Letter #3 - I was wondering if you could provide insight into how Granger handles compensation issues (i.e. salary levels, raises etc). –from Mark in Edwardsville, Illinois

Mark, I’m glad you sent your message, because it’s created a great deal of conversation on my blog the last few days. As promised, this is how much I make. All you have to do is follow this simple formula to calculate my salary or anyone else’s:

  1. start with your metric weight
  2. multiple that by the number of suits that you own
  3. add the zip code where you live
  4. subtract the number of career home runs Duane Kuiper had with the Cleveland Indians
  5. divide by the square root of your mother’s age
  6. do something with "pi"
  7. then ask your boss how much he’s going to pay you

You didn’t really think I was going to tell you how much I make, did you?

Let me try to give you some guidance, though, based on how we try to establish wage levels at Granger. When we’re setting salaries, we primarily consider performance and ministry/leadership capacity. Additionally, we take into consideration responses to questions like these:

  • What do "normal" people in our area make for similar roles? (We can’t compete with marketplace employers, but it helps us get a general idea of what similar positions pay.)
  • What do similar positions pay within our organization?
  • What would it cost to replace this person? How easy would they be to replace?
  • What do other churches our size pay? (This question obviously applies more to pastor and director-type roles where we may be competing with other churches to keep our talent.)
  • What can we afford? (It’s pretty safe to say we’d typically love to pay our staff more; however, we need to balance that with being good stewards of the resources God has provided for ministry.)

The best place I’ve found for external wage comparisons with other churches is the National Association of Church Business Administration. For a small annual fee, you can use their online compensation data to analyze wage levels by position  based on factors like budget size, attendance, denomination, region, etc. Of course, this is no exact science. A position, even with the same title, in one church, may look very different in another church. That’s why external comparisons can’t be the only factor you consider.

For more insights on how we determine compensation levels at Granger, you may check out chapter 61 in Simply Strategic Stuff, "If you can’t pay your employees well, you have too many employees."

And, if all else fails, just follow the formula I outlined above. It really works!

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