Imagine working in a growing ministry where you apply your skills and talents in a meaningful way and you enjoy a healthy home. Imagine being creative, innovative, and financially stable while pastoring within a ministry of open communication and constructive feedback.
What if I told you this ministry environment is made possible by hiring, training, developing, and empowering Millennials on your pastoral staff?
The highly effective ministry environment that allows you to pastor a growing church and spend time with your family is made possible through your Millennial pastoral staff members. If you will allow them to reach for impossibilities, create attainable achievements, prioritize collaboration, build family-oriented environments, and give tech integration and training to them, you will see incredible changes in the level of effectiveness of your church ministries.
Do I Really Need Millennials on My Pastoral Staff?
The short answer is ‘YES’!!!
I can’t really express this enough. In fact, I wrote a whole book on how Millennials are changing our world and how the rest of us are going to be left behind if we don’t get on board with it…and soon. But, let me unpack that just a little bit.
When the Millennials started to come of age, the whole world started paying attention to them for various reasons. The macro reasons were because of their size being the largest generation we have, and because of their complete integration as digital natives. The generations before them were not digital natives and so everything comes a little bit slower to us in the emerging world we live in. But, not Millennials. For them it is intuitive.
So, marketers of the big brands worldwide, employees of the largest companies, the education system, and the entertainment industry just turned their focus from Boomers to Millennials. (Again, us Xers just get overlooked all the time.)
What this has meant for the last 10 years is that the world we now live in has been designed with Millennials in mind. Now, today, we live in that world. We built the world for them, even if we were passively involved. This means that Millennials function at a speed many of us don’t when it comes to integration, experience, and function of our world.
This isn’t to say they know everything, or even think they know everything, which is a common misconception about Millennials. What they know is that they can access information at the touch of a button, so they don’t have to know everything. It is easily accessible. What they do not fully understand is how the information works in real life, how to find the good information from the bad, and how to make information work for their success and the success of those around them.
How does this apply to Millennials being on your pastoral staff? Well, there is a growing trend of pastors retiring, particularly in the wake of 2020’s pandemic. There aren’t enough pastors waiting in the wings to fill those open positions, so there is a developing shortage of pastors across the country. When you add an increasing resistance to hiring young, ‘inexperienced Millennials’, then the shortage skyrockets. If you want to fill your pastoral staff you are going to have to hire Millennials and navigate through their ‘inexperience’ by training them.
That’s the doomsday reason you should hire Millennials. On the upside, Millennials bring with them incredible energy, innovative ideas, an ability to think outside the box, and willingness to try almost anything, and an intuitive understanding of technology.
One of the knocks against Millennials is the idea that they are not loyal and could leave at any minute. This is concerning when you are looking to hire a pastor hoping they will stay more than 2 years. Again, this is a misconception though. It isn’t that Millennials aren’t loyal, it is that they will not be boxed in. If they feel limited, controlled, and stifled, they will certainly leave and go somewhere else. But, if you develop them, invest in their future, are patient with them, and provide them with abundant opportunities to learn and grow, then they may stick around for 5-10 years. During that time, you will have an incredible resource on your pastoral staff team,
Even though there are some concerns with hiring Millennials on your pastoral staff, the upside far outweighs the downside. Especially if you are intentional about developing them and utilizing their talents and energy.
Alright, so you have Millennials on your pastoral staff team, how do you maximize their performance? Here are 5 ways to get the most out of your Millennial pastors and really advance the Kingdom of God alongside them.
Allow Them to Reach for Impossibilities
Do you know what holds you and the other Baby Boomer and Gen X pastors back? Experience Reality.
We have all seen so much, experienced so much, and been hurt enough that even the most outgoing of us are held back because of the things we have experienced. Call it wisdom, cynicism, caution, or whatever you will. The reality is that none of us have the same naive excitement and gusto that we did in our 20’s and 30’s.
Millennials do though.
Give them a challenge, and Millennials will rise to it. Not because of pride or arrogance, but because they are looking for the experience. They will more likely risk failure for the opportunity to have a great experience than shy away from a challenge. This works in your favor incredibly.
The world is moving at breakneck speed, and things are changing faster than we can learn them. For Boomers and Xers, everything takes us longer to learn because we are not native to this emerging world, but Millennials are. The things Boomers and Xers have to learn are intuitive for Millennials.
This means that innovation, creativity, and pivoting in ministry practices comes almost second nature to them. If you want to remain effective in your community, reach people for the Gospel of Jesus, and disciple people to become multipliers of the Kingdom, then you need to be innovative.
This is where you set your Millennials loose. They want to contribute to the effectiveness of the church, they want to prove they can serve well, and they want to make a difference. So let them. Point toward impossibilities, ask them if they want to try it, and then support them fully in their pursuit of making the impossible possible.
