The Greeter and Usher Handbook: Creating a Ministry of Welcome

By Yvonne Gentile

An update to 2005’s The Usher’s Book: Creating a Welcoming and Safe Environment for Worship, The Greeter and Usher Handbook provides a guide to the responsibilities of those who are generally the first faces visitors encounter in church: the usher and the greeter. Intended for training use by church staff or volunteers, the text covers responsibilities related to all aspects of creating a welcoming atmosphere for visitors and new members.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Abingdon Press
• Release date: May 19, 2020
• ISBN: 9781501898921

Yvonne Gentile

Yvonne Gentile is the Senior Director of Hospitality and Connections at the United Methodist Church of the Resurrection in Leawood, Kansas. Before joining church staff in 2011, Yvonne worked in an executive leadership capacity in retail, where she discovered the power of radical hospitality. She has been part of Resurrection since 1996 and served in numerous volunteer roles at Resurrection until 2011, when she joined the staff team, including leading the Spiritual Gifts Team, the Leadership Development team, and serving on the Committee on Nominations. She has led workshops and teaching events nationally on spiritual gifts, leadership development, building exceptional teams, volunteer management best practices, and radical hospitality. She is co-author of five books: Serving from the Heart: Finding Your Gifts and Talents for Service, Leadership from the Heart: Learning to Lead with Love & Skill, and Leadership Essentials: Practica

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SERVING AS A GREETER OR USHER

Introduction

One summer, I took a misstep on a flight of stairs on the last night of vacation and broke my foot. I spent eight weeks in a boot and had to use a knee scooter to get around. About two weeks into this experience, my husband and I were debating whether we could still attend a concert we’d been looking forward to for months. It was being held at a large arena in downtown Kansas City, and I was nervous about navigating the city and the crowds at the arena with my scooter.

I decided to call the Guest Services department at the arena and ask if they thought I would have difficulty. The representative I spoke to (yes, a real person, not a recording) assured me, We are well-prepared to meet your needs. Please have no worries about it whatsoever. When you arrive, a guest services greeter will meet you at the entrance, and our team will escort you all the way to your seat. We’ll take great care of you. We decided to attend the concert, but I’ll admit to being just a little skeptical about receiving a personal escort in a giant arena.

On the evening of the concert, as my husband and I approached the arena entrance, a young man waved us over to his door. He told us he had noticed my scooter and would assist us through the required metal detectors and ensure our experience was comfortable. Once through that process, he directed us to a person wearing a guest services shirt standing about twenty feet away, who was smiling and waving to us. She welcomed us and walked with us to an elevator that would take us to the floor level of the arena, where our seats were located. She introduced us to the elevator operator, who explained that someone would meet us at the elevator doors to escort us directly to our seats.

We were already blown away by the excellent service we’d received. When the elevator arrived on our floor, the woman who met us there (Sandy) explained that she would take us to our seats and then take the scooter to a little garage so it wouldn’t be an impediment to other foot traffic in the arena. She showed us where that was and told us we could retrieve it at any time, and then she identified for us the closest restrooms. She explained that ushers would be walking up and down the aisles during the entire concert, and that if I needed to use the restroom or go to the concession stand, I should simply ask one of them and they’d bring my scooter to me. I noticed other ushers providing the same service to a man on crutches seated in the row behind us and a woman in a wheelchair seated one section over. About five minutes before the break between bands, I asked an usher to bring me the scooter, and he pointed me toward a restroom that would have a shorter line. Toward the end of the concert, Sandy tapped me on the shoulder, showed us that she’d brought the scooter to the end of our aisle, and informed us that there were four songs left in the concert. If we wanted to make our way to the vestibule where we entered, we could watch the end of the concert from there and then be escorted all the way out instead of fighting the crowd to exit.

I lead the ministries of hospitality and connection at my local church, The United Methodist Church of the Resurrection in Leawood, Kansas. We constantly strive for great hospitality, and still I was blown away by the level of welcome and service that I received at that concert. The greeters and ushers at this arena made us feel welcome and comfortable, and they anticipated and met every need we had. I couldn’t wait to share the story of this experience with my team, because it illustrated to me the kind of welcome we work so hard to provide to guests through our ushers and greeters at church. I have talked to my friends, coworkers, and volunteers more about the excellence of the greeters and ushers at this arena than I have the actual concert we attended.

We use the term guests to refer to every person who walks