What Every Family Tree User Should Know about Name Finding Apps - Kathryn Grant

Welcome to the Brigham Young
University Family History

Library Webinar Series.
My name is Sean Firmage.

I will be your host
for this webinar.

Today we will be pleased to hear
from Kathryn Grant, who will be

giving a presentation titled,
"What every Family Tree User

should know about
name-finding apps.

After years on the sidelines,
Kathryn started doing

family history and discovered to her
surprise that she loved it.

Her specialty is mentoring
new family historians and

helping them find success,
and maybe even avoid

some of the mistakes
that she's made.

Kathryn teaches Sunday classes
at the BYU Family History Library.

She also presents at
Riverton Saturday Seminars

and other family
history events.

Her column on family history
ran in the Nauvoo Times

for about a year and is still
available online.

Kathryn works for the LDS Church
as a technical writer,

with a focus on usability
and process improvement.

Besides family history,
she loves uplifting music,

thought-provoking books
and spring lilacs.

Kathryn, we’ll turn
the time over to you.

(Kathryn) Great! Shaun,
thank you so much.

Hi everybody and welcome
to our webinar today.

As we’ve seen, technology has
its blessings and challenges

and we appreciate your patience
as we’ve gotten started with this.

Today’s webinar is about a very
important topic that has become

of interest to people with the
many name-finding apps

being made available
to Family Tree users.

Maybe you have had a friend
approach you and say something like,

“Hey! Have you tried
such-and-such an app?

It’s amazing!
In a matter of minutes,

I found over a hundred names
for temple work!”

Name-finding apps have become
popular in the last few years

for doing family history,
but they’re also widely

misunderstood
and even misused.

And that misuse has some
unexpected consequences.

Today I’m hoping that we can shed
some light on those consequences

and talk about how
to avoid them.

I hope this webinar will be of help
to three main audiences.

The first is for people
who are using the apps

or may be considering
using the apps.

The second audience
is for consultants

who help others
to find family names.

And then finally,
developers of name-finding apps

or those who may be considering
developing a name-finding app.

Here's a short overview of what
we’re going to be talking about.

First of all, we’re going to get
on the same page as far as what

we’re talking about
in this particular webinar

when we say
“name-finding apps.”

Then we’re going to talk about
some common misconceptions

that people have about
name-finding apps.

Then we’ll look at some
unintended consequences.

And finally, we’ll look
at an alternative approach.

So let’s go ahead
and dive in.

What do we mean in this webinar
when we talk about name-finding apps?

Basically we’re talking about apps
that crawl FamilySearch Family Tree

to find names with
green temples.

Why is there such an appeal
for name-finding apps?

I am guessing if you
joined this webinar,

you’ve probably had more than one
friend talk to you about their

favorite name-finding app
and how much they love it.

So, why do people love
these apps so much?

Well, name-finding apps say that
they will save you time,

that they will reduce the effort
required for family history,

that they will eliminate the tedium
(and who doesn’t want that),

and then finally, they promise to
make family history fast and easy.

Now, for a lot of us, especially
if we are just starting out,

family history can seem like
kind of a black box

and we hear people talk about
how they spent years

trying to break down
a brick wall.

And we might look at some
genealogical problem

and just be completely
flummoxed.

What’s not to love about
an app that says

it’s going to take away
all those problems?

But there’s a little bit more to it,
so let’s look at some of the common

misconceptions that happen when
people use these apps.

It’s important to point out
that people don’t promote

these misconceptions
on purpose.

In other words, no user
or developer, for that matter,

says, “I think I’ll spread
some misconceptions.”

When we have misconceptions,
one of the reasons we have them

is that we don’t know they’re
misconceptions.

It’s been my experience
that these misconceptions

lead to using
name-finding apps

and using the apps tends to
reinforce the misconceptions.

Let’s look at a few
of those misconceptions.

First of all there are
three misconceptions

that tend to go
hand-in-hand.

The first is that the
Church is the entity

that provided the
names in Family Tree.

If we think that,
it’s not a very far leap

to believe if the Church
provided the names,

they must be verified
and ready for temple work.

It’s a logical conclusion,
right?

Finally, if we believe the Church
has provide the names

and they are ready for temple work,
it’s not too much of a stretch

to believe Family Tree
was supposed to be

an on-going source
of temple names.

Let’s take a look at the truth
about each of these.

The first misconception
that the Church provided

the names in Family
Tree is not true.

Where the names came from was
users, interestingly enough.

And that's something that is
very often misunderstood

especially by new users
to FamilySearch because

the FamilySearch website is
sponsored by the Church

so it's logical to think the
Church provided those names.

But what the Church and
and FamilySearch did

was they gathered names
that were provided by users.

I have another webinar
that goes into a lot more detail

on that so I won’t go into
a lot of detail here,

but it's important to realize
the names in Family Tree

were ultimately
contributed by users.

Here’s an example, for those
of you who might remember

the 4-generation program
of the last century.

We sent in our
family history

on family group sheets
like this one.

This is an actual family group
sheet for James Waterfield.

He’s got a couple of daughters,
but notice there’s no wife,

and there’s a half-sister
to these other daughters here,

but the information
is scanty.

Rose Hannah has more information;
Mary, not so much.

But before we judge
people too harshly,

we might look at
this record and go,

“Wow, that’s kind of shoddy work!
That wasn’t very complete.”

Remember, this sheet was prepared
before the days of the internet.

The person may not have even had
access to a typewriter back then,

for those of you who know
what typewriters are

since we don’t use them
much anymore.

I have no doubt this person was
doing the very best that they could.

They were following the
counsel to collect names

for four generations and to
submit them to the church.

And to be honest with you,
many of the names that are

submitted to Family Tree,
are about of this quality.

It’s harder to see when
the name is digital.

We can look at this family group
sheet and see there’s a lot missing.

But when you look at this
same name in Family Tree,

it's not quite so obvious
what's missing.

We don’t want to be judgmental
or critical of people

who have put names in
Family Tree.

Whether they did it through
an old 4-generation program

or they're doing it today,
they’re doing the best they can

with the information
and skills that they have.

