Welcome to the Vanderblemen Leadership Podcast. I'm your host, Kristen Idicks, Manager of Marketing and Business Development here at Vanderblemen. Today I get to talk with Ben Stafley, executive pastor of the Life Christian Church. This is part one of our two-week series with Ben, so make sure to tune back next week for the second part of this conversation. Today, Ben shares the importance of staff retention through his experiences of transition and some fundamental principles that he has learned throughout the process. We hope you enjoy this conversation. Well, hey everyone. Welcome to the podcast. We're so glad you're here. I get to sit down or zoom with Ben Stapley today. This is actually week one of our two-part series. Today we get to talk specifically to candidates. We're going to talk about transitioning jobs well. Next week, all of our churches, nonprofits, education staff, we're going to talk to you about transitioning staff well, how to transition staff well. So make sure to tune in next week for that. But this week we're going to talk about all the transitions. Ben, how are you today?
SPEAKER_00I'm doing great. Thank you for having me. Big fan of Vanderbloom. Can't wait to share with your audience today.
SPEAKER_02Oh, well, we're big fans of you and we're glad to have you back. I know we've done conversations with you in the past, and I think these just hit really close to home with a lot of our audience. So we're glad to have you on.
SPEAKER_00Thank you so much.
SPEAKER_02Let's go ahead. So you wrote a couple articles, which is where the conversation started between you and I about this with transitioning staff. I think we exchanged a few emails and you sent over this one that I just think is fascinating. Um, based on some of the trends you've seen in staff retention being really hard over the last couple of years. I think it's no secret to anyone. Um why don't you just tell me a little bit about the background of what led you to write this?
SPEAKER_00Yeah, I'll start from myself from a personal standpoint. I've transitioned, I transitioned churches, jobs about a year ago. So this was a lot of stuff that was on my mind. And at the same time, I had a lot of friends in ministry who were doing a lot of transitions as well. Transitioning from one church to another, transitioning from a church out of a church, and we were all kind of learning a lot of stuff on the fly. And there were repeat conversations I was having or repeat hurdles I saw friends trying to make. And I was like, you know what? I think I want to share some of this because I've just I've learned a little bit during the season. And if I had to pay the dumb tax, because I made a mistake in this process, which we all do, I want to share it with other people so they minimize their mistakes by learning from mine. So that's ultimately that was my heart to help other people because I don't think this high season of transition is completely done yet. And uh for those people still in it, or it's ahead of them, or even ahead of them down the road, because you probably won't be with the same organization your whole life. How can they learn these principles and ultimately transition well for themselves and for the sake of the organization as well?
SPEAKER_02I think that's great. Go ahead and tell just our listeners a little bit of kind of your overview of the article, and then we can dive into some of the points that I thought are really useful.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, so for just for my background, I was in television production before I jumped into ministry. And so I have a little bit of the secular and sacred background, and then I had some friends jumping from sacred into secular professions. Um, real estate, um uh personal coaching, you name it. And I thought that there were a number of principles that I found were universal. It doesn't matter what job you're jumping into or from, these are just some good principles to help anyone transition. And then there were some unique ones that I saw for ministry that I've learned. I've been in four different churches now over 17 years, and I've learned a bunch of these that I don't think most people, they don't they didn't teach me this in seminary. I got my MDiv, but I wasn't taught this. And um my mentors didn't teach me this. I had to learn through experience. And I think some of the principles that apply uniquely to ministry are super helpful because if not, you get blindsided and you can inadvertently get hurt. And I don't want that to be on anyone. So I think those that's the way I approached it, what applies to both settings.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, no, that's really great. Speaking of blindsided, you talked about one of your first points in the general guidelines section is that there should be no surprises. And I think communication, not surprising either end of the parties. Let's talk about that a lot because I think that's a really great point.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, and it's interesting. I actually say it both ways. I say that you're super, if you're transitioning, your suit um your supervisor shouldn't be surprised. But then I also say, in a sense, they should be surprised. So I'm I'm arguing from both sides here, so stay with me. But they they shouldn't be surprised in the fact that if you are experiencing a tension or a frustration, um, instead of just packing up your your bags and leaving, taking your ball and going home, you need to voice them to your supervisor because they will probably want to help you solve them. They probably can. And so, whatever those tensions are in the workplace, those, you know, we there's always pull and push factors. Whatever those push factors are pushing you out of the organization, have you talked to them about your supervisor? You need to give them the opportunity to solve it. So, in a sense, if you kept on coming to your supervisor and just saying, like, I feel I've hit my lid here in the organization, or I want a new challenge to satisfy my desire for growth. And you've said that, you know, year after year after year in your annual reviews, and you're still stuck with the same responsibilities and no additional oversight, then when you do leave, the supervisor wouldn't be surprised because you've been you've been discussing this for a while. So that's the one way in which they shouldn't be surprised. Now, they should be surprised in the fact that your level of effort and your impact in the organization don't diminish before you give them your letter of resignation. So sometimes, you know, we I can see you smiling, nodding. Sometimes it's really clear when someone's gonna leave an organization because you just see their effort plummet. And it's I haven't been given the two weeks' notice, but it's gonna come in about a month from now. I I can tell. And from that degree, your supervisor should be surprised because your level of commitment to the job, the organization, is on par to the very end.
