Ever been blindsided by the fallout of a poor church staff hire? Well, brace yourself, because we're ripping the lid off the all-too-common blunders that are wreaking havoc on churches and staff alike. I'm Todd Rhodes, and in this no-holds-barred episode of the Healthy Church Staff Podcast, I'm channeling my inner crusader to tackle the crisis head-on. With 59% of church staff transitions ending in tears, the call for meticulous vetting and intentional alignments has never been clearer. So whether you're at the helm of a church or on the hunt for your next spiritual home, gear up for a real-talk guide to nailing that perfect church-staff fit.
This is where the rubber meets the road: no guests, no distractions, just pure, unadulterated insights from yours truly and the trenches of chemistrystaffing.com. I'm laying down the five non-negotiable tenets of a harmonious church staff match-up, complete with parallels to the simplicity of hiring a plumber—because sometimes, the truth is just that straightforward. Prepare to have your eyes opened to the stark realities behind that alarming three-and-a-half-year average staff tenure, the pitfalls of unmet expectations, and the pressing need for transparency. By the end of this rally cry, you'll be armed with the know-how to forge connections built to last in ministry and beyond.
Ever been blindsided by the fallout of a poor church staff hire? Well, brace yourself, because we're ripping the lid off the all-too-common blunders that are wreaking havoc on churches and staff alike. I'm Todd Rhodes, and in this no-holds-barred episode of the Healthy Church Staff Podcast, I'm channeling my inner crusader to tackle the crisis head-on. With 59% of church staff transitions ending in tears, the call for meticulous vetting and intentional alignments has never been clearer. So whether you're at the helm of a church or on the hunt for your next spiritual home, gear up for a real-talk guide to nailing that perfect church-staff fit.
This is where the rubber meets the road: no guests, no distractions, just pure, unadulterated insights from yours truly and the trenches of chemistrystaffing.com. I'm laying down the five non-negotiable tenets of a harmonious church staff match-up, complete with parallels to the simplicity of hiring a plumber—because sometimes, the truth is just that straightforward. Prepare to have your eyes opened to the stark realities behind that alarming three-and-a-half-year average staff tenure, the pitfalls of unmet expectations, and the pressing need for transparency. By the end of this rally cry, you'll be armed with the know-how to forge connections built to last in ministry and beyond.
Okay, get ready. Todd's got a high horse and he's about to jump up on it. This is the Healthy Church Staff Podcast. My name's Todd Rhodes, one of the co-founders over at chemistrystaffingcom. I don't know how you found this, but I am so glad you did. We're here every Monday through Friday and you can listen 24-7 if you want to. This is episode number 60, so you can go back. If you just joined us today, it's your first episode. We've got 59 other episodes you can go back and listen to wherever you listen to your podcast. I hope you'll go and catch up.
Speaker 1:
Today we're going to be talking about something that I call it my manifesto. Here's the topic on it. If you could just indulge me for just a little bit today and let me rant a little bit, this is my manifesto and here's the essence of it. We've got to stop the bad church hires. We just have to stop it. It's killing churches. It's killing staff people. It's hurting families.
Speaker 1:
The goal has to be healthy transitions and better longer term fits. Churches need to filter candidates. Better Candidates need to vet and do due diligence on churches that they're considering working for. It's that simple. It's that simple, except it's not that simple. The average church staff member stays on staff for about three and a half years. Of course, there are exceptions. The rules are some people that stay in their church for 30 years spend their whole career on a church 50 plus years but those are the exceptions. The rule the average staff member stays about three and a half years and, according to some internal research I conducted in the past couple years, 59% of those that responded said that their last staff transition was unhealthy. Six in 10, a six out of 10 of church staff say that the simple system that they found themselves in had failed them in some ways, and the reasons were many from churches that didn't tell them the full story about their past, senior pastors and elder boards that changed directions midstream and forced them out. Almost 20% of the 300 people that responded to the survey that I did said that they were either fired or asked to leave their last job 20%, and that's just on the candidate side. Churches had similar stories, candidates that didn't tell their full story or didn't turn out to be who they said they were, and this is the scenario that Matt and I stepped into when we created chemistry staffing about seven years ago. We knew, we know, that there has to be a better way, a way to help both churches and potential staff members find really healthy long term fits. And we did our homework and one of the things that we found one of the reasons that so many things go wrong with churches and hiring is that there are so many things that can go wrong and that's why they usually do.