For any of you who
have indexed,

you may be familiar with the old
extraction program,

which was the forerunner
of the indexing program.

Many extracted names were
also added to Family Tree.

We see the neat screen in
Family Tree and it's all digital

and beautiful and easy to read,
and sometimes we don't stop

to think about where that
information came from.

It came from a record like this.
Some are a little easier to read.

Some are a lot harder.
But they were, in many cases,

handwritten records made
at the time of the event

by a person who may or may not
have had an extensive education.

People were doing their best,
but this kind of information

ended up in Family Tree and it
varied widely in quality.

So, did the Church verify all the
names in FamilySearch Family Tree?

Actually, they didn’t.
Not because they didn't want to,

but because it simply
wouldn’t be feasible.

Family Tree has 1.1
billion names in it,

so it wouldn’t have been
feasible for the Church to get

the staff and the manpower
to verify every single one.

The truth is, we the users
are responsible for

verifying the names
in Family Tree.

Many of those names
that we just looked at

became green temples
in Family Tree.

So those extracted records
or names submitted with the old

3 and 4 generation program,
ended up in Family Tree

with green temples
looking like they need

temple work when
they actually don’t.

And that’s an important
thing to be aware of

when you’re using
a name-finding app.

In my experience, about 80%
of the green temples that I find

in Family Tree do not need
temple work and there are

four main reasons for that,
that are listed here on the screen.

The first one is they
might be a duplicate.

If they are a duplicate
of a record that already has

temple work attached, then
that work doesn’t need to be done,

the records just
need to be merged.

The records might also have
errors in vital information.

As an example, I found a record
in Family Tree that had come from

an early submission that
had the birth place

of Cathearth in
Cambridgeshire, England.

And there was no such place
as Cathearth, but because

the last name of that person on the
record was one of my family names,

and because it was close to
where that family lived,

which was actually
a place called Chatteris,

I thought there’s something going
on, I’m going to check this out.

So I found the original submission
and was able to determine

that the person had meant
Chatteris and not Cathearth.

But because of the error
in that vital information,

a duplicate did not come up
when I did the search.

As soon as I corrected the error,
the duplicate came up

and this woman’s temple work
had already been done.

So errors in vital information
can cause problems.

There can be relationship errors.
Not too long ago,

I found a mother having
children when she was four.

Not so likely, right?
So there was a problem there.

Even though those names
had green temples on them,

they weren’t ready
for temple work.

Another common problem is that
people will put in names,

maybe based on a census
or they’ll come from extraction,

where they won’t have a death date
because they don’t know it

so the person shows up
with a green temple,

but a little more research shows
that they died before eight

and all they need is
sealing to parents.

So green temple names may not need
work for any of these reasons

and a name-finding app will normally
not be able to distinguish this.

They may tell some duplicates
but on most of the rest of them,

these other three
bullet points,

they don’t have the
programming power

or the algorithms, to determine
whether those problems exist.

The last misconception of those
three is that Family Tree

is intended to be an ongoing
source of temple names.

Again, that’s logical if you think
that the Church originally

populated Family Tree
with these temple names.

I found that this misconception
gets passed so frequently,

kind of like wildfire gossip,
from one member to another.

Where I live, people are constantly
telling each other this, saying,

“All you have to do is go to Family
Tree and find your temple names.

Isn’t that awesome that the
Church has made it so easy!

They’ve just handed
us these names.”

And so the “good news” gets
spread around with people

not realizing that it’s
actually a misconception.

But the truth is that Family Tree
is a wonderful gift that was

given to us by the Church
through FamilySearch

as a place to collaborate
with other researchers,

a place to track temple work, and
where we can add family names.

Once in a while when I talk
about the problems

with the data in Family Tree,
I have had a couple of people say,

“Wow! It sounds to me like you’re
criticizing Family Tree.”

One person even felt like I was
criticizing the Prophet because

the Church sponsors Family Tree.
But the truth is,

to point out the reality of the
data in Family Tree

isn’t a criticism,
it’s actually empowering,

because if we understand
the data in Family Tree,

we understand better
how to use it.

So data issues don’t mean
that Family Tree is flawed,

or that the Church
did something wrong

by putting this data
in Family Tree.

It only looks like a criticism of
Family Tree to point out the data

if a person thought the data was
supposed to be perfect

and that Family Search had
intended it to be perfect.

If you think something’s perfect
and then someone says it’s not,

that sounds like criticism and
like the program failed.

But if we realize that the
purpose of Family Tree

is for us to collaborate,
track temple work, and add names,

and it was never meant to be a
perfect source of verified names,

then we realize it’s not a
criticism of Family Tree.

So the problem isn’t
the Family Tree data.

The problem is the misconceptions
that we might have about it.

Two more common misconceptions
that go a little bit hand in hand --

One of those is that success
in family history

means reserving large
numbers of names.

Again, this is one of those
misconceptions promoted by apps,

at least the way they are used,
because so many people use them

to find large numbers
of temple names.

Associated with that, is the
misconception that family history

is tedious and time-consuming,
especially so without an app.

Let’s look a little bit closer
at those two misconceptions.

So, does success in
family history mean

reserving large
numbers of names?

We’ve been taught in conference
that’s not the case.

You might remember Elder Scott’s
talk where he mentioned that he

didn’t think people would be very
happy beyond the veil if someone

reserved a large number of names
and kept them in their temple queue.

So that's a problem and
the Church has dealt

with that problem by
releasing names from

people’s temple queues if they’re
older than two years.

So that took care of that problem,
but still I hear people saying,

“Wow! I found 400 names!”
It almost becomes a matter of pride.

I remember hearing a talk that was
given in my stake by a young woman

who had been taught to use a
name-finding app to just comb

through family tree and
find bunches of names.

So she had used the app.
She had gone through and gotten

a couple hundred names and then
her sister tried to use the app

to crawl the tree, but the older
girl had already reserved the names

after the app had run
for a certain period of time.

So the younger sister was really
frustrated and discouraged because

she tried to do the same
thing her sister did

and wasn’t able to get
this huge number of names.

Another problem with this
misconception is that it can lead

to cutting corners and
not verifying the names.

