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5 Principles for Hiring Staff
Building a church staff is more art than science. Here's how your plant can be well-positioned for both health and strength.
“What do I need to be thinking about when it comes to staffing?”
As I coach church planters, this question comes up again and again.
Hiring and building a staff is an area of leadership that most church planters are unprepared for. And it’s not really their fault. They just haven’t yet been in the senior leadership seat. Even if they’ve had to hire somebody in the past (say, as a youth pastor), they didn’t usually have responsibility for building and developing a complete staff team.
If you’ve planted a church and know that it’s time to add people to the team, how do you do it? What should you be thinking about?
Below are five principles for building and developing a staff.
1. Hire to seize big opportunities or prevent fatal flaws.
How do you determine if you need a new staff person? Ask, “Will this person help us seize a big opportunity or prevent a fatal flaw?”
Some staff roles help you seize big opportunities. They allow you to take big new steps in improving your discipleship or growing your worship experience. Or they allow you to launch a new ministry that reaches a whole new group of people in your community.
Other staff roles help you prevent fatal flaws. If the kids ministry is in shambles, guests will not return. If the worship leader can’t sing or string sentences together between the songs, your people will be less likely to invite friends. If nobody can find information about the events, they can’t come.
In a church plant, the first hires often need to be those who help prevent fatal flaws. The new church is fragile, and adding a solid staffer to a crucial area will provide stability, predictability, and quality. It will give people confidence to invite friends and give you confidence that those guests will have good reasons to come back.
As a church develops, big opportunities become more important. An established church that is solid in core ministry might hire a new person to help build a food pantry or specialized ministry.
Churches get overstaffed when they hire for marginal improvement. From the beginning, determine not to go that path. Instead, seize big opportunities and prevent fatal flaws.
2. Think about functions, not roles.
Planters often ask, “What’s the first role I need to hire? Executive pastor? Worship pastor? Youth pastor?”
That’s the wrong way to think about it. Does your church need a Worship pastor? The role? Maybe.
Does your church need somebody who can lead worship on Sunday, recruit and develop volunteer band members, and work closely with you to plan compelling worship services? The functions? Yes.
Some functions every church plant shouldn’t ignore:
- Updating the website with event information
- Creating engaging social media content
- Following up on first- and second-time guests
- Investing in potential leaders
- Connecting people into groups or other forms of community
- And much more!
Instead of just thinking about it as hiring a worship pastor, what if you thought of hiring somebody who had the skills and time to do 5–7 of those functions, even if they aren’t all tightly related to each other?
As the church grows, these functions can be spread out, and staff can start specializing. But in the early days, everyone is a generalist. So, fill up their job descriptions with functions, not roles.
3. Determine if you need a builder or a sustainer.
In terms of personal makeup, most leaders are either builders or sustainers.
Builders help create something out of nothing or help an existing ministry grow to a whole new level.
Sustainers, on the other hand, manage things well and keep it running. Improvement is made, but it’s small tweaks that improve things on the margins.
Churches need both. A staff of all builders will be catalytic and dynamic, but lots of balls will drop and people will not be cared for well over time. A staff of all sustainers will keep the trains running on time, but there won’t be much momentum behind it.
As you’re hiring, determine what you most need in this season. Does the ministry need to be built? Hire a builder. Does the ministry need to be maintained? Hire a sustainer.
Frustration happens when you hire a sustainer and expect them to build, or when you hire a builder and only want it maintained.
4. Hire growth-creators first.
Some staff positions are catalysts for growth. A strong worship leader, a dynamic youth pastor, or an assertive next steps coordinator. These are positions that are likely to be catalysts for growth.
Practically speaking, these roles eventually pay for themselves. More people come, stay, and give as a result of their work.
Other positions are not growth catalysts. A facilities manager, a missions pastor, or a counseling director: these functions are valuable. Maybe even critical in some places. But they will never pay for themselves.
Here’s the deal: You eventually need both. But you should hire the growth catalysts first. These folks will come on staff, grow their ministry and the church, and help create the resources to hire the others.
5. Use simple math to plan and forecast.
With all the above principles in mind, how does a planter plan and forecast? How do you know if you can afford a new hire?
The good news is that it comes down to simple math.
First, figure out your average weekly giving per person.
Let’s imagine last year a church had 150 people and $250,000 in giving.
- $250,000 divided by 52 weeks = $4,808/week
- $4,808 divided by 150 people = $32.05/person
Now, let’s imagine you want to hire a new position that will cost a total of $85,000 (salary and benefits). How much do you need to grow to be able to afford this position?
- $85,000 divided by 52 weeks = $1,635/week
- $1,635 divided by $32.05/person = 51 people
In other words, you would need to grow by 51 people (giving at the same average rate) in order to afford this new position.
Can this position, on the basis of the new hire’s talent or the nature of the functions, help the church grow by 51 people? If so, consider bringing them on sooner.
But, even if not, use this as a simple way to plan and forecast. For example, you could use this formula to project what your budget would be if you were to be a church of 250, 500, or 1,000 people, and then, you could build out a staffing forecast accordingly.
Building a church staff is more art than science. It’s a source of tremendous joy, but also significant pain when it doesn’t go well. But if you follow these principles for staffing, you’ll be well-positioned for health and strength.
