PTA Principle 01

hi christian everyone welcome to the principles of temple administration course today we're going to begin with the first principle which is a devotee focus temple and we're going to be focusing on devotee care so we'll start with the most important point of all management activities and that is often neglected in many of our temples and centers around iskcon but the most important activity is to look after and care for the devotees a good manager leader understands that the people must be valued and if we invest in people then projects will automatically flourish therefore devotee care

should become our main focus so we're going to give a little overview of the content first we're going to look at different levels of devotees and then we're going to look at the four levels of devotee care case studies how to create a devotee focus administrative responsibilities and feedback forms and analysis our intention is that by the end of this course you'll be able to identify the key advantages of devotee focus temple you'll also be able to describe the various needs of devotees and identify the methodologies by which this principle can be implemented we'll start

with a quote from shiva prabhupada this is a letter to brahmananda in 1969 and shilla prabhupad said you have asked about the management of our society and the position is that management should be done in such a way that people may not break away so such an important statement from shiloh prophet from as early on as 1969 srila prabhupada is making sure that management is done in such a way that the devotees don't leave that we are able to retain our devotees so what is a temple or a center well it's a place where the

lord is worshiped to a proper standard devotees come together and they glorify the lord preaching is going on and the spirit is there with full enthusiasm and vigor and there is an opportunity to serve the lord and his devotees you see a temple is not really just made up of bricks and mortar and cement and sand and stone a temple actually it's made up of the devotees it's kind of like the analogy of a house or a home a house is a building or a structure where a family may live that's a house but the

home is the mood or the spirit that exists amongst those persons who are a family who live in it that's what makes a house a home so we really want to make our temples like a temple or like a vibrant center and that means we have to really have focus on the devotees so there are different levels of devotees as we know from the pages of srimad-bhagavatam in the 11th canto second chapter it discusses about the kunisha adikari and the uttama adikari now the knishta adhikari has described that although he's very faithfully engaged in the

worship of the lord specifically the deity in the temple but he really doesn't know how to behave toward the devotees or people in general so this person is called the canister or a prakrata bhakta majjima adikari is someone who is he worships the supreme personality of godhead is the highest object of love but he makes friends with the lord's devotees and he's very merciful to the ignorant but he also avoids those who are envious by nature but the madhyamadikar he understands how to look after and care for and befriend and interact with other devotees ultimately

he sees everything as as krsna's mercy and as the will of krishna and he sees everything in relation to the supreme lord and understands that everything that exists is eternally situated within the lord so of course he's going to see devotees and even non-devotees all alike is connected with krishna but the point here is that we should at least come to the madhyama platform where we understand the importance of krsna's devotees not that we neglect the devotees trying to step over the devotees and just going straight to krishna oftentimes in our temple in london we

have the experience that even in the middle of the bhagavatam class in the morning someone will come in ring the bell really loudly as they enter the temple room and they'll walk right in front of all the devotees right in between the devotees and the speaker the bhagavatam class without paying any attention to the fact that there's anyone else in the room and then they'll stand and right in front of the deities in front of everybody it's just me and krishna and and there's nobody else and nobody else kind of matters so this this mentality

means that we don't understand the importance and the power of devotees so what does the lord have to say well he speaks to udav in the 11th canto and he says he says the worship of my devotees is actually better than the worship of me and in the padma purana lord shiva explains to durga devi aradhanam sarvei smat he says my dear devi although the vedas mention the worship of the demigods and the worship of lord visnu is topmost and ultimately recommended he says however worshipping the servants of lord visnu is even better than the

worship of lord visnu so the prime focus for our leadership is the devotee satisfaction so in order to keep devotees happy and keep them satisfied we need to look at a few different areas in fact there are four specific areas that we want to try to keep devotees satisfied and look after their basic needs spiritually physically mentally and socially so how do we achieve this first we need to do some researching and understanding and what are the devotees needs and their expectations ensuring that the objectives of the temple are directly linked to the devotee's needs

and expectations and communicating the devotees needs and expectations to the relevant parties we have to be able to measure devotee satisfaction and then act on the results of those measurements and we need to ensure that there's a balanced approach between satisfying the devotees and the other interested parties which may be owners employees employers suppliers financiers so many people within the community like that so some of the key benefits to this first principle is that we're certainly going to receive the blessings of the lord if we look after the devotees we're going to receive the blessings

of the devotees there's absolutely going to be an improvement in the satisfaction of the devotees within the temple and there's going to be an increase in the effectiveness of the temple and the temple facilities there's going to be improvement and the loyalty that the devotees have to iskan as a whole and basically our communities are going to become happy and thriving communities so what is the spiritual needs of the devotees well in connection with the supreme lord by providing the devotees with the following we have to have facilities for strong sadhana which means chanting and