So people will use the app.
They’ll gather hundreds

and in some cases I’ve heard of,
people doing thousands of names,

and then they don’t verify them.
They either put them in their

temple queue or share them
with the temple system,

and then other people end up
doing the invalid names,

which is not really
fair to them.

So if success in family history
doesn’t mean reserving

huge numbers of names, how do we
qualify success in family history?

After years of working with people
and helping them get started,

I’ve come to believe that
success in family history

means a consistent,
diligent effort.

In a way, for those of you who
are home or visiting teachers,

it’s the same principle.
Home and visiting teaching

isn’t a one and done.
We don’t just visit a person

once and then say,
“Okay, you’re good for life.”

or just think about them once
towards the end of the month.

Being a good home or
visiting teacher means

consistent, diligent effort
on a regular basis.

And I really believe it’s
the same in family history.

So, our goal shouldn’t be
to be gathering large

numbers of family names,
but instead to be

making a consistent,
diligent effort.

And this one, oh my goodness,
please forgive me because

this is actually one of
my greatest concerns,

one that I just wish I
could shout from the rooftops

and tell people it’s a
myth that family history

is tedious and
time-consuming.

Let’s leave the app
aside for a minute.

There’s a misconception in the
church that family history is

tedious and time-consuming.
It’s true that some time periods

and some areas of the world are
more difficult than others.

I wish I could tell people
that everybody has places

on their line like that,
but everybody also has

places on their line that
are easier than others.

So family history is not tedious
and time-consuming per se.

What is tedious and time-consuming
is doing it without the spirit.

Let me give you an example.
I was helping my friend Marci

get started with family history
quite a few years ago.

I was kind of new to what I was
doing and hadn’t fully realized

the power of prayer and the
power of following the spirit.

So Marci and I just met in
the Family History Center and

sat down to work on her lines.
I asked what she wanted to work on.

And she said, “Well, what about this?”
So we got in there

and we looked and looked and tried
stuff and churned and finally

after 45 minutes or an hour,
we both looked at each other and

agreed it wasn't working
and didn't feel right.

It was a good learning
experience that it took me

that long to realize
that it wasn’t working.

And it was tedious.
And it was time consuming.

And we both felt that we had not
made the best use of our time.

But what was interesting
is that after we realized that,

and then we sought the Lord
and the inspiration of the Spirit,

we felt prompted to move
to a different place

in her family tree
and things just opened up.

And it was not tedious,
and it was not time-consuming.

So, I really believe it’s a myth,
and we do people a disservice

when we teach them family history
is tedious and time-consuming.

So, technology can help us.
It can take some of the searching.

We can search digital records
so much more quickly than if we

had to travel to a court house.
But family history only becomes

tedious and time-consuming when
we’re not going by the Spirit.

It can be challenging,
but it won’t be tedious

and it won’t be this
terrible experience.

So, unintended consequences
of those misconceptions,

let’s take a look at some of those.
Invalid or duplicate temple work.

We’ve talked a little bit
about that with the high percentage

of green temples
that are invalid.

Another problem that
has surfaced within

the last year or so is using a
name-finding app to take

names that somebody else is
right in the process of reserving.

And then not realizing that names
need to be added to Family Tree.

So if we think that Family Tree
is this pool of names that

the Church has provided,
then we don’t realize that

a lot of names are missing
and that we are the ones

who are supposed to be
adding those names.

And finally, another unintended
consequence is not becoming

self-sufficient in finding names
because we don’t think we have to

and so we don't and so we never
learn to become self-sufficient.

I want to go into a little bit
more detail about this problem

of taking names that other
people are currently reserving.

I want to share two experiences
that I had on that.

The first is that one of my friends
called me almost in tears.

Her voice was teary when she said,
“I’ve been working on this

such and such family.”
She was pretty new to

family history at the time
and she was learning to

do careful verification
and find family and

it had just been such a beautiful
experience for her to finally

take her own family
names to the temple.

So she had found this family
and she was very carefully

putting them in family tree,
verifying the names,

adding the sources,
and so forth and then,

before she could finally
make the reservations,

someone else came through
with a name-finding app

to reserve those green temples
and took the names that

my friend had very carefully
researched and verified,

and this other person
had not done any

research or verification
on the names.

So that’s one experience that I
learned first-hand from my friend.

And then I had an experience
the other night,

where I was working on a name
and I promise you the name had not

been available in the system
for more than five minutes,

and I think it was more
like about 3 minutes,

when somebody else came
through and got the name.

I was in the very process of
reserving it for temple work.

Now, it’s important to point out
that it is not wrong to reserve a

name added by somebody else.
That’s not what I’m saying.

So, my niece, just as an example,
she loves doing family history

and the other day she had found
some names that were very

difficult to find while she was
working on our family.

So she found family names,
but she found some other names

in that process, of people that it
took her awhile and they were

tricky to find. Well, she
made the choice to put

those names in Family Tree because
she suspected that it would be very

difficult for somebody else to
repeat the research she had done.

So she put the names
in Family Tree,

but because they weren’t on her
line she did not reserve them.

So if somebody comes along
and reserves those names,

that’s why she put them there.
So that is not a problem at all.

The problem arises when --
Well, I just have to ask myself,

is it fair to take names
that somebody else

has loved and labored
over with no more

thought than running an
automated name-finding program.

So to avoid this problem,
as you’ve probably noticed

if you’ve used one of these
name-finding apps,

they don't tell, at least none
of the ones that I have tried,

tell you when the
name was created.

And so, if a name
was created,

and you can tell this is by
looking in the change log.

Over on the right-hand side
of the Person page,

there’s a link that says
“Show All Changes.”

If you click that link and
scroll to the bottom,

it will tell you when
that name was created.

So you can tell if the name was
created within the last week

or maybe even within
the last month,

it would be a nice courtesy
to contact the person who

contributed that name and say,
“I noticed that you

contributed this name.
They’re on my family line too,

and I was hoping to reserve
some names for the temple.

Are you OK with me
reserving these names?”

And who knows, through that
process you might meet a

cousin who you can collaborate
on research with.

But just doing that resolves
the problem of reserving names

that other people are right
in the process of reserving.

