Jesus Rock of Ages Ministries

CHURCH EMAIL POLICY

POLICY BRIEF & PURPOSE

Our church email usage policy helps employees/authorized representatives/JRAM EDU students use their church email addresses appropriately. Email is essential to our everyday jobs. We want to ensure that our employees/authorized representatives understand the limitations of using their church email accounts.

Our goal is to protect our confidential data from breaches and safeguard our reputation and technological property.

SCOPE

This policy applies to all employees, vendors, partners, and volunteers who are assigned (or given access to) a church email. This email may be assigned to an individual (e.g. [email protected]) or department (e.g. [email protected]).

POLICY ELEMENTS

Church emails are powerful tools that help employees/authorized representatives/JRAM EDU students. Employees/authorized representatives/JRAM EDU students should se their church email primarily for ministry-related purposes. However, we want to provide employees with some freedom to use their emails for personal reasons.

We will define what constitutes appropriate and inappropriate use.

INAPPROPRIATE USE OF CHURCH EMAIL

Our employees/authorized representatives/JRAM EDU students represent our church whenever they use their church email address. They must not:

  • Sign up for illegal, unreliable, disreputable or suspect websites and services.
  • Send unauthorized marketing content or solicitation emails.
  • Register for incriminatory services.
  • Send insulting or discriminatory messages and content.
  • Intentionally spam other people’s emails, including their coworkers.

Our church has the right to monitor and archive church emails.

APPROPRIATE USE OF CORPORATE EMAIL

Employees/authorized representatives/JRAM EDU students are allowed to use their church email for ministry/work/EDU-related purposes without limitations. For example, employees/ authorized representatives can use their email to:

  • Communicate with current or prospective members and partners.
  • Log in to purchased software they have legitimate access to.
  • Give their email address to people they meet at conferences, church fairs, or other corporate events for ministry and networking purposes.
  • Sign up for newsletters, platforms, and other online services that will help them with their ministry or professional growth.

PERSONAL USE

Employees/authorized representatives/JRAM EDU students are allowed to use their church email for some personal reasons. For example, employees/authorized representatives/JRAM EDU students can use their church email to:

  • Register for classes or meetups.
  • Send emails to friends and family as long as they don’t spam or disclose confidential information.
  • Download ebooks, guides, and other content for their personal use as long as it is safe and appropriate.

Employees/authorized representatives/JRAM EDU students must adhere to this policy at all times, in addition to our confidentiality and data protection guidelines.

EMAIL SECURITY

Email is often the medium of hacker attacks, confidentiality breaches, viruses, and other malware. These issues can compromise our reputation, legality, and security of our equipment.

Employees/authorized representatives/JRAM EDU students must:

  • Select strong passwords with at least eight characters (capital and lower-case letters, symbols and numbers) without using personal information (e.g. birthdays).

Also, employees/authorized representatives/JRAM EDU students should always
be vigilant to catch emails that carry malware or phishing attempts. We instruct
employees to:

  • Avoid opening attachments and clicking on links when content is not adequately explained (e.g. “Watch this video, it’s amazing.”)
  • Be suspicious of clickbait titles.
  • Check email and names of unknown senders to ensure they are legitimate.
  • Look for inconsistencies or style red flags (e.g. grammar mistakes, capital letters, excessive number of exclamation marks.)

If an employee/authorized representative/JRAM EDU student is not sure that an email they received is safe, they can send a support ticket via IT Service Request.

We remind our employees/authorized representatives/JRAM EDU students to keep their anti-malware programs updated.

EMAIL SIGNATURE

We encourage employees/authorized representatives/JRAM EDU students to create an email signature that exudes professionalism and represents our company well. Everyone who represents our church should pay special attention to how they close emails. Here’s a template of an acceptable email signature:

[NAME]
[Title], [Church Campus]

DISCIPLINARY ACTION

Employees/authorized representatives/JRAM EDU students who don’t adhere to the present policy will face disciplinary action up to and including termination and/ dismissal from JRAM EDU programs. Example reasons for termination are:

  • Using a church email address to send confidential data without authorization.
  • Sending offensive or inappropriate emails to our networks, colleagues, or partners.
  • Using a corporate email for malicious and illegal activities.

Declaration

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