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When Your Team Trusts Technology More Than Each Other · The Healthy Church Staff Podcast

• 0:08
  SPEAKER_00: Okay, according to Barna, 61% of practicing Christians would say that they trust AI to help them make financial decisions.
• 0:17
  SPEAKER_00: 56% would trust them for mental health advice.
• 0:20
  SPEAKER_00: But here's what I want to talk about today.
• 0:23
  SPEAKER_00: 48% of professing Christians would actually.
• 0:29
  SPEAKER_00: You ready for this?
• 0:30
  SPEAKER_00: They would trust AI to guide their spiritual growth.
• 0:34
  SPEAKER_00: Let that sink in for just a second.
• 0:36
  SPEAKER_00: Half of your congregation, almost half, 48%, would rather ask a chatbot about their soul than another human being.
• 0:44
  SPEAKER_00: And I couldn't help but wonder, what does that say about trust on your church staff?
• 0:49
  SPEAKER_00: That's what we're going to talk about today here on the podcast.
• 0:52
  SPEAKER_00: My name is Todd Rhodes, one of the co-founders over at chemistry staffing.com.
• 0:56
  SPEAKER_00: Hey, before we get started today, if you haven't already done so, please take some time, maybe even hit pause if you're not driving right now, and go over, run over to church staff assessment, churchstaffassessment.com.
• 1:09
  SPEAKER_00: And we've just opened our 2026 Church Staff Health Assessment.
• 1:14
  SPEAKER_00: I would love for you to be able to take that absolutely free of charge.
• 1:17
  SPEAKER_00: We're going to give a big report back in January of everything that we're learning.
• 1:22
  SPEAKER_00: And I'd love to hear from you to find out exactly how you're doing on your church staff team.
• 1:27
  SPEAKER_00: Okay.
• 1:28
  SPEAKER_00: People are not just turning to AI because it's smarter.
• 1:32
  SPEAKER_00: They're turning to AI, think about it, because it's safer.
• 1:36
  SPEAKER_00: It won't judge you.
• 1:38
  SPEAKER_00: It won't gossip about your question in the break room.
• 1:41
  SPEAKER_00: It won't use your vulnerability against you later.
• 1:45
  SPEAKER_00: It won't make you feel stupid for asking.
• 1:48
  SPEAKER_00: And we need to think about that as church leaders.
• 1:53
  SPEAKER_00: Because it's really important.
• 1:55
  SPEAKER_00: When people prefer a machine over a person for deeply personal decision, that's not just a technology problem, that's a trust problem.
• 2:05
  SPEAKER_00: And if your congregation is moving in that direction, and according to the research, most it are, most congregations and most staff are, because that's where our culture and our people are headed.
• 2:18
  SPEAKER_00: If they're moving in that direction, there's a decent chance, get this, because this is important, there's a decent chance that your staff team is there too.
• 2:29
  SPEAKER_00: So let me ask you a really hard question.
• 2:31
  SPEAKER_00: When was the last time somebody on your team was truly vulnerable in a meeting?
• 2:36
  SPEAKER_00: Not like surface level and pray for my busy week, vulnerable.
• 2:39
  SPEAKER_00: We get that all the time.
• 2:40
  SPEAKER_00: I'm just kind of raw, honest, messy.
• 2:43
  SPEAKER_00: I don't know if I'm cut out for this, kind of vulnerable.
• 2:47
  SPEAKER_00: And if you can't answer that question, or if you can't remember, that could be your answer because here's what happens when trust erodes.
• 2:54
  SPEAKER_00: People stop asking real questions in person.
• 2:58
  SPEAKER_00: They stop admitting real struggles in person.
• 3:01
  SPEAKER_00: They start managing image instead of leading from authenticity.
• 3:06
  SPEAKER_00: And eventually, and this is where I think a lot of everything is going, not just with our culture, but also on our church staffs.
• 3:14
  SPEAKER_00: Eventually, they'd rather ask Chat GPT or AI it or just suffer in silence because they don't want to risk being judged by the people that they work with every day.
• 3:26
  SPEAKER_00: Think about it.
• 3:27
  SPEAKER_00: Six, ten years ago, we didn't have this kind of option if we had a dilemma.
• 3:32
  SPEAKER_00: We couldn't call Dr.
• 3:33
  SPEAKER_00: Laura.
• 3:33
  SPEAKER_00: There's a blast from the past and current up.
• 3:36
  SPEAKER_00: She's still gone.
• 3:37
  SPEAKER_00: Couldn't call a radio show and ask for help with our dilemma.
• 3:40
  SPEAKER_00: And if we didn't want to ask somebody on our team, we'd have to ask somebody else, a mentor, a peer from a different church or something.
• 3:48
  SPEAKER_00: But a lot of times we would ask those kind of questions in a staff type meeting, ask really hard questions.
• 3:56
  SPEAKER_00: What should we do?
• 3:57
  SPEAKER_00: Should we do this?
• 3:58
  SPEAKER_00: Should we do that?
