Fire in the Belly; Pain in the Heart

No, I'm not trying to come up w/ a list of symptoms for some undiagnosed illness. Rather I've been looking at my own motives for writing this blog.

The pain in my heart is for all those who have been unnecessarily wounded by our current processes for examining for ministry. Let me stress the word "unnecessarily." We need an examining process. There are those who may not be ready for ordained ministry. For those who are ready, a good examining process endorses their efforts and demonstrates support from our Association.

The question I'm raising is whether our current processes for examining for ministry represent best practices in examining and, if not, what are the best ways to modify them.

The MFC has asked the Board of Trustees to charter a comprehensive review of ministerial examining. It's great that we're on the same page regarding this need.

Yet, the fire in my belly and the pain in my heart are fueled by concerns about the damage that may be done while this review is undertaken. On Sunday, I heard another tale of woe about the actions of a Regional Subcommittee on Candidates (RSCC). My interlocutor wanted to know why the RSCC would substitute its judgment for those of individuals such as CPE supervisors and internship supervisors who had much more experience with his performance.

OK, let's presume that this candidate had "stage fright." Several other candidates have reported having same. After all, it feels like one's entire future is being compressed into a one-hour interview. Let's also allow that susceptibility to stage fright isn't a good trait in ministry. The question remains whether we want to use this as an opt-out in our examining process or merely advise candidates how to prepare to overcome it.

WARNING: I may be radically oversimplifying. There may be many reasons over and above stage fright that are causing these candidates to stumble. It just saddens me that so many are receiving what appear to be unnecessary wounds.

RECOMMENDATIONS:

• Let's not wait several years to convene a blue-ribbon panel. Let's start modifying the process now. The MFC and RSCCs can provide additional guidance about their current expectations. This guidance will inform candidates and provide useful information for the panel.
  
• Seminaries, academic advisers, internship supervisors, CPE supervisors, and others should be designing and implementing more opportunities for candidates to become test wise. For example, Fred Helio Fred Garcia teaches an outstanding course at Starr King in Media Skills in Public Ministry, which can help candidates prepare for challenging interviews. (As an aside, the film Frost/Nixon is a guide to some of the the perils and challenges of interviewing.)
• Candidates and aspirants can do more to educate themselves about the process and prepare themselves for the interviews. I am pleased with the buzz for this blog. We may start a new motto: "Mock Interview: Don't leave for your MFC/RSCC interview without one."
  

Best Predictors

The mantra for performance based interviewing was the following: The best predictor of future performance is past performance. Therefore, we designed interview questions that allowed candidates to describe how they had performed when facing tasks and challenges similar to those of the positions for which they were applying.

However, there is an even better predictor of future performance on a job than past performance in other jobs and life situations: Past performance on the same job. Christine Robinson, aka iMinister, well makes that point in her comment below on my last post. Her thinking is affirmed by Malcolm Gladwell in his latest book, Outliers: The Story of Success, in which he criticizes many evaluation techniques as being poor predictors of future performance. He calls this "the mismatch problem," and encourages the use of on-the-job evaluation.

This is a justice issue. One of Gladwell's examples was preference for minorities at the University of Michigan law school. Twenty years after the preferences were granted, minority attorneys who had been granted preferences were performing as well as non-minority candidates who had "higher" qualifications.

In "Minorities Will Strive to Cross a Higher Bar," David L. Kirp, professor of public policy at UC Berkeley, cites a recent study that shows that undergraduate minority students at elite private universities who receive preferential treatment perform better. People do respond to rising expectations. Kirp shows the fallacies in claims that this preferencial treatment creates another kind of mismatch problem.

How does all this translate into recommendations for examining for ministers?

• Use the best measures available and recognize their limitations.
• Take iMinister's advice and put more emphasis on on-the-job performance rather than academics.
• Provide preferential treatment when warranted and publicize your processes and rationales. This whole-person approach can consider class and other distinctions and expections that have impacted past performance.

Parker's Legacy for Ministerial Formation & Development

The Eclectic Cleric has a wonderful post "Theodore Parker's destructive legacy . . ." It provides an explanation for his comment on my post "Glory Days."

To read about this exchange in detail, please follow the links above. The short version was my concern that our love of our past--both our shared historical past and the pasts and cultures of our individual congregations--might discourage us from making the changes necessary for a vital future. The Eclectic Cleric wrote the following: "The influence of people like Theodore Parker (in particular) on subsequent generations of Unitarian clergy has in many ways been more harmful than good."

With the best of intentions, I meant to ask him to clarify his remark, but didn't get around to it. Now in his "Theodore Parker's destructive legacy . . .", he's provided that clarity. While I encourage you to read The Eclectic Cleric's complete post, a critical observation he's made is that Parker suicided through overwork, setting a bad example for subsequent UU clergy.

While I'm new to UU ministry, I'm not new to UUism or to overwork. I believe that we set UU ministers on the path of self-destruction by expecting that they will be competent in 15 different areas. We put an "S" on their chests, give them a robe (not a cape), and tell them to make a leap of faith over tall, if not impossible, demands.

Success is often attributable to being specialized and focused. Those who try to be all things to all people may end up disappointing everyone.

It may come as a surprise after the above, but I have some ambivalence around this issue. Ministerial formation caused me to stretch in painful yet growthful ways. The line between a healthy stretch and an injury isn't always clear. The line between appropriately addressing multiple responsibilities and wasting one's energies by spreading them too thin is similarly cloudy.

The mind wants to simplify and is particularly fond of bifurcation. Focus on the congregation or on the community? Hallman or Morales? But the issues we're raising are too complex to neatly fit into dichotomies. Let's continue to bring attention to these questions and encourage others to do so as well.

Bringers of Hope; Companions in Despair

One of my CPE (Clinical Pastoral Education) supervisors, Rev. Dr. Peter Yuichi Clark, taught me that a critical role of chaplains is to be bringers of hope.  It was a challenge to figure out what this meant to a non-theist like me.

The Rev. Patty Franz, then a hospice chaplain, was a guide.  I asked her what one said to a dying person when you yourself had no clarity about what happens after death.  She told me to ask patients what they imagined would happen.  In time, I saw myself not bringing hope but drawing out the hope that was already within others.

Candidates preparing for their MFC (Ministerial Fellowship Committee) interviews are frequently told that the MFC is looking for "ministerial presence."  Is the candidate able to minister to the MFC?  Is the candidate someone that the MFC members would like to have as their minister?

When I was preparing for my MFC interview, I certainly had my bouts of fear and despair.  Before and during the interview, I had moments of high anxiety. How does one bring hope and be a companion to despair when one is feeling hopeless and afraid?

Before reading my answers, I recommend you reflect on your own answers.  What's below worked for me, but each of us has within ourselves the answers to these questions.

I found myself asking for help and guidance.  There's a long list of UU and non-UU ministers and lay persons who supported me.

For some reason, I am reminded of my work on a unit for persons with serious psychiatric illnesses.  I was frightened.  Yet, I came to learn that I was not alone, that others "had my back."

When you go in for your MFC interview, there will be a whole bunch of folk who will have your back.  The members of the Committee are not nearly as frightening as they may appear in your imagination.  They have your and UUism's best interest at heart.  Bring the hope that is within you and draw out the hope that is within them.

Washitarians & Other Strange Creatures

A wise friend from Charlottesville, VA, home of the University of Virginia (founded by that quasi-Unitarian Thomas Jefferson), once told me that all university towns exist in invisible bubbles that separate them from the rest of the planet.  Now that I've lived in the Berkeley bubble for several years, I better appreciate what he said and the opportunity to get out of town every once in a while to breathe the air outside the bubble.

I am a Washitarian, i.e., a Unitarian (now UU) from Washington, DC.  There are over 20 UU congregations in the Baltimore-Washington metro area.  To be a UU at the Fairfax, VA, congregation, for example, may be different than being a UU at Arlington, All Souls, or Bull Run.

Before I moved to Berkeley, I knew what it was like being this UU in DC; Northern Virginia; Madison, WI; and Tampa, FL.  However, being UU at the Starr King School for the Ministry was honest to God culture shock.  I found this link on the subject and started checking out my symptoms.

What is the relevance of all this for examining for UU ministry?  For me, it speaks to the question of "fit."  A minister might "fit" wonderfully well at the Berkeley Fellowship and bomb at the Tampa Church.   A minister might fit the needs of a church in 1995 and bomb at that same church (of course, it wouldn't be the same church) in 2009.

How do we examine for ministry in a way that recognizes the wide range of cultures, needs, and environments in which our successful candidates will find themselves?  What are the lessons learned from successful ministers who've had to grow into positions in cultures unlike their own?