Create Attainable Achievements
Okay, I know that I just told you to allow your Millennial pastoral staff members to reach for impossibilities, and it seems contradictory to turn around and tell you to create attainable achievements. Allow me to unpack it a bit.
Yes, Millennials want to reach for the impossible. It feeds their ideals of doing some great in their lifetime. However, in order to keep that optimism and hope, they need little wins to keep them motivated, encouraged, and moving forward.
Millennials have grown up in a world of constant feedback. Helicopter parents, highly engaged teachers and coaches, and endless feedback in social circles and on social media make them feedback junkies. They need to know they are doing a good job and you are happy with their performance.
After you have pointed to an impossible peak of the mountain and sent your Millennial off to do something great, take some time to create some attainable achievements that may be challenging but relatively easy. For instance, ask them to plan out an evening event for the youth group or do research for an upcoming sermon series for you.
If you send them off to achieve the impossible and they don’t hear from you again, they will move from optimistic and excited to depressed and ineffective very quickly. For you, you will have no idea what happened, how to fix it, and depending on your perspective, will likely reinforce for you every Millennial stereotype. You will be tempted to think that Millennial pastoral staff members aren’t worth the headache.
And you will be completely wrong.
When you do that, then they appreciate your trust in them, and it also allows them to have quick and easy wins in the midst of lofty and impossible expeditions in ministry.
Prioritize Collaboration
For those of us who Boomers and Xers, we grew up in a world of competition and scarcity. Boomers have been fighting to climb the ladders of success in front of their fellow Boomers because the opportunities were fewer than the prospect. Xers have never really had a surplus of opportunities, so they had to create their own or settle for the scraps that were leftover.
What this has done is caused us to be very individualistic and Lone Rangers. We hate the phrase “there’s no ‘I’ in team” and we take great pride in being able to build something on our own. This is neither good or bad, it is just the reality of how we operate.
Unfortunately, we don’t have a natural bend toward collaboration. Some of us like being on teams, but we don’t fully embrace collaboration the way Millennials do. For Millennials, their lives have always been through the function of teams. In sports and academics, collaboration has been a mainstay for them, and there is no surprise they expect the same in ministry.
For your Millennial pastoral staff members, if you create an environment where collaboration is a priority and accessed often, they will thrive and be full of energy and life. For them, it isn’t about having all the right answers or being the superstar solo artist, it is about the experience of doing it together accomplishing great things while enjoying meaningful relationships.
Prioritize collaboration in your staff meetings, in your sermon development, and event planning. When you do this you are communicating that you not only value the Millennials as individuals, but you value their input as well.
Build Family-Oriented Environments
Family is central to Millennials and how they experience the world. Regardless of whether or not Millennials came from a strong family environment, they long for a family atmosphere. They will create family ties and relationships wherever they go. Enjoying family-oriented environments in ministry is the ideal experience your Millennials pastors are wanting.
Don’t just work with Millennials, enjoy life with them.
Don’t just accomplish tasks with Millennials, share memorable experiences.
Don’t just tell about your wins and victories, take them through your values and hardships.
Allow Millennials to feel close to you and the rest of the pastoral staff team. If it is work all the time, ministry in every conversation, and performance in every get-together, then Millennials will shut down and settle into the status quo.
At the same time, take it upon yourself to prioritize your Millennial pastors to have time with their families. This is a good rule for everyone on staff, however, it is vital for your Millennials.
And, this is key to all of you living your dream lives in ministry. Make family time a priority and don’t allow your Millennials to work too many hours and be bogged down with too many projects and events. You make sure they have time with family, helping them create boundaries around their ministry involvement.
This communicates you value them beyond what they can do for you and the church, but you care about them and their long-term health and ministry sustainability.
GIve Tech Integration and Training to Them
As I mentioned about, Millennials are natives of this digital world, and so it only makes sense you empower them to find, research, integrate, and train everyone else on how to maximize the tech tools your staff is using.
Most Millennials love to engage with new tech, figure out how it works, but most of all, they love to see how it makes their lives easier, more enjoyable, and more efficient. They also enjoy teaching others to use the tech and discover the value they have found with it.
This is why they are always trying to show you the new app or piece of equipment they just discovered.
Allow your Millennial pastoral staff members to spearhead any initiatives to integrate new tech into your ministry strategies. They will love the challenge, the experience of learning and sharing, and along the way, they will increase your overall ministry effectiveness.
Conclusion
Millennials are incredible resources for you to have on your pastoral staff team. They bring incredible energy, creativity, and insight to what you are accomplishing in your community. Don’t just have them on your team though. Maximize their potential, unlock everything they bring to the table, and use these 5 ways to see maximum results in your church ministries.