SPEAKER_02I think that that's such a good point. No one wants to be the person. I mean, we've all seen it where there's that person that's kind of starts disconnecting from everyone, starts walking away. You know it's coming, but it's not there yet. And everybody's kind of bracing for impact for when it does. And that's just a tension that you don't want to be the person creating in a workplace. Um, and especially in a ministry workplace. I think that just has even further detrimental effects. Um, something you talked about in, I think it was like point number three of the general part. You talk about um when you start to know when it's time to leave. What are some of the signs of when you're kind of have these negative thoughts? And these are you mentioned when it's generally negative when you think of your workplace, is when it's time to leave.
SPEAKER_00Yeah. So somebody told me years ago, I picked up this uh principle to someone else, but they told me they said, which if a percentage, zero to a hundred, um, uh a hundred being the most favorable and zero being terrible, where are you in relationship to the organization? So I'm still 60% favorable. And they said, okay, they said, um, tell me when you get close to 51. And I was like, why? They said, because there's a world, it's there's a world of difference when you go from 51 to 49. Once your overall perspective of the organization turns to negative, your your pace to departure speeds up exponentially. So he said, you know, you could live in the 60, the 55, even the 51% for a while. But once you turn to 49, he's like, you got weeks left. Because at that point, when you see things overall from a negative vantage point, I don't like the work I'm doing here, I don't like my manager, I don't like the direction where things are going, then everything gets tainted with that negative perspective. And at that point, you're you're you're just counting down your days. So um I think that's really helpful for people who are sliding down that negative ramp. Just realize once you turn that corner, it's really hard to turn back. And so I always start, you know, tell people counseling them that you know, uh, bring up those conversations with your manager beforehand, before things get negative, because once it once it is, you might as well pack up your bags. It it transitions pretty quickly after that.
SPEAKER_02Yeah. You hit on a topic. I know we're kind of talking about the general guidelines that you have, and in a little bit, we'll get into more of the church ones, but I kind of want to swing that direction for a second. And let's talk about something that I think is no secret to a lot of people in ministry, and it's church hurt. It's people that work for a church and they leave the church, things go bad, and they get really hurt, and it's really sad, it really is. Um, and I feel like you kind of hit on a way to like start avoiding that early on before you get to that hurt. Do you have anything to talk about in regards to that?
SPEAKER_00Yeah, I would, if you don't have a mentor, someone who's mentoring you personally and professionally, um, I would, I would definitely encourage people in ministry to do that. I also I've sought out counseling, actually, people who are gifted to give counseling to people in ministry because there's there's some unique challenges that we face. Um, every job has its unique challenges. Ministry has its own. And if you're not talking that to somebody who understands those challenges or is empathetic to those challenges, can help you overcome those challenges, you're really going at it at it alone. And so, my my encouragement is get personal mentoring, professional mentoring, get professional counseling as well to help you move, help you process that. Um, either process it to a degree that you can stay, or process it and help you leave in a healthy way. I like to use, you know, I don't want people leaving the organization bringing emotional baggage with them and to the next place. Oh, my last place, you can't believe what happened there. So unpack as much as uh unpack as much of that emotional baggage as you can before you transition somewhere else with people who know what know what the game is, know what the ins and outs are. So do that beforehand instead of bringing that emotional baggage with you to the next organization. It's not fair to them, it's not fair to yourself, it's not fair to the place that you left as well.