sankirtana hearing the bhagavatam attending the arties and festivals darshans like that we also have to provide facilities for devotees to do seva so there has to be ample opportunity for service in a variety of capacities because we can't expect that everyone is going to be inclined in the same way and this seva it nourishes the heart and brings joy to the devotee it has to be sadachar or interaction and dealings between the devotees so that means we have to provide facility for that this is also satisfying to the heart and and it helps one to

become protected from offenses so really it's a prime responsibility of the temple administration to provide a vibrant spiritual atmosphere in the center or temple this way the devotees remain enlivened and inspired so devotees who are either temple residents or either who are staying outside in our community they have to feel satisfied by the spiritual standards uh in the facility or or the center if we don't take sufficient care of the spiritual needs of devotees connected to the temple or the center then it's very likely that the temple will become just a material organization there really

won't be any inspiration we'll find that people really don't even want to come and be active there so one way that we can find out if devotees are happy is we need to take feedback and this should be taken whether the devotees are happy with the facilities that we're providing or not what are some of the physical needs that a devotee may have so of course we we need to really look after the devotees on the physical level as well because sometimes especially temple residents there's completely dependent on the temple administration for their physical needs

so we may need to look after the medical insurance of full-time devotees we may need to make sure that there's hygienic prasadam for all the devotees well-balanced lifestyle that means sadhana and seva srila bhaktivinoda thakur with his famous statement that their house has to be first health then sadhana then service so our physical health has to be in good shape then our spiritual health has to be really vibrant then we can perform the highest quality of service or sava if there's a lack of physical care for the devotees then for sure the devotees are going

to feel hesitant to give a hundred percent plus they're probably going to be sick or ill or distracted or discouraged it's going to create a situation of selfishness in the center because you want you need wanting and needing means that i i have to think about my own self and devotees may then start to criticize the administration and in difficult times which is not going to really create a very good atmosphere overall so the templars administration may want to spread the message of physical care and concern to every member in the form of a balanced

lifestyle with christian as a center so that devotees may be able to serve the lord in a vibrant way for a long time and assist the mission according to their capacity so they're what are some of the mental needs that devotees have to that we need to look after for the devotees well devotees need to feel a sense of peace and happiness and especially if they're residents they need to know that i'm cared for i'm looked after and and that feeling of knowing that someone cares about them is going to look after them creates a

sense of security in their mentality there shouldn't be any anxiety that if i get sick what's going to happen to me am i just going to get kicked out because if i'm not productive then i won't be able to stay we have to we have to clear that out of the the mentality of the devotee by creating a space where they know that they're looked after really we need to create a family atmosphere in our templar center and we need to avoid as much ad hoc management management as possible so again really there needs to

be a balance of missionary and family atmosphere so there has to be some challenges in the service we should also be there which gives a person a sense of accomplishment some inspiring service should also be given which devotees like to do so it can't just be all for the mission we also have to find that balance where devotees can be engaged according to what what are their actual likes you know and devotees must be appreciated for what he or she is doing or trying to do for the mission so there always has to be an

attitude of gratitude and appreciation so what are some of the social needs so the administration of the templar center has to try to provide the social needs of devotees that means time should be given to the devotees to develop relationships with other devotees sadhu-sanga is such an important aspect and if we're not developing nice strong relationships with the devotees in our community then really in one sense you might say what's the point of an international society for krishna consciousness srila prabhupada was so so um intent on establishing a society and a community where devotees can

come together of course to perform service of course to hear from the bhagavatam but also to develop nice loving and strong relationships so in that way the administration can encourage sort of retreats or recharge sessions or yatras where the devotees can go away together and they can bond and their relationships become stronger in the activities of cultivating a higher level of krishna consciousness and the administration should also make sure that each devotee has at least one person with whom they can really share their thoughts and their innermost feelings so this may mean whatever type of

system of care that there is maybe it's mentorship or counselor or bhakti-vriksha or whatever it is but some way that there's one person at least that this devotee can go to and speak speak to so the administration can also try to provide the social needs of a devotee by creating again we keep saying this family atmosphere for our 40th anniversary festivities we had the uh four of the original six devotees who started the london temple and they came and they they shared about the mood in the early days when devotees would come and join and

it was because every one of them said and and so many of our community heard from them and could understand from them that the main attractive magnetic feature was this family atmosphere everyone just really cared for each other so that can only come from having a community where everyone comes together and they support and encourage and inspire one another so like that there also has to be a mood of servitude towards each other while keeping the lord in srila prabhupada in the center so different needs of devotees there could be many more needs and that