You can imagine how discouraging
that is, especially for a new

family historian, to be right in
the process of adding names and

just have those names vanish
right before their eyes as

they’re trying to add them.
That’s a reason that I recommend

not adding lots of names all at
once with a name-finding app,

but rather checking those names
and checking to make sure that

somebody else is not already
planning to reserve those names.

Another problem is that people
get the mindset that family

history means searching in
Family Tree for names and

they don’t realize
names need to be added.

So I did some checking and
got some updated figures.

These population totals used
to be higher but current estimates

are that about 100 to 115 billion
people have lived on the earth

since the beginning
of human history.

Only 1.1 billion people
are in Family Tree.

I am not really good at math,
but even I can figure out that

this leaves between 99 billion
and 114 billion people

that probably need to be
added to Family Tree.

Granted there are not records
for many people who lived

back through time where either
the records have been destroyed

or they didn’t keep them.
So there are some of this

large group that we’re not going
to be able to find records for,

but there are a surprisingly large
number that do have records.

A lot of people still need
to be added to Family Tree

and it is an absolute joy.
I don’t know that I’ve ever

felt the Spirit stronger
than when I find a name

and add it to Family Tree.
That person has just gone

from being lost to
“getting in the queue”

of having the opportunity
to get their temple work done.

Some more unintended
consequences --

An unfortunate one
that I’ve noticed

is relying on technology
instead of the Spirit.

Now let me be careful to
explain what I mean there.

One problem is that people
trust technology more than

they trust themselves.
I’ve been in information technology

for about 20 or 25 years now
as a web designer,

as a database person,
done different things

with technology and
I love technology.

Technology is so
miraculous to us

in so many ways that we give it
more credit than it deserves.

We think it’s maybe a little
more perfect then it is.

Because of that sometimes
people will trust the technology

and not trust the Spirit.
And usually in a case like that,

it’s not so much that they
don’t trust the Spirit,

but more that they doubt the
prompting that they’re hearing

because they think, “why
am I getting that prompting

because the technology right
on my screen that I can trust,

or I feel I can trust, is showing
me something different.”

If it’s a toss-up and they’re
not quite sure that the Spirit’s

really speaking to them,
I’ve seen that a lot of people

will tend to go with technology.
Another issue is that technology

can just make the Spirit
seem unnecessary.

So it’s not that people are
blocking the spirit

or ignoring the spirit,
it’s just that if you use

a name-finding app and it
presents you with 400 names

of people who apparently
need temple work,

then why do you need to
follow the Spirit on that,

The names are right I front of you.
And I understand that.

I can see why people would.
It would not even occur to them

that they would need to follow
the Spirit in a case like that

because the names have just been
handed to them as they see it.

So another challenge that comes up,
another unintended consequence is

that these misconceptions
just spread like wildfire.

Because somebody reserves
400 names or 8,000 or whatever,

and they feel that they’ve
experienced such great success,

and they can’t wait to share
it with everybody else.

Just in the last couple of weeks,
I’ve seen people posting on facebook

and posting on forums, saying,
“I’ve found this wonderful app,

and I reserved these hundreds
of names and now I’m just so glad

that I did that and you
guys should try it too.

So it just spreads because
it sounds so fantastic.

And it sounds like it’s going to
make a difficult task easier.

The problem is because people
have these false expectations,

then when somebody tries to
share the facts with them,

the facts are really not welcome.
And that also is understandable.

Nobody likes to be disappointed
in their expectations.

I’ll give you a couple of examples.
There was someone on a public forum

who was talking about gathering
hundreds and hundreds of names,

and submitting them to the temple.
When a few of us very gently tried

to suggest that a lot of the names
gathered that way probably

weren’t valid and at least
they should be verified,

the person responded,
“Do you mean to tell me that

the Church has spent millions
of dollars to make Family Tree

and the names in it aren’t
even ready for temple work?”

So that was shock to them and
it was a huge disappointment,

because they had been led to
believe that all they had to do

was run an app and gather
names out of Family Tree.

Another person that I was
helping not too long ago,

we sat down and he happily showed
me his name-finding results,

where he had around 300 names
that the app had found

and he said, “Isn’t this great?
I’d like to get these names done.”

And I said, “I’m so glad
you found those names.

We really should verify them.
There’s a chance that some

of them may not be accurate
and it’s always just a good idea

to go through and attach
some sources and so forth.”

And he just said,
“No, I’d really rather not.

The names look ready to me so I
think I’m just going to go ahead.”

Of course as a consultant, you
can’t put your foot down and say

“NO! You’re not submitting those
names until you’ve verified them.”

We all have our agency
and we’re all responsible,

but I have to think that this
brother had very good intentions,

I know he had very good intentions,
and I have to think that one reason

he felt that it was appropriate was
because he had used an app that

presented those names to him as
apparently needing temple work,

and it just seemed superfluous that
he would need to verify them.

For the last part of these
unintended consequences,

I want to talk about some of the
more spiritual downsides to using

name-finding apps and gathering
large numbers of names.

What I’m noticing among people
that have done this is that they

don’t really get to know the
people whose names they’re

reserving so their hearts
aren’t really turned.

All those people are
is names on a list to them.

Don’t get me wrong,
they feel a general sense of

“Wow, this is great! Now
their temple work can be done.”

That is wonderful but they don’t
know anything about these people.

Where did they live?
What was their life like?

What did they experience that has
contributed to the way I live?

What sacrifices did they
make that enabled me

to enjoy the blessings
I have today?

So when we don’t dig into those
names as we’ve actually been

counselled to do then we lose
something really precious and,

in my experience, people’s hearts
are not turned by just

submitting names from an app,
and especially just by submitting

large numbers of names
that aren’t verified.

Another problem that I’ve seen
is that an app can encourage

people to have that
“one and done” mentality,

like the woman that I mentioned,
I don’t think I told this

whole story in this webinar,
but I mentioned somebody

who found 8,000 names.
She was a sister from California,

who had been taught to use a
name-finding app and didn’t realize

that there were some possible
problems with it so she had just

reserved all these names and
shared them with the temple system

and thought, “OK, that’s done.
I’ve fulfilled my obligation

to family history.”
What’s interesting about

family history is that,
as Boyd K. Packer said,

there is no work that is
more spiritually refining.