SPEAKER_02When your team isn't whole, it disrupts your mission. We have staffed over 2,500 missions of faith. Build your best team through our customized executive search. Go to Vanderblumen.com slash get started to talk with our team today. I think that's great. And I think that kind of leads up to leaving and like leaving well. I think that's a really important point. You talk about how people they remember how you leave long after they remember the work that you did while you were there. They remember if you went out and it was bad, they don't forget that. Um let's talk about leaving well.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, someone said once, they said, you know, never, never uh like the match to the bridge, but you may need to come across it. The longer I've been in ministry for 17 years. You know, for me that feels forever. I know some of our listeners here have double, maybe even triple that amount of time in ministry. Um, but it's one of the things I've noticed during that duration is the ministry world is small. And um even if it's just for self-preservation and nothing else, uh, don't leave on a bad note because that's gonna follow you wherever you go after this. Ministry world is pretty small, and people hear about how you left. So do yourself a favor, uh, leave well. And then the all the the way I like to say it is um if you came back, and hopefully you do at some point, if you're in the area, you're near the church, you have a Sunday off, if you came back, how would you be received? Would the staff say, Hey, great to see you? Or would you feel a sense of shame coming into the doors? And if it's a sense of shame, then you're probably not leaving on the right note. But if you say, No, you know, I I would anticipate being warmly welcomed when I came back, you're probably doing things well and making sure that it's a again, it's a win for everybody in that season of transition. Don't phone it in, don't light a match and try to burn the place on the on the way out. Um, you know, do all those emotionally healthy things that need to happen to preserve everyone in the situation.
SPEAKER_02I think that's great. One of the biggest things we do at Van Der Blumen is succession planning. And so we see a lot of successions and some done amazingly and beautifully, and they restore still those rent for those friendships. And then we see some that aren't done well or it's too late and they've already started that. And so I think one thing we always say is like leave leaving a legacy when you do succeed. If you're a founding pastor that has been at a church for 40 years and then you go to leave, that's a legacy you have there. And that's something important to protect and for people to honor that. And so we always talk to churches about how they can honor that and how we can celebrate that on the way out. Um, someone mentioned this and I don't remember where I heard it, and it was a joke about succession planning. I don't know if you've ever seen the play Hamilton. Um, well, there's this part in it where George Washington's leaving and Hamilton's like freaking out that he's leaving. He's like, no, I'm gonna teach them how to say goodbye. And I just think that's such a good example of like, let's let's leave well and let's show this example well. Um, and I just think it has a lot of long-term effects for the person going out and the congregation that has to say goodbye, you know.
SPEAKER_00Mm-hmm. It's especially in terms of you're talking about some of the lead pastors who may be, maybe some of their children may be picking up the mantle and running with it. Man, if you if you leave in a bad note, you're really undercutting them and their ability to pick, you know, regardless of who it is. But sometimes there's even family ties that you you cast a rock into the pond and the ripples go beyond that. And so just realizing that for those those legacy pastors to to do that, to leave a legacy. You've been here, you've invested so much. Make sure you end off on a high note.
SPEAKER_02Yeah. So let's transition a little bit. We already kind of have, but into more of those church-specific guidelines you talk about a lot in this blog you wrote. I think one of the second ones, you talk about the scope of the transition and treating it accordingly. I think this is something we see. We talk to tons of candidates, and we hear people that are transitioning all the time. We ask why they're leaving. So we hear day in, day out why people are leaving, how people are leaving, if they've already left and they're looking for something. There's just a bunch of ways to do it. Um, let's talk about the importance of taking time to realize the transition. I think the processing you touched on earlier is so important.
