Tag: ministry

5 Crucial Lessons I’ve Learned in the Last 10 Years of Worship Leading

5 Crucial Lessons I’ve Learned in the Last 10 Years of Worship Leading

5 Crucial Lessons I’ve Learned in the Last 10 Years of Worship Leading

There have been many hills and valleys over the years and each one brought some lesson for me to learn from.

After coming to a saving faith in college, I quickly started serving on worship teams. First as a guitar player and soon as a worship leader. I have had the chance to serve with so many incredible people that I am so thankful to call friends. Throughout these different environments and roles I have learned a lot. Today, I want to share some of those lessons I learned; some the easy way, some the hard way. (Cough) Okay…usually the hard way.

1. Stay Submitted to Your Senior Leaders

You can sacrifice your time, your money, your relationships at the service of your ministry but it is truly all for nothing if you are not obedient to the Lord and your leaders. Making the decision to be obedient will do tremendous things for your relationships. It shows the people around you how to serve well and shows the people you serve how much you honor them.

So much of our role as worship leaders is based in close relationships.

Your relationship with your pastor, your co-workers or co-volunteers, and your team to name a few. The more you can buy into the vision your pastor has for your church the more that vision can come to fruition & the stronger those relationships become.

Submission is easy if you agree with everything, but it really matters most when you don’t agree.

Every ministry within your church should all be running after the same overarching mission. God’s heart for your church is that your team affirms the overall mission He’s laid in the heart of your senior leaders. All throughout the Bible there are great examples of honoring and serving your leaders well, seeking to serve and honor your leaders as people like Daniel and Joseph did. I truly believe that there is significant blessing that’s poured out when we are committed to doing this well.

2. We are All One Little Justification Away from a Massive Moral Failure

We need to always be conscious of how to approach things like faithfulness, honesty, integrity, purity, diligence, dedication, and kindness in all moments. A little bit of rudeness here, a little deception there builds on itself and will seep into your ministry.

So many of the major moral failures we’ve seen from prominent leaders throughout the years began with little compromises they made early on.

As leaders we can not get into the habit of justification. That’s something we really have to protect! Justifying using the church card for an extra coffee you might even technically deserve quickly turns into justifying embezzling way more in the future. Don’t believe me? I have a friend who watched that exact thing go down. The worst part, the person who did it was and is a phenomenal pastor; it was justification in the small things that lead to justification in the unthinkable things.

On a positive note, the good habits built everyday will also become pillars of your ministry.

None of us is perfect, but we serve a perfect God that imparts grace that empowers us to do beyond willpower. Willpower is fragile compared to grace, where you are weak he is strong.

3. Quality Gear Does Help, But it’s Not Everything

Much of what I have written about for Worship Online has been about gear. Gear is cool, fun, and so easy to waste a night shopping for the dream rig only to change it three months later when the next thing comes out. There will always be new gear coming out that feels like a need, but trust me, there has been plenty of incredible music made without Strymon, Nord, or Gretsch.

Quality gear does help and really does make things better, but only to a point.

That point is for you to have an honest conversation with yourself regarding your personal situation. Touring the world, playing large venues every night as part of a very high level production team? The spaceship pedalboard makes a lot of sense… but only to an extent.

(sidenote: I know touring acts playing arenas every night with pedalboards that would make the worship guitar Facebook groups laugh, but the tone they get from their board is better than 90% of the people in those Facebook groups.)

Church plant, one person worship team, in a hotel conference room? Just make sure you are in tune and people can hear you. Those are obviously two extremes, but find your place along that spectrum. 

The most important thing here is, learn to maximize what you have.

You don’t have to have expensive gear to sound great. We are in the middle of a series with Chad Carouthers proving this very point 8 guitar pedals that are almost all under $50.

4. Anticipating the Unexpected is the Best Kind of Preparation

I grew up playing football. As I got older, the more serious the preparation became. Two-a-day summer practices, film study, weightlifting, and game-planing. Game-planing of all of those was the most complicated. You would spend hours of study and repetition to prepare for the best approach to a very specific situation in hopes of success.

Things would get really interesting when the other team would do something we hadn’t prepared for. What separated the good coaches from the not-so-good coaches was their ability to adjust and succeed despite the change.

Many of us prepare for a service with an approach of everything going according to plan, but how often do things not go according to plan? Often.

Pastor asks for the band to come up when initially that wasn’t the plan. The tracks computer shuts down unexpectedly. The drummer doesn’t show up! You feel strongly on your heart to take the worship service an entirely different direction.

These are just a few things that are very common. How you prepare for the unexpected by teaching your team how to flow spontaneously, having a back-up click metronome next to the tracks computer, and things like this helps you be ready for anything unexpected that comes your way; whether it be the leading of the Holy Spirit or the leading of the worship fail monster.

5. Minute By Minute, Breath By Breath I Need Him

Over the years I have had so many conversations with other worship leaders that were from a place of stress and being worn down. We wear the effect of our situations differently than so many people, because we see so many different stressors. The most constant thing about what we do and who we are is the faithful Father we love and serve.

It is amazing to me how easy it is to get caught up in all the day to day things and somehow take our eyes off the Father; despite that we spend so much time saturated in songs about Him, teachings about Him, serving His people, and having meetings about how we can better serve His people.

All this shows me is that I need him minute by minute, breath by breath. No time spent focusing on God is wasted time. He is the only true source of peace we have and he eagerly waits for us to go to him seeking that peace. 

I hope the things that I’ve learned, often through doing things wrong, will help you avoid the same mistakes that I’ve made.

But in the same breath, you can’t be a perfect leader, so don’t hold yourself to that standard. The success of your life is determined by who you are in the Lord as a child of God. That status doesn’t waver, so remain in Him and obedient to the call. Outside of that, be the best you can be and give yourself grace as you become better and better.

