Your Staff's 'Why': The Key to Engagement & Impact
Apr 30, 2024Season 1Episode 82
Todd Rhoades
Ever wonder how church staff find their work deeply fulfilling? Well, 72% do, and in our latest podcast, we crack open the secrets to their job satisfaction. I’m Todd Rhodes, and at chemistrystaffing.com, we've been on a mission to understand what makes a church role more than just a job. Our church staff health assessment unveils the transformative elements that align personal and professional goals, the impact of regular feedback, and the essence of being part of a supportive community.
This episode isn't just a celebration of high spirits; it's also a crucial guide for leaders seeking to elevate their team's contentment. We zero in on the 28% who aren't basking in job satisfaction, discussing the actionable steps to ensure everyone on your church staff is thriving in their calling. From aligning individual passions with the church’s mission to the power of an 'attaboy,' we cover it all. Join us as we navigate the path to a profoundly fulfilling church staff experience, and maybe, just maybe, you'll find a nugget of wisdom to apply to your own team.
Ever wonder how church staff find their work deeply fulfilling? Well, 72% do, and in our latest podcast, we crack open the secrets to their job satisfaction. I’m Todd Rhodes, and at chemistrystaffing.com, we've been on a mission to understand what makes a church role more than just a job. Our church staff health assessment unveils the transformative elements that align personal and professional goals, the impact of regular feedback, and the essence of being part of a supportive community.
This episode isn't just a celebration of high spirits; it's also a crucial guide for leaders seeking to elevate their team's contentment. We zero in on the 28% who aren't basking in job satisfaction, discussing the actionable steps to ensure everyone on your church staff is thriving in their calling. From aligning individual passions with the church’s mission to the power of an 'attaboy,' we cover it all. Join us as we navigate the path to a profoundly fulfilling church staff experience, and maybe, just maybe, you'll find a nugget of wisdom to apply to your own team.
Hello there and welcome to the Healthy Church Staff Podcast. My name is Todd Rhodes. I'm one of the co-founders over at chemistrystaffingcom. This week, on the Healthy Church Staff Podcast, we are looking at church staff job satisfaction. That's all a part of our series on healthy church staffs here in the United States and a lot of this information comes from the assessment the church staff health assessment we did last year. I'm sharing some of those results with you and also inviting you to be a part of our 2024 church staff health assessment. You can do so over at churchstaffassessmentcom. But let's go ahead and dig right into it.
Speaker 1:
Today we're looking at a vital topic and that is the sense of accomplishment and purpose in our work and ministry in the church. How many of us are really feeling fulfilled by what we do every day? We're going to talk about that today, and last year on the church staff health assessment, we gave a series as we are this year of statements and asked. Over a thousand church staff responded to this statement. I regularly feel a sense of accomplishment and purpose in my ministry and I just want to start by saying some of the positive things. A substantial 72% 72% of church staff of those a thousand people, a little over a thousand people that submitted their assessments last year, 72% reported feeling a strong sense of accomplishment and a strong sense of purpose in their current staff role. However, not everybody shares this sentiment. About 10% are not feeling fulfilled. About 18% are neutral, like on the fence. So this mix of experiences provides us some valuable insights into what's working and some insights into what might need to be adjusted. Okay, so let's take a look at the positive responses so far. Here's what we learned from those. What was it 72% that say that they feel a strong sense of accomplishment and purpose. What do we learn from them? Well, it appears that their roles and the church's activities align really well with their personal and professional goals. So this might be just due to the work being meaningful. It could be that the work and the church again aligns really well with who they are personally and what they want to do professionally in ministry. It could be we heard this quite often that one of the reasons people feel fulfilled is because they do get adequate feedback and recognition of their efforts. And some people just simply are fulfilled because they feel like they're a part of just a supportive community, a supportive church, a supportive staff, a supportive board, all of those things kind of factor in. These are really the things that can turn just an ordinary job into a profound calling and someone that is not dissatisfied or neutral but, man, they're feeling really fulfilled in their church staff role. So those are some of the positive things.
Speaker 1:
Let's look at addressing those 10% that either said disagree or strongly disagree. Those are the two criteria. 10% of those people that we asked are you fulfilled? 10% said I disagree, I'm not fulfilled or I'm really not fulfilled in my church role.
Speaker 1:
And if you're a leader of one of these staff, it's crucial that you really take some steps to not only understand but to address these gaps. Are you getting regular feedback from people? Do you know that somebody's on the bubble, that they're not fulfilled? And, if you do, what have you done about it? Have you reached out to them to communicate and to have some conversations? The simple thing that we learn from the people that are satisfied is that they're getting that regular feedback. Are you giving feedback to the people that maybe you feel are maybe in that neutral or dissatisfied area? Make sure you're giving them feedback and good feedback and a good pat on the back every once in a while A good attaboy never hurts anybody, particularly if they're feeling not fulfilled or are on the bubble anybody particularly if they're feeling not fulfilled or are on the bubble.
