The Future of Church Staffing!

In this episode of the Church Talk Podcast, hosts Jason Allison and Rob Paterson discuss various aspects of church structures, staffing, and the innovative solutions offered by Church Hire. They explore the challenges pastors face in managing church staff, the benefits of hiring virtual assistants, and the potential of leveraging talent from the Philippines. The conversation also touches on the evolving acceptance of AI in church settings and the importance of building a cohesive remote team culture. Corey Alderin, CEO of Sermon Shots, shares insights on how churches can effectively utilize remote staffing solutions to enhance their operations and focus on ministry.

Find out more from Church Hire

Check out Sermon Shots as well!

Corey Alderin is the CEO and Co-Founder of Sermon Shots and Co-Founder of Church Hire. He is a friend of the Church Talk Podcast and a guy who is devoting his life to helping the local church have the tools and resources necessary to reach people in their community.

Chapters

00:00 Welcome and Weather Check
02:47 Exploring Church Structures
05:27 Introduction to Corey Aldrin and Sermon Shots
08:32 Trends in AI and Church Engagement
11:18 Launching Church Hire
14:07 Building a Team in the Philippines
16:52 Virtual Assistants and Church Needs
19:32 Integrating Virtual Staff into Church Culture
21:45 Understanding Church Staffing Needs
29:44 Exploring Virtual Assistance in Churches
37:12 Effective Management of Church Staff

Follow us on Insta @churchtalkproject. www.churchtalkproject.com

Transcript

Jason Allison (00:00)
Welcome everybody to the church talk podcast with Robin Jason Rob man. good to see you. Are you are you doing well? I mean the weather is so nice right now when we're recording this.

Rob Paterson (00:02)
⁓

yeah, you know, it's so funny because it felt like as soon as we weren't like in winter mode here in Ohio, it was like the rainy season for like months. And then when the rainy season actually we're still kind of in the rainy season, like, you know, it's been raining a lot this summer. But one of the interesting things is like,

And, know, like a month ago we started golf team practice and we're into matches now and all that kind of stuff. but I tell you, like we practice at seven in the morning, which is terrible. Like to get up at six to go, you know, coach some high school kids for free. Most of them don't listen to you. but you know, with like even at seven in the morning, when it's like 91 % relative humidity and. You know, after you're through a hole in a half of walking, like you're just drenched in your own sweat.

Not awesome. So yes, the last four or five days have just been like a gift from heaven.

Jason Allison (00:59)
No, no, it's not.

glorious.

Yes, yes, it is. It's wonderful. It's nice to walk out and not just get wet from walking out there and you're just drenched. But you know what? It's August and that means it's probably going to get hot and swampy again because this is Ohio and you know, this is like first fall and then we've got second summer, then second fall and then third summer and then fake fall and then we...

Rob Paterson (01:22)
Yes.

Jason Allison (01:29)
That's just the way it is. But yes, well, dude, we have been talking the last couple of weeks about church structures. And I know that sounds so boring, but I tell you, we've had some good conversations. It's been a lot of fun, you know, engaging this and talking about it. I had a coaching call this morning with a guy who's his first question for the coaching call was how much how much should the lay elders

be involved in the day-to-day functioning of the church and how much do they need to stay out of it? And how do I know, you know, what to do with that? And I thought, I mean, that's, that's the age-old question, right? I mean, that's not, he's not alone in that question, but man, this idea of structure, who's running what and for how long these are questions I really think pastors are having. And I would encourage any, any of the leaders of any kind that are listening.

Man, if you give us a call, shoot us a text and email something, let us know. We'd love to address any of these questions. We have resources available that we've either developed or we've seen, or we know people who did it, you know, and we can connect you with resources and hopefully get some of those questions answered. But I don't know, Rob, I've enjoyed them. How about you?

Rob Paterson (02:41)
Absolutely, and we've sort of been joking about we're sort of bringing sexy back to bookkeeping and structure and things. Those really, as we've said, are not sexy topics in conversations until you're trying to figure one of those things out, right? And then all of a sudden, you're asking everybody, you're looking for resources. And even as people, you and I who've been...

Jason Allison (02:48)
yeah.

Right.

Rob Paterson (03:06)
you know, kind of in ministry full time for 30 plus years. it's funny how many basic things that you'd think, there's gotta be a million resources out there. How many of those things really don't exist in a good way, in a robust way. and so just being able to figure some of those things out and, even like you were talking this morning with the coaching call you were in, you know, the answer to questions like that of how much do you want, like, you know, lay people involved or not involved.

It really is contingent on who you have on the team, the hearts of those people, their giftings, you know, I mean, are they really gifted and are they able to be involved without feeling like they have to meddle and control everything? Are they going to be able to hand things off and release things? Or are they going to death grip? mean, you know, there's just, it's so complex and nuanced and especially if you've not been through that, helping to guide, lead, whatever, you know, it can be a real challenge.

Jason Allison (03:38)
Yep.

