Search Team Report on Process

As we move closer to Sunday, March 14th when Rev. Sheree Taylor-Jones will speak to our congregation as a viable candidate for Senior Minister, we wanted to provide you with a thorough report from our Minister Search Team. Outlined below are the steps taken over many months to bring us to this amazing point in time. We encourage everyone to join us on Sunday, March 14th and we will provide a mechanism for providing feedback. Your feedback is an important consideration in the decision making process by your Board of Trustees.

The Team 

The team that was involved throughout the process was as follows:

Sandra Vela, James Nowlin, Mary Spangberg, Courtney Poole, Neil Feiereisel, Robena Jackson, Cinnamon Hemmeline and John Fleming.  

The original team included Bob Withrow and Kelly Glover, but each had to step down for personal reasons. Rick Busby also stepped down later in the process due to his newly acquired position on the staff as our Communications Specialist. 

We began everything with prayer to align ourselves and our intentions in consciousness. The team prayed together to  open  and close each of our meetings. Due to the unprecedented circumstances of the pandemic, our team met virtually weekly, via Zoom, as we established our process, in preparation for receiving applications. We proceeded with a multi-faceted decision making process to discern the best fit for the future of UCOH.

The UWM Application

After we had prepared and submitted the lengthy application packet to UWM for posting, we spent a great deal of time reviewing the list of qualities the Board had given us, and creating a detailed Rubric to use in analyzing the basic qualifications, experience, etc. The Board was kept apprised of the process. 

Ultimately, we received (10) applicants from UWM in total.  

Research and Vetting of Candidates

The team thoroughly reviewed and discussed each applicant. We called a minimum of three references on each candidate and submitted reports to the team for their review. We relied heavily on the media footprint to search for talks, etc. as we gathered our resources. Using the team sharing application, SLACK, we were able to collect links and discuss in great detail our impressions and concerns back and forth among the team as we considered each candidate fully. These discussions continued beyond the time we spent in our weekly Zoom meetings totaling many, many hours of deliberation and discussion.

We then selected, by consensus (4) to invite for a 1st interview. We called all references and continued discussions, reviewing videos, social media content, etc.  

The team reviewed more than 30 hours worth of video and podcasting content on the candidates along with individual websites and social media accounts.  

The Interview Process

We spent a great deal of time contemplating and crafting two sets of  interview questions for use in first and second round interviews and we conducted lengthy video interviews with several of the candidates. 

We asked (2) of the candidates to take the 16 Personalities assessment as we moved them through for 2nd Interviews, also by consensus. Our team had also taken this assessment in order to learn to better work together as a team and found it to be very insightful and helpful in our interpretation of communication styles. The candidates who took the 16 Personalities assessment found it very accurate for them, too, and we were able to engage them in conversation about their “communication and leadership styles” more easily. 

We took great pains to conduct the interviews in a conversational manner so the candidates were able to relax and share more easily from their hearts and share fully with us, especially regarding their call to ministry. We wanted to get to know them and did our best to create warmth and intimacy in the virtual interviewing format, which can be quite stark for the interviewees.  

Our Recommendations

We were able to record these interviews and included them to the Board in our packets for candidate consideration. The Board had a very in-depth look at the candidates and each team member’s insights and perspectives which they greatly appreciated.  

We, as the Minister Magnet Team, are 100% in consensus with the Board’s decision based on the process we followed.

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