The church administrator is the person who knows where everything is, and the reason a church can survive a pastoral transition without losing its records. The job is written here at three sizes — full-time, half-time, and quarter-time — because most churches write one full-time description, hire someone for fifteen hours, and then quietly expect the full list. The point of the three versions is to make the cut explicit: going to quarter time is not doing the same job faster, it is doing less of it, and somebody has to decide what.

Job descriptions are approved by SPRC in cooperation with the pastor (¶258.2g.7). Pair this with the personnel policy skeleton, which covers the terms this document deliberately doesn’t.

Flag, not answered here: whether this position is exempt or non-exempt under the Fair Labor Standards Act. “Administrator” and “manager” in a title do not settle it — the Department of Labor states plainly that “job titles do not determine exempt status,” and the administrative exemption additionally requires that the work involve “the exercise of discretion and independent judgment with respect to matters of significance” (Fact Sheet #17A). A salaried part-time office manager who mostly executes established procedures is very often non-exempt and owed overtime. Decide it before the first paycheck, with your conference office — not from this page.

The template

Job Description: Church Administrator

[Church Name] · Approved by SPRC [date] · Reviewed [date]

Reports to: [the pastor / other] Supervises: [none / custodian / nursery staff] Classification: [full-time / part-time] · [exempt / non-exempt — see above] Hours: [ ] per week · [core office hours] Compensation: [range or rate], reviewed annually with the budget

Purpose

To keep the church’s daily operations, communications, and records running, so that the pastor, staff, and volunteers can do ministry rather than administration.

Core responsibilities — FULL TIME (30–40 hrs)

Office and reception

• Maintain regular office hours; answer phone, email, and door.
• Order supplies; manage the copier, postage, and office equipment contracts.
• Serve as first point of contact for vendors and building users.

Communications

• Produce the weekly bulletin, monthly newsletter, and email announcements.
• Maintain the website calendar and social accounts [specify which].
• Prepare and distribute worship materials as directed by the pastor.

Records

• Maintain membership and attendance records, including baptisms, marriages, and funerals, and prepare statistical reports for charge conference.
• Maintain the account register, key log, and document register.
• Keep the church calendar and manage facility-use scheduling and agreements.

Financial support (support, not control — see the note below)

• Process and record contributions as directed by the financial secretary.
• Prepare check requests and maintain vendor files.
• Assist the treasurer with reports to the finance committee.

Ministry support

• Coordinate volunteer schedules for worship and office.
• Support committees with meeting notices, room setup, and minutes distribution.
• Maintain confidentiality of pastoral, personnel, and financial information.

At HALF TIME (15–20 hrs) — what changes

Keep: office hours (reduced and published), bulletin, records and statistical reporting, facility scheduling, contribution processing.

Cut or move: the newsletter becomes quarterly or moves to a volunteer; social media moves to a volunteer team; committee support narrows to meeting notices only, with minutes kept by each committee’s own secretary; volunteer scheduling moves to a lay coordinator.

Say plainly in the posting: office hours are [days/times], not “whenever needed.” Half-time administrators are the single most over-drafted role in a church, because the building is open and they are in it.

At QUARTER TIME (8–10 hrs) — what changes

Keep only: the bulletin, the records that must be kept for charge conference, and contribution processing. Realistically, one or two fixed days a week.

Everything else moves or stops: newsletter, social media, calendar management, vendor coordination, volunteer scheduling, committee support. If the church cannot name where each of those went, it has not made a quarter-time job — it has made a full-time job with a quarter-time salary, and it will lose the person within a year.

At this size, be explicit about what happens when they are not there: who answers the phone, who opens the mail, who lets the piano tuner in.

Qualifications

• Organized, discreet, and comfortable with interruption.
• Competent with [specify: Google Workspace / Microsoft 365 / church database].
• Able to hold confidences absolutely.
• [CHOOSE: church membership is not required for this role in most churches — decide deliberately rather than by default, and if you do require it, know why.]

Screening

This position requires a background check [and Safe Gatherings-type training if the role involves unsupervised access to children or vulnerable adults], completed before the first day of work.

Working conditions

Primarily office-based. Occasional evening or weekend work for [specify — charge conference, major services]. [If the role includes lifting, standing, or setup, say so concretely.]

Adaptation notes

Separate handling money from recording money. The administrator may process contributions or reconcile the bank statement — not both, and neither if they also sign checks. ¶258.4 keeps treasurer and financial secretary as separate people for the same reason. This is the most common internal-control failure in small churches, and it is nearly always discovered after something has gone wrong rather than before.

Write the hours down, and mean them. Every version above names hours. A church that writes “part-time, flexible” has written “unlimited.”

Decide the exempt question before you post. See the flag at the top. It determines whether you owe overtime and whether you need timesheets, and it is much easier to answer before someone is in the job.

Name the supervisor. One person. “Reports to SPRC” is not a supervisor; SPRC is a committee that meets quarterly.

Review it annually alongside the evaluation. A job description that has not changed in six years is describing a job nobody currently does.

Consider sharing the role. Two churches on adjacent charges sometimes split one capable administrator more successfully than either sustains a quarter-time position alone. Your DS will know whether anyone nearby is thinking about it.

Elsewhere

• Fact Sheet #17A: Exemption for Executive, Administrative, Professional, Computer & Outside Sales Employees — DOL — the exempt/non-exempt duties tests, which are less obvious than the salary threshold.
• GCFA — Legal Services — denominational HR and legal resources for local churches.
• Forms and assets — GCFA — where the Local Church Audit Guide lives, along with the insurance worksheet; the audit guide is where the separation-of-duties principle behind the note above is spelled out.
• Personnel policy skeleton — the terms of employment this description deliberately leaves out.
• Staff onboarding workflow — what happens once you’ve hired.