When we treat it like
a “one and done”

I think we miss out on that
spiritual refinement.

We don’t have that on-going
blessing of learning to

recognize the spirit,
of connecting with our ancestors,

of discovering
our family stories.

And so, I think we rob ourselves
of that blessing when we make

family history into a
“one and done” experience.

I debated whether or not to share
this next one because once

in a while people have gotten
offended at my bringing this up.

But, I’ve experienced it myself and
I’ve talked to so many other people

that have experienced it that I
think it’s worth mentioning.

And that is, that when we submit
invalid names for temple work,

our temple experience
is less meaningful.

And I think there’s a
good reason for that.

As perhaps you have, I have been
in the temple when I have

literally felt the gratitude of the
person whose work I was doing.

I could tell they were pleased.
I could tell that they accepted

the work and that they were so
happy about the chance to progress.

I don’t think I would feel that
same joy and gratitude from

somebody if I were doing their
work for the 20th time.

I had a friend who had an
experience that illustrated

this not too long ago.
He had gone to the baptistery

to do some family names
that he had carefully

researched and validated and
he said that the Spirit was so

strong during that experience.
He was just overjoyed to tell that

those people were happy
about their temple work.

So after he did the work
for his ancestors,

apparently it wasn’t a very busy
day so the officiator asked if he

could stay and do other names.
And so he agreed gladly and

started doing the names.
As he did, he noticed that the

wonderful feelings were no longer
present, and that seemed strange.

As they went through the names,
what he started to notice is that

there were a couple of them that
were apparently the wrong gender.

They were clearly women’s names
that were being baptized as men.

And also there were some dates
that were suspect and some places,

and things that you could just
tell that these names

had not been very
carefully researched.

And for my friend,
that was just another testimony

that when we are careless with
our family names and don’t

properly verify them,
and then if we do work and

the names turn out to be invalid,
it’s not going to be as meaningful

of a temple experience.
Now the reason some people have

expressed concern before,
is that they’ve misunderstood me

to say the temple’s not
a good experience.

No, that’s not what I’m saying.
But what I am saying is that

if we’re careful about doing
our research and we find

valid names and we’re guided by
the Spirit in doing that work,

then we’re going to have an
especially beautiful experience

at the temple which we
might not otherwise have.

Let’s return, if you don’t mind,
to the misconception that I said

was one of my greatest concerns,
and that is that we're teaching

people that family history
is tedious and difficult.

And in this particular context
people are being taught that

it's tedious and difficult
without the app.

The truth is
family history is

tedious and difficult
without the Spirit.

What I’d like to do now
is show you an alternative

approach to using
name finding apps,

especially to find
large numbers of names.

A little while ago,
the Church did some research

and I learned about this
in a presentation that I attended

by a brother named Mike Sandberg
who works for family search.

He said that the Church
had done research on people

who were not submitting
any temple names at all

and suddenly they went to
submitting names regularly.

So naturally, the Church
had a burning question.

How did they make the transition?
What enabled them to go from

not submitting any names at all
to successfully submitting

temple names regularly?
What they found out

was very interesting.
85% of those who made this

transition had a helper and 65%
of them got help multiple times.

So the Church discovered that
having a person to help or mentor

somebody new to family history
was the key to success.

If this is sounding familiar
to any of you, you will realize

that this became the basis for the
Church’s Find-Take-Teach program.

Find-Take-Teach is a Spirit-led,
one-on-one effort

where help is given
by a person who pays the price

to know how to help
that person by the Spirit.

Let me go ahead and show you
in a little more detail

why this approach works.
I’m simplifying this.

If you want more information
you can look on FamilySearch.org.

They’ve got a complete
description of it.

But very simply, the helper and
the patron both pray for guidance

and then the helper prepares a
personalized lesson by the Spirit.

And during this lesson,
also by the Spirit,

they find a starting place
for this person

or they find valid temple
names for the person.

Finally, when they get together,
the helper guides the patron

in a one-on-one setting to
reserve those temple names.

I want to show you as a person who
has responsibility currently for

helping and mentoring people,
I want to show you the process

that I go through to find a good
starting place when I’m working

with somebody in a
Find-Take-Teach experience.

This is not the only way to do it.
It’s the way that works best for me

and I have other friends that are
equally successful in using

different approaches but I can
speak to what works for me.

I hope that this example
might be helpful to you

in finding your own best approach.
So the first, most important thing

for me is that I have to go
some place quiet where I can

hear the Spirit in preparing
this Find-Take-Teach experience.

I can’t be where I’m distracted.
I can’t be where I feel pressured.

I have to be in a place
where I can truly feel

the inspiration
of the Holy Ghost.

So, I make those arrangements,
whatever it takes.

In one of my classes a sister said
that she can’t do it at home.

There’s just no way,
even in the bathroom

it’s like knock, knock, knock
“Mom! Are you in there?”

So what she does is she
goes to the public library

where people are
supposed to be quiet.

And so that place works for her.
You might find a different quiet

place that works for you.
But whatever you do,

find a place where you can be
in tune with the Spirit.

And then, I bring up the Fan Chart,
that’s my favorite place to work.

And I listen for what I call
“heart tugs” which are

spiritual promptings to me
that somebody is wanting

their temple work to be done.
So here’s an example.

I had offered to help a sister
at the MTC as part of a

Find-Take-Teach experience there.
This sister had a very full tree

and she wasn’t convinced that we
would be able to find anything.

So I asked for her
helper number.

The place where we were working
that Sunday in the MTC was very

noisy and I knew that it was
not a good place for me to

really hear the Spirit and
find a good starting place.

I asked for her helper number and we
arranged to meet the following week.

And I went to a place where
I could listen to the Spirit.

As I did, I prayed sincerely, and
I had asked her to pray with me.

And so, I looked at the fan chart
and as I pondered and looked and

clicked on a few different names,
I found that I was drawn to this

name of Abraham Chadwick.
So I thought, "OK, I’ll follow that

prompting and I will
check Abraham’s

Person page and see
what’s going on there."

