What if every church in America could hire just 10% better?
What if most church staff members in America stayed a full five years instead of just 3.2 years on average?
What if each of the 35,000 churches that will hire a new church staff member this year could find a great, long-term fit? And what if each of the 35,000 new staff members that will be hired by a local church really turned out to be a great fit for that specific local church?
What if?
These are the questions that keep me up at night sometimes.
Because I hear the horror stories.
"We hired a guy, but he just isn't working out."
"I took the job, but it's not what the job description said it would be."
So... back to the drawing board. Another hire. Another church.
(Granted... personnel issues can be complicated, and not every staff member is worth their weight in gold).
That said, I am convinced that one of the biggest things that holds our churches back today is the misalignment of staff. The moment your leadership struggles with conflict, incompatibility, and desperation at the staff level is the time that ministry, outreach, and mission comes to a screeching halt.
When your team is not all on the same page and moving forward, you have a tendency to take your eye off the ball. Before you know it, you've lost your effectiveness as a church and a staff.
At Chemistry Staffing, we're trying to move the dial. We're trying to make things better.
We know that we can help most churches hire more effectively.
Not that churches can't hire effectively on their own. We don't think hiring staff members is necessarily rocket surgery. But it does take a plan. And many churches can use some outside guidance and help in creating and sticking to that plan.
The plan is the key.
- Start with the Quantity of Candidates, not Quality
- Filter by Theology
- Filter by Philosophy of Ministry
- Filter by Personality
- Filter by Skills & Abilities
- Identify Yellow Flags
- Interview Intelligently
- Vet Thoroughly
- Take the 'Chemistry' Test
- Hire with Confidence
The goal? Find out as much about your church and about each candidate that you can. (You can't match candidates to your church until you do some real introspection).
Ask lots and lots of questions.
One of the keys to our process is our up-front assessment process. We run each of your candidates through our Theology, Philosophy of Ministry, Personality, and Skills & Abilities assessment before you ever see their resumes or interview them. We match over 100 answers to questions to the answers that you've given us about your specific church. That helps us find great areas of synergy with each candidate, and helps us find potential areas of tension and future conflict.
Then we help you mediate those areas BEFORE you hire. In fact, you know what those potential land mines are before you even conduct your first interview.
We've all heard the quote, "If you always do what you've always done, you will always get what you've always got."
If you find that your church needs to do better, we're here to help. We'll help you discover great candidates that will fit the DNA and culture of your church.
If your church is hiring at any time during the next year, let's chat.
Todd
