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In a normal year, pastors and church staff face incredible challenges and stress as they seek to serve the local church. In a year like 2020, burnout is probably a reality for most church staff members. Serving outside their comfort zones, working beyond their job descriptions, and handling the chaos of a global pandemic has pushed many pastors and staff to the breaking point.

What can employers do to care for their staff and to prevent burnout?

The problem with your employees right now is that:

• There are no boundaries between home & work.
• There is no break, and they are not really taking a Sabbath.
• Ministry staff are stretching in areas that are not in their wheelhouse.
• They have kids at home trying to do school.
• They are caring for everyone else—but not themselves.
• They are worried—All. The. Time.

What can employers do?

1. Make staff care a priority.
2. Be intentional.
3. Offer resources.
4. Create a plan.

Make Staff Care A Priority

Lead your staff like Jesus led the disciples. Even though the masses hungered for Jesus’ teaching and healing power, he took deliberate steps to invest in his disciples and to retreat even when the masses were in need.

Remember that there will always be another fire (community needs, online hiccups, and congregant issues).

Additionally, remember that you cannot please everyone all of the time. There will always be someone who has a big problem with whatever decision you just announced. Even in the best of times, pastors and lay leaders get pushback on decisions and emergencies always arise. It is easy to allow these urgent needs to overshadow staff care.

Leaders, board members, and the personnel committee should recognize the necessity and importance of staff care and make it a priority regardless of the ever-shifting winds of ministry.

Be intentional

Take concrete steps to listen to your staff. Find out where they are physically, emotionally, mentally, and spiritually. This may require you to talk to non-core staff members or even spouses that feel more free to open up. Core staff members often feel forced to always be on top of things and never telegraph their shortcomings. Make an effort to get the real story about your staff’s well-being.

Next, ask yourself: What are we doing to ensure that our staff are healthy in every area of their life? Are you enabling (and encouraging) them to use vacation hours? Have you taken steps to create space for them to rest in your ministry calendar?

Finally, evaluate your staff care processes. How are you keeping staff accountable? How are you checking in on not just their job performance but their personal life and their well-being?

Offer resources

Frustrations and stress inside the church is often hard to discuss within the walls and confines of the church. Sometimes the best thing you can do for your staff is to provide access to outside counseling services. Pay for the service and encourage your staff to take advantage of counseling.

Additionally, you can provide them with access to retreats, time away, and even the vacation homes of members. Senior staff often get access to perks such as staying at someone’s vacation home. Are you making those same opportunities for quality, inexpensive time away, available to all of your staff?

Finally, ask your staff what resources they need or they could use. You might be surprised what you learn.

Create a plan

Your church may have a well-thought out vacation day policy, but do you actively help staff to manage their vacation days and do you encourage them to take time off? It is one thing to add vacation days to a salary package. It is another to empower staff to take vacation and create space in your ministry calendar.

Watching your staff for signs of burnout. Take the time to learn about burnout, how it works, what to look for, and how to prevent it. Then create a culture of checking in with your employees. Create a plan to deal with ministry burnout among staff before it starts and before its too late.

• Learn more about self-care for ministry staff and the signs of burnout | Self-Care: How to Practice Self-Care and Avoid Ministry Burnout

Be cognizant of your non-exempt workers in a work-from-home world. Salaried employees often assume that they will be working more than 40 hours a week. Churches have a bad habit of hiring and paying part-time employees and then working them full-time. Working from home during the COVID-19 pandemic has only made that reality worse for part-time staff. Create a plan to help these employees work part-time and manage stress.

Finally, plan for and give your staff benefits, awards, and ways to care for themselves and their families that are low-cost and high-impact. Take some time as an executive team and brainstorm ways that you can care for your staff in the coming year. It will pay dividends for your ministry and the lives of your staff, as well as their families.

Tiffany Henning is a veteran in Church & Ministry HR with over 20 years of combined experience, earning her SPHR and CRPC. In 2016, Tiffany founded HR Ministry Solutions, a faith-based non-profit specifically created to simplify HR compliance and staff pain points for churches and ministries. She serves as the Chief People Person of HR Ministry Solutions overseeing a team of church HR experts whose purpose is to help churches and ministries create an organization that is healthy and sustainable.