• 3:59
  SPEAKER_00: And now, rather than starting at the staff meeting, a lot of times we start with AI.
• 4:03
  SPEAKER_00: And that's where it gets a little bit tricky.
• 4:06
  SPEAKER_00: Because here's the deal: your staff is not just mirroring the culture, they're mirroring you.
• 4:12
  SPEAKER_00: And if you never admit that you're struggling, they won't either.
• 4:15
  SPEAKER_00: If you always seem to have the right answers, they'll stop asking the questions.
• 4:19
  SPEAKER_00: And if you punish doubt or reward performance over honesty, you're really training them to trust the algorithms over the people.
• 4:26
  SPEAKER_00: Because here's the deal: at least the algorithm won't fire them for being human.
• 4:32
  SPEAKER_00: They won't poke fun of them.
• 4:33
  SPEAKER_00: They won't use it against them in the future.
• 4:36
  SPEAKER_00: So, what do we do about this?
• 4:38
  SPEAKER_00: How do we build a team that trusts each other more than they trust tech?
• 4:46
  SPEAKER_00: How do we build a team that goes to each other and asks each other first and collaborates with each other first rather than going to some AI model on their computer or on their phone?
• 4:57
  SPEAKER_00: We need to start by modeling the vulnerability that you want to see, not by oversharing, not by trauma dumping, but by real, appropriate honesty about where you're growing or where you're struggling.
• 5:10
  SPEAKER_00: So you need to create space on your staff in your meetings around your church offices for your staff that aren't just tactical.
• 5:18
  SPEAKER_00: You need to ask real questions like what's draining you right now.
• 5:21
  SPEAKER_00: Because if you don't start asking those questions, where do you feel stuck?
• 5:25
  SPEAKER_00: If you don't start asking those questions, they're gonna start going to Chat GPT or Claude or their favorite AI and say, I'm drained right now, what should I do?
• 5:34
  SPEAKER_00: And they're gonna get that that feedback from a machine rather than from their leader.
• 5:41
  SPEAKER_00: And then, and this is critical, if you can get people to talk, and if you can talk, don't fix it, judge it, or weaponize it for later.
• 5:50
  SPEAKER_00: You just need to listen, affirm, and validate because trust isn't built in a retreat or in a training, it's built in a hundred small moments where someone risks honesty and doesn't get punished for it.
• 6:05
  SPEAKER_00: Here's what I see happening a lot less talk with church staffs among each other, and a lot one-on-one conversations between staff members and AI.
• 6:16
  SPEAKER_00: And I'm not against AI.
• 6:18
  SPEAKER_00: I love AI.
• 6:19
  SPEAKER_00: I think AI has a lot to bring to the table, but we cannot let AI take over our relationships or our trusting in other people, especially the people that I work with.
• 6:31
  SPEAKER_00: Think about it.
• 6:32
  SPEAKER_00: Now, Jesus just didn't teach us about trust.
• 6:36
  SPEAKER_00: He actually modeled it with kind of a ragabuffin team of doubters and deniers and hotheads.
• 6:42
  SPEAKER_00: He let Peter fail.
• 6:44
  SPEAKER_00: He let Thomas question, he let James and John embarrass themselves at times, and he didn't replace them with a more competent algorithm.
• 6:52
  SPEAKER_00: Jesus could have chosen anybody and he chose these guys.
• 6:56
  SPEAKER_00: Why?
• 6:56
  SPEAKER_00: Because the goal wasn't necessarily efficiency, it was transformation.
• 7:01
  SPEAKER_00: And that transformation happened through relationships.
• 7:04
  SPEAKER_00: If we're leading our time, our teams and they prefer AI over each other, we've traded that incarnational model for something safer and faster, but way, way less powerful.
• 7:17
  SPEAKER_00: So here's your bottom line for today.
• 7:18
  SPEAKER_00: If your team trusts technology more than they trust each other, you don't have a tools problem.
• 7:24
  SPEAKER_00: You really do have a safety problem.
• 7:26
  SPEAKER_00: I hope that's been helpful for you today here on the podcast.
• 7:29
  SPEAKER_00: We're here every weekday, Monday through Friday.
• 7:32
  SPEAKER_00: If there's a way that I can help you or your church or chemistry staffing can serve your church, please reach out to me, podcast at chemistry staffing.com.
• 7:40
  SPEAKER_00: I read each and every email that I get from you.
• 7:42
  SPEAKER_00: And I so appreciate hearing from you, listening to your story.
• 7:47
  SPEAKER_00: And if there's any way we can help podcast at chemistrystaffing.com.
• 7:50
  SPEAKER_00: And don't forget about the 2026 Church Staff Health Assessment.
• 7:54
  SPEAKER_00: You can take that at churchstaffassessment.com.
• 7:57
  SPEAKER_00: All right, that's it for today.
• 7:59
  SPEAKER_00: I'm gonna take a couple days off for the weekend, believe it or not, and we will be right back here on Monday on the Healthy Church Staff Podcast.
• 8:05
  SPEAKER_00: Have a great weekend.