Written by Michael Waring

Article taken from here.

Find more ministry blogs at MinistryJobs.com/blog

Building a Healthy Staff Culture

What's the Word Wednesday

Building a Healthy Staff Culture

If you are a leader, one of the things you must always think about is culture. The culture of your church or business. The culture of your staff and team.

The problem with culture, though, is that it isn’t always written on the wall. As one author put it, What You Do Is Who You Are. Which means you are continually building culture.

You are creating it through your interactions, personally and in meetings. You are creating it through how you spend your money and time. You are creating it through how people work in meetings. You are building it through how you handle your own emotions. You are creating it through whether or not you burn out or if you are healthy.

While culture is a squishy thing, a leader must pay attention to it because if you aren’t, your culture will get away from you.

The reason is: Whatever culture you create at work, people will emulate.

If you look around and see dishonest, burned out, or backstabbing people. That’s the leadership and culture.

If they’re honest, balanced, and humble, that’s leadership and culture.

If the marriages in your church are falling apart, that’s leadership and culture.

Those closest to the leader emulate the leader and his or her life and pass those things on. Yes, people make decisions along the way, and a leader isn’t responsible for everyone’s personal choices, but the reality is that a leader shows what makes someone successful or what is allowed.

For example, very quickly in a new job, you learn what it means to be successful somewhere. Can you be late on things? Who holds the real power at a church (hint: it isn’t always the person with the title)? How do things get done?

All of this goes back to culture.

That’s why Henry Cloud famously said: “A leader gets what he or she created or allows.”

Culture will end up determining if you are successful in reaching your goals. But it will also determine where you end up as a leader or a church.

And this is the most important reason to pay attention to it. Because you may not like where you end up, you may not like the church you become.

Written by Josh Reich

Article taken from here.

Find more ministry blogs at MinistryJobs.com/blog

To Hire or Not to Hire

To Hire or Not to Hire

To Hire or Not to Hire

The unique challenges of the Covid pandemic highlighted how churches must reallocate personnel dollars in the future. As more ministry shifts online, churches will need to beef-up their digital ministry staffing. Additionally, volunteers saw unprecedented expectations placed on their shoulders during the pandemic.

These changes have left many church leaders wondering–what should be a paid position and what should be a volunteer position?

Truthfully, this is a timeless question that churches should have been thinking about more critically for years. Large churches or churches with significant incomes tend to hire out every position they can. It is not uncommon for churches of 1000 in average weekly attendance to pay all of their musicians! By contrast, smaller churches or churches with fewer means tend to wait as long as possible to hire a position, often burning out the same handful of volunteers who do most of the work.

The right balance is in-between these extremes. Rather than make a comprehensive list of which positions should be paid and which should be a volunteer (which could vary from church to church), use these three guiding principles to help you know when to hire.

Principle 1: The position involves shaping strategy.

Our Leadership Pipeline Design process emphasizes that volunteers are capable of higher-level leadership skills than most churches assume. Volunteers can coach, manage the schedules for other volunteers, and delegate tasks to frontline volunteers. We call these “L3 Leaders” or volunteers at the Coach Level.

Churches often think that staff should do 100% of the coaching, scheduling, and delegating. But even in a midsize church, this expectation is unrealistic. Consider that a Children’s Pastor in a mid-size church could have hundreds of volunteers. How is he or she supposed to manage the schedules or coach that many people? Hint: it’s not possible.

Any paid staff person should be at a position that requires strategy development, not just management and task execution. A focus on strategy does not mean that staff sit in their offices all day and don’t manage people (they do!) or don’t execute tasks (they do, but should focus on fewer tasks). However, healthy churches understand that ministry staff positions primarily exist to bring strategic thinking and leadership leverage to a specific ministry.

If a position does not require translating church-wide vision into ministry-specific strategy, only volunteer management or task execution, it is not worth hiring out. Volunteers can do it.

As a church gets larger and complexity increases, the need for strategy development increases. It’s reasonable for a large church to have staff in production or marketing. But the same principle applies–don’t hire people to run the camera or press next on ProPresenter. Hire the people who are shaping your digital production strategy, and leverage volunteers for the rest.

Principle 2: The position requires safeguarding theology.

This principle can be tricky. Even your children’s ministry volunteers that work in the preschool classroom, to some extent, are safeguarding theology. Indeed, small group leaders and Sunday school teachers are defending theology.

However, this principle’s intention is not just teaching proper theology, but making high-level theological decisions. For example, children’s ministry volunteers should not choose the curriculum–someone at the staff level should. Small group leaders should not select their content–a staff leader should.

Many churches are failing in this area. Too many churches are giving up this responsibility! They let small group leaders hop on to Right Now Media and select their group’s content without much oversight. This abdication is dangerous.

I worked with a church that touted its commitment to Biblical teaching as one of its highest values. When I visited a Sunday School class, I heard one of the worst theological breakdowns of Genesis 3. Afterward, I confronted the elders who confirmed that Sunday School teachers were “on their own” for writing content.

When ministry staff are too busy executing tasks, they abdicate their responsibility to safeguard the theology taught by the volunteers beneath them. If a role requires ensuring that theology taught downline is proper and Biblical, it is likely to require a staff member.

Principle 3: The position manages significant financial obligations.

It is common for lay leaders to spend budgetary funds. A youth volunteer might need to pick up snacks, or a production volunteer might have to grab a cable from an electronics store. But if a non-board level position requires the development of a budget and its day-to-day management, this is likely a staff position.

