217: Mistake #2: Making Their Jobs Easier For Them | Church Volunteer Series

In Stop Doing This to Volunteers: Top Mistakes Our Churches Are Making, this episode looks at a mistake that feels kind - but ends up weakening people and teams over time. 

When we over-simplify roles in the name of “helping,” we don’t just remove responsibility - we remove meaning. People don’t stay because a job is easy. They stay because it matters.

In this episode, we cover:

• How doing too much for people isn't always helpful
• Why easier isn’t the same as healthier
• People who feel needed show up with different energy

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Transcript

Laurie Graham  0:01 
Hey, welcome to the Small Church Ministry Podcast, where we help volunteers and ministry leaders experience less stress, more joy and greater impact as we share strategies that actually do work in smaller churches. I'm your host, Laurie Graham. Let's dive in.

Laurie Graham  0:22 
Hey, hey, welcome back to another episode of the Small Church Ministry Podcast. Last week, we started a series called Stop Doing This To Volunteers: Top Mistakes We're Making, like plain and simple, these are mistakes that we are making when it comes to powering our churches with volunteers. 

I do want to define just at the very beginning here, that small church and big church is very, very different. I know we have people who listen to this podcast and follow us and come to our conferences from all sorts of different sized churches, from micro churches with 10 people, to churches of 50, churches of 100, churches of 500, churches of 1000s. And this is one of the things that's a little bit different depending on the size of your church, the makeup of your church and even how your church functions, that definition between staff, ministry leaders and volunteers. 

But the essential difference, one of the essential differences in small churches, is the need, our reliance on volunteers, on unpaid people, serving and serving fully. I know larger churches also rely on volunteers, but it's in a different way. 

When you have a church that is staffed with paid experts in different ministry fields, the way that you work with volunteers is different. I know it because I started serving right out of college in a church of 3000, and I can just say it's a very different feeling. It's a different reliance, it's a different need. It's a different way to vision, it's a different way to involve people. It's a different way to develop leaders. 

And so as we talk in this series about volunteers, we're talking in the context of a smaller church where the vast majority of really significant work is done by unpaid people in your church, oftentimes they're serving as ministry leaders or even leaders without a title, and these are our core volunteers who are working themselves, oftentimes to exhaustion and burnout, and we want to stand against that. 

And so as we're in this series about volunteers, we're talking about everybody. We're talking about every single person in your church. How are we working with them. How are we developing teams? And one of the things we're calling out in this series are things that we've got to stop doing. And here's why we're talking about what we have to stop doing instead of start doing. After college, post college, I had an opportunity to go through a really intensive seven week ministry training, like I drove states away and stayed with a host family, and every day, all day long, I was gathered with a group of people with an amazing nonprofit that was training up youth leaders. 

But I will say that the skills we learned were for every ministry area and every day, all day long, for seven weeks, minus weekends, except for a couple thrown in. We focused on amazing ministry skills. And at the end of, I think every session, we even went through some books together. And at the end of those sessions, when we talked about those and at the end of a retreat, the question that really got drilled into my brain and my heart that I'm bringing to you today even is, what do you want to start doing? Stop doing or do differently as a result of this episode. If you read a book, what do you want to start doing? Stop doing or do differently after a significant conversation. Wow. As a result of this conversation, what do I want to start doing? Stop doing or do differently. 

If you're part of the Small Church Network, or you've been to our conferences, or you've heard me speak in other webinar type situations, I often end with that question, what do we want to start doing, stop doing or do differently as a result of this. I think it's pretty normal to ask a version of that question, when things aren't going the way we wish they were, when we're not seeing the results that we want, when things fail, when things are struggling. It's pretty typical to sit around and say, oh my gosh, what would, what should we do? You know, what are we going to do? 

But I would like to normalize asking that question just on a daily basis, on a regular basis, even when things are going well. You may be listening to this podcast right now going, Oh, my team's good. My volunteers are good. I'm doing well. Our church is in a healthy place, and I still want to push us all to growth, even if things are going well, like, let's make them better. You know, I don't want to live a life that's just fine, where I'm coasting. Let's be intentional. And I think this series is bringing home some really important things to look at, to assess where we're at, where we've drifted into coasting, maybe where these things are kind of sneaking in, and today is one of them. 

