The New UCC Profile Process Part 2: A Web Link Strategy

Me, according to Vizify. Vizify is an easy to use website that enables you to consolidate your web links, but it might not be your best option...

The New UCC Profile process will go live in just three short weeks, on January 31, 2014. I am blogging about my experience using the new process. (Check out my first post for an overview and review of the process.) Because I am not currently able to actually work with the online form, in the meantime I'm blogging about gathering and preparing materials for putting my profile together. I'm going to start with what is probably the most difficult step--creating web content for the weblinks section of the Profile. This section is optional, but strongly encouraged. As time goes on, I suspect that the weblinks section will become more and more important to search committees. At this time it is probably just something that will give you a little extra "edge" in the search process--if you provide your links in a well-thought-out way.

My current plan is to provide one link on my Profile that will lead to all other links. You may choose to use multiple links, but I think it is best to use as few links as absolutely necessary to provide access to all the web content that you want to provide to search committees.  There are various options for doing this. In this post I am only going to deal with options for consolidating your web links. In a future post I will provide suggestions about actual web content you might want to add (such as YouTube videos of sermons, Podcasts, etc.). I am only going to present options that I have actually tried. I have no doubt that there are many other options.

LinkedIn: LinkedIn is a popular networking website. Stylistically it is fairly similar to the new UCC profile--minus the networking aspect. I maintain an online resume and some visual portfolios at LinkedIn. It is fairly easy to put together a LinkedIn Profile. The visual profiles are easy to use, but it is so similar to the new Profile that I think most UCC Pastors will not want to add this link to theirs.

Vizify: Vizify is an easy-to-use do-it-yourself website maker. The free version allows you to create a page with an address based on your name (www.vizify.com/Jane-Pastor). You can add photos to personalize it and the way it consolidates all of your web links on a single visually-interesting page makes it a great option for Pastors who have not worked much with creating websites. If you haven't done so already I'd encourage you to check it out--it's easy to use and free. 

WordPress: WordPress is a popular tool for creating websites and blogs. It requires some specialized computer skills (or the aid of someone who has such skills), but it gives you access to an incredible array of themes for websites, many of which are free. You will need to choose (and pay for) a web host for your site, but once it is set up it is fairly easy to add and change content. 

Blogger: My current site is a blog at Blogger, which is a free, easy-to-use blog website that provides a variety of styles of templates. It is also possible to download your own background images. The style I use is called "Magazine."  Because I have a fairly uncommon last name I found it easy to secure a good name for my site, but The Reverend John Smith might have a problem, since many blog names on blogger are already taken.

Facebook:  Facebook gives you all the options you really need for a professional website to compliment your Profile. Although Facebook discourages it, many individuals maintain separate personal and professional Facebook pages. 

Regardless of whether you provide one web link or multiple links on your Profile, the really important thing is to provide relevant content through your links. In my next post I will talk about some things to consider in providing web content through your Profile.

This is part 2 of a series of posts about the new UCC Profile process. Read part 1, which provides an review and overview of the process here.
Part 3, in which I discuss pitfalls to avoid in providing links to web content, can be found here.

I blog, therefore I am. If you liked this post and want some food for thought about church ministry, check out http://creativityinchurch.blogspot.com/. If you or anyone you know is looking to hire a new Pastor, check out my professional profile blog at http://dclapsaddle.blogspot.com/.
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Self-Improvement

As my search for a settled position continues and rejections pile up, I'm spending some quality time on self-improvement. On the one hand, it's not an easy time to seek self-improvement, as a job search involves putting yourself out there in a way that feels personal. Self-improvement efforts tend to make just about everyone feel vulnerable, and self-improvement often involves finding, facing and seeking to shore up weaknesses. 

On the other hand, even if you are fully employed during your job search time, if your search seems to be dragging on, it is important to ask and answer the question, "Is it me?" It could just be that you need to tweak the way you present yourself a little bit, in order to make yourself seem more interesting and appealing to people who don't know you and are probably in a hurry to reject as many candidates as they can just to make their own job as members of a search committee a little bit more manageable. I know some successful pastors that experienced trouble getting their current job, and I also know pastors who got a job quickly and did not last long. 

If I had a formula for finding the right job just when you need to and keeping it forever, I'd freely share it. Part of getting into a job that is a great fit involves self-knowledge. Kate Matsudaira on the website Popforms suggests that a good way to increase useful self-knowledge involves asking others for feedback.

Send an email asking for insights into your strengths. Send it to one friend or peer this week. And try it again with someone new next week! And again!

Follow the link above for a suggested sample email format that includes questions, plus an extended explanation of why this technique is valuable.

In the meantime, I'm going to try it myself and report back....