Volunteers should not manage budgets because it is impossible to hold them accountable the same way a staff member can. If a volunteer mismanages a budget, you can remove them from the position, but they might remain at the church. They might complain to others or mobilize the congregation to antagonize leadership. Staff members have a higher degree of oversight through meetings, and more importantly, you can fire staff for gross misconduct.

Major ministry budgets should be managed by staff, not volunteers.

What about administrative positions?

As a general rule, I consider administrative positions as extensions of ministry staff. A senior pastor’s assistant is an extension of the senior pastor’s role, in that he or she handles tasks that otherwise only the pastor could do. For example, an assistant may manage the pastor’s schedule, filter email, and perform initial sermon research.

A ministry assistant in a smaller church, likewise, may take on some tasks that are difficult to outsource or delegate to a volunteer. For example, he or she may take deposits to the bank or post office. These tasks might require a higher degree of accountability than could be expected of a volunteer, but would overburden ministry staff.

Bonus note: what to do about the gray.

Your church may have needs that don’t fit into clean categories, or your church might lack volunteers with the necessary skills to execute needed tasks.

For example, many churches realized through the pandemic that they simply didn’t have the social media or marketing tools necessary to be successful. The knee-jerk reaction is to hire a staff person in instances where there is a gap between the skills you have on-staff or in volunteers and what you need.

However, two options may be better suited to meet the need:

1. Outsource the job.

When it comes to certain ministry needs, if your church doesn’t have the existing skillset available through volunteers, consider outsourcing. Companies like Church Media Squad, among others, handle graphic design needs. You can outsource custom video editing. If your church needs help improving record-keeping, look into virtual assistant services from a group like Belay that has a track record of working with churches successfully.

Outsourcing is often cheaper than hiring on-site, gives you the flexibility to terminate a contract without the relational headache, eliminates overhead in taxes and benefits, and usually gives you access to talent above what you find on your own. Bottom line: if you cannot delegate critical, specialized tasks to qualified volunteers, consider outsourcing before hiring staff.

2. Put it off for now.

Ministry envy is real. It’s easy to look at the “cool” church down the street or online and think that you must be able to execute at the same level. You don’t. Do a few things and do them with excellence. Don’t worry about being on Facebook, YouTube, Twitter, Instagram, and whatever social media company launches before I finish typing this sentence.

Pick one and do it well. Leverage the assets you do have to execute well on a few things. As you get more qualified volunteers or financial resources to outsource, take your ministry to the next level. But don’t feel pressured to take on more than you can do well at this moment. There is no shame in that!

To hire or not to hire?

Leverage the three principles outlined above to determine if a role is better suited for a volunteer or a staff position. Your church has limited resources, and every staff member you hire adds an exponential layer of complexity to your organization.

Be sure to pause, consider, and plan before taking action in growing your staff.

Written By Scott Ball, Vice President and a Lead Guide with The Malphurs Group.
Article taken from here.

Find more ministry blogs at MinistryJobs.com/blog

The Fallacy of the “3 Cs” in Hiring

The Right Way to Leave Your Church

The Fallacy of the “3 Cs” in Hiring

There’s been a lot written about the “3 Cs” of effective hiring – character, competence, and chemistry. While these may be a good check-list, among other best practices for hiring, I believe one of these three can be misconstrued if we’re not keenly aware of the influences that affect its misinterpretation.

I couldn’t agree more about the priority of character in the hiring process. Whether it’s in a church setting or in a secular setting, character counts. No doubt, this is perhaps the most important trait to assess when considering a candidate for a position.

I also agree with the importance of competence. A candidate must have the necessary education, experience, and skills to do the job well. Many believe this is the least important of the three, because many jobs include skills that can be learned over time. Some, of course, require a deeper level of experience and skill and must be present from the beginning.

It’s “chemistry” that I believe is often misinterpreted in some ways. The misinterpretation comes when “chemistry” is used to define how well the pastor or the top leader “likes” the person. Do they have similar personalities, similar interests, or similar hobbies? I’ll call this “personal chemistry.” I think this is where the chemistry criteria gets off track.

Sure, it might be nice if two leaders who work closely together can play golf or go fishing together on the weekends. Or they can start every meeting talking about all the games from the previous weekend and the performance of their favorite athlete. But I don’t believe this kind of “personal chemistry” is necessary for there to be a good organizational fit.

Many organizations do reflect the personality of its leader, but most organizations should be more sophisticated than to only hire staff with whom the top leader can have a “high five” relationship. When a leader expects his closest team members to be too much like him, he misses an opportunity for some valuable diversity.

Perhaps the best interpretation of “chemistry” in the 3 Cs is when it’s used to refer to the candidate’s fit in the culture of the organization. Let’s call this “cultural chemistry.” Cultural factors in an organization can allow some leaders to flourish and others, while equally competent, to struggle or fail.  We should closely assess whether the candidate’s values and their vision line up with those of the organization. We should determine if there are factors that would create a significant misalignment with the team with whom they’ll be working. We should focus more on the candidate’s identity and less on his persona.

God made us with different personalities, passions, and interests for a reason. That kind of diversity can be very healthy for an organization. Those diffeences can complement the others on the leadership team. They can provide balance, perspective, and accountability. If we’re all essentially the same, even in our “personal chemistry,” some valuable contribution to the team is likely to be missing.

Written By Steve Smith, Executive Pastor at First Baptist Church of Broken Arrow, Oklahoma.
Article taken from here.

Find more ministry blogs at MinistryJobs.com/blog

How to Have Better Conversations With Your Senior Leader

Pastor Appreciation Ideas: Over 50 Creative Ways to Bless Your Pastor and Staff

How to Have Better Conversations With Your Senior Leader

If you are a children’s pastor, youth director, or next-gen leader, chances are you have asked yourself some version of the following questions.

How do I help my senior leader understand my vision?

