# Growth Ladder

A simple way to see where each person actually is on their journey with your church, not
just whether they're an active member or not. Every active member carries a **Growth
stage**: New, Attending, Connected, Serving, or Leading.

## Setting a member's stage

Open a member's record and set **Growth stage** from the dropdown — see
[Members](#/members). There's no automatic promotion between stages; someone's stage only
changes when a staff member or leader updates it, based on what you're actually seeing in
their life at church — they joined a small group, they started serving on a rota, they
took on leading a ministry.

## Why it matters

A plain headcount tells you *how many* people you have. Growth stage tells you *who's
ready for a next step* — someone who's been "Attending" for months without connecting to a
group is a very different follow-up than a brand-new visitor, even though a simple
active/inactive status would show them exactly the same way.

## Seeing it on the Dashboard

The [Dashboard](#/dashboard)'s **Growth Ladder** card shows a count of active members at
each stage, so you can see at a glance whether people are actually moving forward or
piling up at "New" — a sign your follow-up, or your on-ramp into groups and serving, needs
attention.

## What's not built yet

Automatic stage suggestions (for example, promoting someone to "Serving" the moment
they're assigned a rota) and stage-change history — today the field just holds whatever
it's currently set to, with no record of when or why it last changed.