The Paradox of Choice: Why Fewer Options Might Help You Hire Better

Having too many candidates can actually kill your church staff hiring process by creating paralysis and an endless search for the non-existent "perfect candidate." Fewer choices and clearer criteria might be the key to unlocking your next great hire.

• The perfect candidate doesn't exist – only people with unique strengths, weaknesses, and callings
• Too many choices lead to decision paralysis according to psychology
• Churches that hire from 10+ candidates often end up exhausted, confused, or settling
• Churches with clear filters and focused lists hire with clarity and conviction
• Trust the process when you've identified your culture, theology, and must-haves
• Get clarity on: who we are as a church, what kind of leader we need, and what fit means
• Limit your finalist list and say no earlier to candidates who don't meet criteria
• Focus on your church's true needs, not just the loudest voices
• Trust that with God in the process, you need discernment, not endless options

If you need help with church staffing, reach out to me at podcast@chemistrystaffing.com. Join our free webinar on spotting good and toxic resumes on Thursday at 2pm Eastern - register at chemistrystaffing.com/learn.

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Chapters

• 0:09 The Problem with Too Many Candidates
• 0:57 The Perfect Candidate Illusion
• 2:54 The Psychology of Decision Paralysis
• 3:42 Trust the Process Framework
• 6:09 A Better Way Forward
• 7:53 Final Thoughts and Resources

Transcript

Speaker 1: 0:09

What if I told you that having too many great candidates might actually be killing your church staff hiring process? Churches get stuck, search teams spin in circles and the perfect candidate never seems to appear. Does that ever sound familiar? We're going to talk about that today, and we're going to talk specifically about how maybe fewer choices and clearer criteria might be the one thing that unlocks your next great hire. Hi there, my name is Todd Rhodes and I am one of the co-founders over at chemistrystaffingcom and I'm your host right here on the Healthy Church Staff Podcast.

Speaker 1: 0:45

And today we're going to talk about the illusion of the perfect candidate. All right, spoiler alert, there is no such thing as a perfect candidate, okay, but we'll get there in a second. The reality is we all want to get hiring right, okay, but here's the truth the perfect candidate doesn't exist. Instead, what exists is a list of people with unique strengths, weaknesses and callings. A side note here, they all have a resume, and I'm doing a special webinar. If you're listening to this on the day that it was released on Wednesday, may 6th, wednesday, may 7th. If you're listening on Wednesday, okay, I'm doing a free webinar on Thursday at two o'clock Eastern. I hope you can join me. You can just go to chemistrystaffingcom slash learn and you can register for that. It's all about resumes and how to spot a good resume and how to spot a bad or a toxic resume. Okay, so side note there, sorry, squirrel. What does exist, though A list of people with unique strengths and weaknesses and callings, and sometimes the more options that you have, the more likely you are to delay decisions, waiting for somebody who checks every single box and ends up checking out of your process.

Speaker 1: 2:07

Instead, we have a lot of the churches that we work with that say hey, I need more candidates to compare with each other. And our answer almost always and we tell this to most of our churches, all of our churches, really, before we even start a search is that if you are crystal clear on what you're looking for, the type of person, the job description, the experience that you're looking for, when you see that candidate you're going to know you won't need to do a lot of comparing and contrasting. Anyway, ask your team are we hiring for perfection or are we hiring for purpose? That's a really important distinction there. There's actually psychology that kind of backs this up. Studies have shown that too many choices lead to what they call decision paralysis. So when you're faced with 20 candidates, your brain shifts from making progress to managing all of that complexity.

Speaker 1: 3:03

Barry Schwartz is the person that coined the phrase the paradox of choice, and he says it best. I think More isn't always better. Sometimes it's worse. So churches that hire 10 plus candidates for every role often end up exhausted, confused or, worse, settling on a candidate Even though they looked at more candidates. They end up settling on one, feeling that they're still missing out. Right.

Speaker 1: 3:30

But churches that commit to clear filters on the front end and a shorter, more focused list, a lot of times they will hire with clarity and conviction and much faster and much easier actually. So how do you do this? Here's three words I use quite often with churches and with candidates both sides of the fence. Right Three words Trust the process. Okay, if you're hiring, trust the process, not just the resume. When you've done the work of identifying your culture, of your theology and your must-haves, you can trust the process is going to bring the right people forward. You can trust the process is going to bring the right people forward. This means saying no to maybe candidates early on and yes to a few strong fits because you're being very intentional. So if you're trying to keep 8 to 10 candidates alive in your process, just in case one doesn't work out or we don't see it often with churches that have 8 to 10 that they want to keep hanging on by a thread, we see it with one or two candidates that boy, we really like this person, but these two people, if this person doesn't work out, don't do that. That's not a strategy, okay. Honestly, in many cases that's fear and it leads to burnout for both your team and for the candidates, because there's not really a good way to communicate to a candidate without letting them know that they're not your first choice. So clarity is going to bring confidence.

Speaker 1: 4:57

Clarity will bring confidence and churches who get clear on their criteria early and as far as I'm concerned, early means before you even start the search. But if you can get clear on your criteria early, you will move faster and you'll make better decisions. So what kind of clarity do you need? First of all, who are we as a church? Secondly, what kind of leader do we actually need? Not what kind of leader do we want, but what kind of leader do we actually need in the season? And then, finally, what does fit really mean in our context.

Speaker 1: 5:29

Now, when your team can answer these questions, it becomes easier to recognize the right person, even if they don't have the flashiest resume, and it also means that when you can identify this person, you're not going to have eight to 10 people in the pipeline. You're going to weed that down based on those clarity questions that you set up beforehand. Because here's the truth Sometimes the best hire is the one you nearly overlooked because you were distracted by the shiny object candidate. I've seen it happen over and over again. All right, so there is a better way forward.

Speaker 1: 5:59

Here's a challenge for your next hire okay, limit your finalist list. Okay, don't go from 100 to 90. Say no earlier, it's okay. It's okay to say no If they don't meet your criteria, that clear criteria that you set up beforehand. Say no early, that's fine, and then focus on your church's true needs, not just the loudest voices in the room, and that is something that you really need to take to heart. And, most importantly, is something that you really need to take to heart and most importantly this is so important most importantly, trust that if God is indeed in this process, you don't need 20 options. You don't need 10 options right. What you need is discernment, prayer and the courage to move forward with the right one. All right, so hiring doesn't have to be overwhelming. When you simplify and you clarify, that's where confident decisions are made.

Speaker 1: 6:56

I hope this helped you today. So many times we just we think more is better, and, particularly when it comes to hiring, more is not always better. Quality is better. Knowing, having clarity on what you're looking to hire, what your church really needs not wants, but needs is incredibly key, and it will be guiding you through your search. That's what we help churches do every day here at Chemistry Staffing, and if there's a way that I can help you or someone on our team can help you or your church through hiring a new staff member or really anything to do with church staffing or building a healthy church staff team or culture, reach out to me.

Speaker 1: 7:35

I'd love to hear your story and where you're at and how we might be able to help. Reach out to me anytime podcastchemistrystaffingcom. I read each and every email and I will get back to you as soon as I can, and if you're feeling stuck, let's talk. We can hop on a Zoom call for 30 minutes. Happy to help you Again. Podcast at chemistrystaffingcom. All right, thanks so much for joining me today. We will be right back here tomorrow on the Healthy Church Staff Podcast. Hope you're having a great week you.