Divisional Lesson: Human Resources 1
Health and Value:
Value: The Human Resources team partners with leaders around the globe to ensure our people strategies are all aligned to help staff and volunteers flourish. HR especially helps with staff, supporting leaders to ensure we hire well, care for people well, and help people exit the ministry well.
A local ministry has healthy HR when it works with all supervisors and leaders to:
- Encourage volunteers and staff through honoring faithful service
- Help the life cycle of employment go well: Hiring well, compensating work appropriately, developing, guiding performance and helping people transition off staff well when needed.
- Ensure the right systems are in place to help with healthy supervision and people formation, to support the role they are in and future opportunities and needs.
- Protect the mission with policies and training that help avoid complicated legal situations with staff or volunteers, and provide assistance if they do arise.
- Ensure we are leveraging our vast global diversity in how we hire and develop all people.
HR Module 1: “Healthy HR Capability & Who Does What”
Audience: i100 Divisional Groups
Duration: 60–75 minutes
Format: Interactive Zoom Call
Lesson Objectives
By the end of this session, participants will be able to:
- Describe the value of healthy human resource capability and describe how it advances the mission.
- Distinguish between divisional and local/country-level HR processes and resources
- Evaluate what exists and what is needed to improve HR Tasks, processes, and resources
Lesson Outline
1.) Welcome & Health/Value Reminder (10 minutes)
- Discuss: What is HR, and why does it matter in ministry? “HR partners with leaders to make sure we do our best through our people: helping us hire well, grow well, and transition well.”
- Here are some examples of what Human Resources supports to serve leaders:
- Preparing staff well for success in their role: onboarding, goal setting, and understanding of YL culture/expectations
- Guiding performance - celebrating success and intervening when performance needs to improve
- Developing staff for the present and the future
- Equitable hiring processes (posting all positions versus choosing the “one”
- Supporting supervisors in their walk-in servant leadership
- Ensuring everyone can contribute to their fullest potential while maintaining legal integrity
- Listening and responding to concerns as they arise
- As a group, add to this list.
2.) Group Activity: “What Even is HR?” (15 minutes)
At the moment, Human Resources issues are handled very differently around the globe depending on Young Life's structure, country regulations, and divisional delegation. But what kind of things even fall into Human Resources? As a group, make a list of responsibilities that are Human Resources related:
After you have made a list, compare your list to the list below:
- Hiring Well
- Exiting well
- Employment/Contractor/Consultant Contracts
- Conflict Resolution for a Respectful Workplace
- Giving solid feedback to help the team grow and become better - guiding performance
- Setting direct reports up for success in their role including providing tools and knowledge for success
- Partnering with direct reports in challenging relationships
- Walking alongside them with challenges that might arise outside work
- Helping employees plan for their future within the ministry
- Preparing them for organizational changes
- Preparing them for their next opportunity/role
- Communicating the vision to them
- Determining compensation
- Complying with labor legislation
Here is a general overview of what tends to happen at each level. Discuss: Is this true in your context?
● Divisional HR:
- strategy,
- frameworks,
- alignment,
- electronic systems,
- regional support
● Local/Country HR:
- compliance,
- legal documents,
- employment records,
- national employment rules,
- context-specific onboarding,
- executing strategy/tactics
Principle: HR capabilities are strongest when both levels collaborate with trust.
We honestly have much work to do here as a mission, and while these will likely change, the key is that you, as a leader, partner with HR resources available to make an impact and resource to our mission. This is known as thought partnership.
Discuss the scenarios below
What kind of HR help currently exists, and what more help do you need? Record your answers as a group with the google form below.
Discuss/EVALUATE
- In our division, who is carrying the weight of helping in these areas?
- WHERE is that weight falling (mainly division, country, area?)
- Where are we confident it is being done well? Where are we not sure of that?
- How could improved international HR help us best?
3.) Teaching Segment: Partnership in A New Reality
In the last section, you discussed how HR tasks get handled in your geography. Let's hear from our VP of International HR to share how there is a hoped-for reality change for how these things get handled.
A word from VP International HR, Bryan Heinz:
I’m grateful to share a new HR support capability we’re developing together with you—one designed not only to help us fulfill our mission goals, but to do so by faithfully investing in our people and caring for them in ways that reflect the heart of Christ. At the center of this initiative is a deeply biblical conviction: when we love and steward people well, they flourish—and when people flourish, the work of the Kingdom advances. This capability is about aligning our HR practices with that truth.
We’re building a support model that serves in three key ways: it aligns people practices with our mission priorities, strengthens care and connection across teams and regions, and equips leaders to shepherd their people with wisdom, empathy, and spiritual discernment. This new capability will include a trellis—a framework that supports growth—linking talent, culture, and care to our strategic direction; guidance for leaders in coaching, conflict resolution, and team development; and relational support to help leaders make people-related decisions with clarity and compassion.
We believe this will bear fruit in several ways: greater clarity and alignment across teams, stronger engagement and retention, and a culture where people feel known, supported, and empowered to contribute to God’s work. This isn’t just an HR initiative—it’s a leadership commitment. A commitment to stewarding our people well, so that together, we can pursue our calling with excellence, humility, and integrity.
We trust that this new HR structure will bear fruit in the months and years ahead—not only by streamlining decision-making, but by empowering our leaders with clearer support, sharper insights, and more responsive care. Just as healthy roots produce lasting growth, this framework will cultivate trust, alignment, and long-term impact across our mission—so that all we do may bring glory to God and good to those we serve.
While this is being developed, please continue to reach out to previous resources used and our new VP of International HR, Bryan Heinz. Though trellis is being developed for the future, we can’t let current opportunities pass us by.