SPEAKER_00So, in contrast to a, again, I'm using a dichotomy here and painting with broad brushstrokes. So I understand it's not as black and white as I set it up in terms of sacred and secular, working for the church and not. But in if we're going to use that dichotomy, what I I encourage people in ministry is just realize it's completely different than trains transitioning a different job. When you transition a typical uh secular job, you're changing your employment. And that's usually it. Your social circle is still the same, your house of worship is still the same. When you leave a church job, all three of those things change at the same time. And it can be earth-shattering for people if they're not aware of what a big transition it is. You're not just transitioning a job when you leave churches, you're leaving your spiritual home and you're leaving also oftentimes a big part of your social network because there are a lot of friends that you will probably identify and built up at that church. Generally speaking, not everyone has friends at work, but at if it's a church that you're working at, you probably do have a large degree of your friends. And when you leave, you don't take all of them with you. Oftentimes they're still invested in their church, and you're going to become a memory over time to them. And that's that's news flash for some people. And for those, it is a news flash, is it can be heartache for them to go through it if they don't properly anticipate it and mourn it. So I've encouraged people, you know, don't just end on Friday at one church and start at the other one on Monday. Take take a week off in between and allow yourself to grieve what is ending before what is beginning. And if you don't do that, it's gonna be really hard for you to emotionally invest in the new church because you're still gonna be remembering the old one.
SPEAKER_02That's really good. I think my husband and I actually talked about this recently because um we moved or he moved to the Houston area only a few months ago. And we were talking about switching churches when we went to one church for years, and we loved that church, we built relationships at that church, we had our community at that church, and then you move, and you can't compare day one at this new church to years of relationships and friendship and teaching and discipleship at another church. And we've even found that hard, not even as um ministry leaders at this church, just as members. So I can't even imagine the even how much harder that would be. And so I think this is really important. And I don't think I've ever heard someone say this so clearly how important that is.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, it took me again, I pay the dumb tax on this. It probably took me my transitioning into my third church where I finally realized, hey, this is a big deal. I need to spend a little bit more time on it. So I finally figured it out and helping, hoping to help others do as well.
SPEAKER_02That's great. Um, another point you have it's simply protect his bride, which I think is so beautiful. Um, and just a great thing that I think we should talk about is like how how can church leaders protect his bride as they are as transitioning jobs.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, and I'll even I'll combine two thoughts here at once, where I would encourage people to protect their families and then and also protect the bride. When I say protect their families, in ministry sometimes compensation is a dirty word, and we don't want to speak about it. And we if if you're asking for a raise, that's somehow ungodly, but pro providing for your family, you know, if you have a family, that is a that's a biblical mandate. God wants you to do that well. It's it's an expectation on you. So having that compensation uh conversation up front and being unashamed of it or trying to um secure the highest potential you can in terms of earnings is not a bad thing. It's not now it could be, but not inherent, it's not inherently bad, I guess I'll say that. Um it could be, it could be a godly thing if you're looking to provide for your family. If you're just looking to uh amass earthly possessions, then obviously your heart's out of line there. But that's the first thing I would say is you know, protect your family. And the reason why is early in my career, I wouldn't do any negotiation. Whatever the paper was slid to me, and whatever number was on there, I said, yes, that's I guess that's it. And I didn't engage in any negotiation. And it took me a while to realize, hey, that's not really honoring my family as well as I can. So I'm gonna I'm gonna write a number, I'm gonna slide it back, and we're gonna play this little game. But um, that's a way for me to honor my family. Some yeah.
