The unified GraceSteps app today is a competent clinical-client mobile experience. Mentors send messages, clients track goals, journals get written. Phase G adds the church-and-campus-ministry member experience alongside — but the strategic move isn't to bolt church features onto the existing app. The strategic move is to elevate the entire mobile interaction model with seven principles: the inbox as connective tissue; one user holds many communities (church + campus ministry + mentor journey); cards as time-aware state machines ("Confirm I'll be there" → "Confirm I'm Here" → "Rate the session"); gestures that carry intentional weight (swipe-right to pray); voice as a first-class input for the older audience; daily spiritual context built into the header (verse of the day → Daily Spotlight prayer); and universal search at the top of every panel so the library is one tap away from anywhere.
The mockups below show the current app on three core screens, then the proposed Phase G experience on eleven screens (including church polls, ministry serving schedules, and an in-app course), then a side-by-side comparison of three key user journeys. The visual style is illustrative — final design will collaborate with whoever picks up the mobile work.
Three screens that represent the current app: a list-and-timeline dashboard, an inbox that handles mentor messages and broadcasts as two sub-tabs, and a journal list. Solid clinical-client UX, but built before church features existed and before the inbox became the strategic hub.
Twelve screens showing the key innovations. The tab bar changes to Today / Inbox / Schedule / Practice / Me — five tabs that map cleanly to both clinical and church use cases. Innovation lives in the first four; Me is conventional. Every tab carries the same verse/virtue header (tap = Daily Spotlight) and a slim search bar (find anything in two taps). The final screen is the Pastor's Today panel — same Today shell, but when the user holds the pastor role on an org, their Today gains a glanceable Missional Vital Signs card with the three keys + North Star, tappable to the full backend dashboard.
The same user journey, today vs. Phase G. These are where partners can most clearly see what the strategic moves buy us.
Mentor composes in the web dashboard. Email goes to the client. The client opens the email, taps the link, opens the app, lands on the journal screen. Three apps and four taps to get there.
Mentor composes in the web dashboard, attaches a "journal prompt." Arrives as a single card in the client's mobile inbox with a "Open journal entry" button. Push notification deep-links straight to the prompt. One tap. Email is optional, not the primary surface.
Church staff sends an email blast through Mailchimp (or a Sunday bulletin announcement, or both). 30% of members see it within a day. Many never see it. No way to know who opened.
Church staff composes in the web dashboard; selects audience (all members / scheduled prayer volunteers / specific ministry). Arrives in each recipient's mobile inbox with a "Read" badge. Optional follow-up: pulse-respond to confirm received. Push notification + email arrive as channels for the same inbox item.
Open the prayer wall on a website. Scroll a paginated list. Click "pray" buttons. The act is buried in a feed; the friction means few people engage daily.
Open Practice tab → prayer wall. Each request is a full-screen card. Swipe right = "I prayed for this" with a haptic confirmation and a small animation. After 5 prayers a gentle prompt: "How did this prayer time feel?" The physical gesture makes the act feel intentional. Engagement rises.
What partners should take away after looking at the screens.
Mentors, church staff, the system, and other members all reach the user in one place. Email and push become delivery channels, not separate surfaces. CCB doesn't do this. The current GraceSteps app doesn't fully do this. Phase G ships it.
A college student is in her home church, her campus ministry, AND on a mentor journey. The mobile app holds all three contexts at once: each card on Today tags its source community; the Me tab gives each community its own section with its own color. Multi-org isn't an edge case — it's the strategic shape of a unified Christian platform.
The day's verse or virtue ("Joyful Trust · Psalm 16:11") replaces the heavy word "Today." Tap the header to open the Daily Spotlight prayer for that verse or virtue. The app starts every interaction inside the rhythms of the Christian year. Subtle, but no church-CRM does this — and it matters for the audience.
Every tab has a search bar at the top — find a prayer request, a library article, a course, a journal entry, an event, anyone in your community. The Today tab surfaces a "For you" row of curated courses and library tiles so discovery happens passively. Library access drops from 4 taps (Me → Journey → Courses → Title) to 1 tap (search or row).
Today is a snackable card stack of what matters now. Meeting cards have FIVE states: upcoming-far ("Tomorrow · prep notes"), upcoming-near ("Confirm I'll be there"), check-in ("It's time · Confirm I'm Here"), live ("Rate this when you're done"), completed ("How was your session with Sarah?"). The card adapts as time passes.
Every meeting card — clinical 1:1, mentor session, discipleship mentoring, group Bible study — carries a "Rate the conversation" affordance after the meeting ends. 1:1 loads the 4-item SRS; group meetings load the GSRS. The ORS becomes a "Daily check-in" card on Today — same 4 sliders, no clinical jargon. The MEP strategic moat (ROM — Regular Outcome Measures) lands invisibly inside the daily UX.
Swipe right on a prayer request = "I prayed for this" with haptic feedback. Long press a meeting block = quick swap. Voice input on prayer requests, prayer dedications, find-sub messages. The older church audience experiences a product that feels physically alive and doesn't punish them for not loving phone keyboards.