Staff pay: What should you pay your ministry team?

The greatest asset that your church has is likely to be your ministry team. 

These are the folk at the cutting edge of much of what goes on in, and through, your church as they lead the church forward. Whilst we may often readily acknowledge their importance, do we honour them in thinking well about remuneration levels and in communicating well about matters of pay?

The context and concern

This blog comes from a concern that many ministers are undervalued by their churches, if value equates to remuneration. Past salary-related surveys suggest that around one-third of churches pay less than the ‘position merits’, which correlates to a similar percentage of church ministers who consider their salary levels to be ‘less than adequate’. Whilst there are no recent comprehensive, significant bench-marking surveys, we do not believe that this situation has improved. In fact, there is anecdotal evidence that some ministers are taking on debt simply to cover increased cost of living expenses. Whilst this may be true of many others in the country, we see it as good care of our workers to give time to consider what is right for them.

Trying to set a pay structure for your ministry team that enables them to live to a reasonable standard is not without its issues. There are no readily available comparable pay scales to hand, and even for the larger denominations suggested stipends make little allowance for size or location of church, nor for the skills, experience and qualifications of the incumbent team member. Getting this right may not be straightforward but it is important to aim to do what is right.

What might you want to think about?

• Have an intentional, robust process that enables you to calculate remuneration levels. Such a process:
  
  • Takes account of inflation in a consistent way.
  • Considers when extra responsibilities/skills should be taken into account over the longer term.
  • In a team situation, considers pay differentials. Should you pay different salary levels to team members with different roles and levels of responsibility? If so, how much and why?
  • Removes any salary distortion (positive or negative) as a result of personalities.
  • Allows you to respond in broad terms to church members’ questions about 'why' and 'what's fair'.
• Remember that remuneration is more than just salary:
  
  • Pensions are an important component of remuneration, so think about the level of contribution being paid by you, the employer. Is the minimum 3% required under pension auto enrolment sufficient? (Increasingly, we are seeing churches - and other Christian ministries - pay the full 8% as employers' contributions, recognising the value of pensions as part of life long financial requirements of ministry).
  • In addition to salary, some churches may pay living expenses or allowances (but be careful about the tax implications) to supplement a minister’s income where specific extras are incurred.
• Setting the right pay levels in your own context:
  
  • Remember that circumstances and responsibilities change: size of church, management of others, particular pressures.
  • But see these in the context of a longer term plan of where the pay will be in, say, 5 or 10 years’ time.
  • Churches are relational places, and ministers operate within that relational structure and so there is a strong argument that it might be unhelpful (perhaps causing some resentment) if a minister’s remuneration is significantly different from the income of the ‘average’ church member.
• Benchmarking can prove helpful:
  
  • It helps staff see their ‘package’ in a wider context.
  • It is not easy for church leaders; there is little public data and some of what there is has distortions due to semi-voluntary roles and housing benefits.
  • Teachers’ salaries or other local pay levels (such as NHS workers) are often used as a benchmark. If teachers’ salary scales are used, remember to match the roles appropriately. Benchmarking a senior pastor’s salary in a large city church against an entry level teacher’s salary is clearly not appropriate. However, nor is matching an ordinary church leader’s salary against the Head’s role in a large school.
• Communicating well
  
  • Make sure there is frequent and open dialogue with members of the ministry team about financial matters. (NB It is helpful for leaders to have someone who they can talk to about their personal finances, but this may not be best to be someone in the Trustee team – a sense of failure/embarrassment over personal financial management, or lack of it, can be significant!)
  • Listen well to the concerns of your ministry team.
  • Explain remuneration: both the framework and any changes – don’t leave the staff second guessing.

Conclusion

Getting this right is not easy, but we owe it to our ministry teams to do the best job that we can to pay at levels that:

• Reflect what the position merits;
• Provide a reasonable standard of living; and
• Make the team see that, in this most material way, their needs are being considered.

Helpful links:

Raising the Standard: Transforming the Culture of Money in the Church

UCAN have worked hard to produce a survey in 2023 on church salaries: Benchmarking Survey — UCAN | UK Church Administrator Network (churchadministrators.net). It has some very useful statistics and comments, although they do acknowledge that the survey respondents were skewed towards larger, more organised churches and did lack data on ordained or senior leadership roles.