How to Use This Blog

In my fantasy world, all readers of this blog would be tech sophisticates reading every word of my deathless prose with bated breath. Meanwhile, back in this universe, I know that many of my readers are seminarians and other candidates for UU ministry who are checking it out for pointers for preparing for RSCC and MFC interviews. And, like the rest of us poor mortals, there are seminarians who have not yet achieved tech enlightenment.

Therefore, there are lots of labels, such as "Preparing for the MFC Interview," on the lower right side of this page. Click on one of them, and only those posts related to your interest will appear.

Knowing how stressful it can be preparing for these interviews, I hope this guidance and these shortcuts are helpful to you.

Envy & Evangelicals

Of all the books I read in seminary (and there were many!), one that made a particularly deep impression was The Very Large Church by Lyle E. Schaller.

A lifelong UU who'd never been inside a metachurch, I'd lumped together "evangelicals" and "fundamentalists." I learned that not all evangelicals are politically and social conservative and that the message of many of them is more about hospitality and salvation than about dogma.

The programs and services offered by the megachurches are amazing.   I became jealous, imagining what UU congregations and ministers could do with the resources of churches of this size.  While nationally we UUs were holding our own in absolute numbers, we were becoming increasing insignificant as a percentage of U.S. population. 

In "The Coming Evangelical Collapse," Michael Spencer, predicts a major decline of evangelical Christianity.  His reasons include evangelicals having become identified with culture and political conservativism and their failure to pass onto their youth a faith that can survive the impact of secularism.  He write [italics his]:  We fell for the trap of believing in a cause more than a faith.

In "The Future of Religion," Jon Cleland-Host raises interesting questions about the future of religion.

What does all this have to do with examining for UU ministry?  Well, when you don't like an outcome, e.g., the flatlining of UU membership since the Us joined the Us in 1961, you may be tempted to round up all the usual suspects, including the formation and development of ministers.  In this case, ministerial formation and development played a role in UUism's failure to grow, but the above articles give us context and perspective for evaluting that outcome and that role.

Have UUs also confused causes with a faith and have we failed to provide our youth--or even ourselves--with a faith that can survive secularism?   How do we form and develop UU ministers who bring hope for our religion and for our planet?

Love-Making Elephants and Moments of Clarity

The last sentence of my previous post was too long, complicated, and obscure. Clarity hopefully follows.

When I worked at the Department of Veterans Affairs (VA), we used to say that all the major projects were like elephants making love: the underbrush was trampled, small creatures and flora could be damaged or even destroyed if they were in the way, there was a lot of trumpeting and other unpleasant noises, and there was no visible result for at least three years. (The actual gestation period for elephants is around 22 months, but for VA projects, 3 years could be just the kickoff.)

Over at the UUA View from Berkeley, UUA Trustee Linda Laskowski reports that the UUA Board has created a working group on excellence in ministry that will be convened by Rev. Doug Gallager. Starting on page 3 of its April 16, 2009, Report to the Board, the Ministerial Fellowshipping Committee (MFC) recommended a "comprehensive review of the MFC's role in fostering excellence in ministry" which is anticipated to take 2 to 3 years.

I applaud this recommendation of the MFC and wonder what might be done while the review is being undertaken. My previous post on prototyping was an argument for making adjustments while data collection and analysis occur.

Francis Bacon, C. Otto Scharmer, & the Evolution of Competencies

Since there may be a UU who hasn't yet discovered The Teaching Company, let's start with a shout-out.  The Teaching Company is a purveyor of audio and video recordings of college courses: a great way to fill the gaps in one's knowledge or to challenge one's "knowledge" with new perspectives.

I've been listening to Great Minds of the Western Intellectual Tradition, 3rd Edition.  Lecture 30 is "Bacon's New Organon and the New Science."  The professor, Alan Charles Kors, tells us that when Francis Bacon (1561-1626) entered Cambridge University all university education was essentially clerical (religious) education.  In The New Organon, Bacon argued for a separation of religion and science (then known as "natural philosophy") and for learning by direct observation and inductive reasoning (from the specific to the general) rather than the study of words (Scriptures) and deductive reasoning (from the general to the specific).

 In "Addressing the Blind Spot of Our Time: An executive summary of the new book by Otto Scharmer Theory U: Leading from the Future as It Emerges," C. Otto Scharmer, a professor at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, claims that "we" weren't properly educated for innovation.  (His "we" is engineers, scientists, managers, and economists, but I suspect his claim also applies to ministers and lay leaders.)   He writes about his experiences learning about prototyping from Hans (Nick) Roericht, a design professor at the Berlin Academy of Arts.  Scharmer was impressed with Roericht's design teams producing prototypes in four hours that most managers would not have undertaken without years of analysis.  Scharmer learned:  

The prototype is part of the sensing and discovery process in which we explore the future by doing rather than by thinking and reflecting.  This is such a simple point--but I have found that the innovation processes of many organizations are stalled right there, in the old analytical method of "analysis paralysis."

The division between science and religion isn't as neat as we might assume reading about Bacon's innovation in thinking and education.  Throughout this blog, I have been arguing for applying scientific methods to examining for the ministry.

Scharmer provides an interesting correlative to this purpose.  Rather than limiting ourselves to exhaustive analysis to support inductive reasoning about examining for ministry, it may be more beneficial and expeditious to prototype examining and formational processes first and then start testing the prototypes.  I will provide future posts describing what this might look like.

Glory Days

Glory days well they'll pass you by
Glory days in the wink of a young girl's eye
Glory days, glory days

--Bruce Springsteen

Growing up in Virginia in the 1950s and 60s, there were lots of opportunities to reflect on "glory days." With Washington, Jefferson, Madison, and Monroe all Virginians, it was easy to reflect back to the glory days of Virginia, the Mother of Presidents.

With the pride and the offended honor that only the defeated possess, there were also the glory days of the Civil War, immortalized on Monument Avenue in Richmond. If Virginia has a saint, it's Robert E. Lee; a martyr, Stonewall Jackson.

I compounded the problem by falling in love with Greek mythology. We were an agnostic household, but every boy must have his gods. With wonder, I contrasted these glory days of ancient Greece to Greece's standing in the modern world.

OK, OK, I bet you're wondering what the above is doing on a blog on examining for UU ministry. Like Virginia and Greece, UUism has a proud and significant history. In a culture where so many have never heard of us or confuse us with Unity or Unification, UUs wear "famous UUs" tee shirts just to claim our identity and differentiate ourselves from followers of other religions.

In this reverence for our history, we risk falling into a glory days syndrome. Let's return to the Boss for a reminder:

And I hope when I get old I don't sit around thinking about it
but I probably will
Yeah, just sitting back trying to recapture
a little of the glory of, well time slips away
and leaves you with nothing mister but
boring stories of glory days

If you'll excuse the cliche, we must find a way to honor the past while preparing for the future. In a religion where the average age is creeping upwards past 55 and we've remained at about 200,000 members (adults and children) since consolidation in 1961, we want to make sure that we're not left with nothing "but boring stories of glory days." Our stagnancy in numerical growth has resulted in a dramatic decline as our percentage of rapidly growing U.S. population.

Currently, I'm serving as an organizational consultant to a Fellowship where the average age is much, much higher than the nationwide UU average. The minister and the Board are supporting the development of a young adult program and an oral history project so that this congregation's wonderful legacy of social justice work may be passed on to another generation. The Fellowship is participating in a "quadrilogue" with two other congregations and the Starr King School for the Ministry to see how all four UU institutions may support one another.

We are cheered and inspired by the stories of growing, vibrant UU "breakthrough" congregations. While it's clear that many factors--including lay leadership, governance, location, and facilities-- contribute to such breakthroughs, the role of the minister is significant. As we contemplate revising the examining process for UU ministry, we should focus on the lessons learned from these successes to identify ministerial performance and competencies that will lead to a whole new set of glory days.

Of Guilds, Gatekeepers, and Paraprofessionals

The Ministerial Fellowshipping Committee (MFC) plays the very important role of gatekeeper of fellowshipping as a UU minister. We want it to exclude those not ready for ministry and include those who are.

No gatekeeping function is perfect. However, the greater the validity (measuring what you intend to measure) and reliability (consistency in measurement) of your examination the less likely you are to exclude those who are ready and include those who are not.

Examining can be a delicate balancing act. You want to assure the competency of practitioners for the safety and well-being of those whom they will serve. Yet there is a temptation to restrain trade/oppress/exclude as may be seen in this Wikipedia article on guilds.

Examining for the professions should include both professionals and nonprofessionals as a way of fostering professionalism and of assuring that the profession remains responsive to those whom it serves. The mixture of clergy and laity on the MFC reflects this wisdom.

