James (Jim) Edward Perryman

In this part-time (40%) role, I was responsible for the recruitment, training and deployment of seasonal chaplains to serve in various European resorts (Switzerland, Ibiza, Italy, France). I also had responsibility for the upkeep of the English Churches and Chaplain’s apartments in Zermatt and Wengen. The associated publicity and administration also came in this role, including contact with managers and staff at resort Tourist Offices, and with church authorities including the Diocese in Europe and the local Catholic and Reformed churches in the Swiss resorts.

I was also responsible for the safeguarding checks for those chaplains not able to obtain full PTO from the Diocese in Europe and basic safeguarding procedures for ICS.

I shared in the budget planning and financial accounting for this work to ensure that figures from the Short-term Mission chaplains were submitted correctly to the Finance manager, and I shared in the banking arrangements in Switzerland. I was also responsible for setting up and maintaining the sound system and IT systems in the Swiss resorts to ensure the best missional value from limited resources.

I retired from the role when I did to allow for the most effective transition to a new structure prior to the current Mission Director's retirement in a few months time. We planned our dates at least two years ahead of time so that my role could be filled by someone who would then be well placed to help with the transition in the summer for the society who have just appointed the new mission director.

I worked as a member of a small team at the office in Coventry where we each needed to be aware of the work of one another. I developed a good working knowledge of the most recent CRM (Beacon) and accounting system (Expense Plus) that were used by the society, including inputting details into both systems and producing my own role-specific reports and extracts. I had a very good reputation for caring and working relationships and for efficiency and dedication.

I served as the Parish Priest at Leek Wootton fulfilling all the normal duties while seeking to build a welcoming, family-friendly, community centred fellowship. Initially, my role also covered the parishes of Stoneleigh and Ashow but, at my suggestion, after five years of trying to build a coherant group out of three parishes which had been forced unwillingly together, the Diocesan authorities agreed that the parishes would be better served by my voluntary offer to revert to a half-time role at Leek Wootton with a dedicated minister being recruited to serve in a similar role at the other two parishes. This proved beneficial and allowed both 'halves' to flourish and grow over the following twleve years into the healthy parishes they now are with good community connections.

As Parish Priest, I had oversight of parish finances as well as the natural pastoral oversight and ensured that each parish was financially stable. My role also involved being a ex-officio trustee of various local charities which again included a financial aspect and I remain now in the role of financial correspondent for one of these, coordinating the fiancial reporting for the trustees and the submission of annual accounts etc to the Charity Commission.

Acted as a School Governor for the federated Leek Wootton and Burton Green Church of England schools, engaging extensively with staff and pupils at Leek Wootton.

Full-time role in suburban Maidstone. Parish (pop. c15,000) 2 secondary schools, 3 local authority primary schools + 1 private primary; large number of elderly residents in bungalow estates and residential homes; many professional people.

Main achievements:

Development of schools ministry in all the primary schools of the parish including after­school clubs in two and regular assemblies in all.

Development of funeral ministry with good relationships built with local funeral director who used church for his annual remembrance service. Introduction of All Age worship, drawing families into the church and developing a breadth of worship styles.

Development of audio­visual aids to worship, varied liturgy, website and other communication aids, aiding development of reader and ordained ministries.

Development of financial stability enabling the church to employ a part-time adminstrator and a part-time Children's worker.

During my time in Maidstone, I also served as Deanery Treasurer for some years at a time when the Parish Share calculation methods were being redeveloped allowing Deaneries to customise their own systems. This required the production of spreadsheets which enabled the Synod to model the effects of different methods of calculation.

Full-time role in an international church, primarily serving the large and diverse expatriate English-speaking community in the city of Lyon and a vast area around. This included a Civic and Ecumenical role as the representative of Anglican Communion, including regular contact with the city authorities (political, military and judicial) and regular meetings with the Cardinal Archbishop of Lyon, the local Bishop of the Armenian Apostolic church and the Lyon leaders of the Greek Orthodox and French Reformed, Lutheran and independent Protestant churches.

I played a major role in Anglo-French Acts of Remembrance in partnership with the local branches of the Royal British Legion and the Royal Air Force Association, as well as city-wide ecumenical events.

I built up a fractured fellowship which, once healed, grew rapidly again to embrace people from a wide range of nationalities and Christian traditions - helping many people discover or develop their gifts which, with the large turnover of congregation because of the short-term nature of ex-pat life in Lyon, hopefully resourced churches around the world.

During this time, I also served on the French ARC group at the invitation of the Anglican Bishop in Europe.

Due to the turnover of the congregation (resulting in 5 different treasurers over a six year period!), it was necessary to keep a very close oversight of the finances as we sought to build up a fellowship from being 50% dependant on outside support from our Patron, the Intercontinental Church Society, to being fully financially independant. For several months, I had to fill the role of Treasurer myself.

This was my second curacy, where I was working as one of three stipendiary clergy, each with responsibility for a different centre of worship within the parish. I was the leader of a small fellowship on a mainly owner-occupied, urban housing estate on the edge of Dagenham.

I struggled to develop a desire for growth among a small close-knit fellowship who served their community very well, but somehow didn’t want to open up their worship ‘family’. However, I helped to encourage some into new leadership roles.

This was my title post, in suburban Romford.

During my years as curate, I helped to develop ministry with the youth and children as well as with young families.

A few months ago, I was privileged to be asked to preach at the funeral of my training incumbant, and was delighted to see five of my youth group, now very much adults and all active in church life.

I was responsible for maintaining and developing a Financial Accounting software package as part of a small team. I embarked on this role for a known short time frame between my two periods of theological studies in preparation for ordination. I continued to work for the company as a vacation employment during the two years 1986 to 1988.

My second period working for the then Access Credit Card organisation, maintaining the existing financial systems but also developing new suites of programs as the organisation began to develop into the international partnership of card providers which eventually became Mastercard. Had it not been for my sudden, and very unexpected, sense of calling to Christian ministry at the end of 1980, I would probably have stayed here for many years.

Computer Programmer in a more business environment. My employment here included time in software support before moving more into Systems Analysis.

In this, still very new, Access Credit Card organisation, I started as a computer operator, aged 16, as part of a large team caring for a large mainframe computer. After 6 months, recognising my aptitude, I was moved into less manual roles of operations support and control, and began to develop my understanding of the working of the computers and of the business and financial environment, eventually transferring into the programming department and having responsibility for maintaining the major accounts updating programme.