The Healthy Church Staff Podcast
We're all about helping create a healthy, positive, and spiritually positive environment for church staff members and leadership teams.
The Healthy Church Staff Podcast
7 Times When Your Church Should NOT Hire Staff
Ever wonder if sometimes the best move for your church is to hit pause on hiring? You're not alone. I'm Todd Rhoades, your guide through the unconventional wisdom that might just change how you approach staffing in your ministry. In an episode that challenges the norm, we discuss seven pivotal moments when bringing on new staff might not be the blessing it appears to be. From empowering volunteers to navigating financial constraints, we delve into why holding off on that job listing could be the strategic call your church needs.
This isn't your average conversation about church staffing. Join us as we dissect insights from Dr. Tom Rainer's thought-provoking post and apply them to real-world scenarios. We're tackling everything from the risks of internal agendas to the potential benefits of a staffing vacancy. Whether you're knee-deep in resumes or contemplating a future hire, this episode is packed with advice aimed at fostering a robust, spiritually healthy church community.
Have questions or comments? Send to podcast@chemistrystaffing.com
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Okay, let me put my cards on the table. I co-own a church staffing agency, so this is a weird topic, but it's true. Seven times when your church should not hire staff. We're going to talk about that today on the Healthy Church Staff podcast. My name is Todd Rhodes, I'm one of the co-founders over here at chemistrystaffingcom and, as I said, today we're going to talk about seven times when your church should not hire staff. And it might be counterintuitive for the owner of a church staffing agency to say, hey, don't hire staff because that's what pays our mortgages around here. But no, seriously, we are very tuned in to the fact that not every church should hire staff all the time. That would just be bad consulting and bad advice, and we're going to look at seven things to consider before you start your next staff hire.
Speaker 1:A lot of this comes from an old post written several years ago by Dr Tom Rayner, and I really think that this has some great wisdom for everyone in the church when it comes to hiring. So here's the first. We're going to go through these fairly quickly. But here's the first reason first time when you should not hire church staff, and that's when it takes ministry away from laity and volunteers. Don't take the temptation to hire more hired hands. Volunteers should be the backbone of your ministry. They really should be, and a new pastor or staff member could actually increase the number of volunteers, not decrease those serving they should. But a lot of times churches and pastors and leaders think, hey, if we, just if we pay somebody to do this, it'll get done. And really what they do is they pay somebody and kind of take that role away from a key volunteer. So only hire when let me put it this way when you hire somebody, you should actually increase the number of volunteers, not decrease the number of people that are serving in your church. Okay, so that's number one. Number two when you're adding staff and you decide to add staff because it's always been done that way, okay, so if your youth pastor resigns, you hire a youth pastor. If your worship pastor resigns, you hire a youth pastor. If your worship pastor resigns, you hire a worship pastor.
Speaker 1:Sometimes as quickly as things change in the church. You might not need that position or it might be a position that you've had for the last 20 years, but when that person resigns or takes off, you might know that there are other things that you need more than replacing that position, and I always tell all the churches that we consult with that. When a staff member turns into resignation, it is a great time to regroup. It's a great time to even restructure if you need to reconsider. Okay, so what was what did that staff member bring and what holes does that? What holes does this departure leave for us that we need to fill, and what opportunities does it bring as well? Maybe there are some things that we could hire differently for this next person.
Speaker 1:So the second time not to hire is just to replace somebody. And here we go to number three. Don't hire when it's just not a smart financial decision. And here we go to number three don't hire when it's just not a smart financial decision. Don't move someone and their family four states across the country to serve at your church when and if you can't afford it. Be sure that you've got the resources, not just for the first six months, not just for the first year. But is your church financially viable enough to support the staff person for at least a couple years? And even in a couple years? You need to be really upfront with the staff person. I see a lot of churches a lot of times that want to staff for growth. Staffing for growth is great, but they're staffing for growth when they don't have the financial resources necessarily to do or they don't know how this position will be paid for.
