Volunteer Engagement Pastor

Position Title: Volunteer Engagement Pastor
Functional Ministry Area(s): Serve With Compassion Serve the Church
Church: Hillside Community Church
Location: Rancho Campus
Reports to: Pastor of Serve With Compassion
Supervises: Yes
FLSA Classification: Exempt/Full-Time (Ministerial Exemption)
Position Schedule: 40+ hrs/week; Sun -Thurs; Sunday presence required
Salary Range: $65,000 - $85,000
Created/Updated: October 2026

OVERVIEW

The Volunteer Engagement Pastor leads Hillside's church-wide strategy for engaging, developing, and mobilizing people to serve. This pastor champions serving as an important part of discipleship, helping people discover and use their God-given gifts while building the systems, pathways, and leadership culture necessary for healthy volunteer engagement across Hillside.

The Volunteer Engagement Pastor provides leadership for Serve the Church and partners with ministry pastors and directors to strengthen volunteer recruitment, connection, onboarding, development, care, celebration, and multiplication. This role also leads Hillside's volunteer measurement and reporting systems, while ministry leaders maintain relational ownership and leadership of the volunteers within their ministries.

CORE STAFF VALUES

• Christ-centered: I choose to seek Christ and His kingdom above all else. I will keep the main thing the main thing and strive to love, trust and follow Jesus, stay grounded in Scripture and keep in step with His Spirit day by day.

• Compassionate: I want to be marked by the compassion of Jesus in how I relate to others. I choose to be a proactive initiator of care, remembering that Jesus is a friend of sinners like me and reaches out to the suffering.

• Collaboration: I choose partnership with God and with others over individual achievement and effort. I want to work with God and His people on His mission of transformation that is bigger than any one of us.

• Community: I will devote myself to and faithfully cultivate friendships with others at Hillside. Growing with Jesus always involves being with friends who pray, serve and follow Jesus together.

• Commitment: I will wholeheartedly and sacrificially devote myself to God and one another in a world of busyness and overcommitment. In my heart, home, neighborhood and church I will be a devoted follower of Christ.

• Courageous: Our faith calls us out of our comfort zones and invites us to live with boldness and resiliency, filled with God's Spirit and power. I will seek first the kingdom of God, being a servant and witness to Him daily.

• Celebration: I will choose to be thankful and joyful in the goodness of God and His salvation. Even when sorrowful I will seek to be grateful for the gifts of God. I also choose to rejoice with others as they rejoice.

RESPONSIBILITIES

Volunteer Engagement & Mobilization

• Lead Hillside's church-wide strategy for moving people from attending to meaningful participation on a Serve Team.

• Champion serving as an expression of discipleship and help people discover opportunities aligned with their gifts, interests, availability, and spiritual maturity.

• Develop church-wide recruitment strategies, campaigns, and connection opportunities that increase awareness and participation across ministries.

• Equip staff and volunteer leaders to practice relational recruitment, recognize potential, and invite people into serving and leadership.

• Maintain a visible Sunday presence that encourages Team Members, connects prospective volunteers, identifies emerging leaders, and champions Hillside's serving culture.

Volunteer Pathway & Systems

• Lead and continually improve Hillside's church-wide volunteer pathway from initial interest through connection, onboarding, placement, development, care, and transition.

• Oversee centralized volunteer applications, workflows, follow-up standards, and effective handoffs into ministry-specific onboarding and training.

• Establish church-wide volunteer standards and partner with ministry leaders on appropriate screening, background checks, and safety requirements.

• Identify and remove barriers that prevent people from moving into meaningful service.

• Build simple, relational, scalable systems that ministry teams can consistently implement.

Leadership Development & Ministry Partnership

• Develop a clear leadership pathway from Team Member → Team Leader → Coach → greater leadership and multiplication.

• Identify and develop emerging volunteer leaders in partnership with ministry pastors and directors.

• Coach and equip ministry leaders to build healthy teams through effective recruitment, onboarding, development, care, retention, and succession.

• Partner with Hillside's broader Leadership Development efforts to provide ongoing development opportunities for volunteer leaders.

• Build collaboration, alignment, and shared ownership of Hillside's volunteer engagement practices across ministry areas.

Volunteer Data & Reporting

• Lead Hillside's church-wide systems and data standards for measuring and reporting Serve Team participation.

• Track and regularly report progress toward Hillside's current goal of 65% of average Sunday attendance serving on a Serve Team at least three times per semester.

• Establish consistent definitions and Planning Center practices that enable accurate reporting of unique Team Members, serving frequency, ministry participation, onboarding, retention, and leadership development.

• Develop clear dashboards and reporting for the Pastor of Serve With Compassion, Management Team, Executive Leadership, and ministry leaders.

• Equip ministry leaders to maintain accurate volunteer data, identify trends and gaps, and use engagement data to strengthen their teams.

Serve the Church Leadership, Care & Celebration

• Provide overall leadership for Serve the Church, including supervision and development of the Guest Experience Director and assigned Ministry Partners.

• Champion a culture where Team Members are known, valued, cared for, spiritually encouraged, and celebrated.

• Establish church-wide rhythms for volunteer appreciation, feedback, recognition, and healthy serving.

• Lead church-wide volunteer celebration initiatives and events.

• Establish annual Serve the Church goals, priorities, plans, and budget in partnership with the Pastor of Serve With Compassion. Pasted text