Nick Newman is the lead pastor of Propel Church, a church in Mount Pleasant, North Carolina, and the founder of Selah Leaders, a nonprofit serving church leaders and pastors.
Nick and his wife Tori started Propel Church in 2015 with the hope of creating an environment where people could encounter Jesus — no matter what their life currently looked like.
Propel Church’s principles are to know God, find freedom, discover purpose, and make a difference. It exists to propel people into an authentic relationship with Jesus Christ.
Since starting Propel Church, Nick has had the opportunity to coach, train, and help pastors all around the world. Nick's passion is to help pastors stay in the game for the long run but to do that, rest must be a priority. That’s why Nick founded Selah Leaders in 2022 as a non-profit that provides leaders with resources for rest and longevity.
The Challenge
“We had tried to bring a volunteer into a role to [see] what it would look like for me to have an assistant, somebody to handle emails and scheduling and things like that,” Nick explains. “Because we had never done it before, we didn't know what they could do for me, so the role never worked out.
“They would do my emails for a little while, but then I would be right back in it because they needed so much of my input, or they would do scheduling until it became easier for me to just book X, Y, and Z.
“We decided if we're going to ever have somebody in this role long term, the best thing for us to do is to bring somebody from the outside in to teach us what it would look like to do it. And the best way to do that would be [to hire] somebody who specializes in it.
“A lot of [BELAY’s] clientele is in that church [or] nonprofit space, [and] that's where both of the organizations that I run coincide. I realized I’m not just hiring a Virtual Assistant. I'm hiring a company that specializes in helping people who do these things.
“Once I figured out what you guys do and do well, it's like, ‘All right, let's jump in.’”
Enter BELAY Virtual Assistant Britt Boller.
The Solution
According to Nick, he began to experience relief only two weeks after working with Britt.
“I quit worrying about whether or not I was missing emails,” Nick remembers. “I was always missing something from somebody. Something was slipping through the cracks and ‘Oh, we haven't responded to them in three weeks,’ and that's problematic.
“A couple weeks in, I was like, ‘Oh, I'm actually not worried about whether or not my email is covered anymore.’ My goal in working with Britt is how do we maximize my efficiency. And so a lot of the stuff that I have her spend time on is stuff that makes my life more streamlined.”
Britt has streamlined Nick’s life by managing his inbox and calendar, scheduling social content, and making reservations for dinners and date nights with his wife.
“The thing that surprised me is the flexibility and the responsiveness,” Nick says. “She’s available to help with whatever I need. We just had a meeting two weeks ago where my conversation with her was, ‘What do you [need to] be your best, and how can I better utilize you?’
“One of the tension points in having an assistant is sometimes you don't know what to give away. But if we're going to work together, [and] you have a set of skills that I don't know about, I can't utilize [them].
“One of the things that she came back with was, she's great at [creating] itineraries. Well, I travel a ton, and I'm always scrambling once my plane hits the ground. Where is my rental car, where am I staying, and what's my next meeting that I have to get to?
“And now she's building a document that puts all that in one location. I would've never asked for that because I didn't think about it, but she's able to do it because I'm tapping into the gift set that she has.”
The Result
Having a BELAY Virtual Assistant has given Nick the best ROI — peace of mind, efficiency, and margin in his calendar.
“It created less stress in my life, and, in all honesty, that's probably more valuable than what I pay for BELAY at the end of the day.
[We’re] spending a couple hundred bucks a week to be able to create space and margin. It frees me up to do other stuff that I need to be doing as opposed to being bogged down with the details of everything else.”
“Since Britt's come on, I've finished writing three books that are going into editing. We have conversations at the beginning of the week, and then she gets to strategically build my calendar accordingly, and that's huge for me.”
Propel Church has also been growing, and Britt is going to continue to be instrumental in managing Nick’s priorities and schedule throughout.
“Our church has grown by about 50% in the last 12 months.”
“We're building a brand new facility in our town, and so there's a lot of stuff going on with that. But additionally, in the other nonprofit that I run, we serve pastors and church leaders and we host events and [have] really helped pastors embrace the lifestyle of rest.
“That organization has gone from hosting one to two events a year to this year having 10 on the calendar. And so it just demands more of my time.
“It's a worthwhile investment,” Nick says. “If it creates more space for you to do what you're supposed to be doing, then it's worth it. And I think sometimes we get gun shy because we are scared of, ‘Will it pay off? What if it doesn't work?’
“But normally when you're at that spot where you're looking at alternatives, it's already not working. So you really don't have much to lose. It is already not working, giving something a shot is the best solution to be able to figure out if it works.”