The conversation around the Call to Action: Reordering the Life of the UMC and the subsequent UMC Leadership Summit, as well as the conversation in Kansas and Nebraska about Great Plans for the Great Plains: A Vision (PDF Link), I have been reflecting on the time that I spent on the spring senior staff retreat at Resurrection in which we read together, Bearing Fruit: Ministry with Real Results.
How do you do evaluate the programs and ministries of your local church? It is part of my life in ministry to always ask the question – How could we improve? A time of reflection, evaluation and planning to improve is important. What I had not considered carefully before was evaluation that lead to an ending. This is not just asking – How could we improve? Instead it is asking the question, “Do we need to be doing this any longer?” This could be connected with my earlier post about strategic pruning.
How do you evaluate? Does your evaluation lead to cuts?
Rev. Andrew Conard 
6 replies on “Evaluation that Leads to Cuts: Senior Staff Retreat (4 of 4)”
Andrew,
Since you are at one of the most high profile churches in the UMC, I’d love to hear how COR answers your question.
John – Thanks for asking. In my experience, we are constantly evaluating and trying to determine how to improve programs, ministries, worship and as staff members. We have room to grow in evaluations that lead to cuts. This is part of why this book was helpful for us as a staff.
One thing I’ve observed is that many times when someone needs to be cut, there is a question that is asked, but it is answered from the wrong perspectives.
“Why did this person/thing need to be cut?”
usually it answered because of a ‘they/it wasn’t doing such & such’ but what if it was answered from another angle of ‘was this a job/thing we really needed? where did we not fully support/communicate/define/etc?’
I think we would have some ministries and hiring of individuals from a whole new perspective and with more success.
Gavin – You suggest a great approach. There are times when the support / communication / expectations for an individual or ministry area are not clearly defined. It is hard to do a good job of evaluation if the purpose wasn’t clear from the beginning. In addition, there maybe the right person who is either not in the right role or didn’t receive the support necessary to succeed. Wise words, thanks for sharing!
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