Speaker 1:
Each church has a complex set of desires and demands and I'm going to go through kind of four of those really five of those that we've identified but we liken it to a plumber. I don't think we probably have any plumbers that are listening today. Maybe we do. That would be awesome. When you go out and you hire a plumber, you just want somebody that can fix your toilet right. Your toilet's clogged and you want a plumber that's really good with pipes that can really unclog that toilet and get you back in business right. My guess is that you don't care what their theology is. You don't care if they believe with you on whether you should be Calvinist or Reformed or whether your plumber is a complementarian or an egalitarian. You don't care about that. It could be that you don't care what their family situation. They may be divorced, they may be having an affair and you could just say, hey, that's none of my business, I just come in and fix my toilet In the church.
Speaker 1:
We don't hire plumbers, we hire church staff people, and there's a lot of things that go into hiring church staff people. We've identified five things that have to be in play in order for a staff person to be healthy, for a hire to be healthy, and if you're looking at a new church, there are five things that you need to look for in your new church, and all five of these things have to be present. If they're not, if you're missing on even one of these things, chances are you're gonna be leaving in that three to five year period. We talk about healthy long-term fits here at chemistry. We want to find somebody for a church. We want to find churches for people that where they can serve for at least five years, and that means that all five of these things have to be in play, and they have to. There has to be agreement in these.
Speaker 1:
First is theology. Each church needs a staff member that fits them theologically. If you're looking for a church, you need to find a church that fits you theologically. If you're looking for a staff person, you need to find a staff person that fits your church theologically. So the first one is theology. Second is church culture and DNA. Every church has a unique culture and a unique DNA. Each candidate has a unique DNA and philosophy of ministry and those have to be in alignment if there's going to be a good, healthy, long-term fit.
Speaker 1:
Personality is number three you need to have sometimes we call this chemistry, but I'm going to get to chemistry here in a second. Healthy, long-term candidates must gel with your current team and just needs to be some coherence on personalities on your team. Number four is skills and abilities, and a lot of churches hire for personality or for skills and abilities only, and that's a trap. It's important. Each candidate must have the specific skills that they can pull off the job. That is required and that's really important. So, theology, church culture, dna, personality, skills and ability.
Speaker 1:
And then the fifth one is chemistry. You need to. If you're a candidate at a church, you need to know that, hey, this is someplace I really want to serve. I want to be in this community, I want to be in this church, I want to serve with these people. If you're hiring somebody, you need to make sure that they want to be there, that you want to do ministry with them for the next five years. We often say, hey, is this the person that you're about to hire? Is this somebody you would love to have over them and their family over to your house on a Tuesday night for a barbecue? That's the chemistry piece. And if you as a church, or you as a candidate, miss any of these five chances are a healthy, long-term staff relationship is going to. The chances of it working out for five years it diminishes dramatically.
Speaker 1:
One of the things that we try to do at chemistry staffing and really what I've given my life to during the stage of my life is to help churches stop the bad hires, to help candidates stop going to churches that they will not be a good fit at. And that's what we do all day, every day, is helping churches, helping candidates find those connections, find the place where they can serve and be a healthy, long-term fit. So here's what I'd love for you to do today If you are a staff member and you feel like, hey, in the next year, the two years, maybe you're not looking now, but at some point you think, hey, I feel like God is not going to have me here forever, but I'd start like to start looking at opportunities. Head over to chemistrystaffingcom. You can add your resume and your profile for free. We'll send you some free assessments that you can take so that we can get to know you, to find out what kind of church you would be a great fit at. And if you are a church looking for staff members, we would love to come alongside you. We would love to come alongside you and we offer a lot of different ways that we can do that, from full searches on down to final fit assessments, to salary reports and helping you with compensation and benefits packages all those kind of things.
Speaker 1:
If you enjoy the podcast you enjoy listening to me here on the podcast I would love to check with you and your church and see if there's any way that we can help you as you hire during this next year as well. You can reach out to me whether you're a candidate or you work at a church. You can reach out to me anytime. I always read every email that comes in at podcast at chemistrystaffingcom. Podcast at chemistrystaffingcom. I would love to hear from you and see if there's any way that we can work together. Again, thanks so much for joining us. It's Friday. Hope you have a great weekend and we will be back here on Monday, right here on the Healthy Church Staff podcast.