Recruiting and Developing Effective Leadership Teams (Part 2)
Hiring Staff: Inside or Outside? Full-Time or Part-Time?
by Royal Speidel, Distinguished Evangelist in Residence, The General Board of Discipleship

In part one of this article, we looked at the importance of recruiting and developing effective leadership teams. This article will look at two important questions: where should churches look for potential new staff persons and should they be full-time or part-time?

When a church needs to add paid staff, where should it look — inside or outside the church?

There are several good reasons to consider hiring members of your congregation:

• People from within are known by the congregation.
• They have a track record of service; they are known for their leadership qualities.
• In addition, people from within tend to have a deep commitment to the congregation because it is their church. They are not working for strangers.

Friendship United Methodist Church in Bolingbrook, Illinois, grew its paid staff from five in 1987 to twenty-one in 2001. This was done using a model — advocated by Lyle Schaller many years ago — of employing part-time lay staff. The church found gifted laypeople who were willing to work for $10 an hour. They were highly committed because they were working for their church. They felt honored that their church asked them to work for it. Schaller's model proved to be very successful in that setting.

There is, however, a downside to this potentially ideal arrangement. The biggest argument against hiring from within is that if it does not work out, terminating employment may create a larger rupture in the life of your congregation than if the person had been an outsider.

There are also several good reasons to consider hiring someone who does not belong to your church:

• Someone from outside the church may be more objective about the congregation, which could be a positive.
• There are times when a church needs skills that are not found among its members. Hiring from the outside may help a church to find someone with the competence necessary to do the job.
• As mentioned before, it is easier to supervise and, if necessary, to terminate a church employee who does not belong to the church.

When a church expands its staff, should it hire a few full-time staff or several part-time staff?

Some advantages of hiring two part-time staff versus one full-time staff person:

• Two people bring two different personalities and two points of view to your staff. This potentially could appeal to more diverse groups.
• Sometimes, two heads really are better than one! An attentive hiring committee may, by hiring two staff people, more effectively address the church's needs. For example: Let's assume the church is looking for a youth director and a director of education. The personality most suited to reaching young people and the organizational skills to put together an education program may be harder to find in ONE full-time staff person than in TWO part-time staff.

The downside of the part-time lay staff model is the difficulty of supervision. When a staff grows to twenty part-time people, it is difficult to properly supervise.

• It is difficult for the pastor to give each staff person adequate time.
• Finding a common time for staff meetings is challenging.

Adding additional staff will have a great impact on your churchÕs ability to be more effective in reaching your community and in making disciples of the Lord Jesus Christ.

Posted 9-1-04.