SPEAKER_02No, just on that part that we've seen is a lot of churches don't know how to do like this, might be insider information, but a lot of churches don't know how to do compensation well because it does feel dirty. No one wants to talk about it. No one, how much do pastors make? How much should they make? Um, we've started doing a couple of years ago, gathering compensation reports for churches. And so the churches, we have options for if churches just want to do compensation reports with us to have an idea. We do that. We do them for our searches, um, because it is, it's so important, especially when trying to find good candidates. Um, I think right now, in a time where there's a lot of candidates going on, it's really important. And nobody knows, very few people know how to do it well.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, I I really appreciate you guys providing that resource. And there's always a pendulum swing in terms of who's more in the driver's seat. Is it the employer who has more of the power or leverage in that relationship, or is it the employee? And I think we've seen, and I think I know we've seen that pendulum swing way over to the employee. And there's a lot of, hey, um, you're hard pressed to find uh employees. People have left the market. Uh, you know, you have two candidates you're looking at, and the other one I know is no good. And I'm the only, you know, they they have all the leverage. Um, not all the leverage, they have more leverage, or maybe a balanced leverage at this point. But it's helpful, so it's helpful for both sides. And uh, I've appreciated those salary ranges to help us in terms of a hiring staff. What is an appropriate level? And then if someone is asking for the moon, I can, hey, just we just want to show you what is out there. And so um, it may not be what you want, but what we're offering is it's actually higher than the competitive rate out there for this job in this field. And so I think that's really helpful to help both parties come to a position where they feel pleased with the relationship. And they both feel, man, I'm really excited about this. Instead of it's it becomes a win-win instead of a win, you know, a win-loose situation. Um, but get getting back to your original question about protecting his bride is something that is super helpful when you transition out of the church. Again, whatever emotional baggage that you have, any any potential wounds that you may have endured at your previous church, just realize it's still Christ's bride. It is still the church that he came to die for. And it he it is and that church, even though you may have hurt feelings by them, is still beloved by him. And so, how do you protect his bride on the way out? Well, again, it's not gossip, it's not slander, um, and it's and it's not taking it out on them for sure. And beyond that, it's helping you, if you have hurts, to forget. Give and to move on from that as well, so that you are empowered to do new ministry without this baggage along with you. So if there's anything in terms of people transitioning out of church jobs, I say remember to protect his bride. And that is a good, for me, that's a good guardrail where that'll keep you in the lane of doing things well if you just remember that statement right there.
SPEAKER_02That's great. As we wrap up, I want to talk on one more of your points that I think you made. I think we've talked a lot to people who are switching from one job to another within ministry, but let's talk about the idea of maybe you're switching out of ministry jobs. Maybe you're no longer gonna be in a church. Um, because I think your last point you talk about this is not everyone is called in ministry for their whole life and it looks different in different seasons, and the Lord uses different seasons in different ways. Let's touch on that.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, this is helpful because I've and I'll I'll say it from my vantage point. I haven't felt, I've never felt that call upon my life that Ben, you know, God's telling Ben, this is what for the rest of your life, this is what you're gonna do. It's always been seasonal. And so because of that, I've been able to approach it. But I know some other people, some other people, it's clear God's call on their life, this is this is what I want you to do for your whole life. I think the tension is oftentimes we overplay that model and that that template that if you're in ministry, you're a lifer. And if you leave, you've somehow been unfaithful to God, you've rejected his call on your life, um, or you're you know you're a failure because you couldn't hack it or make it, or or a host of other negative assumptions that may come with that. And so my encouragement for people who are on the fence is um is to determine that. And if you are, if God's called you to ministry for your life, then figure out how you can stick in there and figure out and be faithful to that call on your life. But if he hasn't, then feel released from that and and and feel the freedom to explore other options or stay in it, but don't feel, don't put someone else's yoke on yourself. It doesn't fit. And so realize the yoke that God's given you and and carry that well.
SPEAKER_02That's great. Ben, thank you so much for joining us today. I think this is gonna be such a helpful conversation for so many of our listeners. Um, for anyone listening, where can they find more of your information at?
SPEAKER_00Yeah, this article and others would be found at benstapley.com/slash blog. So if you wanted to go there and check it out, I'd love to share that content with you guys.
SPEAKER_02Great. And for anyone that is looking to potentially switching a career, at least in ministry, feel free to talk to us at Vanderblumen. We have a whole job board on our website of wonderful um churches, schools, nonprofits that we are just honored to work with. And we would love to talk about that with you. Um, and then don't forget to join us again next week as we talk about um how to transition staff well. Thank you so much for joining us, Ben.
SPEAKER_00Thank you.
SPEAKER_01Thanks for listening to the Vanderblumen Leadership Podcast. At Vanderblumen, we help Christian organizations build their best teams through hiring, succession, compensation, and diversity consulting services. Visit our website, Vanderblumen.com to learn more, and subscribe to our Vanderblumen Leadership Podcast wherever you listen to podcasts to keep up with our newest episodes. Thanks for listening.