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The Candidate Department was responsible for enlisting, educating and evaluating prospective candidates for missionary work supported by the Society. Conferences had Candidate Advisers who oversaw the work in the field, and also sent applicants to the central Committee. The Scholarship Department (from 1942-1953 the two operations were combined) was developed from funds initially donated by Dr. Victoria Cheung, and scholarships were offered to overseas and Canadian students who came from non-Anglo-Saxon backgrounds.

The Periodicals Department was charged with producing three publications: Missionary Monthly, World Friends, and the Annual Report, on behalf of the Society. There was a Secretary-Treasurer of the Department, as well as editors for each of the magazines.

The Society entered the field in 1953 as part of the British United Mission to the Copperbelt. Two churches operated in Northern Rhodesia (Zambia) at this time: the Church of Central Africa in Rhodesia (CCAR), a predominantly black African church, and the Copperbelt Free Church Council (CFCC), a predominantly white European church. While the missionaries were to work with both groups, their activity was concentrated on working with African women through the Mindolo Women's Training Centre, which eventually became part of the Mindolo Ecumenical Centre for Conference, Training and Research. An integration of the mission work with a united church made up of these two churches (United Church of Central Africa in Rhodesia--UCCAR) took place in 1961.

The Literature Department was charged with producing materials for use at all levels of the Society. This included mission study packages, educational packages on social issues, stories and pamphlets.

The Maritime Synod of the Presbyterian Church Women's Foreign Missionary Society sent Louise McCully to Korea in 1900. The educational, medical and evangelical work continued in Korea when the United Church's Woman's Missionary Society took over the work after 1925. Missionaries left Korea in 1942 because of the military situation and when they returned in 1947, it was to a divided country. It was only after the Korean War, that work became more settled. Work then continued in cooperation with the Board of World Mission and through the Joint Work Committee with the Presbyterian Church in the Republic of Korea.

The Japanese Mission began when the Methodist Society sent Martha Cartmell to undertake evangelistic and educational work in 1882. By the time of Church Union in 1925 there were stations in nine cities. Kindergartens, a primary school, three high schools, and the Women's Christian College suggested the heavy emphasis on educational work, but there was also evangelistic and social work in the cities. World War II interrupted the work. Many of the missionaries returned to Canada, and a national church, the Church of Christ in Japan (Kyodan), took over responsibility for mission work. Following the war, Canadian missionaries returned under the direction of the Church of Christ. Western missionaries were represented through the Interboard Committee, based in New York, and through that body, represented on the Council of Cooperation (COC) along with the Church of Christ and the Japan Christian Education Association.

The India work was begun in 1876 at Indore, when Canadian Presbyterian women established schools there. After the establishment of The United Church of Canada in 1925, the Woman's Missionary Society continued to be active in educational, medical and evangelistic work. The Woman's Missionary Society was represented on the United Church Mission Council which was associated with United Church of North India through the Malwa Church Council. By 1956, all responsibility for direction of the work was transferred to the Indian Church and the Mission Council dissolved. A Missionary Committee to look after missionary needs was established.

The Society was late in entering Nepal, Helen Huston arriving in Katmandu in 1960 as partner in the United Mission there.

Hong Kong became a station upon the removal of missionaries from China in the 1950s. Margaret Brown acted as liaison between the Society and the missionaries in West China while continuing her work for the Christian Literature Society for China. By the mid-1950s, the work had expanded to medical work and partnership in what became the Junk Bay Medical Relief Council. Educational and relief work was especially important in the early years as thousands of refugees from the mainland relocated in Hong Kong.

In South Formosa those former Presbyterian missionaries who joined with the United Church worked in the English Presbyterian Mission here, the Canadian Society taking responsibility for the salaries, the English Board assuming all other costs.

Originally a Presbyterian station, the Women's Missionary Society had twenty-nine missionaries in medical, evangelistic and educational work in Honan in 1925 and the United Church WMS carried on the work. Especially important in this service was university and hospital work as well as that of the Christian Literature Society for China. The rise of Chinese nationalism in the late 1920s, the Japanese invasion of 1937, and the war between Nationalist and Communist forces in the 1940s made the work difficult and by 1947 the Mission had to be permenantly abandoned.

The Home Organization Department was responsible for completing the organization of the Society throughout the country, to supervise the work of the auxiliaries and also to act as a liaison with other Boards of the United Church. The Department had several secretaries with responsibilities for Younger Groups, Community Friendship, Supply, Baby Bands, Mission Circles, Affiliated C.G.I.T. Groups and others. The Field Secretary and Secretary for Younger Groups were to encourage the organization of affiliates in each congregation, and to promote the message and work of the Society. The Supply Department was responsible for supplies throughout the Society nationally; much of its material went to Home Mission areas.

The Woman's Missionary Society of the Methodist Church (Canada) began supporting a nurse at the Port Simpson Hospital, B.C. in 1892. The Atlin Nurse Committee formed by Presbyterian women in Toronto, Ont. sent nurses to Atlin, B.C. in 1898. Hospital work in Canada was expanded under the direction of Missionary Societies of both denominations, and was continued under the United Church of Canada. The work was largely confined to the western Provinces, on Aboriginal reserves and in northern communities. The work included large capital expenditures on buildings, grants to hospitals run by the Board of Home Missions, the appointment of staff, as well as community service and visitation. The W.M.S.'s policy was to remove itself from a community once the population was capable of supporting its own health services. With the growth of provincial health departments, the Society's contributions in the field narrowed so that by the end of 1961 it operated only four hospitals.

