New Staffing Patterns for NI Synod

At its meeting on Friday January 19, 2007, the Synod Council Executive Committee approved the following two staffing patterns to replace Pastor Hunt’s positions:

There will be eight part-time Assistants to the Bishop, one for each Conference. Three Conferences are already staffed this way and it is going well.

To cover Pr. Hunt's Mission Director responsibilities, two part-time people will serve as New and Existing Missions Consultants, one part-time person will serve as Evangelism Consultant, one part-time person will be Multi-cultural/Urban Consultant, and one part-time person will serve as Rural Consultant.

There will be a small financial savings in comparison to present staffing costs.

Sandy Musch will continue in administration with other duties. Pr. Jeff Clements will continue in stewardship with other duties.

The Rock Island Office will remain open. Bishop Wollersheim, Pr. Jeff Clements, and Sandy Musch will go out there on a regular basis. Nancy Corey will serve as the Support Staff person for the part time staff.

Advantages include more people on the ground and closer to the action, more people at the table, and more ideas. Disadvantages include the challenge of coordination and a high learning curve.

It is an experimental model to be tried for a year and then evaluated. It is timely now to try a new model. If it doesn’t work we can go back to the previous way of staffing.

Anyone interested in applying for any of these positions is invited to contact Bishop Wollersheim.