Yeah.

Mm-hmm.

Yeah.

It can be. You're right. And you know, one of those areas that that are it's always an issue is staffing, right? And figuring that stuff out. And so today we brought in a heavy hitter. We brought in somebody who is had they've been on the podcast before and they are like a serial starter of really cool stuff. And so I'm excited. We have on the podcast today.

the one and only Corey Aldrin, who is the CEO of Sermon Shots. we, Corey, we've had a couple of conversations about sermon shots on the, on the podcast, but we're going to talk about something different today, but maybe Corey, maybe just catch us up, man. How you doing? It's good to see you.

Corey Alderin (04:47)
Yeah, it's great to be here. third time maybe? Yeah, yeah. Always love talking to you guys. So it's great. It's great to be here.

Jason Allison (04:51)
I think so, yeah.

Well, we,

we love having you on and a sermon shots for those that are unfamiliar. you gotta go check it out. Sermonshots.com. and we'll put.

Rob Paterson (05:05)
Yeah, and this,

this is not like you hated the sermon. You want to take a shot at the pastor. So you, you know, hire Corey's cool business and it helps you to really, you know, get that pastor good. It's not that kind of sermon shot. I just gave Corey a new idea and he's going to start another company.

Jason Allison (05:19)
wait, it's not. I've been using it wrong the whole time.

yeah, it's I

mean, you've just tapped into AI and then a bunch of programming stuff that I'll never understand that, you know, can take the sermon from the day and the video of it and turn it into reels for social media posts. so that it's brilliant. I've used it for two, three years off and on for different reasons for the podcast for and it's phenomenal. I like I recommend it everywhere I go. If people ask about

social media posts and all that. I'm like sermon shots. Just go there and leave me alone. Like, you know, that's, that's the way, but maybe it catches up. How is that going? And maybe my first question for you before we dive into the new venture, uh, is are you seeing any trend trends in just from your work with sermon shots and, seeing the, just the questions maybe you're getting are the types of reels or the time? don't know what kind of trends are you seeing?

Rob Paterson (05:58)
Mm

Corey Alderin (06:19)
Yeah, so I, you know, a quick 20 second catch up on sermon shots is, to your point, reels. Big thing. That's the thing that everybody knows sermon shots for, but we do all kinds of repurposing. So lots of social media, not just video, but turning it into images and thumbnails and carousels. These are new things that some people might not even know that we do. And five-day devotional, discussion guide, and all around the idea of

Allowing you to edit it too. So it's not just take the AI take what AI gives you download it and post it It's no it's full editor video editor image editor text editor lets you edit everything that you want to so Yeah, and and trends what you know, biggest biggest thing I'm seeing recently is AI in certain use cases is Coming around to being okay in the church

Jason Allison (07:00)
Yeah.

Rob Paterson (07:00)
Hmm.

Corey Alderin (07:12)
Uh, very, very early on, didn't matter what you did. If it was anything AI, was very anti. Uh, and for so long, me and, know, other people are saying like, okay, I, get it. AI had, there's limitations to it in the church. I probably get it. But like using your sermon to just cut a video, like it's your sermon. I'm not making it. So anyways, you, get it. Uh, I'm seeing more and more people be like,

there are use cases. Okay. It's not just black and white. There's maybe some use cases for AI.

Rob Paterson (07:47)
Mm-hmm.

Jason Allison (07:47)
Wait, wait,

there's nuance and you can actually think and share like, wait a minute, how that's not Christian. There's no way.

Corey Alderin (07:54)
Yeah.

Rob Paterson (07:55)
Yeah, Corey, it's interesting. We actually had another person on the podcast who talked about AI. actually met a couple of people talking about that. But one of them was like, you know, when, when cell phones came out, when the internet, you know, like all those kinds of things, when they were newer technologies, how the church, know, like that's witchcraft, that's evil, that's satanic. And now, you know, they're things everybody uses.

I wonder instead of did you have to say, no, no, AI in this case isn't artificial intelligence, it's Aldrin interference. So like I interfere and makes the magic happen on your behalf for a small.

Corey Alderin (08:27)
Yeah.

that's good, that's good. No, I think early on it was like that, you were saying. It's just like completely anti, for not everybody, not everybody, but yeah. for interference, that's, yeah. That's a good one.

Jason Allison (08:41)
Yeah.

There

you go. You got it. It's all yours. You can have it.

well, tell us about this new venture that you just announced. You just rolled it out. And I mean, I love what it's all about, but I really want you to talk about it. What's this new thing that you are launching? Tell us about it.

Corey Alderin (08:58)
Yeah. So Church Hire, which we just, we really just launched, publicly. mean, it's kind of, it's been happening in the background for a while, but Church Hire is really all about trying to help the church hire good staff quickly, in a way that is probably unique, I think, to some churches, but leveraging what we've learned as a company. that, the real, really the big thing is, is hiring from the Philippines.