If you missed last week's episode, we talked about asking people where they'd rather be serving, the fear of doing that, and I was pretty much proposing that we should be asking volunteers all the time, including ourselves, what would you rather be doing. I think a lot of times there's fear with that, that people are all going to go get the fun jobs that they're going to say, Oh yeah, I don't like the job I'm doing. I want to do something else. But really it's just in light of growth, in light of moving forward, like, let's make it normal to get it into different positions so we don't have the same person serving in Sunday School or behind the sound board for one whole year, or five years or ten years, and then when they leave, we're like, Why can't anybody else do this? Because we never trained anybody, because we left one person at spot forever, or that person gets burnt out because they're the only ones who know how. 

So instead, let's invite more movement. Let's ask people what they'd rather be doing. Let's cross-train. Let's let people grow in different ways, and let's quit holding on so tightly that we keep ourselves in stuck patterns. 

So today, we're talking about the mistake of making jobs easier. Okay, sometimes we make jobs so easy for people that it takes out the significance, it takes out the beauty. It takes out the challenge of a certain role. So mistake number two is to stop making their jobs easier for them. Now I am all for setting up volunteers to succeed. Do not take this as not having a clear job description or not giving people the support they need, because we all need support, but the overall view of making people's jobs easier for them, it sounds really kind. We don't want to overwhelm them. 

Let's make it super simple. I'll just take care of that part, because that's the part nobody would ever want to do. But little by little, we start removing the thinking, the decision-making, the harder, challenging parts of a role, or the creative parts, and what's basically left is a job that anyone could do, anyone could show up, almost like we need a warm body. But it doesn't have to be you. 

Just consider that for a minute when we've broken down jobs into ways that that anyone could show up and that one person isn't really needed for who they are, and the uniqueness that they bring in. And if we want to be honest, sometimes when we make jobs easier for volunteers, we're actually making it easier for us. Sometimes we use that phrase, oh, I'm just going to make this easy for you. When we want to control things more, when we want to pre-decide. When we don't have to risk somebody doing something differently. Because if I keep the complicated pieces or the difficult pieces or the pieces that I think are going to make a difference, here, I stay indispensable, but I also stay in control. 

So just kind of keep that in mind, that sometimes, that sneaks in. And there's another layer here too, when we do more or most, when we're the ones holding it together, when we're giving the easy jobs away, but we're keeping the harder parts. I want to just talk about the whole Superwoman thing for just a second, because we get, we put ourselves in a position where we actually unintentionally intimidate people, when we've always handled it, or we've always been the problem fixer, or we're the one who anticipate what's going to happen, and we make it look effortless, like I'm good at this, people kind of stay back because they know we're going to handle it. People do start thinking, I'm not really needed. I wouldn't do it as well as she or he does. I can't give as much time as that person does. And again, we're just creating some division here. 

So stop making it so easy for everyone. Now, if you don't have this problem, or you're thinking, Well, I wish I had that problem, just kind of keep going with it, absorb what you can see, what where this plays out. Because I promise, we've all been in situations on both sides of this fence, but people don't show up because something is easy. We all have busy lives, and I'm going to say this as well. Human beings want belonging, and they want significance. We all do. We all want a place to belong. We all want a place where we feel significant.

Laurie Graham  10:18 
Where we show up, when we get to choose where we show up, it's because it matters to us. It's because it's significant. If you work a full time job, or you are a full time caregiver, or your volunteer commitments in the community are huge, or maybe you're parenting littles, the stuff we do in our free time or our off time, we show up there because it matters. Human beings want to feel significant. We want to feel responsible. We want a voice. We want to serve in places that actually use our gifts, places that light us up, places that give us a chance to learn something new. 

Most adults don't need a church to feel like it's elementary school, where we're handed the scissors and told to cut on the dotted line. We want to feel trusted. We want to be trusted. So when we dumb down jobs in such a way that actually flattens out a role or makes it so simple that it doesn't require any talent or skill or growth, we're actually flattening out the energy, the momentum, the excitement of being part of a team. Now, when I say, don't make things easier for volunteers, I don't mean that we ignore people's capacity, their need for support, their need for structure, their need for growth, their need for training. I'm just saying, let's not make things so simple that anyone could do it. Support is good. Over control, not so good. 