Well, as my friend mentioned,
he had done a lot.

As it turned out, and I had no way
of knowing this of course,

he was the first member of their
family to join the Church.

So as I looked here and read
his personal history and clicked

on his wives’ names and
his children’s names,

sure enough all their work
was done and it was evident

that he was a good, faithful
man from reading his testimony.

So I thought, "Wow, this might
be harder than I thought."

But I continued to pray and ask
the Spirit for guidance to be led

to that place where the
Spirit wanted me to work

for my dear sister in the MTC.
And as I did, again just another

line-upon-line gentle prompting,
I found that I was

led to this name of
Sarah Ann Chadwick.

So I looked at that and
this is what I found.

She had a husband, George Bradbury,
and they had six kids.

And all their work was done too,
so I’m so grateful that by this

point I had learned better
how to recognize the Spirit,

because in my younger days I might
have doubted myself and just said,

“Wow, I’ve been digging around here
and I’m not finding anything so that

might not really have
been the Spirit.”

I might have questioned myself.
But because I had, fortunately,

tried really hard to grow in my
ability, and I’m far from perfect,

but I’d really tried to grow in
my ability to hear the Spirit,

I trusted these promptings.
I thought, “I’m gonna keep going.

I am not sure why ‘cause this
isn’t looking too good,

but I’m gonna keep trying.”
So I clicked on the first name of

their first son and that’s when I
started to feel that I was going

the right direction.
And so the first thing that caught

my attention was that Samuel’s wife
didn’t even have a last name.

So that indicated more research
definitely needed to be done.

And I noticed that they
didn’t have many children.

Back in the 1800’s, most families
had a large number of children.

With just a little bit of research,
it wasn’t like I took days and days,

in fact I don’t think
it was even hours,

it was just a little quick checking
in Ancestry and FamilySearch

historical records.
It didn’t take long to discover

that Samuel and Kate were missing
four children from Family Tree.

These children were not there and
needed to be added so that their

temple work could be done.
And then I thought,

“OK, that is why I
got that prompting.”

I think the reason I was prompted
to start with Abraham was that if

I got a prompting like suppose
that the name Samuel Bradbury

came into my mind, I would not
have a clue what to do with it.

And so the Spirit led me along a
path where I could see how this

family first got involved with
the Church and then how these

people who needed their ordinances
were related to that first convert.

So this was just a wonderful,
beautiful experience in

finding these names.
Also, as I did more research,

I found in the 1911 census that
Kate had died and so Samuel had

remarried and his second wife
Ada Sarah was not in

Family Tree either, and her
temple work needed to be done.

So just from following that
prompting, I was able to find and

verify these five names and pass
those on to the sister in the MTC

so that she could get
that temple work done.

Another example on this family,
was that when I looked at Hannah,

Samuel’s younger sister,
she did not have a spouse.

Again, just a little
bit of research.

This wasn’t hours of looking
through court records or something,

this was doing a search on
Ancestry in available censuses.

In just a short period of time
I discovered that at one point

Hannah had been living
with her mother.

And so there was the definite proof
there that this really was my

Hannah that I was looking for,
and found out that she did have a

husband and they had
three children together.

Right there were four more names,
four valid names that needed

to be added to Family Tree.
So that is an example of how

to follow the Spirit to find
a place to work in Family Tree.

But I was mentioning this to a dear
sister in my stake who I was

helping get started with family
history and this is what she said,

“I don’t think I’m that good
at hearing the Spirit.”

I have to tell you
something about this sister.

She is amazing! She serves people.
She’s wonderful.

I don’t think she was giving
herself enough credit.

But, I think all of us have felt
that kind of sense of inadequacy.

I know I certainly did, especially
when I was first starting to really

try to follow the Spirit
in family history.

Fortunately we all learn to hear
the Spirit line upon line.

Wherever you are in learning
to follow the Spirit,

wherever I am, that’s a place
to start growing from.

In fact the only place we can start
growing from is where we are.

So we all learn to hear the
Spirit line upon line,

and to me that is such good news,
because that’s doable.

I can do that.
I can grow line upon line.

And the wonderful thing I that have
found about family history,

and to me it’s one of its greatest,
greatest blessings is that it is

simply one of the best tutorials
in learning to hear the Spirit.

I could give you dozens of
examples on this, but I won’t.

I’ve got a whole other webinar
on that and I’ll show you the

link at the end of this one and
you can watch that if you'd like.

I have found as I listen to the
Spirit in doing family history,

I’ve learned more about how the
Spirit speaks to me and that

knowledge has grown over the years
as I continue to hear promptings

and discern then correctly,
and sometimes not correctly.

I learn from making mistakes too.
But the point that I wanted to

make is that family history
is one of the very best

tutorials in learning
to hear the Spirit.

And if we don’t try to follow the
Spirit in family history then we

lose that great opportunity of
refining our ability to hear.

Hearing the Spirit better brings
blessings in all areas of our lives.

I love this quote by Joseph Smith,
and it’s something that I have

experienced doing family history.
And that is that a person may

profit by noticing the
first intimation (or hint)

of the spirit of revelation.
It may give you sudden strokes

of ideas like call so and so,
or sit here at this meeting

because you don’t know this
but you’re going to find somebody

to help you with temple names,
or there’s a mistake in your record,

go back and check it.
So it may give you these sudden

strokes of ideas so that by
noticing it you find it fulfilled.

So you find that prompting
you got was a real

prompting because whatever
it told you about was true.

So you find it fulfilled
the same day or soon

and thus by learning the Spirit
of God and understanding it,

you may grow into the
principle of revelation.

And it’s my testimony that this
is absolutely true and that doing

family history gives
you the opportunity

to grow in hearing
revelation in this way.

So, closing thoughts.
This is something that comes up

from time to time when we
talk about the problems with

misusing name-finding apps.
So the person will say,

“But, the app I’m using is
certified by FamilySearch.

Doesn’t that mean that it
finds valid names?”

And that’s understandable why
people would think that because

the word “certified” sounds
really official, doesn’t it.

