Effectiveness Strategy

Documents (last revised 11/27/07)

• Forms Only (Do not use these without reading the entire document.)
  • Congregational Evaluation (PDF | RTF)
  • Clergy Self-Evaluation (PDF | RTF)
  • Clergy Evaluation (PDF | RTF)
• Effectiveness Strategy Document Complete Package (PDF)
  • Guidelines for Appropriate Conduct by Current and Former Pastors, pg. 33, has been superseded by this document from the 2009 Clergy Session.
• Appointment Advisory and Profile Forms

Introduction

Clergy and SPRC chairs should all use this Effectiveness Strategy for evaluating clergy and local congregations. The document has been under development since 2002, according to Brenda Lear, Sunshine District Superintendent and secretary of the Cabinet.

In 2002 the cabinet attended a General Board of Higher Education and Ministry event for cabinets called "Leading Supervisory Systems." This event gave attention to clergy effectiveness and the RMC cabinet learned that several conferences had effectiveness strategies in place. Following the event, the RMC cabinet gathered some of these strategies from other conferences to begin their own discernment about what might be beneficial in our own setting.

In 2004 the RMC cabinet participated in a Six Sigma training which gave them a clear process for beginning to develop an effectiveness strategy. The Board of Ordained Ministry was invited to partner with the cabinet in this process. After much discussion the BOM suggested that the effectiveness of clergy cannot be discerned in a vacuum: congregational effectiveness and clergy effectiveness are interrelated. Therefore, the strategy was enlarged to include elements of congregational effectiveness.

Using The Discipline, documents from other conferences, input from clergy and lay people around our own conference, and published scholarship on effectiveness, the cabinet and BOM have developed "components of effectiveness" for clergy and congregations. Care was taken to identify broad areas of effectiveness that apply across demographics of congregations and age of congregations and clergy. It is also important to note that no one clergy or congregation reaches perfection in all areas. The point is to help us identify what effectiveness looks like so we can continue moving toward it.

The evaluation tools for clergy and congregations that are contained within the Effectiveness Strategy will be in place for the remainder of this quadrennium (2007-2008) and through the next (2009-2012). As they are used this first year, the cabinet and BOM welcome feedback so that the strategy might be refined. For this purpose a feedback form has been sent to appointed local church clergy and SPRC chairpersons, enclosed with the Effectiveness Strategy Notebook.

< Prev		Next >