Building a Ministry Staff Team

I’m fortunate to have a stellar ministry team that I get to work with every single day to create these environments for children every weekend.  Some of them are administrative experts, others are creative geniuses, others are gifted communicators, and every one of them is truly dedicated to the vision of our church and ministry vision, values, and mission.  I’m speaking of our paid staff team that does Children’s Ministry at Trinity Church.  Every one of them has been hired by myself, and they all fit together nicely.  Do we always get along?  I’ll let you ask them!

When building a volunteer team you often take what you can get your hands on, then work to find the right place for them.  That means sometimes you bring someone on for one volunteer role, then move them elsewhere when you discover more about their gifts and/or talents.  However, with a ministry staff team I have to get it right the first time, and except for the rare exceptions; I need them to do the job they’re hired for because… I’m paying them!  The reality is that the ministry staff team that I build has more to do with the health of my volunteer culture than many of the volunteers.  Choosing the right person to come on staff is important, and it’s a slow process.

When I’m going through the hiring process, of which I’ve been doing quite a bit over the past 3 months; I look for some key qualities in those that may potentially join my team.  Over the next three posts, I’ll be covering the three most important things I look for in a person that has the potential to join my ministry staff team.  This is not meant to be an exhaustive search, as there are many, many, many things I’m looking for in each staff candidate.  However, these are the big three that are the same for every position and every person.