The Healthy Church Staff Podcast
We're all about helping create a healthy, positive, and spiritually positive environment for church staff members and leadership teams.
The Healthy Church Staff Podcast
Why Staff Culture is Everyone's Job
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If you've listened to very many episodes of the Healthy Church Staff Podcast, and if you have, you'll know that we talk a lot about church step culture. But today we're going to talk about whose job is this whole culture thing anyway. We've bust the myth today that culture is only a top-down initiative. Okay? It doesn't just come from the senior pastor. It doesn't just come from the executive pastor. It doesn't just come from the board. We're going to show you how every person on your church staff shapes the culture that your team lives in, either for better or for worse, because it's time to stop pointing fingers and start building something better together. That's what we're going to do and talk about here on the podcast today. Hi there, my name's Todd Rhodes. I'm one of the co-founders over at chemistrystaffing.com, and I'm your host right here every weekday on the Healthy Church Staff Podcast. Think church culture is your senior pastor's job or problem? Here's the spoiler for today's podcast. It's not just them. In fact, it's not just your senior pastor, it's not your board. It's not the executive pastor. It's not your supervisor if you're on a larger church staff team. In fact, you might be shaping your team culture right now, whether you mean to or not. And that's what we're talking about today. We're talking about the hidden influencers of staff culture and how to shift your team from frustrated to flourishing. All right. Culture when we talk about church staff culture, culture is what you feel when you walk into the room. I've done this at many churches. You walk in the office and you immediately know. Within the first 10 seconds almost, if not within the first five minutes for sure, you can tell a lot about the culture by walking into a church office and just reading the room. At least I can. Culture is what you feel when you walk into the room. Culture isn't the mission statement, it's not what you put on the wall, it's not your branding. Culture is the lived experience of your team. It's the tone in the team and staff meetings. It's the way that conflict gets handled. That's culture. The space people feel to be honest or the pressure that they feel to pretend, that, my friend, that, my friend, is your culture and the culture of your church. So think about it. Do people avoid certain coworkers? That's part of the culture. Are there ideas that are celebrated or shot down really quickly? That's your culture. Do leaders welcome feedback or do they squash it? That's your culture. All those things feed in to your culture. And it's not just top-down responsibility. Yes, your senior pastor, your executive pastor, your board, whatever your polity is, they get to cast the tone, right? So some of it actually does come from the top. But they are not the only ones that are holding the brush. Everybody contributes. The gospel and kids ministry, the worship leader who either builds up or tears down behind the scenes, the administrative assistant who speaks encouragement or is just snarky all day long. Every word, every email, every decision is either shaping for the good or eroding for the bad your church's culture. You don't need a title to be an architect or be a builder of your church culture. All right, so we've determined that it doesn't just come from the top down. Some of it does, but all of us, if you're on a church staff, you are helping build the culture or tear down that culture. Um, here's the next thing I'd like to go over though today. And I think this is really important because we think culture are the big things. But culture is either built or broken many times in the small stuff, right? It's how you respond when somebody drops the ball. It's how you celebrate wins, it's whether people feel safe enough to admit that they're struggling. And if you want to build culture, try this. Start praising what you want repeated. Let me repeat that because it's really important. If you want to build culture, one of the easiest and best ways and fastest ways, quite honestly, to build positive culture is to start praising what you want repeated. When you see something that somebody did really well, praise them for it. Praise them individually, but also make a note among your staff that this is what happened, and man, isn't this awesome? And you can gently call out the behaviors that don't reflect your values. Here's a good question. What's it like to be on the other side of me? That's a question that you can ask as a leader because culture doesn't culture change doesn't need a budget. It just needs some brave people that are willing to ask questions like that. Here's the final c thought for today. The bottom line, if you will. Culture isn't someone else's responsibility. If you're on a church staff, culture is also your responsibility. So what are you building today? I'd love to hear from you. Podcast at chemistry staffing.com is my email address. What's one positive culture move that you've seen recently on your team? I bet if you think about it, there is one. I'd love to hear what it is. Reach out to me, podcast at chemistry staffing.com. And if you need help hiring team members who help build culture and not break it, reach out to me. That's what I've given my life and my ministry to. And you can reach out to me anytime. Podcast at chemistry staffing.com. I'd love to have a conversation with you to see how we might be able to work together to that end. All right, that's it for this week on the podcast. It's a wrap. I hope you'll be back and spend some more Todd time here on the Healthy Church Death Podcast right here.