Jason Allison (09:28)
Mm.

Corey Alderin (09:29)
So one of the biggest things that I would say that has helped sermon shots, know, some might think it's the technology and all of that, but in reality, I really think it's the team. We've been able to build an awesome team and in, and not in the traditional way that we had to get funding. Like we didn't get funding to do this. And so there was, there's limitations when you don't have funding. I don't have unlimited budget. so there, you know,

We found this way to basically build a team for the vision that I had for sermon shots without that funding. a big reason for that is just our team that's over in the Philippines. yeah. ⁓

Jason Allison (10:09)
What is that

team? We'll get to that in a second. But what is that team like? know, I mean, Nike figured out a way to make cheap shoes by going to Taiwan or whatever. So, I mean, you don't have a bunch of kids, you know, creating, creating reels. So maybe clarify what you mean by going to the Philippines.

Corey Alderin (10:25)
Yeah, yeah, yeah, like Sure, sure I would

Rob Paterson (10:25)
you

you

Corey Alderin (10:30)
say yeah, absolutely I you know, that's a that that's a probably a common kind of misconception if you ever use anybody from over this overseas right on your team like common misconception in understandable to because that's the sort of like negative publicity out there with that right but Couldn't be farther from the truth on we are we we are

Jason Allison (10:40)
Yeah. Yeah.

Corey Alderin (10:54)
building a team of people who are very skilled at things that we need help with. Developers, marketers, design team, all the things that you need in a team are available all around the world, right? there's nothing, there's nothing specific about us as Americans that makes us better than the rest of the world in terms of like our abilities in business. There really isn't. And

Jason Allison (11:15)
Mm-mm.

Corey Alderin (11:18)
It's I think it's sort of an American thing to think that we're the best and the biggest, right? so and and so There's a huge world out there and of just great talent and the world Operates at different cost of living. So what? What would be you know, average pay over here might be just amazing top-of-the-line pay in other parts of the world and so you could like you can

Jason Allison (11:33)
Mm-hmm.

Yeah.

Corey Alderin (11:45)
you can pay

somebody a great salary that they can't get in their country and it helps you as a business too. So being able to hire two people instead of one or you know that sort of thing.

Jason Allison (11:57)
Yeah.

Rob Paterson (12:00)
Yeah, that's that that is so good. And, I know for us, you know, for years we supported a church and a pastor in Ukraine and even before the war. I mean, just the the dollar there was so depressed that, you know, for $200 a month, we could literally pay a full time salary for a pastor like here. $2,400 a year. You know, like that doesn't really do it.

You hardly can afford coffee for your cafe on Sunday mornings for $2,400 a year. But in other parts of the world, that would be like a significant salary that you could literally cover the cost of living for your whole family for a year. so just understanding that, there's a reason why when we go and purchase a vehicle nowadays, we're spending 60, 70, $80,000, like not for a fancy vehicle, but just for a regular vehicle.

It's because made in America a lot of times means had to pay that person $60 an hour to, you know, stand in the assembly line where in other parts of the world, it's just like the cost of living is just completely different.

Jason Allison (13:04)
Hmm.

So tell me about this, the sweatshop that you have in the Philippines. but I mean, what, tell me what, what does that mean? Why do you do that? Like, how is, how did that connection happen? Because I know this, this didn't just grow out of nowhere. There was a connection there and then start talking about maybe what, you know, how that, how this can actually impact the, leaders and churches that that might be listening to this podcast.

Corey Alderin (13:37)
Yeah. So one of the things that I've been hiring people in our businesses for 10 years now, and we've had to hire from all over the world. And we do hire in the U S too. So like I have nothing against people, Americans either. So we hire from all over the world. And early on, we just started noticing a trend that all of our best employees were from the Philippines. It's like,

Jason Allison (13:43)
Mm-hmm.

Hahaha

Corey Alderin (14:03)
We started noticing this. it was like that just fitting in our culture ⁓ as a business, it just felt like the culture fit was so much better. And then it started realizing like why. They work similar to me in terms of like working hard and there's a strong Christian value in the Philippines as well.

Jason Allison (14:07)
Yeah.

Corey Alderin (14:27)
And so a lot of those same cultural things are there. English is great. A lot of them grow up speaking English. So I know that can be a barrier at times for some people across the world, but in the Philippines, it hasn't been as big of a barrier for us. And so just over time, we just started realizing like, okay, we're hiring from all over, but the people that are

Jason Allison (14:33)
Yeah.

Corey Alderin (14:52)
still on our team that we like working with the most are consistently in the Philippines. And so just over time, we started like, okay, that's where we're gonna concentrate a lot of our effort. We still hire from all over, but that's a big, concentration. And the reason why is basically what I said, it's same values, Christian values, ⁓ work ethic, all the sorts of things that...

Rob Paterson (15:15)
Mm.

Corey Alderin (15:19)
I like to see in my business. And so I think it's a similar thing that I think churches would want to as well.