Is there a way to get my senior leader to agree with me on this decision?

How do I get my senior leader to see things my way?

Part of leading a next-gen ministry is leading up to your senior leadership, so how do you have better conversations with your senior leader?

1) Think about the bigger picture.

Just like there are elements or dynamics of your job that your senior leadership may not fully understand, there are also elements of your pastor’s job that you may not be aware of or fully understand. It’s easy to look at your pastor and wonder why they made a particular decision. But other dynamics may be playing into that decision. Your senior pastor may be managing board dynamics, staffing issues, or budget restrictions. By understanding that they have to see the whole picture while you carry your ministry’s vision, you’ll be able to build a bridge and have better conversations.

Before presenting a new idea, try asking yourself these questions.

If I were in their shoes and position, what dynamics would play into this decision?

What information will they need to know?

How does this decision affect the church as a whole?

You will earn points with your leader when you show that you have thought beyond just your ministry.

 

2) Ask, don’t demand.

When you present new ideas, try posing them as questions. Use phrases like, “Would it be possible to” or “Would you be open to.” By asking questions instead of making demands, you start the conversation with less tension and leave more room to discuss the idea.

 

3) Try it as an experiment.

If you are making a significant change, ask for a trial period. Offer to try it for a few months and then re-evaluate if it doesn’t work. Not only does this demonstrate flexibility, but it also makes the decision less overwhelming.

 

4) Give your leader time.

Remember, there may be other dynamics that affect this decision. Your pastor may even have to run the decision by a board, elders, or other staff. By giving them time to think about it, they can make better decisions and will most likely feel more positive about the conversation in general.

Written By Carey Nieuwhof
Article taken from here.

Find more ministry blogs at MinistryJobs.com/blog

What to Look for in a New Worship Pastor Job

It’s Too Loud

Looking for a new worship pastor position at a new church? Things to consider:

 

In early 2014, I was working at a university and received an invitation to bring a team of students to a church in Colorado Springs. The trip went well. Eventually it led to my wife and I flying out to this church once a month. Every trip we would do training and lead worship on Sunday morning; which ended up lasting fifteen months. About halfway through our “consultation” period we began to sense that this church could very well be our next home. Sure enough, in the spring of 2015 we committed and moved that fall.

We had an ideal situation for choosing a next ministry destination:

(1) plenty of hours spent on the ground, (2) over a long period of time, (3) while engaging with congregants, staff, and the senior pastor. All of these factors gave us the opportunity to discern what it might be like to live, work, and worship with those people.

I doubt the slow process like this will ever happen like that again, but I’m grateful for it. Typically the timeline of “trying out” is more compressed, which on top of asking all the questions, makes it difficult to really grasp the culture of a church.

There are three groups of people that are important to engage with while auditioning for a new position.

Here I’ll share who they are and what kinds of things I’d be asking and listening for in times of engagement.

Senior Pastor / Senior Leadership

In most Evangelical or charismatic churches, the senior pastor is the key culture setter and decision maker. The first two questions I’d ask is: Who will your direct report be? And how directly involved will the senior pastor be in your department?

Obviously, the senior leader casts the overall vision, but some senior pastors have very generic, basic wishes for their worship leader and will be relatively uninvolved in your day-to-day operations. Other times – particularly if they are former worship leaders themselves – the senior leader will have very specific expectations down to weekly involvement in song selection, style, service flow, etc.

Some people work better with regular specific guidance. Others will hate it and feel micromanaged.

Let me be clear: neither is inherently right or wrong. You just don’t want to be three months in and have this blindside you.

Don’t be afraid to ask specific questions.

Are you being hired to be the primary worship or to build a great team?

Or are you being hired to be a production manager / creative director with the title “Worship Pastor”?

If it seems like there’s a lack of clarity from the senior leader, get more specific.

Ask things like:

How do you envision me spending the bulk of my time? Songwriting? Meeting with team members and volunteers? Praying and preparing solely for Sunday morning?

You need to know the Senior Pastor’s vision for you position & all of these questions will help you draw it out – despite what’s posted in the job description.

At the end of the day, if you feel like you can align with the vision that the senior leader casts for your position there’s a good chance you’ll be able to thrive. If not, you probably shouldn’t take the position even if the benefit package is fantastic.

Current Staff Members (Colleagues)

One of the greatest things the pastor did when we were auditioning was setting up time with other staff members, where he wasn’t there, with explicit permission to ask them anything we wanted. It revealed his security as a leader to trust employees to talk about the strengths and weaknesses of the organization and not feel threatened by it. If you request this and it’s either denied or evaded then that might be a sign that the culture isn’t open and honest.

If you are able to get time with future colleagues, ask them what it’s really like to work there.

Is it common for things to change at the last minute with no rhyme or reason given?

Difficult to get vacations approved or what typically happens when personal requests are made?

Flexibility with office hours or is it more of a “clock in, clock out” environment?

When you’re asking these questions, do you sense fear or dishonestly in their answers?

Candidly, do they seem scared for their jobs? Or do they seem to have healthy relationships with their direct reports?

Lastly, inquire about the workplace expectations.

Does every little thing require approval?

Is there space to have open conversations and share disagreements with superiors?

This group can be the most tricky to get direct answers from, but if you ask good questions and pay attention you can learn a lot about how the organization really works.

The Volunteers in Your Area

Volunteers are choosing to attend and serve in this ministry; which is where you should expect to learn the best things about the church. They have nothing to lose! Weaknesses in the ministry are easiest to find out about from volunteers.

With volunteers I would ask questions like:

What drew you to this church and what has kept you here (you’d be surprised how often they’re not the same)?

Which areas of the church have you participated in and which areas seem to be the most healthy and life-giving?

Then I would ask them pointed questions about the worship ministry.

