A ward is a Latter-day Saint congregation of a few hundred members within a drawn geographical boundary, and the bishop is the man who leads it. He is called rather than elected or appointed by application, serves about five years, holds an ordinary job throughout, receives nothing, and has no training in theology or pastoral care beyond what any member has had. He may be a dentist, a mechanic, a schoolteacher or a farmer, and on Monday he goes back to work.
The load is substantial. He presides at Sunday worship and conducts the sacrament meeting. He calls almost every other officer in the ward, several hundred positions over the course of his service. He conducts the interviews that determine whether a member receives a temple recommend or may serve a mission, which makes him the gatekeeper of the movement's central ordinances for everyone in his boundary. He administers the ward's fast offering fund and decides personally who receives help from it. And he counsels members individually in what the church calls the office of a common judge, which in practice means marital crises, addiction, bereavement, financial collapse and disciplinary matters, in a role that a trained minister would find demanding.
He is assisted by two counsellors and holds the presiding keys of the Aaronic priesthood for the ward, a detail with real content: his authority is over the congregation in front of him and does not extend past its boundary.