Rob Paterson (15:26)
Yeah,

that's awesome, Corey. And so I have a question, because one of the things I've noticed, and I'm sure you guys have too, is how churches sometimes might not need a full-time person, but for whatever reason, churches like to own people, right? Like we want our youth pastor, our worship person, not somebody that is like, does some stuff for us. We want to own that person, even if we really don't need them full-time. So churches sometimes, you

maybe pay more than they need to because they don't, they're not really in the kind of place where they need somebody like that to do that many hours. So, know, so with that in mind, like talk about like, does a virtual assistant work and why might that be like the best or the most appealing option for some churches?

Corey Alderin (16:13)
Yeah, I think Virtual Assistant is probably one of the first easy ones to understand. It's an easier one for people to test with. There's more use cases and we can maybe get into that, but Virtual Assistant, I mean, we were just talking before this, right, of all the various things that we have to do and it's like, what pastor have you not heard?

in that same scenario, right? Like what church staff person does not have Post-It notes all over and all these things that they have to do. And there's somebody that can help you do that. And most of those things can be done virtually, I would imagine. So there is so much help out there for that. Yeah.

Jason Allison (16:52)
Yeah.

So you guys have created a company churchhire.com and obviously it's not necessarily like, mean, I work with chemistry staffing a lot and I'm on their team. Well, we're helping pastors find our churches, find a pastor or a position that they're going to hire and bring someone in. it's, know, it's, they're going to have a person that come just like Rob was describing a worship guy of whatever. This is different. What you're doing is, is a totally different animal.

I think because you're talking about a virtual hire and with that saves a lot of money in a lot of ways. it's other places have used like a temp service or whatever and that's fine, but that's a physical in-person type. This is really on a whole nother level. Tell me how that works and what are some of those options that people could go with?

Corey Alderin (17:45)
Yeah, yeah, so when you're looking for somebody to hire for whatever position you want, whether it's virtual assistant or some of the other common ones are social media help, video editing, just think any sort of position that can easily be done virtually. Those are the types of things. And so what typically happens is in the background, church hires constantly recruiting people.

And training them on these different things knowing kind of which things are in demand Most of them already come in with a lot of this but we can help train them we can help like if there's any sort of like Understanding church culture in America sort of things like all these different things are things that we're training them on and then when a church comes in and

gets on like a discovery call of what they're looking for, that person is helping match you with the right person. And that person who you're having a discovery call with is most likely gonna be somebody in the Philippines too. So she knows all the people, she's training everybody, and so she's matching you up with the right one. And you get to choose between a couple too. And you get to interview them, you get to talk to them.

Jason Allison (18:53)
Mm.

Corey Alderin (18:55)
all of that. And then all throughout there is, they continue to get trained. Church Hire helps the church with tracking all of the hours and what they're working on and all of that. Because that's big deal. know that churches aren't used to having to do that virtually and all that. So that all happens. And this person, what I always say, this is part of your team.

This person you hire is not a, know, when we think virtual assistant, we think of somebody that's just kind of over there in the internet and the cloud doing their thing and not, you

Rob Paterson (19:22)
Mm.

Jason Allison (19:32)
I think of the

little paper clip that Microsoft used to have.

Rob Paterson (19:35)
Hahaha

Corey Alderin (19:36)
Yeah,

yeah, yeah. And it's easy. I totally understand early on. That's how I thought about all of my teams that was virtual as well. But over time, my whole thought on this has completely flipped. it's, do not think of these people on your team.

Or don't think of them as somebody separate from the team. They are part of your team. So how would you treat the person sitting next to you? You treat them exactly the same way. And I don't mean like the church would treat them badly, but I mean like in terms of like incorporating them into team events and you know, all those things, we do all those things and it has just made a great culture for the team and the church can do that as well.

Rob Paterson (19:58)
Hmm.

Jason Allison (20:06)
Yeah.

Rob Paterson (20:17)
Yeah. Corey, I love that, you you described for your own business, right? that this was, not only cost effective, but it was, it was efficient and effective. as you started doing this, you're like, man, there's just some of these amazing people that you have found that are great culture fit for your organizations in the Philippines. know, you know, when Jason and I, we're starting the church talk podcast a few years ago now, you know,

Jason Allison (20:17)
Yeah.

Rob Paterson (20:43)
We outsourced our logo to a service that uses primarily people from overseas. And again, very efficient and effective. And, you know, probably there's lots of people. mean, I talk to pastors all the time. Maybe they're a little bit older, maybe just their, their skills or their gifts. It's like, they know, Hey, I, want to push some of our content out to social media. We want to be able to record and edit things, but man, we don't.

I don't know how to do those things or I don't have people, you know, immediately kind of in my context who can do those things. And so the idea of being able to say, Hey, there's, there's, you know, this, organization now where we can in a cost-effective way, add some of these things to our team so that we can do this at a high level. I just think is exciting. You know, so as you think about that, I mean,

Do you think is there a certain type of church that's sort of like the best fit for some of the services that Church Hire offers, like a certain size or demographic, or is it just awesome for everybody? What would you say about that?