Do you feel like your voice is honored when you share thoughts, opinions, or suggestions?

How have you been treated when you’ve needed to take time off or request off for sickness?

Try and get a sense of any unspoken frustrations. Maybe there aren’t any – fantastic! That also speaks to the culture.

The most crucial thing to remember…

There are no perfect churches and we all know that. But there are churches who are honest with their imperfections and are pursuing Christlikeness together – then there are others who aren’t.

Ultimately, you want to be where God wants you to be. But, unless you sense a strong call from God, you don’t want to be in an unhealthy, stifling environment where fear and control pervade the culture. Engaging with these three groups of people can help you discern if this is that kind of place or not.

Find more ministry blogs at MinistryJobs.com/blog

Written By Jonathan Swindal
Article taken from https://worshiponline.com/what-to-look-for-in-a-new-worship-pastor-job/
For more info and resources about worship ministry > https://worshiponline.com/

Cost of Living Differences Matter in Salary Negotiations!

3 Thoughts on What Christian Leadership Should Look Like

Cost of Living Differences Matter in Salary Negotiations!

If you find yourself looking for a new position in a higher or lower cost of living location, you want to make sure you come with the right tools when it comes to salary negotiations. Now more than ever, candidates hold what seems to be the majority of the cards during these negotiations, but you still need facts to back you up! As a Co-Founder of Froot Group Staffing, a church staffing company, I have been involved in many salary negotiations and I want to share with you a few things that may help you if you find yourself in this situation in the near future.

  1. Know Your Worth

This is the first measure you need to identify before factoring in the cost of living differences. In my opinion, your worth is not based on how much debt you have, whether or not your spouse works, or how many kids you have. Your worth is based solely on what YOU can bring to the table. Sure those other factors may cause you to make different decisions when it comes to finding the right job, but having more responsibility on your plate means you need to bring more to the table if you want to be worth more to an organization that is willing to hire you.

Education, years of experience, the quality of experience you have had in the past, staff you have overseen, ability to relate and connect with people, and other competencies are all factors that organizations will look at when factoring your worth. Knowing the results of some of these factors will help you (and the organization) determine what you are worth paying.

  1. Moving Up

I always receive questions from candidates I speak to about whether it is alright to move up in salary when transitioning from one place to the next. We always need to check our heart on this before diving into justifying it to ourselves, but in short I believe the answer is yes. Many organizations are not actively keeping up with inflation year to year in giving their employees raises, so use this transition as an opportunity to correct your worth with how inflation has grown.

Our number one ministry we are called to take care of is our families, so as long as our increase is in line with what we believe our worth is and how inflation has affected that worth, then I believe our hearts are in the right place when asking for this increase. Remember, 1 Timothy 6:10 says “For the LOVE of money is a root of all kinds of evil…”, not money in itself.

  1. Cost of Living Differences

Finally, this is the final factor in determining what salary number to present to the organization you are applying for. There are typically two different scenarios you will find yourself in. One, you are moving from a higher cost of living area to a lower cost of living area, or vice versa. Both can be difficult pills to swallow!

Housing costs are the largest factor in the cost differences, which often is driven by…you guessed it…location location location! If you are moving from Elkhart, IN to Miami, FL where the cost of living difference is around 53%, you can’t always expect a 53% increase in salary, because part of what you are “paying for” is the benefit of the location. Now you might look at that difference and say a 30% increase in salary is more reasonable, but maybe you’d need to find a house 20 minutes from your organization instead of 5 to expand your housing search.

I believe that the hardest move to make is from a higher cost of living area to a lower area. Making $80k in a city like Houston and a similar position in Canton, OH is going to equate to around $62k for a lateral move. However the same $400k house in Houston may translate to $250k in Canton, which is a HUGE difference and may actually give you more room in your budget after paying your mortgage. These are all factors to consider!

  1. Calculating Tools

The best tools I use to come up with some of these calculations are very simple to use. The first place I like to go to is bestplaces.net to give me a general idea of the cost of living differences. The site allows you to put in your current city, future city, and current salary to give you a rough estimate of what your current salary should laterally translate to in your future city.

Zillow is the next place I go to. I always try to cross reference what bestplaces.net is telling me the median home cost is with the actual types of homes I would consider purchasing through Zillow. Make sure those numbers align and adjust your cost of living differences as needed, though make sure your calculations are all lateral! Again, you’re not worth more because you want a larger house!

ChurchSalary.com is the final resource I typically use. This is one of the most robust tools because it calculates many factors, including the church specific position you are applying for. It does require a subscription, but many churches subscribe to this resource as well as search firms. If you become a Froot Group candidate, I would be more than happy to run a free report through ChurchSalary.com for you!

Written by: Alex Purtell

Alex is a co-founder of Froot Group, a church staffing company, and a worship pastor at Lifepoint Church in Lewis Center, OH.

Find more ministry blogs at MinistryJobs.com/blog

5 SIMPLE QUESTIONS ABOUT THE FUTURE EVERY LEADER SHOULD BE ASKING RIGHT NOW

5 SIMPLE QUESTIONS ABOUT THE FUTURE EVERY LEADER SHOULD BE ASKING RIGHT NOW

5 SIMPLE QUESTIONS ABOUT THE FUTURE EVERY LEADER SHOULD BE ASKING RIGHT NOW

Knowing what you should do as a leader in normal times is hard enough.

As you may have noticed, these aren’t normal times.

Trying to figure out what to do in the midst of a global crisis is so much more complicated.

So how do you cut through the mess and noise to chart a course that leads you into a better future?

Here’s a simple place to begin: start by asking the right questions. After all, the quality of the answers you get as a leader are determined by the quality of the questions you ask.

