Thursday, August 6, 2009

The Rabbi's Job Description

I mentioned here that I once surveyed my board, to get a better handle on their view of the rabbi's job description.

In that survey, I submitted sixteen scenarios, taken from eight different areas of rabbinic work, and asked them to answer (a) whether these were items for the rabbi to handle, and (b) how high a priority these should be for the rabbi, on a scale of 1 to 10.

I found the results very useful, and not entirely what I had expected. (To honor confidentiality, I will not discuss the actual results here. Sorry.)

In retrospect, I would do two things differently:
1) Poll the whole shul as well;
2) Change the ranking to 1-5 instead of 1-10; I find that people do better with 1-5.

Here are the scenarios:

Halachic Authority
Offering religious guidance on when to recite certain prayers or blessings
Handling kashrut questions

Officiant
Addressing ideas for making the shul davening more inspirational
Helping plan and organize ritual celebrations

Educator
Implementing programs for communal and individual study
Making sure the library is an up-to-date, well-stocked resource

Counselor
Advising on ways to relate to a lesbian daughter
Providing marital counseling

Pastor
Making sure members know the shul is “there for them” and responsive to them
Providing short-term assistance in a financial crisis

Program Coordinator
Drafting a flyer publicizing a shul event
Recruiting people for a shul program

Community Representative
Writing a column on a Jewish theme for the local newspaper
Serving as the Jewish representative on the board of the local hospice

Building manager
Adjusting the heat or A/C for the morning minyan
Making sure the synagogue building is open for a program

Take the survey; I'd love to see what you - and your shul board - do with it...

13 comments:

  1. To make the prioritization exercise even more thought-provoking, you might consider giving respondents and budget of, say, 32 points to distribute between the different scenarios. The more point advantage one scenario has over another, the more priority it should have and time the Rabbi should spend on it.

    ReplyDelete
  2. In the words of Dr. House "everyone lies" (i.e. certain items will get a higher score on your survey than people actually will act on in real life -e.g. people claim top priority to be inspired, but if the Rabbi doesn't visit them daily in the hospital, he's out no matter how inspirational)
    KT
    Joel Rich

    ReplyDelete
  3. Isaac-
    Yes; I wanted to do that, and then decided it would be too demanding for a simple exercise, and people would drop it.

    Joel=
    True. I find it funny that many people come to a rabbi's shiur when he visits for a proba, but they will never again appear at his shiurim...

    ReplyDelete
  4. well, that's easy, they're all a 5! ;)

    ReplyDelete
  5. I wonder how the same people would rank the scenarios today. Do you think the original ranking reflects the way your position actually played out in Allentown?

    Would you consider a similar exercise for your new position?

    ReplyDelete
  6. Even better: Instead of 32 points, give them 24 hours to distribute.

    ReplyDelete
  7. Issac said:
    Even better: Instead of 32 points, give them 24 hours to distribute.

    No, you had it right with the 32 points. There are 24 hours in a day. A shul Rabbi is expected to devote 32 of those 24 hours to the shul. The balance is for his personal life.

    ReplyDelete
  8. Tzipporah-
    Not all a 10?

    Fruma-
    The poll was actually only 3-4 years ago, after I had been here several years. I suspect they still feel the same way.
    Re: New position - Yes, although in a very different way, and to a different group.

    ReplyDelete
  9. New Job Description

    1) Set an example
    2) Devolve responsibility
    3) Work to eradicate your old job description (see 2) with the ultimate goal of nobody being quite sure what exactly the rabbi does/why they need you
    4) Draft a new job description/survey of what you think you should be doing which is unlikely to include having expertise in air conditioning machinery, unless you know about domestic engineering equipment from a previous course of study/other existence and even then, do you need to admit it?

    B'hazlacha!

    ReplyDelete
  10. Great Post! Here's my completed survey, 1-5 with 1 being lowest priority, with some comments when applicable

    Halachic Authority
    Offering religious guidance on when to recite certain prayers or blessings 4 (Gabbai has responsibility)
    Handling kashrut questions 5

    Officiant
    Addressing ideas for making the shul davening more inspirational 2
    Helping plan and organize ritual celebrations 3 make sure they're not doing anything wrong or problematic

    Educator
    Implementing programs for communal and individual study 3
    Making sure the library is an up-to-date, well-stocked resource 1 that's the job of the librarian

    Counselor
    Advising on ways to relate to a lesbian daughter 5
    Providing marital counseling 2

    Pastor
    Making sure members know the shul is “there for them” and responsive to them 3
    Providing short-term assistance in a financial crisis 5 as long as you have a discrecionary fund

    Program Coordinator
    Drafting a flyer publicizing a shul event 1
    Recruiting people for a shul program 1

    Community Representative
    Writing a column on a Jewish theme for the local newspaper 0/not sure
    Serving as the Jewish representative on the board of the local hospice 0/not sure. Do these need Halachik guidance or just a Jewish presence?

    Building manager
    Adjusting the heat or A/C for the morning minyan 1
    Making sure the synagogue building is open for a program 1

    ReplyDelete
  11. Anonymous 7:49 PM-
    Huh?

    Talmid-
    Thanks for taking the challenge. What kind of community are you describing, though? I could see that working in a larger city, but never in a community where the rabbi was one of few Jewish resources.

    ReplyDelete
  12. Yes, I was talking about a large city. I didn't know you were limiting this experiment to smaller communities

    ReplyDelete
  13. The Talmid-
    Not limited; all comments are appreciated. Thanks.

    ReplyDelete