So what are you holding on tightly to that somebody else could grow through? Where are we stepping in too fast to rescue someone? Where are we hanging on to the keys so tightly, but then we resent that we're the only one that has the keys. This is where the shifts happen, when we can identify for ourselves, where we're even keeping significant ministry, holding it really tightly, because that's what we value, that's what we love. And we think, Oh, I don't want to give you that, because it's so hard and there's so much weight with it. But can we also acknowledge the joy and significance of it. If you're serving in an area where you feel needed, where you feel like what you're doing makes a difference, let's share some of that. 

Let's involve other people in the heavy parts of ministry, because it's really not doing anybody a favor to say, Oh, I'll do the hard stuff and I'll give you the easy stuff. So let's build meaningful roles, meaningful places where people can step in and feel significant, instead of making things so easy that they feel like errands. 

The reality is, is when we're working in team situations or ministry situations, or we're working on a vision or a mission that we're excited about, when we ask people to do meaningful things, not just something that feels like an errand or feels insignificant, you'll actually see a shift happen in the way that we all show up together, the investment and the ownership that we have. You'll also start seeing other people's creative juices start going in so many directions that it can end up being really, really fun. 

So don't make people's jobs so easy that they're really unneeded or that anyone could do this job. Don't take away the creative process, or don't take away all the visioning in the guise of saying, Hey, we're going to make it easy for them to serve. People want belonging and they want significance. 

So let's make sure that the roles out there are significant and that we're not dumbing things down so much that people feel like what they're doing. You know, it's a piece. It's a cog in the wheel. Yeah, but it's not necessarily that meaningful. So what do you want to start doing, stop doing, or do differently as a result of this episode? Maybe you're in a role that's too easy, that's too simple, that's been dumbed down, and you're like, gosh, maybe this is why I'm not feeling so excited about what I'm doing. I want to talk to my ministry leader or my pastor and say, Hey, I think this might be a key thing for me. Maybe I want to do something more significant. Maybe you lead a team, and maybe you're seeing some spots where you're like, wow, I have made this way too simple. 

Now I'm not saying to pile a bunch of work on other people without their knowledge or their agreement, but this is where we can start having some conversations. Hey, would you like to know how to do this? I set up the sound system by myself. This is hypothetical. I don't do this, but let's say you set up the sound system by yourself every Sunday morning, because you're coming early, because you don't want to put that on your volunteer. You have your volunteer come in, and all they do is they work on the sliders, you know, the the volume levels of the sound system. Why not ask them? Hey, would you like to learn more about the sound system? Would you like to be able to troubleshoot? Let's stop keeping all the troubleshooting to the expertise level of the pastor. Okay, the pastor shouldn't have to troubleshoot the sound board. 

So let's stop making things so easy for people that they lose energy or they feel insignificant. Maybe you teach Sunday School, and maybe you have somebody who helps you, you know, set up the lessons. Or maybe you have somebody who comes in and is working on the games. And maybe last week you decided to ask them, hey, what would you rather be doing? Maybe this week, it's Hey, what else would you like to learn? So what's just one thing that stood out to you from this episode? 

Just one thing. And when you think about that one thing that stands out to you, what do you want to start doing, stop doing or do differently, whether you're a volunteer, a ministry leader or a pastor, whether you're paid or unpaid, we're all in this together. Next week, we're jumping into mistake number three in our series, which is treating volunteers like their volunteers. That's going to be a fun one. 

If you're not hanging out with us yet in our free Facebook community. Please come join us. There lots of questions, lots of interaction. It's a really positive place where small church people are sharing solutions to small church challenges. That group is called the Creative Solutions for Small Churches group. 

The link is in the show notes. If you're past the idea phase and you're looking for ongoing support, real time coaching and practical tools that you can implement immediately in your small church. Come check out the Small Church Network. It's where we go deeper. The link for that is in the show notes as well. 

So until next week, when we dive into mistake number three, be a light.