Over at the UUA View from Berkeley, UUA Trustee Linda Laskowski expresses concern about the anticipated turnover in UU ministry of 50% during the next 10 years. She writes the following:

Add to that the calling many lay leaders feel for ministry, especially in their later years. Is devoting yourself to several years of seminary the only option to satisfy this deep longing?

The answer is clearly "no." Some UU congregations have wonderful worship associate programs. At least one, the UU Congregation of Fairfax, VA, has an outstanding lay pastoral care program developed by a psychiatrist and a hospice nurse. You don't need to be an ordained minister to have a ministry any more than you need to be a physician to perform the duties of a nurse practitioner. Let's go for a both/and solution that recognizes the need for professional clergy and lay ministry.

Resistance is Futile (and Unwise): Excellence & Oppression

Often people are wisely concerned about the relationship between examining and oppression. A powerful historical example of oppressive examining is the "literacy tests" that were used to deny the vote to African Americans in the South from the 1890s through the 1960s.

The other side of the examining coin is presented in this history of the relationship between barbers and surgeons. Suffice it to say that we all may be thankful that the examining of surgeons is much more rigorous than it once was.

A third interesting example comes from the film Jazz. Listening to Wynton Marsalis wax poetic about Louis Armstrong, we are reminded of the roles that genius can play.

Incompetence in the professions is dangerous. People do not die on the operating table because of an incompetent chaplain, but incompetent and unethical ministers have done much damage.

Ministers have also inspired. While not every minister may have the genius of the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., we may all--ministers and laity--be inspired by his example.

Resistance to examining is futile and unwise. It's important to make judgments about competency, excellence, and genius. However, it's also important that such judgments and the processes by which they are reached are congruent with the first (the inherent worth and dignity of every person) and second (justice, equity, and compassion in human relations) principles of UUism.

Competencies & Performance

"The best predictor of future performance is past performance."

The above was our mantra for the Performance-Based Interviewing project at the Department of Veterans Affairs (VA). Jobs at VA were described in terms of duties and responsibilities, the competencies required to perform the duties and exercise the responsibilities were identified, and interview questions were developed to assess whether candidates possessed the required competencies.

In Hire With Your Head: Using Performance-Based Hiring to Build Great Teams, Lou Adler suggests a more direct approach: figure out what you want done and ask the candidates to describe or demonstrate the capacity to do it.

In one way, this is a very old idea. When I entered the workforce as a typist, I took a typing test. (AKA keyboarding for the post-typewriter generations. :-) )

The idea of performance testing gets much more complicated when dealing with duties and responsibilities that are more difficult to demonstrate in an interview. Adler gives the example of an interview for a position involving the development of marketing plans. The interviewer and interviewee outlined a plan during the interview. The interviewee was hired and used that outline to complete and implement the plan.

If we try to apply this concept to the MFC (Ministerial Fellowshipping Committee) interview, we can see that the first challenge is deciding what we want ministers to do. The tasks of healthcare chaplaincy, community organizing, and parish ministry overlap, but are far from identical.

The second challenge is evaluation. During an interview, you can demonstrate skill outlining a marketing plan or delivering a 10-minute sermon. Neither assures is that you will be successful at implementing a marketing plan or regularly leading worship that inspires a congregation/community.

That these challenges are daunting should not be discouraging. The reflection and dialogue required to address them will be strengthen and deepen our religion.

Of Ministers and Movements

My Unitarianism started at age 5 in the 1950s when my father took me to Sunday school at All Souls Unitarian Church in Washington, DC. The minister there, A. Powell Davies, was responsible for extraordinary growth in Unitarianism in the area. Davies believed that Unitarianism needed to end its identification with Christianity and become a world religion.

Now, nearly 60 years down the pike, most UUs would agree that we are no longer a Christian religion even though there are many Christians among us. Despite our bumper sticker claims to being the "Uncommon Denomination" (which implies that we're still Protestants), I frequently hear references to UUism as a "movement."

It's hard to describe what I think of the use of the word "movement" without giving into the temptation to be scatological. UUism isn't a movement; it's a religion.

All the UUs who say that they are spiritual but not religious are doing themselves and UUism a disservice. What they may be trying to say is that they are not theists. Yet they should learn from UU religious humanists that you can defined "religion" in a manner to include atheists and agnostics. You don't have to be a believer to be a UU, but once you join a UU congregation, you are religious whether you know it or not.

My hard-won understanding acquired through the sturm und drang of seminary is that the critical difference between spirituality and religion is that only the former can be a solitary pursuit. Religion is a messier business; it involves other people.

It is in the nature of the free faith that is UUism that it's often difficult to define what is inside and outside of our tent, what it means to be a UU, and the role of ministry. These are worthy challenges that we must undertake if we are to continue to build our legacy.

On the Other Side of the Interview Table

In this blog, I have mainly been focused on helping candidates prepare for the UU ministerial fellowshipping process and making recommendations for modifying that process. However, I have also started thinking about another use of examining that is often critical to success in ministry.

A little history first. I first became involved in an in-depth study of interviewing because a senior official at the Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) told me that he believed that improving selection processes, especially interviewing, was the more important action that human resources could do to most improve employment at VA.

This official based this recommendation on his experience in interviewing people for executive positions. He said that the executive interviewees consistency stated that the decisions they most often regretted were selection decisions.

Recently, several UU ministers have told me that one of the critical areas in which they feel least prepared is human resources. Selecting staff, identifying volunteers, and providing guidance to committees and boards are important roles in parish ministry. I even found that knowledge of human resources principles and practices enhanced my capacity to provide spiritual and emotional care to staff and patients as a hospital chaplain.

I'm not going to try to turn this blog into a human resources manual for ministers. However, I encourage my readers to look at the posts here from both sides of the interview table.

Comments about human resources challenges in ministry will be appreciated.

Structured Interviews: What They Are; Why You Should Use Them

Ministerial Fellowshipping Committee (MFC) interviews should be structured to increase the likelihood of accuracy and fairness. However, when I've made this recommendation, I've received some rather strong reactions that appear to be based on differing understandings of what is meant by "structured" interviews.

Interviews may be structured in many ways. Here's a way to do so for professional positions that increases the likelihood of fairness and accuracy while giving interviewers latitude to improvise and to inquire in depth.

The consistent questions (i.e., those asked of all candidates who are expected to possess a competency) in a structured interview tend to be broad and serve as jumping off points for more detailed, individualized questions. For example, a broad question might be the following: "What has been a significant challenge in your anti-oppression work and how did you overcome it?"

We can imagine that answers to this question will vary greatly depending upon the social location and life experience of the interviewee. Follow-up questions, tailored to the interviewee's response, might be one or more of the following:

• Were there other consequences to your actions?
• After your this initial success (failure), were other actions undertaken at a later date?
• What role did collaboration play in your success?
• What, if any, networking and research did you do before acting?

Contrasting this strategy for structuring interviews with other types of examining may help put it more in focus. Interviews structured in this way are not:

• Standardized tests.
• Foolishly consistent.

Structured Interviews vs. Standardized Tests
Someone expressed the concern that structured interviews were standardized tests and would be subject to cultural bias. As noted below, while some authorities equate "structured interviews" with "standardized interviews," that's not how I'm using the terms here. Furthermore, when most of us thing of standardized tests, we think of multiple choice tests.

Standardized testing risks cultural bias in both questions and the answers. The risk is often greater in the answers than the questions because in many forms of standardized testing, such as multiple choice tests, there is only one right answer.

No form of examining based on content validity (i.e., the test is designed to see whether candidates have the knowledge required for the position) is immune from the risk of cultural bias. However, there is less risk with structured interviewing than with multiple choice tests because in the former interviewers can ask follow-up questions designed to more thoroughly elicit the candidate's competencies and because there is no single right answer to a structured interview question.

Structured Interviews vs. Standardized Interviews
Another interlocutor was concerned that a structured interview would tie the hands of the interviewers. This concern is quite understandable because some authorities use "standardized interviews" and "structured interviews" synonymously.

For some kinds of research, standardized interviews in which all the interviewees are asked the same questions in the same sequence is a strategy for increasing validity and reliability. It also permits the use of interviewers with minimal training.

This strategy is not likely to be effective in interviewing for professional positions. In such interviews, you do not wish to assure accuracy and reliability in a manner that does not permit you to draw upon the experience and expertise of your interview panel.

A structured interview is a wonderful midpoint between free-form interviewing and standardized interviewing. It provides a degree of consistency while allowing the interview panel to delve more deeply in to the qualifications of the interviewees.

Calling Ministers: Calling & Examining

What is the relationship between ministerial calling and ministerial examining?