It sounds like there’s some
type of guarantee on the app

that it’s going to perform
as I expect it to.

But, that’s actually not the case.
The short answer is no,

being certified doesn’t guarantee
finding valid names.

And, in fact, it doesn’t have
anything to do with valid names.

Let’s take a look at what
FamilySearch certification means.

This is a direct quote from the
FamilySearch certification site.

The reason most people probably
don’t read this is that it’s

geared towards developers.
So most of us don’t have any

reason to go out to this site.
But, listen to what it says.

The designation is simply used
to identify software applications

that FamilySearch believes to be
generally compatible with

FamilySearch or its application
programming interfaces,

which is basically the way the
programs talk to each other.

So FamilySearch believes that
this app is generally compatible

but FamilySearch takes no
responsibility and is no way

liable for any such application.
Accordingly, FamilySearch in no way

warrants that these applications
will function as intended or that

they are free from harmful
or undesirable aspects

or free from errors.
So, the reason I bring this up

is just to help us understand
that to say an app is FamilySearch

certified is a wonderful thing and
it does mean something specific.

It means that you can generally
count on it to work correctly with

the FamilySearch.org website,
but it does not guarantee anything

about the app being used in a
certain way, or misused, or any

problem that result from its use.
Here’s another thing that I hear

sometimes in talking with a couple
of different app developers or

reading their websites.
They say, “I’m an app developer

and my app warns people that they
should research the names that

they find so isn’t that enough?”
You would hope that it would be.

You would hope that everybody
reads the fine print,

but my own experience is that
I don’t always read the fine print.

Sometimes if I’m in a hurry
I just glance at it and think

"I don't have time for this."
My experience is most people don't

read the warnings not only for
these apps but for anything.

In fact, I’ll give you an example.
The other day I was helping

somebody in a Find-Take-Teach
experience and several warnings

came up during the process of
our working together and

the person I was helping just
clicked right past the warnings.

And the sense that I got was that
they felt that they would not

have understood the warnings anyway
so why bother to read them.

So maybe it was a little sense of
technophobia or inadequacy or

whatever, but for whatever reason,
most people don’t read the warnings

on these apps or anyplace else.
I’ve also found that the few people

who read the warnings don’t really
understand how to apply it because

often the main users of
name-finding apps are people

who are just getting started
in family history and

somebody has told them about
the app and said this is a

quick and easy way to
find temple names.

So they get to the app,
and if they read the warning,

they go, “Oh, Okay, I’ll research,
whatever that means.”

And so they reserve their
hundred names, or whatever,

and then they look at the list
of a hundred and they go,

“Well, looks fine to me.
I’m not really sure what I’m

looking for but I don’t see any
problems so I guess I’ll go ahead.”

And we can’t fault people for
that because if they’re just

getting started and they don’t
understand, then they’re doing

their best to follow the warning
but they didn’t really understand

what the app developer
meant by the warning.

So, that’s an example of how just
putting a warning on an app doesn’t

really help solve the problem of
the app being misused to find

invalid names or large
numbers of names.

So at this point you might
be asking yourself,

what if I submitted a lot of names
like the dear sister in California

that has submitted 8,000 names
gathered with a name-finding app?

Well, if the names are in your
reservation list, verify them.

You’ve got them. There's no
reason to not verify them.

What that means is not just kind of
looking at them and going

“Well, I don’t see any problems,”
but rather going back and verifying

is the vital information correct?
Is it supported by sources?

Are the relationships correct?
Are there any obvious problems

like the mom having kids
when she’s age four?

So verifying
those names,

you can’t really verify
names en masse.

You need to verify
them individually,

just like when the Savior had
the individuals come to him.

When he appeared in the Americas,
they came one by one.

We also need to verify
names one by one

and make sure that
they’re correct.

So that, of course, is not
necessarily a short process,

especially if you have 8,000
names in your temple queue.

So if it’s going to take longer
than two years before the names

will be released by the Church,
then you probably would want to

put those names back in
FamilySearch and let other people

go ahead and reserve them and
hopefully they would reserve

just a few and they would
carefully verify them.

If the ordinances
are already done,

don’t worry about it.
Don’t beat yourself up.

I know of people who have
beat themselves up.

Like a sister I’m aware of
who found out that she had,

after reserving green temple names
and doing about 30 ordinances,

a cousin contacted her and said,
“Did you realize you just did

all this duplicate work?
Those names were done years ago.

And she was so hurt and so
frustrated and so disappointed

because she had been told that the
right thing to do was just gather

these green names and that
she didn’t need to verify them.

So she was so hurt and disappointed
that she exclaimed,

“I am never doing
family history again!”

Now, hopefully after she thought
about it she changed her mind.

That was hopefully just said in the
disappointment of the moment,

but that’s what we don’t want
to do is beat ourselves up.

If you’ve done some of these names,
especially if you did them with

the best of intentions,
consider it a learning

experience and just say, “Okay,
that’s water under the bridge.

Going forward I’ll know
better what to do.”

And, you can help people that you
talk to be aware of these problems

so that they don’t run into
the same types of issues.

Your next question might be,
are you saying that I should

never use a name-finding app?
No, I’m not saying that,

because it is possible to use name-
finding apps to find valid names.

It's just that in my experience,
and this is anecdotal,

so this is just my experience
as a Stake Temple and

Family History Consultant
and a ward consultant

in a number of different
wards, it’s been my experience

that they usually aren’t
used to find valid names.

Most of the time the people
who are using them have been

told that it’s a fast
and easy way to find

temple names and they’re
not told about verification.

So, if I use a name finding app,
how can I find valid names?

You can! So here are some tips
for finding valid names

with name-finding apps.
First of all, most importantly,

seek the guidance of the Spirit.
I know a woman who started to use

a name-finding app and the
Spirit told her not to.

Now that was specifically
for her situation.

That should not be
generalized to anybody else

in any other situation.
That was just in hers.

But, she was told not to
and if she had disobeyed

the Spirit, then that would
have been a mistake for her.

So you want to seek the
guidance of the Spirit

in using the name-finding apps,
and if you’re warned

not to use them, then don’t.
On the other hand, if you’re

told to use them by a definite
spiritual prompting then do.