Corey Alderin (21:45)
Well, you know, I don't know exactly with size. I would say it really comes down to is there more you want to do? Do you have a lot of things on your plate that you're not able to do?

and money's an obstacle. Like you just can't hire somebody here in the US. I might be describing 98 % of churches. ⁓ So I don't know if, right? Like I don't know. So it's hard to say yet like who the like perfect fit is because I truly hope we can help any sort of church really. ⁓

Jason Allison (22:03)
You

Yeah.

Corey Alderin (22:17)
Yeah, I don't know. I'm curious what you think, actually, if I can that question to you.

Jason Allison (22:18)
Well, I-

Yeah.

Yeah. I mean, I was thinking when I was looking through the website and I was just, you know, mulling this over in my brain a little, I thought, first of all, a church does need to have, well, okay, for just the virtual assistant side of things or, know, cause there's like five or six categories of, of hires that you guys do. And there's probably nuance even between that, but, you know, a virtual assistant, any pastor who is, you know, saying, I wish I had help.

Creating some graphics or creating and by that I mean like a bulletin, you know I mean like this is I'm thinking as simple as you can get, you know, you know, like my mother Is retired and she is not a graphic designer, but she has she at her church She runs the bulletin every week, but she creates it, you know, like she has the template and she were well and

That's great that a volunteer can do that, but how many churches have a high capacity? And that's like one of a thousand things that she does. like who, you know, not every church has a high capacity volunteer like that. What would it look like, you know, to know? Cause every week Sunday comes. So what are those things that repeat that someone could easily be trained in? Right. And, and, and getting it done. you know, that's like a starting point. So I feel like a small church could handle that. a church that's just.

Rob Paterson (23:26)
Mm-hmm.

Jason Allison (23:37)
man, the pastor is just running on fumes because he's doing so many things that someone else could take off his plate. Like that's a starting point. but then I think I also think there are some church, if you really wanted to get the full benefit of church higher.com, you probably need to be a church that has some kind of social media presence or at least wants to, and has the ability to record your service. I know everybody says they stream the service, but I've watched some of these.

And you do not want people to see this. you know, pushing that out there is not necessarily the best thing for you. And some of that's just having the right camera, having the right angles, understanding because a video editor can only edit the video they've been given. They can't recreate something. So, mean, to me, I don't know what else, what am I missing there?

Corey Alderin (24:22)
Yeah. ⁓

Well, I would say another sort of misconception, not to say that it's necessarily happening in this conversation, but a misconception on this is that you only think about the lowest level things that can be done too. It really is more than that. My whole leadership team on sermon shots, for example, is all in the Philippines. So my lead dev, my...

Jason Allison (24:40)
Tell us more.

Corey Alderin (24:50)
my lead customer success, my lead marketer, my lead creative. And so just keep in mind too that this, I think VA is the easiest one to think about because it's kind of top of mind, but like there's a, you know, there's a vast amount of different skill sets that can be applied. think if the job can be done online.

If there's no limitation to it being specifically in the church, like if you need to record like in your church, you know, there's, there's limitations to that. But, yeah, I mean, I, I have a team who on the creative team on social media is recording their church and there, you know, there's, if you saw it, you might even think that it's a U S church. like it, you know, church culture, there's some similarities, depending on the church you're at over there. So I don't know that makes sense, but.

Rob Paterson (25:38)
Yeah.

Jason Allison (25:38)
Well, think, yeah,

no, I think I just heard a couple of brains explode as they, cause I mean, you know, imagine if you're the lead pastor and part of your leadership team doesn't even live in the city, they live in another country on the other. What? Like, I mean, that's a, that is hard to put your head around when you're used to the staffing structure that we've been told is the proper way to do it for the last hundred years, you know, et cetera and so forth. And so we're really asking people to stretch.

Rob Paterson (25:40)
No, it's good.

Jason Allison (26:08)
their imagination because and let's be honest, staffing is one of the hardest things churches deal with. Like it's, it's, it's expensive. It's we didn't go to seminary to learn how to run a staff. And so what you're doing is saying, let, we did go to school and learn how to run stuff. And we've tried for 10 years and learned a few things. We can handle that part of it. you just need to help us.

Rob Paterson (26:19)
Mm-hmm.

Jason Allison (26:32)
find the right fit so you can take your ministry to the next level. At least that's what I hear you saying.

Corey Alderin (26:37)
Yeah, yeah. And we can help with all that. All the questions, like I know the top like 10 questions that are gonna come to people's mind. How do you deal with the time zone difference? How do you deal with language barrier? How do you deal with like church culture being different over there than over here? And all like, I know all that. I went through all that and we figured it out. And I will say the church space is a little bit unique than in a business, right? Like the church space,

definitely needs in-person people working face-to-face with people in the church. so don't, hopefully nobody hears me saying like I'm trying to replace like in-person stuff that the church is uniquely fit to do. Like that's not it. And cause in reality, what I think this is, is about helping the pastors in the church be able to kind of get out and do those things more so that they're not having to do some of this other stuff that is keeping them from.