The Methodist women were the first to become involved with missions to the Japanese and Chinese in Canada, in Victoria, B.C. in 1887, when a Rescue Home was opened for Chinese girls. Work amongst Asian immigrants was not confined to British Columbia, however, but was spread across the country in Toronto, Ont., Montreal, Que., Calgary, Alta., and other places. The work was initially with young girls, but soon kindergarten work was established, along with evangelism and some community service. Many Chinese immigrants who became church members worked in cooperation with the Society in providing services. During World War II the Church operated secondary schools in Japanese internment camps. In the post-war period, a large influx of Chinese immigrants compelled the Society to redouble its efforts in order to reach the new Canadians, often employing former China missionaries to good effect. In all these operations the Society acted in close cooperation with the Board of Home Missions, the purpose always being to develop congregations which would become self-supporting.

This Department carried on the work begun by the Women's Missionary Society of the Presbyterian Church. The work involved meeting immigrants, visiting them in hospital, and informing local churches and W.M.S. auxiliaries of their presence. By 1936, the Department ceased to exist as its functions had been gradually taken over at the local level by the auxiliaries, and at the national level by the Community Missions Departments.

Like the Community Missions East, the work of the western section (Manitoba to British Columbia) was built upon the work carried on by the three uniting societies. The Congregational missionaries had been instrumental in isolated communities, while the Methodists had worked among recent immigrants in cities such as Winnipeg. The Presbyterians had undertaken work among Jews, Ukrainians, and other immigrant groups and new Canadians, as well as workers in extractive industries such as logging on the Pacific coast. Work with recent immigrants, hospital visitation, community work, and church extension into rural areas were all undertaken by the missionaries. While early work was concentrated primarily in large centres such as Vancouver and Calgary, a new type of woman worker, the missionary-at-large, came to labour in small, isolated communities where she was often the sole representative of the Church. This was especially true in northern communities, such as Flin Flon, Man., Cold Lake, Alta. and Cariboo Presbytery, B.C.

Community mission work was long an activity of both the Methodists and Presbyterians and was inherited by the United Church Society in 1925. The work was divided geographically, the East constituting everything east of the Ontario/Manitoba border. It included work among immigrants, the poor and the sick, and church extension work. Many of the missionaries were attached to community centres, others to Churches of All Nations, and still others worked through newly-established churches.

Boarding schools and school homes, i.e. residences for those attending public schools, had been an important part of the work of both the Methodist and Presbyterian Societies prior to Church Union, and by 1931 there were still eighteen institutions in central and western Canada. Many had started as homes for European immigrants during the last century and the early years of the twentieth century, especially in small, isolated communities, while others ministered to Aboriginal children, Anglo Canadian children, and French Canadian children in Quebec. By 1961 the increased provision of provincial schools led to the demise of these institutions and there remained only the homes in Lachine, Quebec and Assiniboia, Saskatchewan and the Boys' and Girls' Homes at Teulon, Manitoba.

Presbyterian women began educational work with Aboriginal children in 1877 near Prince Albert, Sask. As their Church's mission to the Aboriginal People expanded, women missionaries were sent to boarding and day schools at Alberni, B.C., File Hills, Sask., and Birtle, Man. among other places. Educational and medical work among the Aboriginal People was also a prominent feature of the mission efforts of Methodist women with women missionaries stationed at hospitals in Bella Bella and Hazelton, B.C. and boarding schools at Kitamaat and Port Simpson, B.C. As provincial governments expanded their own educational networks in the 1940s, the residential schools were closed and more women and resources were turned towards community service and work in the inner-city. In 1960 all remaining Society work on reserves was turned over to the Board of Home Missions.

The Dominion Board was the central authority of the Woman's Missionary Society, and it alone was permitted by the constitution to initiate mission work for the entire Society. It was made up of officers, including a President, General Secretary, Treasurer, and Assistant Treasurer, all of whom were elected at the Annual Meeting. In addition, the Board included the presidents of all the Conference Branches, the Moderator of the Church, one representative from each of several Boards of the Church, two representatives of each Conference Branch, and the secretaries of the Departments of the Society. Its Executive Committee acted for the Society between annual meetings, and it had the power to borrow money, mortgage property, sell or otherwise dispose of all holdings, and establish priorities for the Society.

The General Secretaries were Effie A. Jamieson, 1925-1931; Winnifred Thomas, 1932-1952; and Anne I. Ward, 1952-1961.

Conference Branches consisted of the Presbyterial Societies within their bounds, and were charged with coordinating their activities with the policies of the national office. The Presbyterial Societies were composed of all the Auxiliiaries, Mission Circles, Mission Bands, Baby Bands, Affiliated CGIT groups and Affiliated Societies within their bounds. Both the Presbyterial Society and the Conference Branch were to prepare an annual report of activities which was to be delivered to the next highest jurisdiction in the Society.

The Angola Mission was originally a Congregational mission and the first woman from the Congregational Women's Board of Missions began her service there in 1890. After Church Union, the Woman's Missionary Society was one of three overseas missions boards working in Angola. The United Church Board of Overseas Missions and the American Board of Commissioners for Foreign Missions (Congregational) were the other two. Throughout this period the Church of Christ in Angola gradually took over more and more responsibility for the direction of the work done by the foreign boards.