Ask better questions, you get much better answers and, as a result, a much better future.

The challenge is that it can be difficult to know which questions are the best questions to ask. In addition, you’ve got more agitated and angry voices than ever trying to tell you what to do (for more on that, see Pastors, Here’s Why Everyone’s So Mad At You Right Now).

So to help cut through the noise, here are five questions about the future that in my view, are the most helpful ones to be asking right now.

They’re questions I’m asking, and I think two years from now, they’ll turn out the be questions leaders who are making progress found themselves asking in this season.

1. How Much Of The Current Change Is Permanent?

People in the midst of a revolution often don’t realize they’re in the midst of a revolution.

It’s not like people woke up on November 1st, 1517—the day after Martin Luther nailed his 95 thesis to a cathedral door—and said “Hey, it’s day 2 of the Reformation.” No one knew the Reformation had started. They didn’t realize a seismic shift was underway that would change the course not just of the church, but of human history.

When carriages and horses first started being replaced by cars, or radio went from Marconi’s curious invention to the launch of KDKA in Pittsburgh in 1920 (America’s first radio station), no one realized this was the cusp of a massive and permanent cultural change. The first cars and first radios seemed like anomalies, until, of course, they weren’t.

Crisis is an accelerator, and many of the ‘temporary’ trends we’re seeing right now are likely more permanent than we realize.

The COVID disruption that started off as a medical disruption is now also accelerating cultural disruption. Work, school, shopping, entertainment and fitness (all of which has become more home-based or morphed in other ways) will never quite be the same again.

Neither will church.

Whether you and I like change or not is kind of irrelevant. Culture never asks permission to change. It just changes.

If you want more on what I see changing, these posts can help.

The Original 2020 is History: 7 New Disruptive Church Trends Every Leader Should Watch

Why Going Back to “Normal” church Seems So Compelling and Can Be So Dangerous

Avoid This Big Mistake: Stepping Back Into the Past When You Step Back Into Your Building

Leaders who see the future have a better chance of seizing it.

2. What Do I Now Have Permission To Stop Doing?

This is a fun question for most leaders.

Remember all those things pre-disruption you wished you weren’t doing but didn’t have the courage or energy to kill? Yep, now’s the time.

If you haven’t gone back to ‘normal’ yet, this is the time to redefine what normal is.

I’ve found that changing one big thing (like say a move to a new facility) can give you permission to change a lot more things.

It’s like moving from one era to another. People expect there will be change, dislocation and new things.

So often when we’ve gone through a big change, we’ll change a lot.

Hint: There’s never been a bigger disruption in our life-time. You’ve already stopped doing so much…only bring back those things are are mission-central as you move into the future.

Remember to focus on the why of change, not just the what and how. But if there was ever a time to change what wasn’t working, this is it.

If you’re wondering how to lead change without blowing up your organization or your own leadership, this might help.

3. What Would I Do If I Was Leading A Start-Up? 

It can be hard to transition an existing church or organization into a new future, but one helpful way to think about it is how you would approach things if you were a start-up.

Old models rarely do well in new eras.

If you were a brand new church plant, opening a new restaurant, launching a new business…how would you approach it?

That kind of thinking can be exceptionally clarifying.

For example, speaking at conferences and events was a big part of my life pre-COVID. Like many people, I haven’t been in a plane since March 2020.

With COVID still surging and mandatory quarantines in place where I live for returning visitors, I don’t know when I’ll be back on a plane again or speaking in person.

If you were launching out as a speaker right now, well, how would you behave?

If you were launching a church right now, what would your strategy be?

Or say you were opening a new restaurant, how much would you focus on indoor dining v. take out, delivery and patio space? Or helping people create their own food experiences?

Once you know the answer to that question, go there.

For me, we’ve written in-person speaking out of our future plans indefinitely, launched a second podcast (which doesn’t, of course, require travel) and done any speaking events I accept digitally instead. At this point, it doesn’t matter when in-person speaking at events will be feasible again. We don’t need it.

Existing organizations who behave like start ups will have a much better future than organizations that don’t.

You can bet the future on things changing, or you can change. The second is a much wiser strategy.

4. Where Are We Seeing Real Momentum?

This is another fun question.

It might feel like you have no momentum anywhere, but that won’t be true for most organizations. (If it is true for you—that you have zero momentum anywhere— the problems are much deeper than a global crisis.)

You likely have momentum somewhere, and chances are it’s happening somewhere different than it did before.

Pay attention.

Example: you might be hyper-focused on getting people back in the building because that’s where you historically had momentum. You can end up being so fixated on trying to manufacture momentum where you used to have it that you completely miss that your YouTube channel is growing quickly and you have a far bigger open rate on your emails than in the past.

And when someone points out that you’re growing your open and subscriber rates, you dismiss them because it’s not where you want to see momentum.

Continue that for long, and you become the c.2003 music industry executive focused on CD sales who keeps ignoring the 20-year-old who are focused on streams that keep growing while your CD sales keep dropping.

“Streams aren’t real”  you tell yourself, and make fun of people who don’t want to ‘own’ their music or have a physical copy of it.

Soon, you’re staring out the window watching the future pass you buy.

You probably have momentum somewhere.

Study it. Try to figure it out. Ask yourself why that’s growing and how you can leverage it to reach more people.

If you want to get your mission going, fuel what’s growing, not what’s declining.

5. How Will I Find A Sustainable Pace? 

This one is really close to my heart.

I’m running into so many exhausted leaders right now.  I’ve been there.

One of the best questions (perhaps the best question) you can ask yourself is how you can find a sustainable pace.

As I shared in this post, most leaders look to time off to heal them.

The problem with that strategy is you can never have enough time off to recover from ridiculously stressful, unattainable days.