There was a lot of activity last month in the UU blogosphere about ministerial calling. Here are links to posts on the subject by Transient and Permanent, Lizard Eater, and A UU Minister in the South. They caused me to reflect on why I chose the title of "Calling Ministers" for this blog and what "calling" means to me.

When I came up with the title "Calling Ministers," I had multiple purposes. I wanted to call ministers to look at the blog. I also wanted to look at the process of UU ministerial calling and formation.

"Calling" has at least two meanings in UU context: (1) the call to ministry; and (2) the call of ministers by congregations. Once upon a time, one's calling to Unitarian or Universal ministry came from God and was confirmed by a congregation.

Congregations still call ministers, but today many of us are less certain about a calling from God. Is the encouragement we receive from others the voice of God in disguise? Or, are both an anthropomorphic "God" and "God's voice" misplaced literalisms?

Whoa, I am waxing much to philosophical/theological for the purpose of this blog. Let's see whether I can to reconnect the dots from calling to examining.

In the absence of certainty of God's existence (much less God's primacy in calling), the calling that we receive from others -- ministers, congregants, friends, and family -- becomes primary. However, once candidates move to the formal process of ministerial formation, they find a whole new set of challenges and obstacles, including examinations, that they may not have anticipated.

The challenges and obstacles are part of how candidates develop the strength they will need as ministers. And, despite all you've heard to the contrary, failure -- or at least turning away from ministry -- is an option. It should be our objective to see that to the extent of our powers and wisdom, the examining process guides examinees, examiners, and the denomination in constructive and compassionate decision-making.

Situation Comedies, Film Noir, Tragedy

When I was a child in the 1950s, watching TV situation comedies often frustrated me. The half-hour shows would start with misunderstanding and failure to communicate. For the next 25 minutes, the characters would go through elaborate gyrations, faulty thinking, and emotional turmoil before one of them finally told her or his truth.

I would sit in front of the TV wanting to shout "talk to one another." I soon stopped watching these shows.

Film noir was another matter. In films such as Night and the City (1950), you could see how the protagonist's guile, ambition, and desperation led to his inevitable decline. This was not a simple and stupid miscommunication followed by an inevitable happy ending; this was character as destiny, a lesson of what might happen if you failed to take A. Powell Davies' advice to grow a soul.

Tragedy was even more compelling. As an adolescent, I saw A Long Days Journey Into Night at Arena Stage, a theater in the round in Washington, DC. On leaving the theater, I felt like I was escaping from a spider's web. Each member of that tragic family contributed to her or his own destruction and to the destruction of one another. They could not exit from the web of their own creation.

You may be wondering by now what the above is doing in a blog on examining for UU ministry. I started this blog because I believed that there were opportunities to improve examining for UU ministry for the examiners, the examinees, and the denomination. However, my interest broadened from the question of examining to the question of ministerial formation and development. That, in turn, lead to the question of the evolution of UUism, including the question: Is UUism producing the leadership it needs for the 21st century?

When I was a child in the 50s, UUism was a vital and vibrant faith in the Washington, DC, area. It was a faith for the modern, post-World War II era, not encumbered by the superstitions that weighed down other religions.

Now, 50 years later, with the average age of UUs reaching 55, I wonder whether UUism needs a new sense of purpose and destiny. Is UUism a faith with a future, or will it, like MacArthur's old soldier, just fade away?

I believe UUism can be a faith for the 21st century. I believe it is time for soul growth. Shall we grow together?

Academic, Formational, and/or Professional?

I've been researching ministerial formation and examining. The access and assistance offered by a great university library and its staff are hard to beat. (Yes, dear reader, I proudly confess to being a library nerd.)

Only a few journal articles speak directly to ministerial examining. One of the most intriguing is "Beyond Wish Lists for Pastoral Leadership: Assessing Clergy Behavior and Congressional Outcomes to Guide Seminary Curriculum" by John Dreibelbis and David Gortner (the latter is a professor here in Berkeley at the Church Divinity School of the Pacific) in Theological Education, Volume 40, Supplement (2005): 25-49.

Dreibelbis and Gortner are persuaded of the need for "competency-oriented models of [theological] education in which competencies are identified as actions rooted in knowledge, character, and skill contributing to positive outcomes in congregational contexts--the ultimate testing grounds (italics in original) of theological disciplines." They go on to note that the two educational models usually found in theological education are academic and formational. They believe that a professional model must be added if seminarians are to develop the knowledges, skills, and abilities they will need as ministers.

There is a wealth of information in this journal article. For today, I just wish to point out that the Episcopal priests who were surveyed for it generally reported the most confidence in their ability to perform sacramental and preaching job activities and the least confidence in community outreach, lay leadership development, and organizational leadership job activities.

Looking at the 10 knowledge-based versus the 5 performance-based Competencies for UU Ministry affirm a mismatch in ministerial formation. Many a candidate for UU ministry has spent hours memorizing information that they may never use again while slighting important skill development. Those who participated in the Excellence in Ministry conference and members of the MFC recognize that the time has come for a review of the examining and formational processes.

What do you think?

Love & Justice

The other day I had an interesting conversation with a recently fellowshipped UU minister about his experiences with the Ministerial Fellowshipping Committee (MFC) and his assessment of this blog. He questioned where "beloved community" was in the MFC process. He wasn't sure that his question belonged in this blog, which he categorized as being "technical."

Well, I'd heard of "beloved community" and knew it was central to the thinking of Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King. This article from Christian Century provides more information. This Wikipedia article credits the U.S. pragmatist philosopher Charlies Peirce as being the original developer of the concept.

King recognized that his beloved community was not a present reality, but a promised land for which those of good will should strive. It was to be a place of love and justice.

Being brought up Unitarian, the related Christian concept of "kingdom of God" made no sense to me. Hadn't we had enough of kings and kingdoms? Why would God want to be a king?

Seminary taught me that my thinking was anachronistic. There weren't a lot of flourishing democracies in Jesus' neighborhood. The choices were Roman Empire or Jewish monarchy. Under Roman rule, the return of Jewish monarchy looked awfully good.

Jesus was offering up another kingdom. He wasn't comparing kingdoms with dictatorships, republics, and democracies. He was picking rulers.

In the 20th century, humanity gained lots of experience with dictatorships, the modern form of absolute power. Their violence has reminded us of the importance of the rule of law. It helped inspire the Universal Declaration of Human Rights (1948), which includes the statement: "It is essential . . . that human rights should be protected by the rule of law."

Now I would be the first to admit that the rule of law does not guarantee justice. As Charles Dickens, whom we sometimes claim as a Unitarian, wrote (cited here at IMDB (Internet Movie Data Base) from the 1948 film "Oliver Twist"):

Mr. Brownlow: The law assumes that your wife acts under your direction.
Mr. Bumble: If the law supposes that, then the law is a ass, a idiot! If that's the eye of the law, then the law is a bachelor. And the worst I wish the law is that his eye may be opened by experience.

While Dickens was making a humorous comment on the state of law and marriage in his time, there is one marriage I hope we all can honor: the marriage of love and justice.

This blog, to quote the 2nd UU principle, is about "justice, equity, and compassion in human relations." Or, to say it more succinctly and specifically, it's about justice and love in ministerial examining.

Law, regulation, and procedure can go frightfully wrong. However, the laws, regulations, and procedures that are promoted in this blog are designed to promote love and justice. While the devil may be in the details, grace too resides there.

Hubris, Chutzpah, and A Long Pause

One of my mentors in ministry advised me that its greatest challenge was learning to say "no." She said that there would be more opportunities for ministry than I would have the time or energy to undertake. I did not know then how right she was.

But my delay in posting from 2/15 to the present has not solely been a matter of busyness. It has also been connected with the loss of nerve. Who am I, recently fellowshipped but not yet ordained, to advise about examining for ministry? If I am challenging other ministers, it's chutzpah. If I'm challenging the gods, it's hubris.

Thankfully, my nerve has returned. This project is not about my relative inexperience in ministry. It's not even about my expertise in examining. It's about the synergy that comes from building and facilitating a high-performing team. The best examining processes are developed and implemented in teams. It's no accident that the Supreme Court has 9 members. Good examining requires teams.

So I'm not going to write a lot more right now about changing the examining process for UU ministry. Rather, I intend to move forward with my recommendation to the MFC that they charter a research team and volunteer to serve as a participant or facilitator.

In the meantime, if you have stories, questions, or feedback, please submit them.