can be found out by the medium of feedback so the administration should really try its level best to regularly find out what are the needs and satisfy the needs of the devotees who are serving in our centers so we understand that if devotees are happy and satisfied then certainly krishna is happy or satisfied so a couple of case studies here in one iskan temple there was a feedback survey that was conducted some a few years back and uh one of the big feedbacks that came with that devotees they just were not happy simply with the

fact that the toilets weren't clean and they made the statement that actually that because of that it put them off even coming to the temple at all so imagine if the temple had done that survey sooner they could have easily rectified such a small problem and sometimes it's hard for us to imagine or believe that something as small as that can put people off but you see everyone's an individual so everyone has different leanings and and likes and dislikes so a simple thing like you know an unclean toilet can actually prevent people from coming to

the temple another case study was that a new devotee he was planning to join one temple and then he went to visit another center and there he met a little bit more senior devotee and that devotee said oh you're planning to join the ashram he said oh be careful you know if you join the ashram they're not going to look after you they're not going to look after your health they're not going to take care of you like this like that and so many things and he said basically you should have you know loads of

money in the bank because if you ever become unproductive they're just going to kick you out and he just really you know affected the mentality of this person now what is that it means that that devotee was not satisfied he was not happy there's a saying in the secular society that you know a person did one dissatisfied customer can spread his dissatisfaction more quickly than a satisfied customer so it's important that we make sure that devotees who come and join and serve in our temples that they're actually satisfied and happy so how are we going

to create this devotee-focused temple or center well whatever we focus on that gets reflected in the different areas of the temple so it means if we're focusing on the devotees and that's go that should show up in our vision statement it should show up as a measurable objective for the temple we should discuss it in talks we need to have actions that show that we're doing this create policies around it and make it a priority and as part of the mindset so in doing that some of the administrative responsibilities as a leader as a manager

some of the things you're going to need to do is make sure that in the in the vision for your temple or center that devotee care or or a catch phrase that's been spoken recently is more devotees happier devotees and this should be echoed in a prominent way around your organization more devotees happier devotees in the objectives to be achieved in the yearly planner you can make sure that there are objectives clearly pointing out and giving the devotee care a prominent position with some quantifiable objectives and some measures that are taken to improve compared to

last year and the talks with the temple leadership amongst the temple council meetings and different things bodies with devotees satisfaction and level of devotees difficults and efforts for improving the devotee satisfaction they have to be reflected there may be different seminars in a year based on different needs of devotees the leaders and managers in their talks have to emphasize the care and asp caring aspect for devotees so all of these things need to be put out there different policies should be put in place expanding should also show and indicate that our focus is to look

after the devotees so how do we expand that also has to be included and then this becomes a priority we talk about it we focus on it and it and its prominence grows within our community and then our community will flourish because everyone will feel happy and looked after so feedback so it's really important that we get feedback from devotees this is this is really as we'll discuss later that if we we can make better decisions if we got good data and information so there's a feedback form that you can create and design basically we

follow three points you define your objectives of the feedback form identify your participants and then you design the questions so in designing defining your objectives you know there's some important information that you might want to learn from the participants their satisfaction and loyalty uh sentiment on new service rating on different aspects of the product or service area for improvements contact information different different things like this identifying the participants so which people do we want to make sure we're addressing here because there will be different needs for different people let's say a newcomer person who walks

in for the first time we want to get feedback how did they feel when they first came into the temple their their needs are going to be different from adobe who lives in the temple or someone who's in the position of management but you got newcomer you've got regular devotees maybe people of a specific age group a specific education type or a specific address or location so all these things will help us to identify the participants so then we need to design the questions so there's a variety of questions that can be asked and here

in the slides and as the resource you can look through these in your own time and and this will help to educate you into different possible questions a few of them are rating types of questions single select questions multi-select questions ranking questions uh open-ended questions and then you know we need to make sure that we include personal information fields that we get content that is going to be useful and helpful for us so we also included a sample feedback form and you can have a look at that in the in the resource pack that's included

okay so the feedback feedback form analysis so once we got the feedback then we need to look at it we have to see what's what's there in the feedback and we need to know how to look and get the best out of that so that we can really do something in order to make a difference and action the feedback so then once we get all the feedback we've analyzed it we have to take steps in order to make sure that we reduce the negative feedback and and encourage and inspire the devotees to let them know

that we took the feedback we analyzed it and now we're acting on it so as you can see there is such a huge scope for looking after and caring for the devotees and making devotee satisfaction the prime focus in our temple um so many things we could talk about we've just really tried to give you a bit of an overview and some food for thought to help you to begin to really focus on this devotee care is such such an important aspect of the temple and creating a devotee-focused temple really it should become the leader's

priority and that's why we've made this the first principle so we hope that this course and this video has been of some use to you and some benefit and we hope that you can begin to make this devotee focus a priority in your own temple thank you very much for your kind attention hari krishna