I blog, therefore I am. If you liked this post and want some food for thought about church ministry, check out http://creativityinchurch.blogspot.com/. If you or anyone you know is looking to hire a new Pastor, check out my professional profile blog at http://dclapsaddle.blogspot.com/.

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“What God Has For You, Is For You”

(This piece is contributed by invitation. Rev. Malcolm Himschoot, MESA Minister for Ministerial Transitions, works in the United Church of Christ denominational office. He works closely with administrator Darrell Ludwig, who on a daily basis handles all Ministerial Profiles for the UCC. MESA can be found at www.ucc.org/ministers/. )

“What God Has For You, Is For You”

Malcolm Himschoot - October 8, 2013

A man walked past my office, headed for the Profiles desk. He had come from far away for a UCC meeting at the denominational offices. While here, he decided to see what had happened to his profile. In the current system, it’s like an inter-galactic black hole. You never know.

He found Darrell. Darrell found the problem. A piece wasn’t in yet. Darrell didn’t know it because the administrator only is alerted by the system when all pieces are in. The minister didn’t know it because he wasn’t alerted that a piece was missing. The profile was far from circulating, but neither one knew it. Meanwhile opportunities were passing by, and the man who was a qualified and dedicated minister waited, and waited, in search.

Of course this situation is unacceptable; the grief, understandable. MESA is tasked to finally improve the tools of the search and call system this year – to design something that resembles a modern, efficient task process, to fit together procedure and purpose, to align a functional product with the stated goals of numerous focus groups.

The denomination promises to have a better system soon. MESA can deliver on that promise with the help of professionals and suitable centralized technology. (It’s coming! See http://www.ucc.org/ministers/search-and-call/.)

Still, the UCC search and call process will always be more than a little mystifying. Far beyond the professional office, out there even beyond cyberspace, is where profiles are actually picked up and handled, touched and used.

The task before a Conference staff person is to find a batch of possible ethical leadership candidates for a church. The task before a congregation is to find a minister the church will respond to as they grow in God. There are as many ways of accomplishing this outcome, as there are people! Algorithms and heuristics, strategies and shortcuts. There are modern and ancient ways of doing this, there are European and African ways, cheaper and richer ways, speedy and slow ways, considerate and commercial ways, committee and consultant ways, happenstance and certified ways.

There is also, and despite it all, prayer.

The Holy Spirit has worked through stranger things than paperwork. The Holy Spirit has almost certainly moved in spite of paperwork! But the Holy Spirit does move, regardless.

It just so happens that a search process which makes no sense, which shows no rhyme nor reason, which takes too long or comes too sudden, may yet be a very faithful process. One in which God shows up, and has a leading role.

Which is why, for years and years, the starting instruction for the minister preparing their profile has not been, “Turn on your typewriter, computer or iPad.” And the starting instruction for the search committee engaging ministerial profiles has never been, “Locate the mimeograph, risograph, copy machine or PDF.”

The starting advice is always, “Begin with prayer.”

And so, next year when the profiles process is clean and transparent, when a strategic database exists, when authorized ministers in search know entirely what to expect, when colleagues across conferences are working together better than ever before, when each church in search is miraculously behaving as a rational engine no longer a called community of human beings, when the numbers of supply and demand equalize marvelously in the perfectly demographically-matched employment marketplace… unless that year is also the year in which Jesus comes, there will still be a moment when everything apparently breaks. Down.

Somewhere, a person of faith will be trying to discern their path while stressed out to the max, needing a secure place to be, enduring a time of flux and change, with many needs pressing upon them. Somehow this person, an authorized minister, will be doubting or at least wondering about grace and providence, vocation and justice. They’ll be praying that their spirit too may be called for a purpose, that their contribution will have a place in a heaven’s unfolding drama on earth, and that their employment needs will be met. Although anger, despair and fear will come naturally, this person must learn to rehearse, as the visitor rehearsed today in my office, “What God has for me, is for me.”

Try that line on. No matter how long or winding the journey. If it’s true, it’s true.

What God has for you, is for you.

Through such courage and conviction, a Way will be created to further Jesus’ gospel of mercy and hope, the sacrament of peace in the breaking of the daily bread. I pray such courage and conviction for each and every minister of Word and Sacrament in this time.

Amen.
(This piece is contributed by invitation. Rev. Malcolm Himschoot, MESA Minister for Ministerial Transitions, works in the United Church of Christ denominational office. He works closely with administrator Darrell Ludwig, who on a daily basis handles all Ministerial Profiles for the UCC. MESA can be found at www.ucc.org/ministers/. )

I blog, therefore I am. If you liked this post and want some food for thought about church ministry, check out http://creativityinchurch.blogspot.com/. If you or anyone you know is looking to hire a new Pastor, check out my professional profile blog at http://dclapsaddle.blogspot.com/.