An Aside: RSCC Interviews and "Recommendations" from the Center for Ministry

The other day a seminarian told me that she'd received a "yellow light" from her Regional Subcommittee on Candidacy (RSCC) because she hadn't acted on a "recommendation" from the Center on Ministry. The RSCC told her how to implement the Center for Ministry recommendation, and required her to do so before returning to see them again. Obviously, she did not know that Center for Ministry "recommendations" are requirements unless you can make a well-documented case that they are erroneous.

You may wish to fault this aspirant for her naïveté. However, it's likely that other aspirants have been similarly naive.

After the interview, a friend told the seminarian that therapists and counselors don't direct, they recommend. This leaves me wondering whether she shared her Center for Ministry report with others and obtained guidance in its interpretation.

As my mother used to say, "a word to the wise is sufficient." May these words be that for current and future aspirants.

Step 2, Part 2: Further Research

Do I contradict myself?
Very well then I contradict myself,
(I am large, I contain multitudes.)

Walt Whitman, "Song of Myself"
US poet (1819 - 1892)

OK, OK, I'm not going to claim I contain multitudes. However, I am learning that writing a blog means at the least that I sometimes repeat myself (and probably sometimes contradict myself as well).

One of the challenges in the next step of the research is distinguishing the basic competencies expected of all UU ministers and the competencies (or the levels of attainment of competencies) for different types of ministry. (Currently, the three broad categories are parish, religious education, and community. Each of these categories could have subcategories, such as medical chaplaincies, prison chaplaincies, adult education.) For example, chaplains may rarely preach and may not have or need the expertise in this competency parish ministers develop. Conversely, some parish ministers may rarely provide counseling and may not have nor need the expertise that chaplains develop.

There is merit in having the assessment for preliminary fellowship be for ministry in general. It allows the newly fellowshipped to explore different opportunities in ministry without seeking the MFC's approval for every change. Conversely, it allows the MFC to set foundational qualification for all UU ministry.

Yet, examining need not be an either/or proposition. The MFC could continue to examine candidates for ministry in general while directing or weighting some of the questions to be more specific ministry or ministries for which the candidate is preparing. I suspect that it may already be doing so.

While I have been focusing on competencies and interviewing in this blog, a thorough soup-to-nuts review would include the entire process of ministerial formation and development. The magnitude of this task is another argument for the development of a research team. Maybe the team members will be the multitudes to which Whitman was referring.

Step 2: Conducting Research for the MFC, Part I

My many years in planning have taught me that my crystal ball is often cloudy. When it comes to research, it can even be stormy. Research will go where it will. What follows is intended to be neither comprehensive nor definitive.

"Research" is too large a topic to be covered in a single post. So this is Part I.

The best place to start is assembling the research team. It should include individuals with expertise in examining, ministers successful in different types of ministry, and interested stakeholders.

The team would start by collecting information from the MFC and others about the history of the MFC and its current practices. It would then conduct a literature search and look for "best practices" in examining in other denominations/religions and in related occupations. Focus groups also are likely to be helpful.

One of the challenges facing the research team will be obtaining consensus about just what is expected of UU ministers. For example, for years there has been much discussion about UU growth (or the lack thereof). People have argued about whether this means growth in numbers of congregants, social justice, spiritual depth, or some other parameter. How important is "growth" and what is meant by it?

To put this search for consensus and clarity in the broadest perspective, what do the UUA and its member congregations hope to accomplish in the foreseeable future and how will they examine for ministry so as to support those objectives? This links examining to workforce planning and workforce planning to strategic planning.

Beginning Again at the Beginning: A Research Team

This morning someone pointed out to me that it's hard to find my recommendations for the MFC on this blog. That observation is accurate. I have been dancing around the subject, collecting my thoughts, while I sought a better understanding of where the MFC was in its process. I will use the label "Recommendations for the MFC" to make it easier to locate posts on this subject.

Now I am ready to make more specific and systematic recommendations. Once I get them all together, I will submit them to the MFC. In the meantime, I would love your feedback.

Each year when the MFC visits Berkeley, it has an informal get-together on Holy Hill. At this year's gathering, it was quite evident how hard the volunteers who make up the MFC work reviewing tons of paperwork and attending meetings. Redesigning an examining process is a major undertaking. Any recommendations for the MFC should account for these facts.

My first recommendation is that the MFC charter a research team. Ideally this team should include as a consultant or a member a psychometrician (a psychologist who specializes in tests and measurements). It should also include UU and non-UU ministers and laity. A process like this always benefits from a multiplicity of perspectives.

The first task of the team would be to review the existing competencies and to collect information about ministerial competencies. Excellent sources for such information are ministers who are well respected by their colleagues and by those whom they serve.

Where is the Ministry?

After more than 30 years of organizational development (OD) and human resources work, I find myself serving as an OD consultant to a local UU congregation and the author of this blog. As a recently minted UU minister, I am trying to figure out what it means to do this work I love as a ministry.

In some ways OD work is naturally a ministry. You are ministering both to an organization and the individuals who make it up. To take a broader, ecological view, you are seeking to understand and support the organization and those affected by it as part of the interconnected web of existence. In business-speak, you look for employees, customers, suppliers, shareholders, and affected communities. In congregational consulting, you work with the members and friends of the congregation, visitors, the congregation as a whole, the committees and groups, the board and the officers, the minister(s), the staff, neighboring UU congregations and communities, the district, and the UUA. (And, I'm sure I've missed a few.)

Somewhere during my medical center chaplain residency, I recognize that my OD background was not always serving me well as a chaplain. I wrote that I needed to move my attention from the god of efficiency to the goddess of compassion.

So what does it mean to have a compassionate organizational development ministry? In this time of economic and political turmoil, this is a wonderful question. Organizations are dying right and left; individuals are losing their jobs.

Many years ago I read Healing Into Life and Death by Stephen Levine. It had a profound impact upon me. It made me recognize that our ministries aren't always about healing into life; sometimes are about healing unto death. And the "death" may not be the death of the body; it may be the death of old perspectives and beliefs.

Over at Philocrites, there is a wonderful post and comments on the question of whether UUism is or can be transformational. By claiming that UUism could guide one in growing a soul, A. Powell Davies built upon the salvation-by-character theme of William Ellery Channing.

The comments at Philocrites indicate that the word "transformation" has different meanings to different authors. I can testify to the transformational nature of UU communities and UU ministers. What are your experiences of transformation in UUism? Are their competencies possessed by UU minsters that facilitated those transformations?

Examining for UU Ministry & the UUA Presidency

On Wednesday, iMinister posted the written responses of Peter Morales, a candidate for the UUA presidency, to a question in a candidate's forum. The question was the following:

Imagine five years have passed and imagine that your vision for UUism is fully alive and thriving. What three to five goals have been realized?

His response included the following goal:

We have developed a strategic vision for ministry and are beginning its implementation. Our strategy for ministry has been developed through consultation with stakeholders. Our strategy is a comprehensive approach that includes recruitment, training, placement, mentoring and development of professional ministry.

I am very heartened by these words. While the subject of this blog currently is examining and interviewing for UU ministry, Peter's broader approach is to be commended.

Sex, Lies, and Competencies

Okay, I cheated a little bit, maybe even lied a little bit, in my choice of title for this post. It's not going to be about sex or sexual competencies; however, it will be about lies and competencies. I just wanted to give a shout out to a wonderful movie title, "Sex, Lies, and Videotape."

In Hire With Your Head: Using Performance-Based Hiring to Build Great Teams, Lou Adler argues that we cannot trust our intuition when it comes to using interviews to make hiring decisions. Though it is possible that interviewees may lie, he is more concerned about the lies that interviewers consciously and unconsciously tell themselves about the selection process.

Though it might well be said that in calling ministers one should use head, heart, and soul, Adler is pointing the hard headed work is needed to make good selections. He cites a study (John Hunter & Frank Schmidt, "The Validity and Utility of Selection Methods in Personnel Psychology," Psychological Bulletin, 1998, vol. 124) which found that the typical employment interview is only 57% effective in predicting subsequent success on the job, or only 7% better than flipping a coin. He cites several reasons for this low success rate; a critical one being too much focus on the interaction between the interviewee and the interview, and too little on the candidate's capacity to do the job. In other words, interviewers were examining the interviewees' capacity to interview rather than their ability to work. Could "ministerial presence" be another name for competency as an interviewee?

The Paradox

Just finished listening to Numbers, a This American Life podcast. In Act 4 of this podcast, a marketing man tells how he used the tools of modern brand marketing to "sell" himself to his own wife and how it helped their marriage. Act 5, Break It Down, is a short story by Lydia Davis about a man who tries to calculate what love costs.

The contrast between the two Acts is telling. Both the marketer and the love love their partners. The marketer began going steady with his wife when they were both 14; they both went to the same college; they've been married for several years. The lover describes a mutually intentional short-term relationship.