Time off won’t heal you when the problem is how you spend time on.

A decade into leadership, I went through a season of burnout that was so intense I thought I was finished. By the grace of God, I wasn’t. But I’ll never forget how painful it was. (If it’s helpful, here are 11 signs you might be burning out.)

My heart for leaders is that you find a sustainable pace heading into year two of the crisis that will give you the regular rest and renewal you need.

My formula for staying out of burnout for the last decade a half can be summed up in this phrase: live in a way today that will help you thrive tomorrow. 

Most leaders live in a way that will make them struggle tomorrow: too many hours, not enough sleep, poor diet, too little exercise, and failing to nurture life-giving friendships. Living that way slid me into burnout.

So as you move forward, ask yourself: what changes can you make spiritually, emotionally, relationally, physically and even financially (financial stress is stress) that can help you thrive moving forward?

If the crisis is a long term thing, which it appears to be, you need a longer term strategy for personal renewal.

Time off isn’t the solution for an unsustainable pace. A sustainable pace is the solution for an unsustainable pace.

Original article appeared here. 

Carey Nieuwhof is a former lawyer and founding pastor of Connexus Church. He’s the author of several best-selling books, including his latest, Didn’t See It Coming, and speaks to leaders around the world about leadership, change and personal growth.

The Carey Nieuwhof Leadership Podcast and Carey’s blog at www.CareyNieuwhof.com are accessed by millions of leaders each year.

Looking for a new position? Stop by MinistryJobs.com and have a look at the jobs that are available! Ministry jobs are hard to come by and job hunting is no fun. We help ministry job seekers find their ideal role in their next ministry – for free! More than 6 million search for a job every day. Be found! Looking to list a job or an open position? We help churches and organizations get job openings in front of potential candidates. We have several plans and packages available. Today is the day!

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4 Questions I Ask My Team on a Regular Basis

What's the Word Wednesday

4 Questions I Ask My Team on a Regular Basis

In a survey reported in Forbes magazine, staff members and subordinates were asked what they wished their boss would do better. The number one answer by far:

“Communicate with me.”

Here’s the funny thing, I bet those leaders are communicating with their team members. They just aren’t talking about the right things.

If you lead a paid staff or work with large numbers of volunteers who serve in “staff” type roles, you are leading a team.

So what would your team say about your communication with them?

If our only communication with our team is about what WE want to talk about then they probably do complain about us. They don’t just want to hear what we have to say, they want to be able share as well. They don’t want to just talk about “work”, they want to know that you care about them as an individual.

So, let me share with you 4 questions that I ask my team on a regular basis.

1. How Are You Doing in Life: Spiritually, Emotionally, Physically, Intellectually? 

This is more than the trite “how are you doing” that we might ask while passing someone in the hallway. I genuinely want you to unpack for me your current spiritual, emotional, physical and intellectual state.

Sometimes their answer is “I’m doing great” and that’s enough. But over time I’ve had the opportunity to help hold them accountable to some physical fitness or dietary goals, recommend a book that would help with an emotional issue they were walking through, or walk them through a season of difficulty.

2. What Do I Need To Know About The Areas That You Lead?

This can include so many things.

Maybe they had a recent “win” that they want to celebrate with me, or maybe there is a volunteer causing trouble and they aren’t sure how to handle it. Perhaps they are considering a change in curriculum or have a budget concern.

No matter what it is, this is my way of keeping a pulse on their area before larger problems arise and I might be caught off-guard.

3. What Are You Working On Right Now?

This is more than a micromanagement question.

I’m not as concerned with if they are returning emails as I am that they are managing their present responsibilities with an eye toward future endeavors that will help us be successful.

Depending on their answer I may be able to redirect their efforts toward things that will serve us better.

4. How Can I Help You? 

Not every leader is comfortable asking this question.

They think it makes them look weak, gives authority to those under them or exposes a flaw in the leadership.

However, the opposite is actually true. It requires strength to admit that you may have made a mistake or overlooked something, or to position yourself as a servant to those you lead.

The answers to these questions help me know my team better. Over time they come to know that I’m genuinely interested in them. They open up to me. They trust me.

What more can I ask for!

Does all of this seem like A LOT?

It actually is a lot. Frankly, it’s too much to do alone. That’s why at CourageToLead we believe, “Every Leader Needs a Coach”…because no leader can do it all alone!

Let’s set up a call with one of our coaches to talk through leading your team and organization through re-entry.

It’s simple, click the button below, schedule a time that works for you, fill out a brief application and show up to your call…we’ll handle the rest!

Original article appeared here. 

Jeremy Isaacs is a coach at CourageToLead. He serves as Lead Pastor of Generations Church in metro Atlanta. He has been coaching pastors since 2014 and has written 2 books including “Toxic Soul: A Pastor’s Guide to Leading without Losing Heart”. He has a BA in Christian Ministry from Lee University and a MA in Theological Studies from Liberty Baptist Seminary. He goes on #Fri-Dates with his wife Corrie and on Saturdays sits with her on the sidelines of sporting events.

Looking for a new position? Stop by MinistryJobs.com and have a look at the jobs that are available! Ministry jobs are hard to come by and job hunting is no fun. We help ministry job seekers find their ideal role in their next ministry – for free! More than 6 million search for a job every day. Be found! Looking to list a job or an open position? We help churches and organizations get job openings in front of potential candidates. We have several plans and packages available. Today is the day!

Find more ministry blogs at MinistryJobs.com/blog

5 Key Leadership Traits of a Great Campus Pastor

Pastor Appreciation Ideas: Over 50 Creative Ways to Bless Your Pastor and Staff

5 Key Leadership Traits of a Great Campus Pastor

The concept of the campus pastor is a genius kind of idea.