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Family Matters

Steve Urkel (as played by Jaleel White) from the TV series "Family Matters"

A clergy job change can be a strain on the family members of a clergy person, even in the best-case scenario. If the Pastor in question is quietly searching for a new job, the children in the family might be asked to keep that a secret. That can be tough, as the children of Pastors often have friends within the congregation. If a clergy person quits a job before finding a new one, financial woes can materialize. A new job often requires relocation, and all the disruption involved in that.  And even if a job search results in a much-wanted new position that doesn't require the family to move or the clergy spouse to change jobs and the kids to change schools, getting used to one of the adult family members being in a new Pastoral position is disruptive to family life.  These factors also apply to career changes in other fields as well, but clergy folk are often described as living "in a fishbowl" for good reason. Sometimes they even live in a house owned by the church. Any job change is bound to result in stresses and strains in a family--there are nearly always some raised voices and acting out by kids involved--but if you work at GE, your employer doesn't bear witness to it very often.

As a clergy woman married to a non-clergy man, I've found it best not to pretend to the congregation that things are perfect in my marriage and family life, and not to pressure my husband and kids to act a certain way. On the other hand, I've also learned not to involve the congregation too much in family business. If the whole job search process or the acceptance of a new job is putting a strain on you as a Pastor, it is important to find some place other than through the people who employ you at your Pastoral job to help you sort through your problems. On the one hand, they are likely to outwardly offer sympathy, but on the other hand, they may start questioning your leadership abilities, e.g., "The Pastor can't even handle his own kids. How can we expect him to take handle conflict within the congregation?"

I blog, therefore I am. If you liked this post and want some food for thought about church ministry, check out http://creativityinchurch.blogspot.com/. If you or anyone you know is looking to hire a new Pastor, check out my professional profile blog at http://dclapsaddle.blogspot.com/.

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Should I stay or should I go?

In the beginning, I loved my job as the Pastor of the Riverton Church. I also loved it in the middle, but at some point in the middle I began to understand that I had fulfilled my calling to this particular church. As much as I still loved the people and the job, I needed to move on, so I initiated a job search and submitted my resignation.

Now, the conventional wisdom about job searching is that there are pluses and minuses to resigning before securing a new position, but the minuses usually outweigh the pluses.

The minuses mostly involve the financial pain of losing a steady paycheck.

The pluses are many--if, and this is a very big if--you, like me, feel able to take on the huge risk of losing a regular income and all the potential repercussions of that.

Here are what I see as the pluses of searching for a position as a pastor while you are not currently serving a church.

You have time for discernment. Let's be real--discerning what God wants for your life takes some effort. When you take the energy you have spent discerning what God is calling you to do in relation to the church that you serve out of the equation and put that energy into discerning what God requires of you, period, that is a powerful thing.

You can be totally open about your search. This is a big deal for most pastors--especially in my denomination, because we rely on references from people in congregations we have served in order to find a new position. It doesn't feel very fair--or even very smart--to tell people in our home church that we are searching for a position in a job market in which many searches end in rejection.

You can "take your act out on the road" and preach at other churches to see how your message comes across in a variety of contexts. The longer you serve in a particular church, the more likely you are to fall into a habit of preaching in a style that suits them. A really good preacher needs to connect with an audience, and if you have the same audience every week, you may come to rely too much on established relationships to make that connection.

You are free on Sunday mornings. Successful clergy job searches often come down to a few candidates, and at that point the hopefuls have to preach in a "neutral pulpit"--that is, in a congregation that is neither the one you serve nor the one you hope to serve.  This is a difficult thing to manage if you currently serve as a pastor that preaches almost every Sunday.

The ultimate decision of whether you stay in a ministry position or resign is between you and God, but because it effects so many other people, the discernment process that goes into that decision can feel pretty burdensome. Do not be afraid to ask for support before, during, and after the decision. Where I serve the denomination makes available free counseling and some financial support. In some states, if your income dips below a certain level, you may qualify for governmental help with health insurance premiums or SNAP (formerly known as Food Stamps.)  In addition, you may find that family, friends and colleagues can help you by providing referrals for work that bridge the gap. Through local denominational officials you should try to get on lists of supply Pastors--pastors who fill pulpit vacancies during a vacation or extended absence of a Pastor. (In some states it is possible and advisable to get on supply lists for multiple denominations and/or clergy associations.)  You may feel too proud to ask for this sort of help, but before you reject the idea out of hand, take that to God as well. Accepting help when you are in a difficult period can be an important life lesson. It can help you learn what it is really like to be in the position of the people who have come to you as a Pastor and asked you for help over the years. That's not a bad thing.

I blog, therefore I am. If you liked this post and want some food for thought about church ministry, check out http://creativityinchurch.blogspot.com/. If you or anyone you know is looking to hire a new Pastor, check out my professional profile blog at http://dclapsaddle.blogspot.com/.
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