules coordinated online. Adding events is quick an easy (FIGURE 1). Now everyone can know who’s bringing this weeks snack!

Another neat little trick is using Pages to share information about this weeks study. Post verses to look up and keep everyone on the same page, then with backpack’s centralized discussions you can get the clocks working before your next gathering.

A lot more be done with the super effective and simple tool. Read more about it at backpackit.com