The marketer thought he knew nearly everything there was to know about his wife. He felt silly using the tools of his trade to market himself to his wife, but he was doing it as a project for work. Much to his surprise, he found out that there was much he did not know.

Particularly compelling was an observation by Ira Glass, the host of the program. He speculated that the marketing work so well because it allowed a translation of what was most important to the wife into words the husband could understand.

The emotionality, the pain, and even the despair in Act 5 are more obvious. The lover loves; yet he (she?) must face the inevitability of the end of the relationship.

What do these stories have to do with "Calling Ministers"? The parallels and the paradoxes are interesting. Like love, there are aspects ministry that can't be quantified. Both stories from This American Life show the limits of communication. The surprise is that in a situation (a marriage) where one would think certain tools (marketing) would not apply, important lessons were learned.

They are interviewing and assessment tools that were developed in academia and first applied in the private sector would benefit the examining process for UU ministry. Much would be learned, both by the examiners and the examinees. In future posts will explore the benefits and the limits of applying these tools.

Professional Competencies

As stated in an earlier post, there are 15 areas of competence for fellowshipping as a UU minister. 10 are academic, and 5 are professional. The latter are worship, preaching, music aesthetics; pastoral care and counseling; leadership and organization; administration and management; and anti-racism, anti-oppression, and multiculturalism.

Those of you who are reading closely will note that the "5" areas of competence are actually 12 areas of competence. Let's take a closer look at a couple of these:

• Worship, Preaching, Music Aesthetics: Candidates are expected to know the theory and art of worship, preaching and rites of passage, and have experience in conducting religious ceremonies.
• Pastoral Care and Counseling: Candidates should be familiar with theories, techniques and issues related to pastoral counseling, and be able to demonstrate ability in pastoral counseling. One unit of Clinical Pastoral Education is required.

The first question that naturally arises regarding the Worship area of competence is whether there should be a comma and the word "and" after the word "Music" in the first competency. Are candidates expected to be competent in "music" and "aesthetics" or "music aesthetics"?

How much experience are candidates expected to have in conducting religious ceremonies? Are there measures of competence in conducting such ceremonies and how will candidates demonstrate that they competently conducted such ceremonies.

There is some guidance in the Pastoral Care and Counseling area of competence. Candidates must have completed one unit of Clinical Pastoral Education (CPE). Is that sufficient experience? What distinguishes a successful CPE unit?

There are over 250 theories of personality. How "many theories, techniques, and issues related to pastoral counseling" are candidates expected to have absorbed? How are they to demonstrate competency?

Some of the above questions are difficult, if not impossible, to answer definitely. However, it's quite possible that the competencies could be written in a manner that would make expectations clearer.

Myths About the MFC

The other day I was speaking to a friend who is associated with the MFC (Ministerial Fellowshipping Committee). He said that there are many myths about it.

"Myth" is one of those funny words that has two meanings: one of which is nearly opposite the other. (If there's a technical term for this, please let me know.) The first meaning is archetypal story. The second meaning is a commonly believed falsehood. It was this second meaning to which my friend was referring.

When a subject is veiled in myth, it usually means that there is a shortage of evidence. The evidence shortfall may be a consequence of its unavailability, an unwillingness to look for or at it, the desire to tell a good story, or all of the above.

In the "good story" category, someone observed that before and during MFC interviews, the level of anxiety among candidates from UU seminaries is higher than that of candidates from non--UU seminaries. Is this a consequence of more reliable evidence, or less?

A Little Reassurance

Once upon a time, many, many years ago, I was asked to be a mystery guest on a radio talk show. My persona was "Mr. Know-It-All," which some may imagine was not much of a stretch for me. However, knowing my limitations, I decided to focus on familiar quotations. I also decided to cheat.

We started the program by reading and discussing some of my and the host's favorite quotations. Then we invited call-ins. The host would engage and stall the callers while I frantically searched for their quotations in the index of Bartlett's Familiar Quotations (a major reference work in the pre-Internet age). Then I could cite the author and the lines of the quote that might have escaped the caller's memory.

Unfortunately, the MFC will not permit candidates to bring a library with them for their interviews. And a library is certainly what one acquires during a seminary education.

My last post may have put the fear of God in those preparing for the MFC interview. Reading the competencies and sample questions, you might imagine that you'd have to have an encyclopedic memory and the talents of a mentalist to be successful.

However, you should know the following:

• MFC questions are drawn from what's in your package. If you write that you have an extensive knowledge of Buddhism, then you are likely to be asked questions about Buddhism. These questions about Buddhism may seem quite obcure to someone who says that they have extensive knowledge of Islam (and vice versa).

• "I don't know" is a perfectly acceptable answer. While it is probably not appropriate for every question, it's not a fatal response to one or two questions. It's usually useful to follow it with your strategy for acquiring the information.
  

• The MFC appears to be more interested in how you answer questions that in what you answer. Trying to b.s. the Committee is believed to be the worst possible strategy.
  

Whatcha Know? Whatcha Do? & Meltdowns

There are 15 academic and professional competencies for fellowshipping as a UU minister. 10 are academic, i.e., Whatcha know? 5 are professional, i.e., Whatcha do? Another way of describing these 2 categories (academic & professional) is that they are, respectively, knowledges and skills.

Today I'd like to speak to the knowledges which are the following: theology; church history (i.e., Christian church history); Hebrew and Christian scriptures; world religions; social theory/social ethics; human development/family life education/ministry with youth & young adults; UU history and polity; religious education history, theory, method, and practice; and professional ethics/UU Ministers Association (UUMA) Guidelines. Are you overwhelmed yet?

If the fear of your own ignorance hasn't taken over yet, consider some of the sample questions from the UUA website:

This is a set of world religion questions. What religion is each of the following words from? Then briefly describe them. Five pillars. Karma. Beltane. The sh'ma. Yom Hashoah. I Take Refuge. N'amaste. Four noble truths. Nirvana (Nibbana). The four yogas.

A. I was doing a funeral for the ex-wife of member...she was Jewish. Her family wanted me to lead the recitation of the Kaddish in the traditional Aramaic. Where might you look up how to say the words properly in that prayer? B. A couple came to me recently for a wedding...they described themselves as Neo-pagan. They wanted a Hand Fasting ritual. Do you know anything about that? How would you look that up? C. The young folks in the Coming of Age program in my congregation have to spend an hour or two speaking with one of the ministers on theological issues that they find important. Each of the young people in this recent year have come to me and talked with me about reincarnation, and what I thought of it. What would you say if you were asked about your opinion of reincarnation and what it might mean in modern UU congregations?

Talking about General Assembly leads us right into congregational polity. I wonder if briefly you could compare and contrast the different polities of Catholicism, Methodism and Congregationalism/Unitarian Universalism. What are the strengths and weaknesses of congregationalism? Have you heard anyone speaking of their fear of any "creeping Methodism" in our association? Was the 1997 book produced by the Commission on Appraisal helpful to you? Who are the members of the UUA? Who are the members of the Board Of Trustees? Can you name three communities outside of North America associated with the UUA?

OK, I believe that we can generally agree that this is not easy stuff. Furthermore, the descriptions of the competencies are not reassuring. Let's look at a sample:

RELIGIOUS EDUCATION HISTORY, THEORY, METHOD, AND PRACTICE: Candidates should have an understanding of several current philosophies of educational learning theories, teaching methods (including methods of teacher training,) and the history and philosophy of Unitarian Universalist religious education. Candidates are expected to be knowledgeable about several current philosophical and methodological trends in UU religious education, and be familiar with at least one Unitarian Universalist religious education curriculum at each age level. Candidates should be able to discuss the theological and educational assumptions and methodologies each religious education curriculum uses.

At one UU seminary, the seminarians sometimes speak of "meltdowns." They're not the same as a "breakdowns." Usually, recovery from the former is faster than recovery from the latter.

Well, looking over the competencies and the questions can lead to meltdowns. More about competencies and meltdowns soon.

You Ought to be in Pictures

With a tip of the hat to Charlie Dieterich, Starr King student, cinematographer, scientist, engineer, and all around great guy.

Charlie videorecorded my mock interview. Not only did he record my performance, he used a 2nd camera and picture-within-picture to record the responses of the mock panel.

Afterward, I happen to mention to him that I only knew a few of the members of the MFC. I thought it would be an advantage to know who was whom in advance. The material from Boston gives you a short bio on each member, but no clue what they look like.

Charlie had a great idea. He suggested Googling everyone and copying their images into a Word document. Googling provided me more info about each member of the Committee.

I pasted the pictures on a mirror and set about memorizing everyone's names and faces. It was a good investment of time.

