At Westside, we have the bittersweet news to share that our Director of Operations, Shannon Day, is planning her retirement. She will finish in her role at the end of this church year, in June.

In Shannon’s many years doing administrative work for Westside, she has gone above and beyond in so many ways, ministering to this congregation through joyful and difficult times. She has been a steady presence through numerous ministerial and other staff transitions.

In my time here, Shannon has been an integral part of welcoming me and has frankly smoothed my transition into this congregational setting. She is a wealth of institutional knowledge. She is generous and humble with her support of all the great work that our staff and volunteers do here. And, she deserves a wonderful retirement. I am deeply sad to have her leave in this capacity, but I am also happy to see her enter this new chapter.

Briefly, the plan from here. Jill Jackson, John Hornby, and I have begun to work together as a search committee to fill this role. We plan to invite others to join the team.

Right now we are working on creating a job posting, or rather job postings. In discussing how we want to move forward, we are likely going to hire two part-time people to focus on different aspects of the many roles Shannon has filled. One more focused on bookkeeping, HR and other admin, the other more focused on communications and volunteer engagement. We will share more details as they are ready as we go through this process.

As we enter this time of transition, let us make space for any grief that may come up. I hope we will share our gratitude with Shannon, as we know that while we will be hiring new people into her role, we will not be able to replace her.