FREQUENTLY ASKED QUESTIONS ABOUT MINISTRY DEVELOPMENT REVIEW
Is this review completely confidential?
The review is confidential to you, your reviewer and your Area and Diocesan Bishops. The reviewer will not disclose anything about the review other than through his or her summary. The Bishops will be sent only the summary sheet, but see below about what happens if you and your Reviewer cannot agree the summary.
Should portfolio posts be included in the review eg Rural Dean?
Yes, the review is about your ministry, so include all of it.
I hold a part time chaplaincy, funded by a secular organization. Should this be included in my review?
Yes, the review is about your ministry, so include all of it. You will have regular reviews in the secular funded part of your role, so you may only want to give an outline summary of these and the conclusions reached. However, there may be aspects of that role that you will be able to discuss more easily with your MRD Reviewer.
I do not receive a stipend and see the major part of my ministry in my secular role and workplace. Should this be part of my MDR?
Yes, the review is about your ministry, so include all of it. Your ministry in the workplace is just as important as your ministry within the church, so use this opportunity to review it.
If my review contributors have consistently marked me ‘weak’ or ‘developing’ in a particular area will you automatically expecting me to address this in my objectives?
The review contributors are asked to give you feedback on your ministry as they see it, not an evaluation against agreed criteria. Their feedback may indicate weakness in a particular area, that should be addressed, but in many cases it will indicate something far more complex, perhaps to do with change in church life or pastoral re-organisation.
It is important that you discuss the feedback with your Reviewer, so that together you can decide if any particular objective should be chosen in relation to the feedback.
What happens if I realise in taking part in the review that my role description is no longer accurate?
One of your objectives could be to change your role description. You do this in consultation with your Archdeacon and PCC or PCC’s.
What happens if my Reviewer and I disagree about the summary of my MDR?
The Reviewee sends the summary to the reviewer within 1 week of the review. If the Reviewer is not happy with it, their first course of action should be to phone the Reviewee and discuss their views. Most often this will be simply that the Reviewee does not seem to be clear in what they are saying and this will easily be clarified. It may be that the Reviewer thinks that something important that has been raised in the review has been omitted from the summary. If this is just a mistake that too will be easy to rectify. If, however, the Reviewee has intentionally omitted something that was said, by themselves or their 180 degree review participants and the Reviewer considers that to be important, then the Reviewer will have to send in a separate summary. The final decision rests with the Reviewer, who must give you a copy of what they send in their summary.
In what circumstances might the Reviewer feel they need to include information in the review summary that the reviewee wishes to omit?
A Reviewer is not a Spiritual Director or Confessor. Information relating to child or vulnerable adult protection would need to be passed on by the Reviewer as would information relating to a potential disciplinary matter. A Reviewer may also consider that he or she needs to include information relating to such matters as apparent exhaustion or incapacity. A Reviewer should not include in an alternative summary information relating to other members of the Reviewee’s family, although the Reviewee may choose to do this.