Small church leadership

 All churches are different, of course. 

My curacy was in a larger town centre church. There were three administrators who between them must have done more than 40 hours a week; a paid verger; a full time youth and children's worker. And of course many volunteers. 

But everything was pretty much sorted out in the weekly staff and church wardens' meeting. The Vicar never sent and email. The office took care of everything (including printing incoming emails and typing responses). They, or a church warden, would get together a team for that event. Or check with so and so. And so on. The vicar and curate had to do very little by way of organising or implementing on the practical side of things. 

In my experience, leading three small churches with no other paid help is actually in many ways more complex and demanding. In particular, there is no one obvious go to person, except the Vicar. Jobs are shared around, which is great, but it requires someone to know and remember who does what and to make sure they are doing it again / have done it etc. Sometimes jobs are done by teams and its not even very obvious whose in the team or who the team leader / contact person should be either in theory or in practice. Some needs will be brilliantly anticipated - or maybe pre-empted in a way you may not have expected, which of course can produce its own challenges. Other balls can be dropped if no one makes the call and checks its been heard and done. 

This - along with church yard management - is one of the many things my curacy didn't really prepare me for.