For more than a decade, the roles and responsibilities of a campus pastor have been innovated by hundreds of leading multi-site churches.

Campus pastors, while many are very capable communicators, they focus more on leadership and shepherding than on teaching and preaching.

The weekend sermon from the primary communicator is broadcast to all campuses. The senior pastor or a small teaching team typically carries that responsibility, thereby saving time for the campus pastors to invest more in the people of their campus.

Some multi-site churches choose live teaching nearly every week by their campus pastors. But in these cases, they meet as a team and construct the sermon together which accomplishes similar goals. First, the team makes the sermon better, and second, it gets it done faster. (Saves time.)

The multi-site model is efficient. It has the potential for incredible stewardship of time and talent.

The word efficient doesn’t sound very warm and fuzzy. It’s not a relational word. But the more efficient your church is, the more relational it is because you have more time for people.

The word inefficient, on the other hand, is a word that relational or not, no leader likes to hear. It wastes time and energy. A key question is: How do we design systems to invest more time in the things that really matter?

Effective is the idea that trumps both efficient and inefficient. Measurable progress, according to the goals of the vision, is the bottom line of effective leadership.

Effective campus pastors are a formidable force for good.

Because campus pastors are typically not required to do things like write sermons, deal with the overall church budget, and oversee administrative functions from buildings to leading a church board, they have more time to invest in people.

Don’t misunderstand; campus pastors are among the busiest leaders I’ve ever known, primarily because they do devote themselves to helping people grow spiritually and leadership development!

In the launch of a multi-site campus, there is nothing more important than your selection of the campus pastor.

Here are our choices for top leadership traits for campus pastors.

First, a quick list of assumed foundational characteristics, such as:

  • Humble
  • Godly character / Loves Jesus
  • Smart
  • Strong work ethic
  • Leadership drive

5 Key Leadership Traits of a Great Campus Pastor:

1) Team player 

A great campus pastor has an entrepreneurial spirit but can work within systems and flourishes on teams.

The entrepreneur in a great campus pastor gives them that edge that provides drive, ideas, and the courage to be the point leader.

Yet at the same time, they are willing to listen, take ideas and direction from others, and play team ball. Candidly, that’s not a typical combination of skill and attributes.

It’s common for leaders with drive and courage to want to be out on their own, but this unique person sees the potential of what can be accomplished through teamwork. They understand how their willingness to join a team can often advance the Kingdom in more significant and faster ways.

2) Developer of leaders

The best campus pastors are quick to roll up their sleeves and jump into the messiness, pain, and struggles of everyday life with people.

However, they are keenly aware that they must protect time to train and equip quality volunteers for ministry. Ephesians 4:11-12 makes that clear. (Equip the people for ministry.)

The best campus pastors develop other leaders. They are very good at identifying potential leaders and developing them to the point where significant responsibilities can be entrusted and released.

Surprisingly, the art of empowerment can be so difficult. It’s one thing to develop a leader; it’s quite another actually to trust them to lead and give them the keys. Great campus pastors do that every day.

3) Shepherd’s heart and strong people skills

As I just mentioned, great campus pastors jump in quickly to help people. The focus is spiritual growth, but sometimes the need is more basic, for example, a parent is struggling with one of their kids. No one campus pastor can meet all the needs, but they possess a heart that causes them to do for one what they desire to do for many.

In addition to a shepherd’s heart, the importance of strong natural people skills can’t be overestimated.

The ability of a campus pastor to connect quickly with all kinds of people, love them, and care about them is essential. 

Campus pastors think fast, but they intentionally slow down to see and meet the needs of people, including carrying an evangelistic zeal into the community to reach people.

Loving people is at the core of a great campus pastor.

4) Vision wins over a passion for communicating

At 12Stone Church, all of our campus pastors are skillful communicators, and most really love to teach. But their vision to reach people is greater than their passion for communicating regularly.

(This does not mean that teaching and reaching more people are mutually exclusive. I’m merely focusing on the characteristics that make a great campus pastor.)

Let me give an example where all campus pastors are required to be good communicators. They cast the overall vision of the church at their respective campus. They do this on the platform as well as other gatherings at their campus.

It is not necessary for all great campus pastors to be strong vision creators, but all must communicate the vision and be outstanding vision carriers into the lives of the people at their campus.

5) Cultivates and transfers church culture

The ability to embrace and transfer the true culture of the church is one of the most sophisticated and necessary skills of a campus pastor.

This ability is needed both on the platform during the worship services and throughout the week with leaders and the congregation in general.

This, of course, works best when the church’s culture is healthy and clear to everyone.

This takes strategic and intentional effort from the top leaders and everyone on the team. It carries three distinct elements.

First, the entire staff must care about the culture, and all agree upon the key values.

Second, the campus pastor must intentionally cultivate that culture, including enhancing the good and eliminating what is not desirable.

Third, the results are that the culture is noticeably present and healthy in every campus.

I’d love to know what you think.

What would you add or delete from this list of five? 

Original article appeared here. 

Dan Reiland is Executive Pastor at 12Stone Church in Lawrenceville, Georgia. He previously partnered with John Maxwell for 20 years, first as Executive Pastor at Skyline Wesleyan Church in San Diego, then as Vice President of Leadership and Church Development at INJOY. To read more of Dan’s articles, click here. 

Looking for a new position? Stop by MinistryJobs.com and have a look at the jobs that are available! Ministry jobs are hard to come by and job hunting is no fun. We help ministry job seekers find their ideal role in their next ministry – for free! More than 6 million search for a job every day. Be found! Looking to list a job or an open position? We help churches and organizations get job openings in front of potential candidates. We have several plans and packages available. Today is the day!

Find more ministry blogs at MinistryJobs.com/blog