I hear from senior leaders often that staffing is the hardest part of running a church. I’ve spent about 15 years and 10,000+ hours thinking about this. I’ve done a few thousand interviews and helped hundreds of organizations. Some once, and some over and over almost every year during that time, working on this problem. I know…I am slow.
Like an engine to a car, there are many cylinders that must be firing in the operation of your church. I also know as I type this sentence, it’s not going to age well because at some point all cars are running on a battery, but go with me.
Seems like four important ones (not in order of importance) are:
Vision
Money
Facility
People
Your senior leader brings the vision. The Lord has the money. Facilities can be figured out.
Let’s focus on the people. People, and I’m talking paid staff on your team, continue to be the difficult engine. I’ve sat in church and listened to a leader say things like “finally, we have the dream team assembled to take the hill of the future,” only to then have someone resign.
I’m going to propose something to you. You should be recruiting whether or not you have an open spot.
Question: What is your 18-month turnover? In the marketplace, there’s an equation to determine an annual turnover rate, but I’m proposing we look at 18 months given the nature of ministry and the speed at which we move.
So go back 18 months and count. Now go back 18 months before THAT and get that number. Average those two numbers. That’s your 18-month turnover. Here’s my math that I believe maths:
Turnover TO (that’s the number you just worked out) PLUS
Projected Growth PG (Growing at 10%? 15%? Plan to double? Turn that growth into people using your attendance-to-staff ratio) PLUS
Big Leap BL (Are you planting churches? Launching a campus? Opening a facility? Dropping a new balcony in? This leap requires people based on your attendance-to-staff ratio.) TIMES
New Vision NV (Is there a chance at some point your senior leader is going to come back from a trip and change the playbook? New playbooks require new people. This may accelerate your TO. I’m not saying this is wrong or bad, but it is pretty normal. Multiply by 1.5 if this happens or just leave at 1 if it doesn’t).
So your turnover plus projected growth, plus big leap, times a new vision equals the new staff required (NSR) to carry all of this forward.
(TO + PG + BL) x NV = NSR
Don’t ignore NSR.
What is your NSR for the next 18 months? And the 18 months following? Knowing most searches take 6 months, how does this impact your hiring strategy?
Ignoring your NSR looks something like thinking you are finished recruiting when you get that last hire done. You take down the landing page, you stop talking about it amongst connected people, etc.
If I went to your website today, would I get a sense that you understand the new staff required for your visionary future? If a good friend asked me if I was interested in working there doing something, would it be clear to me what I should do?
Is there a clear and simple landing page even if no jobs are currently posted?
“Here am I, send me.” We want that answer in our future staff, but are we consistently asking that question?
If you want to discuss how to make sure you are paying attention to NSR just hit me up. It’s actually a favorite topic of mine.