Inauguration

Ah, Inauguration Day. A time of beginnings.

This morning as I was catching up on the Books section of the SF Chronicle, I read the following in a review by Eric Rauchway of Adam Cohen's new book, Nothing to Fear: FDR's Inner Circle and the Hundred Days That Created Modern America.

Adam Cohen treats the 100 days as largely the product of personalities - Roosevelt, his key advisers and their experiences. Cohen produces fine pencil portraits of the president himself, an aristocratic good-government reformer touched by polio, which imbued him suddenly with a sense of what it meant to suffer; Henry Wallace, his secretary of agriculture, scion of a long line of practical scientific farmers experimenting in the fields; Raymond Moley, his critical banking adviser, a hard-nosed political scientist keen to take credit for preserving capitalism; Lewis Douglas, his budget director, a mining man devoted to fiscal conservatism; and perhaps most important of all, Frances Perkins, his secretary of labor, the first female Cabinet member, an eyewitness to the Triangle Shirtwaist Factory fire and a shrewd proponent of working Americans.

Cohen's use of biography works because Roosevelt surrounded himself with such a variety of advisers, each intimately familiar with one aspect of the problem they together approached. Rather than trivia, then, each of these personal stories represents a section of Depression-era America, and in their diversity they suggest why so many Americans supported the New Deal: Almost anyone could see the administration addressing his concerns.

My father, who was born in 1913, didn't believe in God, but he did believe in FDR. He lived thru the Depression and served in the Navy during WW II which were formative events for him and his generation.

May the UUA "surround itself with a variety of advisers" as it looks at excellence in ministry and at forming, examining, developing, and evaluating ministers. Such a strategy served us well at the Department of Veterans Affairs when we were designing our performance-based interviewing process.

The Tyranny of Excellence

Thanks to iMinister for posting the keynote speech by Daniel Aleshire of the Association of Theological Schools on the Tyranny of Excellence from the UUA Excellence in Ministry Summit. The following remark are striking:

As you might expect, “excellent ministry” is more likely to become an issue when there are fears that something is not going well. . . . When the question is being asked in earnest, my hunch is that it is often a symptom of some underlying dis-ease.

My hunch is that “excellence” is a topical way of getting at some other question, maybe some worry. I have a hunch that, if UU ministers and congregations were doing well, and if there were abundant money for all the movement’s agenda, including theological education, the question would not be asked.

Ministry always has a communitarian setting and “excellence” must have a definition that a community has agreed to honor.

When I was a child in Washington, DC, in the 1950s, UUism was busting out all over. The sermons of A. Powell Davies, minister at All Souls, not only filled the church's sanctuary and social hall, but were piped into several suburban locations by radio. These locales became the nuclei of five new suburban congregations—Arlington, Cedar Lane, Paint Branch, Mount Vernon, and what is presently known as the Davies Memorial Church—established under Davies' leadership. These "daughter" churches later founded three additional congregations—Fairfax, Rockville, and River Road. Some of these congregations -- and Arlington (which had been established earlier) -- remain among the largest UU congregations.

Yet, on the other hand, in the 48 years since the Unitarians joined with the Universalists in 1961, UUA membership has varied slightly around 160,000 adults while it has dropped from .08% to .05% of the U.S. population which has grown from 180 to 305 million. If you don't believe that numbers matter, read American Theocracy by Kevin Phillips (or at least the Wikipedia article on the book).

This phenomena is like The Incredible Shrinking Man (1957) in reverse. In that film, when Scott Carey, the protagonist, begins to shrink because of exposure to a combination of radiation and insecticide, medical science is powerless to help him. UUism has not shrunk, it has remained the same size while everything around it has grown, like Gulliver's travel to Brobdingnag.

Please, please hear that I'm not saying that the formation and development of UU ministers is the source of the stagnation in UUA membership, much less the rise of politically and theologically conservative Christianity. I'm merely raising the question of whether there is any relationship between the two.

Developmental, Selection, & Gatekeeping Interviews

When people think of employment interviewing, they usually think of selection interviews, which are used for appointment, advancement, and entry. Appointment interviews, a.k.a. hiring or employment interviews, are usually competitive. When we go for an employment interview, we know that we need to show the interviewer(s) that we are the best qualified candidates for the job.

An entry or gatekeeping interview is like an hiring interview, except it is usually non-competitive and our objective is to show that we are qualified -- but not necessarily best qualified -- for the position or occupation.

A developmental interview is noncompetitive and is more about acquiring information than providing it. Let's say an office work wishes to be considered for the office manager position when it becomes available. In developmental interviews, the current office manager and her or his supervisor can guide the worker on the training, education, and experience s/he would need to become well qualified for the office manager job. While the worker's current qualifications are relevant, the main focus is on the gap between current qualifications and those required for the office manager position.

One of my favorite bits of movie dialogue comes from Casablanca. Capt. Renault asks Rick why he came to Casablanca. Rick replies that he came to Casablanca for his health, for the waters. Renault exclaims that they're in the desert. Rick calmly replies that he was misinformed.

While there is often overlap between developmental interviews and gatekeeping interviews, the Regional Subcommittee on Candidacy (RSCC) interviews have been evolving from developmental to gatekeeping interviews. It therefore would be helpful to aspirants for UU ministry to understand this distinction and prepare accordingly.

This evolution is laudatory. It's helpful to aspirants for UU ministry to learn as soon as possible that they may not be qualified.

The reform that would benefit the process is that aspirants be taught that the purpose of the interview is gatekeeping so that they can both demonstrate the qualifications they have already acquired and their knowledge of those that they need to acquire before they present themselves to the MFC (Ministerial Fellowshipping Committee).

Reverse Engineering

According to Arleigh Crawford, "Reverse engineering is taking apart an object to see how it works in order to duplicate or enhance the object."

Wise planners do their best thinking backwards: They start out w/ a goal or vision and then think about what steps would be necessary to achieve it.

Well, we can't take apart excellent ministers to see how they work so we may duplicate or enhance them. However, we can examine excellent ministers to learn how they are excellent and what made them excellent. We could use what we learn to help other ministers improve their ministries and to prepare candidates for ministry. Furthermore, a dialogue among excellent ministers about excellence might help these ministers enhance their performance. (Such dialogues using appreciative inquiry have helped individuals and organizations grow and thrive.)

Anticipating objections:

• We don't agree what is meant by "excellence in ministry." This objection actually supports doing further study. The goal is not to achieve a single cookie-cutter answer, but to deepen our collective understanding.
• Different ministers are "excellent" in different ways. This is a good argument for involving a number of excellent ministers and observers of excellent ministers to see the commonalities and differences.
• Difference ministries require different kinds of excellence, e.g., being an excellent hospital chaplain may require a different set of skills than being an excellent director of a legislative ministry. This is a very interesting concern. The UUA has decided to examine candidates for ministry. It is assumed that those accepted into fellowship have the capacity to move from one ministry to another. This may be true. However, further study might reveal competencies that fellowshipped ministers might wish to strengthen before changing specialties.
• The very idea of "excellence" will only reinforce hegemony. This objection argues for casting a wide net to get diverse perspectives on excellence. It even argues for reaching out to other denominations/religions to learn how they assess ministry.
  

What do you think?

Knowing Your Package

One of the mantras among those preparing for the MFC interview is: "Know your package." The package in question is the material you submit to the MFC directly and the material that follows you from your Regional Subcommittee interview. Packages can tip the scales at more than 200 pages.

What is meant by "know your package" is knowing the vulnerabilities in your package. Did your Intern Committee identify a growing edge? Did a CPE supervisor noticed where you were challenged?

The MFC does not expect perfection. However, MFC members do seem to expect progress, reflection, and insight. If one of your documents states that you've been wrestling with the integration of your personal theology with other UU theologies, then don't be surprised if you are asked how the wrestling match is going.

In some ways, this may be one of the best parts of the existing interview system. You and others have provided the MFC with the basis for inquiry. The panel members then ask you entirely relevant questions.

It matters less what you say then how you say it. Acknowledging both your challenges and your progress is the kind of vulnerable humility and authority that is one aspect of "ministerial presence."

"All right, Mr. DeMille, I'm ready for my close-up."

By the time of your MFC interview, you may feel a little crazed like Nora Desmond, the character who spoke the above line in the movie Sunset Boulevard.

Many people take umbrage at the thought of an interview being a performance, especially an interview for the ministry. After all, is the ministry about authenticity? Aren't you supposed to bring your true self to the interview and be evaluated on who you really are?

However, there are two meanings of "performance." Sometimes we use the word in reference to pretending, or even deceiving. The actor pretends to be someone else. The con man (con person?) intends to deceive. Yet we also talk about how well someone performed in the Olympics or what a wonderful performance the orchestra gave last night.