Speaker 1:Do not hire when you're not sure how you're going to pay for the position. Okay, that's number three. Number four do not hire when a particular group in your church pushes it because they have an agenda. Bringing a new staff member into an area of known division is never a good idea, and this happens a lot of time in churches. You'll get some people that say, hey, we need a youth pastor, or hey, we need a full-time worship guy or gal, or we need this or we need that, and it could be that you need that. But if there's division, if you've got half of your board that's not even sure whether or not you need to hire the position and pay for this position, it's never a good idea to hire. Always get Unity on your team before you decide to hire somebody. It's going to be good for your church and it's also going to be good for the person that you're bringing in as well. So that's number four. Number five we're on five of seven.
Speaker 1:Don't hire somebody. When you've got a friend that needs a job. I see this happen quite often, actually. Maybe you've got a college roommate that lost their job and maybe he's a fairly decent youth pastor and you need a youth pastor. So you just say, oh, come on up here and work with us. Friends can make really great staff members. Don't get me wrong, but many a friendship has been lost because of hiring a friend as well. So you got to. If you're hiring a friend or you're bringing somebody in from a past church or somebody that you've known recently that you think might be a good fit, somebody to take a look at, but you got to do so cautiously. Never hire just because a friend needs a position. That is absolutely a recipe for disaster. I've seen it happen way too many times. So that's number five.
Speaker 1:Number six, according to Dr Rainer and I would agree with this as well when it's just a copy of another church. We would never do this. This never happens. You don't hire an IT director when your network consists of a couple of MacBooks and an old Windows 98 machine just laying around. Just because the church down the street hired that new IT director doesn't mean, or that new hip position doesn't mean that you need to as well, and believe it or not. Churches hire due to peer pressure and due to trying to keep up with the Joneses. It's alive in the church as well, baby, and I would just advise you if you're trying to hire we saw this a lot of times during the pandemic with churches hiring, and I don't mean to incriminate anybody that did this, but churches hiring online campus pastors when they hadn't really thought through their campus and their online strategy. Don't hire just to copy another church or just to be cool.
Speaker 1:Okay, and then finally, number seven, and can we talk here? This is important Do not hire when you're unwilling to deal with a current ineffective staff member. I would go as far as to say that you should not hire any new staff member when there's conflict on your current staff team. Deal with the problems that you've got in your family before you decide to date or marry anybody else and I cannot tell you how many times, because we talk to candidates all day, every day, a lot of times, and the number of candidates that say man, I got here and within six months I knew that this place is a dumpster fire and I had no clue. So be sure, do not hire until you're willing to deal with the mess that maybe you already have on your hands.
Speaker 1:All right, so these are some of Dr Rayner's suggestions and my thoughts are probably not as good as Dr Rayner's thoughts. You can search that and find those. He's written a lot about staffing over the years At Chemistry Staffing. This isn't meant to be a sales pitch, but we can help you work through this. If you're dealing with some inner struggles on your team and you need somebody just to come in and give some advice and some consultation on how to deal with the people that you currently have on your team that you're having some issues with, I'd love to hear from you. Reach out to me at podcast at chemistrystaffingcom.
Speaker 1:Maybe you're looking to hire, maybe you're not sure if you should hire. Maybe one of these points just stuck at you and said Todd, oh my goodness, we're about to pull the trigger and I'm not sure we should. I would love to have a conversation with you, no obligation, just love to hear your story and be able to help however I can. We love to partner with churches whenever we can, obviously, but I'm in this to make you and your church successful, and if that means spending a little bit of time on the phone with you or doing a Zoom call with you. I would love to do that, hear your story and give you any help that I can. You can reach out to me anytime at podcast at chemistrystaffingcom. Thanks so much, hope you'll join us again. We're here every weekday, monday through Friday, and this is actually episode number 71. So there's 70 previous episodes. If you're just new to the podcast, you can go back to the website and listen and catch up on all that we've been discussing here on the Healthy Church Staff Podcast. Thanks again for listening.