Rob Paterson (27:32)
Yeah, yeah, Corey.

And that's one of the things Jason and I talk about all the time is how many people and even when we were thinking through like talking about church structures this month, you know, like how many people in ministry are dying on the vine because they are just swamped with with literally tasks anyone could do. But man, they're called to, you know, do the people stuff and, you know, have kind of redemptive interactions, but they're stuck in the office.

designing and printing bulletins or doing, you know, the books or whatever, things that other people could do or could be outsourced. And what a great thing. And so, you know, just even that question that I asked you that you threw back to us, you know, like what size of church is this for right out of college? I remember, the first church I worked at was just under 200 and there were a few of us on staff and I still remember every week, you know, the, the bulletin.

that was developed, was thinking about that Jason, when you were talking about your mom doing that, was being developed by the pastor and his wife who was kind of our part-time secretary. And they used clip art and it was, I just remember being like, this is not at all compelling. And probably for less money, that could be done in such an excellent way now.

you know, just to outsource and one of the problems like we're always trying to solve at like my church is even with our staff, you know, I don't want my staff to have to waste their time on that kind of stuff. Like if they could be freed up to meet with people to, you know, to do higher level leadership things, we always want to do that. So if we can outsource a lot of the things that just have to happen every week, they can get done. They can get done in an excellent way.

by other team members, remote team members, whatever, and that frees my people up to just love people, to develop people, man, I think the church is way better off.

Jason Allison (29:28)
So what kind of, know what, I know you're just launching this, but maybe give some detail of some jobs or positions that churchhire.com could help with. let's give some hard examples so people can actually get their brain around it.

Corey Alderin (29:44)
Sure. I'll tell you the three most common ones. then, yeah. So the three most common ones, well, just the pastors VA that we've talked about that.

Jason Allison (29:54)
And

by VA, you're saying virtual assistant for those who don't know what that means. It's not the VA like the Veterans Association. It's the virtual assistant.

Corey Alderin (29:58)
⁓ yes, yes. ⁓

Good point,

yes. The next big one is social media. You probably hear this all the time too. It's very rare that you hear a church say they're posting social media enough. It's usually, I don't have enough time to do as much as I want to, right? So that's a big one. Video, some sort of video editor, I don't know what that exact...

title is, but the person that does a lot of video editing for you, that's a common hard one that I've seen to hire in the U.S. and that's a great skill.

Jason Allison (30:30)
Yeah.

So real quick on that one, because, and I don't, I haven't, I didn't do a discovery call yet to, you know, learn how everything's structured. did read through the website and I see there's 20 hour, 40 hour, but there's also, you know, a timesheet type thing. you know, to make sure that like. Let's cause I know when video editing, like first of the month, if you've got a, if you're doing sermon series and you need a bumper video, you need this, you need, know, there's it's usually one week is heavy.

You know with stuff and it's not like every single week I've got 20 hours of video editing to do. How does that work within your system like do I am I kind of pan like a retainer and I just have access? Is it? I don't know. I don't. How does that work?

Corey Alderin (31:15)
Yeah, I would, I would throw back the thing I said before. How would, how would you treat anybody on your team that has a, that has a job? Really? That's how I would think about it. And so to answer that it's this person is part of your team going to work 20, 40 hours, whatever it is. How do you fill up anybody's day with, with stuff? So typically what we do is like have a backup.

If I haven't given you anything to do, here's the three things that you can always work on. Especially if you can't constantly be communicating and talking to the person, because you're a busy pastor doing things, always have those two or three things that they just know, oh, I'm done with everything that I have. I've got five more hours this week. Okay, here's the two or three things that I know I can work on for five hours this week.

Jason Allison (31:41)
Okay, right.

Do you offer training for the pastors on how to do what you just described? Cause I'm telling you 80 % of the pastors that I have contact with work with what you just said that they have no idea how to do that. That is new information to them.

Corey Alderin (32:09)
Thank

Yup.

Absolutely, absolutely. And I think it's very common. Every new person has all of these sorts of questions. And like I was saying before, there's...

Rob Paterson (32:26)
Mm.

Corey Alderin (32:29)
I'm sure everybody has 50 more of those and it's very common what those are. And so yes, they get, they get the training just as much as the team member does on like, here's how you do this. In fact, there's all, when you, when you hire somebody, there's, there's, a dashboard of stuff that you get to do to like keep track where you see all the hours and what's been worked on and all that. So.

Jason Allison (32:38)
Okay.