It is in this latter sense of performance that I'm using the word here. Sermons and interviews are performances. I am not encouraging deception or even pretense, but I am encouraging as with a good performance, and practice, practice, practice.

In the performance of an interview, body language and tone of voice are as important or even more important than words and their meanings. "Ministerial presence" may be found more in appearance and tone than in content.

Knowing this, it is important to have your mock interview videorecorded. If you can, have two cameras -- one on you and one on the panel. While it is inappropriate to video the panel's deliberations, record the sermon, the interview, and the feedback you receive after the panel finishes deliberating.

Then make this recording your favorite TV program. Pay careful attention to your posture, facial expression, body language, timing, and tone of voice as you view the video. Many of us find that our internal impression of how we did can vary dramatically from what's on the screen. Also, it's often difficult to absorb a lot of feedback at once. Watching the video several times and/or watching it and pausing it for reflection can help one absorb the feedback and make adjustments in one's performance.

The Mock Interview - Your Key to Success?

Sorry I've been off-line for a few days. I picked up a bug -- biological, not computer -- that put me out of commission. I'm glad to be back.

Although the main purpose of this blog is to recommend modifications to the examining process for UU ministry, the recommendations (even if immediately accepted) couldn't be immediately implemented. Therefore, individuals preparing for MFC interviews in 2009 can expect to be examined under existing procedures with whatever modifications are already in progress. Not wanting to leave these candidates in the lurch, this blog will also include suggestions for preparing for your MFC interview.

Though I have sought and received input from many individuals, including the aspirants, candidates, ministers, seminary professors, UUA board members, UUA staff members, and WRSCC members and staff, the opinions expressed here ultimately will be mine. (At least, until you start posting comments on them.)

If it takes a village to raise a child, it takes a small town to raise a minister. Many, many people assisted me in preparing for my MFC exam. Today, I will focus on the Mock Interview, which I found to be the turning point in my preparation.

Those of you who have carefully examined the Competencies for UU Ministry may have some idea of the fear and trembling with which I faced the examination. Whom do you know is well-versed in all 14 of these competencies? After 4 years of seminary and a year of residency, I was aware that there were still gaping holes in my knowledge. Cramming felt like drinking from a fire hose, alternating with despair regarding the impossibility of filling all the gaps before examination time.

Well, in the mock, I learned that I could handle most of the questions that were directed at me. More importantly, I was advised by seasoned ministers that I should give up trying to become "Mr. Know-It-All" (my phrase, not theirs) and focus on ministerial presence.

I have much more to say about the mock, but this post is long enough and the day has gotten away from me. More soon.

Fear, Trembling, & Structured Interviews

The other day I was speaking to a long-time UU minister who said that as a candidate he'd been unhappy with the examining process for UU ministry, but once he'd become a minister he'd moved on to other issues, assuming that the outcomes of the interviews were generally appropriate.

For me, the experience of the Ministerial Fellowshipping Committee (MFC) interview for preliminary fellowship is more recent. I no longer fear that a single one-hour interview will trump years of preparation for fellowshipping and determine my future in ministry. However, I've not forgotten that concern nor the concerns of others who have been interviewed or who are about to be.

But this blog is not predominately about feelings or outcomes: it's about process.

I do not have an insider's view of the entire examining process and may be misunderstanding some aspects of it. However, there appears to be a disconnect between the competencies, such as ministerial authority, that many say the MFC is looking for and the competencies, such as knowledge of church history, found on pages 17 and 18 of the booklet Requirements for Ministry with the UUA (which may be downloaded from "Related Content" box on this link).

To generalize, successful ministry may be more about what a minister is able to do than what academic knowledge the minister has acquired. It appears that both UU seminaries are revising their pedagogies to reflect this insight.

Scientific research has much to say about interviewing and other assessment techniques. At this link, there is guidance on developing effective interviews from the Society for Industrial & Organizational Psychology (SIOP), Inc., Division 14 of the American Psychological Association APA, re effective interviews. At this one, the Office of Personnel Management (OPM) provides guidance on developing structured interviews. Both the SIOP and OPM web site contain a wealth of information about assessment and examining.

Assessment Techniques

Federal employees do have a sense of humor. They realize that many people believe that the third great lie (after the two others about "checks in the mail" and "respect in the morning") is: "We're from the government, and we're here to help you."

We've all be frustrated at times by customer service inside and outside the government, but please consider the politics behind the above ridicule as revealed in this NY Times article. As we're about to see, there is great help and great expertise is available from the government.

The Office of Personnel Management (OPM) sets human resources (HR) policy and issues HR guidance for most civilian positions in the Federal government. At the OPM website, you may find an Assessment Decision Guide, which includes an Assessment Decision Tool, and information on Structured Interviews. There is also a Guide to Structured Interviews.

Not all of this material is directly applicable to ministry. However, a surprising amount of it is.

For example, the Assessment Decision Tool doesn't have already-identified competencies for ministry (or chaplaincy, the nearness occupation found in the Federal government). It does have such competencies for psychology and other related occupations.

Included in the Assessment Decision Tool as possible competencies for psychology positions are conflict management, creative thinking, customer service, flexibility, influencing/negotiating, integrity/honesty, interpersonal skills, leadership, vision, etc. Obviously some of these competencies apply to some ministries.

The Assessment Decision Tool discusses assessment techniques such as accomplishment records, assessment centers, biographical data (biodata) tests, cognitive ability test, emotional intelligence tests, personality tests, reference checking, situation judgment tests, structured interviews, training and experience evaluations, and work samples and simulations. It recommends specific techniques for assessing specific competencies.

The Foundation - Occupation/Job Analysis and Competency Identification

When you plan to examine individuals for entry into an occupation (including professions such as ministry), the best place to start is identifying what people in that occupation do and how they do it. Once you've identified the duties and responsibilities, the next step is to identify the competencies required to perform them.

In considering the competencies for UU ministry, we are blessed to have the work of the Market Voice Consulting for the Panel on Theological Education. At this link, you can download "Report on Excellence in Ministry." Market Voice Consulting found consistent agreement on the following competencies:

– Strong interpersonal skills.
– Self-aware, understands boundaries, mature.
– Compassionate and caring.
– Inclusive and supportive.
– Thorough knowledge of UU history and traditions.
– Solid grounding in theology – history, sacred writings, beliefs, cultural impact – not just UU.
– Savvy about organizational and institutional dynamics.
– Passionate about the work, a strong sense of calling.
– Challenges people and congregations to be their best.

Furthermore, they added:

Some people say excellence is determined by how well-matched the minister and the position/job are.

While these competencies require further review to turn them into behavioral standards, it seems like we're off to a good start in competency identification.

While there is little doubt that there are shared competencies for serving as the senior minister at a large congregation, the sole minister of a small congregation, a minister of religious education, a prison chaplain, a medical chaplain, a military chaplain, a community organizer, and the director of a legislative ministry office, it is quite likely that different positions require different competencies.

It is understandable why the Ministerial Fellowshipping Committee (MFC) would not want to examine all ministerial candidates on all competencies or even on the competencies that are specific to certain assignments. However, it appears that individuals who are not preparing for parish ministry are much more likely to be tested on uniquely parish ministry competencies while individuals who are preparing for parish ministry are unlikely to being examined on competencies not required for parish ministry.

Welcome Janus

January was named after Janus, the god of the doorways and beginnings and endings. He has 2 faces, one forward and one backward, so he could guard both doorways from both directions. Janitors, caretakers of halls and doorways, draw the name of their occupation from Janus.

I will start being 2-faced by both supporting and challenging the examining process for UU ministry. Ministers have fiduciary responsibility. Fiduciaries are not only financial guardians; they are any people to whom property or power is entrusted for the benefit of others. This not only includes accounting, but law, medicine, and the other professions. Examining processes should be designed to help protect those served by fiduciaries from incompetence and misconduct.

While there is wisdom in having formation and examining processes for professions, sometimes such processes can get out of hand or out of date. Have the examining processes gone out of balance when considering academic and experiential knowledge and preparation.

Recently, a mentor of mine who is a experienced UU minister wrote:

In the very old days ministers (and lawyers, physicians, carpenters, et al.) "sat at the feet" of those who knew what they were doing and were pushed, prodded, pulled into acquiring the sensitivity and skills they needed. At it's heart, this was also the SK method of education. At the end it wasn't just the mentors who knew a person was ready, more important, the person knew.

How does an examining panel weigh the assessments of mentors? What are the fiduciary responsibilities of mentors to mentees, to the MFC, and to UUism?

Thoughts and comments on this issue will be appreciated.