Speaker 1:
It could be and we mentioned this yesterday it could be that one of the reasons for lack of fulfillment is that they're just not in the right role. Maybe you know that and you've known that for a while. They're not in the right role. Now's the time to take for you, for them and for the church. Make sure that they're in the right role and that their individual passions and the passions of your church align. That might just be what needs to be done Maybe just a few little tweaks that are going to help those that are not feeling unfulfilled.
Speaker 1:
And then let's take a look at the neutral group, because this was a fairly large group it's about 18% that have. They're on the fence, they've got mixed feelings and engaging them could involve maybe introducing some new challenges I've mentioned before. Maybe they're just a little bored or just going through the motions and just don't have anything really that they feel excited about. So maybe a new challenge, maybe clarifying the impact their work is having, which, again, is feedback saying hey, job, we really appreciate you being here and the work that you're doing is making a positive impact in the church. Sometimes that's all it takes. Some little encouragement along the way that will really help encourage those that are in that neutral group. Let's talk about some opportunities for improvement in that neutral group. Let's talk about some opportunities for improvement.
Speaker 1:
Though and this is I'm going to go off on a little bit of a tangent here and you can either listen to me or not listen to me, but this is just something that I'm reading between the lines, particularly because in my work at chemistry staffing we work a lot with candidates all day, every day, of all different ages and different types and different specialties, youth and worship and all different kinds. But one of the things we're seeing generationally, particularly with younger candidates and this is different than what it was in my generation is that they're looking for lots and lots of feedback, and they're looking not just for a lateral job, they're looking for areas that they can advance in their career, and I think this is a huge mistake that churches make all the time is that if you hire let's say you hire a youth pastor, there's no really way for a youth pastor in most churches to make any kind of career advancement. Sure, sometimes they make it from youth pastor to a campus pastor or to a discipleship pastor or a different role, but there's no real career track inside churches and that really wasn't important in my generation because I was a worship guy, so I just anticipated that my role in churches would be a worship pastor. Candidates and younger people in the church role are really looking at that career track, thinking, hey, I'm not going to be a youth pastor all my life or I don't know how long. I want to do worship ministry, but I feel called to ministry. What else can I do here? So if there are ways that you can tweak some of those job descriptions and make roles for people in areas that they're passionate about, number one, it's going to help you with keeping really great staff and number two, it's just going to help you attract additional team members when you need to. Sorry, I'll get off my high horse now, but that's something that I've really seen here in the last few years and I don't think that's a bad thing. I think it's just it's different and churches particularly if you're a leader in my generation, need to understand that a lot of the people that are on your team that are younger are looking for that fulfillment, but they're also looking to change it up a little bit and to I don't want to say, move up the ladder. That's not the right thing and you don't want to say that in ministry. But at the same time they're looking for different ways that they can advance their ministry career. So if you can do that internally at your church, you're going to keep staff members longer, because if they can't find it there, they're going to probably after a few years they'll get bored and restless and want to move on and do something a little different. All right, todd rant done.
Speaker 1:
Let's wrap this up for today. And the wrap up today isn't any different than really what it was yesterday and even last week, when we were talking about communication. This week it's about staff how well staff feel and confident they are on our teams. This is not something that, if you're a leader and you're trying to create a really great staff environment, this is not something that you just flip a switch and everything is fixed. This is a continuing, continuing, hands-on approach to making sure that you not only keep those that are satisfied but those that are lacking fulfillment, that you find ways to engage them and those that are neutral, that you find ways to make them in that satisfied category. It's one of those things that's going to take time, but you need to look at it as, hey, we want to be better tomorrow than we are today. We want to be better next month than we are this month. We want to be better next year than we are this year, and that will not happen without a plan.
Speaker 1:
Maybe you're at a point where you're like Todd, I just don't know what to do. I've inherited a staff. I've got some staff that maybe three quarters of them, like the survey says are zoned in and doing great, but I've got some neutrals and I've got some that are maybe not in the right seat or just are not happy where they are, and I need some help. I would love to work with you and your church. You can reach out to me anytime. Just reach out at podcast at chemistrystaffingcom. I'd love to be able to bring some of, hopefully, my expertise and the expertise of my college here at Chemistry Staffing to bear with you and, at the very least, would love to hear your story and see if there's any way that I can help. So you can reach out to me anytime podcast at chemistrystaffingcom.
Speaker 1:
And as we close, we just opened last week and it's open for a couple more weeks, but I'd love for you, if you haven't already, to go take the 2024 Church Staff Health Assessment. It is available at churchstaffassessmentcom. It's absolutely free. You'll take I think there's about 50 questions on there that will ask you different aspects of how you're feeling About your current church role and then at the end we'll send you an email With a score between 1 and 100. Tell tells you from the answers to your questions how healthy we feel like you are. A really insightful report, absolutely free of charge, and you can take that today at churchstaffassessmentcom. Thanks so much for joining us today. We're going to continue on tomorrow. I hope you'll join us right here on the Healthy Church Staff Podcast. Todd Rhodes out.