Every time you hire a new staff member your staff culture is momentarily disrupted and will soon change for the better or worse. The outcome is determined by the strength of the culture and the quality of the staff you select.
There is often an unintentional tendency to conduct what seems more like a parade of friends than a process to hire the best candidate.
The position doesn’t matter, and it can be the pastor, technical personnel, someone on the children’s ministry team, a worship leader, or support staff, etc. There is always the danger of parading pedigrees and picking who’s popular rather than digging deep and remaining diligent through the process.
Whether your church is large or small, every person you select to serve on staff matters in a big way. Each one carries the culture, vision, and heart of your church. One misaligned staff person can truly hurt the team.

Releasing a staff member is much more complicated than hiring one.
And because this is true, there is an inherent temptation to think about hiring as relatively easy and therefore lighten up in the process. Big mistake. Dig in, do your homework, and make wise choices.
1) Lowering standards
When you are short a staff member, either someone else carries those additional responsibilities, or the job doesn’t get done. That creates pressure. Time passes, someone becomes overloaded, balls are dropped, and the cracks start to show and reveal themselves in your ministry.
Your pressure increases.
Soon, if a candidate says they love Jesus and likes coffee, they start looking pretty good. Yes, that’s exaggerated, but if you’ve been hiring for a while, you know what I mean.
Set your hiring criteria and hold firmly to it. Never lower your standards.
It’s far better to wait than to settle and make the wrong hire. You are not looking for a perfect person, but you do want the right person.
If you hire a part time temporary staff member to help keep things moving forward, always remember there’s a reason you asked for a temporary commitment. It’s easy for that person to start looking really good, but that doesn’t mean you should make them a permanent hire.
Hold to your standards.
2) Surrendering to politics
A leader’s personality matters, of course it does. In John Maxwell’s book, The 5 Levels of Leadership, Level 2 reminds us that people follow you because they like you. But if personality and likeability are the primary reasons you are hiring someone, you are making a mistake.
Hiring someone you know can be a great advantage. It’s smart to hire people from within your church when you can. But hiring buddies, good friends or an influential person’s son or daughter primarily because of the relationship rather than competency needs to be avoided at all costs.
Don’t give in to political pressure when hiring. Hold strong. Each candidate must be able to stand on their own merit and capable of doing the job.
Making good hiring decisions requires courage to hold fast to your values. Never surrender your convictions for the sake of making people happy.
Making progress is always better than manufacturing peace.
3) Rushing the process
If the person is worth hiring, and God is in the process, there is no need to panic and hire fast. You won’t lose them if they are the right person and called by God to serve on your team. Take your time.
Taking your time doesn’t mean to go slow. Keep moving. You should be doing something nearly every day in a hiring process. It may take months to find the right person, that’s OK. The principal idea is to cover all your bases and don’t cheat the process.
One good rule of thumb is to have three good candidates that you would hire before you select one. This isn’t always possible, but the closer you adhere to that practice the better your hires will be.
*Take your time when hiring. You won’t lose the right person if they are called by God to serve on your team.
If you’ve made a good hire the team will not remain the same, healthy changes will come and the outcomes will be noticeably better.
4) Unwilling to ask the hard questions
It’s easy to see how this happens. You like the person, they like you, and you share good chemistry. You have a relational approach, and so before you know it, it feels like you are good friends. But you don’t really know the person yet, not like you need to.
This sets you up to skip the more difficult questions. Most of us have done this. For example, I’ve skipped asking about theological issues, temptations they face, or fears they battle. That’s a mistake. Or specific things such as belief about tithing, their personal prayer life, or recent mistakes they’ve made.
Asking the hard questions isn’t done with a harsh spirit, or in a way that makes the hiring interview uncomfortable. It’s about expressing appropriate maturity between you and the candidate to genuinely get to know each other.
This includes calling references. A practical tip here is to always ask for at least one or two more references than are listed on the resume.
Asking the hard questions in the interview process is much better than making the hard decisions when you must release someone from the team.
5) Failing to involve a group
No matter how smart you are, or how much experience you have, hiring someone by yourself is a mistake. Your personal perspective is good, but it’s too narrow. You need input from others to make the best choice.
If you are the pastor of a small church, ask two or three business leaders in your church to help you. If you are a staff person in a large church, it’s important to form a well-selected team of at least three people from your staff.
Even five interviewers are not too many. This doesn’t mean you surrender the decision to a group vote, and there is usually a final decision-maker, typically the new hire’s direct report. However, if that decision-maker is wise, they will listen carefully to the input and opinions of the team.
Avoid these five mistakes, and you’ll make better hires!
Dear Pastor Dan Reiland, the Pastor’s Coach;
Thank you for your commitment to continually sharing your insight and wealth of experience.
Please, permit me to add my voice to the topic.-
In hiring, hire Character before Competence. But both are not mutually exclusive.
Knowledge, Skills and Attitude (KSA),
With the right Attitude, knowledge could be acquired and skills could be developed/trained for.
…
So, hire and promote first on the basis of integrity; second, motivation; third, capacity; fourth, understanding; and last and least, experience.
Without integrity, motivation is dangerous; without motivation, capacity is impotent; without capacity, understanding is limited; without understanding, knowledge is meaningless; without knowledge, experience is blind.
Experience is easy to provide and quickly put to good use by people with all the other qualities.
-Dee Hock
Thank you Abimbola,
These thoughts are a great addition and help all of us continue to learn and grow.
Many years ago I worked for the best company in America in what we did. That was like a dream job, because the people I worked with were some of the best. My boss was the VP of the company. He told me he hired for the things you cannot train. That company had me take a battery of tests. They checked to see if had any moving violations. They did a credit check and a background check. After I had the first interview I felt privileged that they had selected me for an interview. When they notified me that I was excited because of the interview and how thorough and honest they were with me. After I had been there for three weeks the owner visited with me. When I came home my wife asked me about how it went. I felt 50 feet tall. The owner expressed to me how fortunate he felt that they hired me. I felt fortunate to work there. That company gave me many opportunities in which I flourished. It was an opportunity for me to lead in ways I had always felt leadership should lead. After about two months the company gave me a 60% pay increase. After one year they gave me another 60% pay increase. There was a time when I was offered a different position and the pay was so high I was shocked. I was so shocked that I asked the VP if the owner would follow through. He told me the owner always had. The owner was a Christian and was a man of integrity. Anyone who knows about that business gives a lot of respect to anyone who has worked there. The owner’s philosophy was that excellent employees pay. They are not a cost. Churches should have the same attitude. If the church does not know what to do then they should hire someone to do what needs to be done. When I pastored I was shocked by those I heard who said they needed a pastor. So often they just want someone as a pastor who will stay. I would suggest those churches will eventually die or seriously decline with that kind of attitude. Recently I listened to a video and the person is a church consultant. He said he expects about 30% of the churches in America to close their doors. Recently I was shocked to hear someone else talk about the percentage of people in churches who are unwilling to share their faith. Churches should be led and filled with people who are eager to grow and led by the best people.