Verify each and every name
carefully that you find.

So verify the vital information,
the relationships,

check for duplicates, add sources,
make sure the vital information

agrees with the sources.
And here a tip is to use

one or more names as a starting
point to find and add more names.

So you can find, maybe a couple
of names using a name-finding app

and then go back to Family Tree and
thoroughly research those names and

see if anybody’s missing,
kind of as we did in the example

that I showed you of the Find-
Take-Teach experience in the MTC.

And then finally, I found
that it really helps to work

on one family at a time, rather
than a large list of random names.

The reason it’s helpful to work on
one family at a time is that you

get to know that family,
you become familiar with

the place that they lived,
with what they did for a living,

with how many children they had,
with when their kids left home

and got married, and so forth.
And so, as you follow

this family through time,
as you find their birth records,

their census records,
their death records,

all those different things that
help you know that family,

then you’re able to correctly
find the information for them,

validate those names and
add them to Family Tree.

And I felt so much more
comfortable working in

family units to add names
to Family Tree rather than

just working from a mass list of
random names that are just in

whatever order they were found
by the name-finding app.

So, therefore what?
Do you remember President Packer

used to say this a lot,
so what are the takeaways that

I hope we’ll get from this webinar?
Well, if you are a user

of a name-finding app,
the takeaways are

I hope that you would be aware
of the potential problems

that we’ve talked about today
and also that you’d help others

be aware because there’s so many
misconceptions going around,

that you would use these apps
as guided by the Spirit,

that you would remember
that there are so many names

that still need to be
added to Family Tree,

that you would realize
that a good helper can help you

in a way that an app can’t,
and that you would remember

that technology doesn’t replace
thought, research, or the Spirit.

As amazing as technology is,
it’s not perfect and we need

to use it as a tool and
as a companion to our

spiritual efforts but not
as a replacement for them.

If you are a developer,
what would I hope that

you would take away from
this webinar today?

I would love to see app
developers educate people about

the data in Family Tree to
combat those misconceptions.

Again, I don’t think most
developers are setting out

to tell people wrong facts
about the data in Family Tree.

They’re not meaning to
communicate misconceptions,

but users pick them up anyway,
especially when they’re shared

word of mouth from user to user
or posted on Facebook or wherever.

So app developers could do
a huge favor to users

by educating them about
the data in Family Tree.

Also, teach people that
Family Tree is not meant

to be a primary source
for finding names.

Yes, there are some great, valid
green temple names in Family Tree,

but Family Tree was never intended
to be a primary source of temple

names so we don’t have to find our
own family or do our own research.

I would love it if app developers
did not give users the impression

that family history without the
app is difficult and tedious.

Again, family history is only
difficult and tedious

if we don’t have the Spirit. Let
me take that back on difficult.

There can be challenges,
especially in some time periods

and some places, but what I found
is that if you follow the Spirit,

you’ll be led to solve those
problems and there’s a

sense of joy and it’s not
difficult in a horrible way.

It’s difficult in a challenging
and invigorating way.

So, I would love for this
misconception to be done

away with in the Church,
that family history is synonymous

with difficult and tedious.
I would also love it if apps

put caps on the number
of names that they found.

I’m aware of some that do,
but to my understanding,

there are some that don’t,
that allow users to just grab

huge numbers of names and
submit them for temple work.

I was talking with some friends
the other day about the problems

that we continue to see with people
submitting large numbers of invalid

names using name-finding
apps and we would love it if

there was some kind of
feature that would allow

people to clean up those large
numbers of the invalid names

that have been submitted,
whether it was some

super duplicate search or
something, I don’t know.

This was on our wish list.
We thought it would be

so wonderful if there was
some way to clean up

those many invalid names
that have been submitted.

I would like to close with
a quote from David Rancher,

who is currently the chief
genealogical officer

at FamilySearch.
He said, “I love my computer.

I love it for everything
it can do for me,

but the computer is not
what turns my heart.

What turns my heart are the
experiences and the impressions

I have from the Spirit and the
things that I know and understand.

So that concludes
our webinar for today.

I wanted to share with you those
promised additional resources.

The first one is a list of other
webinars that you can get on this

link down at the bottom and
they are webinars that go into

more detail about what
we’ve talked about today.

Many times people use name-finding
apps because they’ve been told that

it is the only way to find
success as a beginner.

And, unfortunately, I’ve
even seen this attitude

among consultants where
they will say it is too hard

to teach a beginner to do
careful family history.

They’re going to get discouraged
and they won’t do it.

And so therefore I have to teach
them to use the name-finding app.

Well of course, Find-Take-Teach
has turned that on its head.

As a helper prepares a Spirit-led
Find-Take-Teach experience

to find valid names, beginners do
learn to do valid family history.

So that first webinar kind
of touches on that subject.

The second one dives more
into using the Holy Ghost

in family history, duplicates
in Family Tree, obviously.

And then the last one goes into
a lot more detail on understanding

the data in Family Tree,
where it came from and

what some of the additional
challenges are with it.

And then lastly,
I want to recommend to you

this amazing book that I just love.
It’s available at Deseret Book.

It’s called "Hearts Turned
to the Fathers,"

and it’s a history of family
history since the restoration.

So it starts out from
the beginning of the

restored gospel to about
the 1990’s when the book was

published and when FamilySearch
was just gaining traction.

So if you love family history
I think you would love this book.

So thank you everybody for your
time and attention today

and I hope that this webinar
is helpful to you,

hope that it makes your
family history more meaningful

and more successful.
Thank you.

(Sean) Okay thank you so much
to Kathryn for that wonderful

presentation. I would just like
to remind everybody that these

webinars will be uploaded onto
YouTube and our channel name

is BYU Family History Library.
If you could, before you leave

the webinar today, look at the
different polls that we have

down at the bottom
of the screen.

We’d love to hear any feedback
that you have or suggestions

to different topics that you’d
like us to cover in the future.

That would be very helpful for us
and our different presenters.

And again, thanks to Kathryn for
that wonderful presentation today

and we hope to see you guys at our
next webinar. Alright, Bye.