That that's really good because I just know, I mean, even as a when I was the lead pastor and had a small team, keeping them busy just to keep them busy, I just wasn't thinking about that. I mean, I had some amazing people who were initiators and they would see something and just go do it. I didn't have to tell them. But we met in my office once a week face to face. So this is just a different ball game. And

Rob Paterson (33:04)
Mm-hmm.

Jason Allison (33:16)
It's changing the way people think about staffing and churches and, you know, that the jobs that need to be done for church to happen. and Rob, I like the way you put it earlier. You said, you know, we, want to, we will happily outsource, so to speak, the things that, anyone could do or someone specialized could do so that our people who are on the ground can actually spend more time with people.

Like, you know, ultimately that's what the church is all about. And what, what I'm seeing, Corey, and what you guys are developing is this idea of let's, know, there's certain things that only people in that city, you know, living there can do. but then there are other things that someone in the Philippines could do and they can be just as much a part of your team. They can be involved in the meetings through zoom, through, you know, all that.

They can stay connected, but obviously they're not taking people to coffee because that's kind of a big commute. so, know, I, that's just a new way of thinking. And so I love how you you've stretched, you've stretched that. don't know what you, so you said, you know, virtual assistant, you said social media and that's kind of someone who would manage your social media account, right? Like they would make sure things are being posted, make sure, you know, stuff's happening, which obviously assumes

they're communicating with you, right? Saying, hey, what do you want posted? You know, and give us pictures and video that we can use. And then of course, some kind of video editing concept. I know that could be even graphic design. that fall in there as well? Yeah. Okay. Yeah.

Corey Alderin (34:50)
Yeah, yep, yep, that would be the next one. And there's, there's overlap in all that, right? Like

a person who's doing social media can actually do some of those, those things too. So that, that's where like the, the fit kind of depends on what you really need in your church. There are people who are amazing at graphic design, not as good at video, right? But there's also people who are great at graphic design and have all this experience with social media, can do video and like, if you need all that, that, that's a, that's a different person. So.

Jason Allison (35:03)
Yeah.

Yeah.

Rob Paterson (35:18)
Hmm.

Corey Alderin (35:18)
That's all possible.

Jason Allison (35:20)
Yeah.

Rob Paterson (35:20)
Yeah. So I want to go back, Corey, just to something Jason said a couple of minutes ago when he's like, you know what you just said about, yeah, just, you know, just do this and then just do this. And, you know, it Jason's like most pastors don't just do that. Like it doesn't even occur to us. And I would even say, you know, for me, as I look back over quite a long time now, you know, anytime I've had a staff where I just have people who don't know what to do or who are not internally motivated.

Corey Alderin (35:35)
Yeah. Yeah.

Rob Paterson (35:49)
I will, and I'll just, you know, confess this, I will completely under utilize them because I'm not going to babysit them. I'm not going to micromanage them. And so at some point, you know, when a change needs to happen or the budget gets tight, they'll be the first person to go. Cause I'm like, you don't really do much on your own. and so, you know, but I I'm really good with people who are motivated and self starters, cause I know they're going to find things to do.

And I actually heard Dave Ramsey recently say something like, if you have employees who aren't motivated, he's like, they'll never be motivated. He's like, find motivated people and stay out of their way, you know, but you know, as people are hearing this, and I was again, just noodling around on the website too. And I mean, I love the pricing structure. think it's like super affordable. So maybe there's somebody listening in who's like, I would love to, you know, have some help in these ways, but

Corey Alderin (36:26)
Yeah.

Rob Paterson (36:42)
I don't really like, you know, the issue that we've just said is an issue, right? And they're like, I just don't know how to direct, to utilize, you know, what are one or two things you would sort of maybe if you were just having a conversation with a pastor that you would say, Hey, here's a couple steps. If you can keep these things in mind that would help you to more effectively, you know, utilize maybe not just your people on your team right now, but even some potential virtual employees that you might.

get through church high.

Corey Alderin (37:13)
How, ask that question again. is some point here?

Rob Paterson (37:15)
Yeah, like

for pastors who have no idea how to manage a staff and they're like, I could use some help, but I don't know how to really manage people well.

Corey Alderin (37:24)
Yeah, what are some pointers? Man, managing people, that's a big thing. I will say, I don't think there's any way I could just say something and you're all of sudden a good manager. This takes time. I mean, if you've ever managed somebody, you have to learn how it works. You just have to do it. ⁓

Rob Paterson (37:45)
Yeah, and it's different with everyone.

So it's not just I figured it out now. I know because you might have different personalities and different.

Corey Alderin (37:50)
Yes.

It's yeah. And so there really is no way to like be great at it. And so I think you just have to, you have to do it and you have to be okay with messing up a couple of times, like on a lot of things that you do, right? Like if you've never done something, you're not going to be good at. So just know that you're going to be bad at it for a while. And get advice from people who have done it. I have gotten advice from people all along the way that I trust to have been

Rob Paterson (38:10)
Mm.

Corey Alderin (38:21)
good business owners on things like this. Talk to other church people who you see as great leadership pastors. Get their advice. Listen to podcasts. Like how are they doing it in the church? And then putting this back to church hire, me, my business partner, everybody on the team at church hire.

Rob Paterson (38:32)
Mm.

Corey Alderin (38:42)
has done this and understands this, utilize us to help you do this. Like we've gone through all this. You can get pointers from us. That is what all those calls are for, to set you up for success. So, give advice.

Jason Allison (38:55)
Hmm.

Rob Paterson (38:55)
Hmm.

Yeah, that's so good. And actually, I just saw a meme last week that said this. Being ready is a myth. You start, you suck. Figure it out. You get better. And you know, which is is people need to hear that kind of stuff more often, right? Because we always I think for most of us, we feel paralyzed when we don't have developed gifts. And so we won't wait in because we're afraid we're going to make mistakes. Of course, you're going to make mistakes.

Corey Alderin (39:08)
Yes.

Rob Paterson (39:24)
But the biggest mistake is not waiting in, figuring it out, making some mistakes and getting better, right? Because the church will be better if we figure these things out.

Corey Alderin (39:35)
whole church will be better. that is really the heart behind Church Hire. I would have never started this as a business if that wasn't the case. We want to help the church. see this huge, like first-hand experience of what we've been able to do in our business. We want to transfer that to a church, to multiple churches. I know that it's going to just have a huge impact.

If it could have just a small impact on every church that takes advantage of this, I just feel like we will be better as the big C church, better everywhere.

Jason Allison (40:09)
Yeah.

Oh, I love that. Well, I would encourage every listener, check out church higher.com and the prices. I mean, on the website, it was like 250 a week for a part time and then 500 a week. I'm please don't hold me. This is not a quote. I'm just I'm remembering from from looking through it. So we're not talking, you know, hundreds of thousands of dollars like it would cost to, know, if you hired a brand new staff person, once you factor in benefits and

just time and everything, you know, it's minimum 50 to 60,000 for a secretary or, you know, assistant of any kind. And that's minimum. and yet this is, this is way more manageable. And, you know, Rob, you said sometimes you just got to do something, right? Even though you're going to suck at it. Well, there, that's the great thing about the way you've got church higher structured is, know what? I can try this for a month or two. And if I'm just never going to get it.

I'm only out two months of paying this person and probably getting a lot of benefit aside from just what I learned in the process. you know, it's not like I'm, I'm in a contract that now for the next three years, I'm paying all this money. so that's why I just love the way you, you've structured that. think it's good for churches and encouraging. So Corey, man, thanks for taking the time. and, and I do hope, I do hope a lot of churches take advantage of this. I would have 10 years ago.

When I was leading a church and this this would have been a great thing Yeah, yeah, so so thanks man. please do please

Rob Paterson (41:35)
Huge.

Corey Alderin (41:35)
Yeah. Can I say one more thing that I feel like

Rob Paterson (41:39)
Yes.

Corey Alderin (41:39)
I missed in all of this is think about the impact that you're having on a person in the Philippines too. Like there is this huge opportunity to be helping a person and their family impact them in a different way that's not necessarily the same impact as somebody hiring somebody in the US. So there is absolutely a whole nother part to this that I can.

Jason Allison (41:47)
Yeah.

Yes.

Corey Alderin (42:03)
for many more hours.

Jason Allison (42:03)
Yeah.

Rob Paterson (42:05)
Yeah,

that's it. You know, and just let me just push that for a second. You know, I love, know what Jason was just saying. If someone's terrible and they're like, I have totally underutilized the staff person and I feel terrible. Well, guess what? You don't have to see him every Sunday sitting there looking at you or glaring at you now, you know, because they're in the Philippines. And at the same time, you know, if if we offered somebody locally, two hundred and seventy dollars a week, you know, for for 20 hours of work.

We might feel guilty about that, but utilizing someone who is skilled and gifted in another part of the world, you're right, Corey, that could be change their life, support their family money. And so we're getting what we need and we're giving somebody in a different part of the world life and freedom and success. And that's pretty cool.

Jason Allison (42:55)
Yeah. What I heard is you could pull it from the missions budget. that the same? ⁓ well, on that sacrilegious note, ⁓ maybe not. I don't know. I could actually justify it. But Cory, man, it is always great hanging out with you. We haven't been to a conference in a couple of months, so I haven't seen you in a couple of months. But we'll have to figure out an excuse to get together sometime soon.

Rob Paterson (43:00)
Amen. Amen.

Corey Alderin (43:01)
Why not? Why

not? Why not?

Rob Paterson (43:06)
you

Jason Allison (43:20)
To all of our listeners. Thank you so much We would love it if you would take a minute and rate the podcast us share it subscribe all that stuff so that people can get this and You can watch for all the stuff on social media as well. Please give us a call interact with us Give us an email. We would love to hear your thoughts And we appreciate you and we are here to support you to engage equip and encourage leaders and pastors all over the world Have an amazing week