Integrity Ideas are specific actions a leader can consider during the Re-Align step of Integriosity^®—actions that will begin to Re-Align the organization with Biblical beliefs, principles, and priorities.  You can find more Integrity Ideas at Integrous | Integrity Ideas (integriosity.com)

INTEGRITY IDEA: Ask for an Autograph

“Ask for an Autograph” is about faithful leaders implementing practices that make the people behind an organization’s products visible.  It is about finding ways to allow customers to learn about the humans whose skill, care, and labor went into the creation of a product they purchased—not as a marketing gimmick, but as an act of recognition, gratitude, and human dignity.

Integrity Ideas are practical actions toward implementing a bigger WHY for the organization.  Some are helpful ideas to consider as a faithful leader prayerfully discerns the best stewardship of the organization. Others may be important steps in the RENEW/RE-ALIGN/RE-IMAGINE/RESTORE process.

“Ask for an Autograph” is in the “if it fits” category because its implementation will depend upon the nature of an organization’s products and services, as well as the production processes involved.

Our “Autograph” Traditions

We live in a celebrity culture in which asking for autographs from “famous” people is a way to show we made a connection, regardless of how fleeting or impersonal.  We ask authors to sign books. We ask athletes to sign balls. We ask musicians to sign albums. We expect artists to sign paintings. Movie and television actors, social media influencers, politicians and even successful business leaders are regularly asked for their autographs.

These autographs tend to be customer-driven, with the celebrities accommodating the desire of their fans, sometimes reluctantly.

We are also used to production-driven recognition in the form of credits at the beginning and end of movies or television shows, recognizing everyone who was involved with the production, from the “stars” to the caterers, drivers and even lawyers. For many, their right to credit and the prominence of credit is secured in and dictated by union contracts.

Outside of entertainment, professional service organizations frequently show “Our Team” on their websites. For some, it is just the leadership. For others it is just the “professionals.” Most organizations have a page on their website showing “Leaders,” which may include members of a Board of Directors or Advisory Board.

Extending the “Autograph” Culture

In several earlier posts, we described how business as usual—business in the way of the world—often brings the inherent “beauty-potential” of business (solutions, prosperity and jobs) with an ugly cost to God’s creation, particularly people.  Some of the dehumanizing consequences of business as usual we identified are:

• When profit is the “end” toward which the business is managed, people can never be more than tools of production to be managed toward that end.

• People will be valued based on their perceived profit contribution, and value is likely to be based on short-term profit or stock value.  Senior management will be perceived as more valuable, particularly by senior management.

• People may be paid what is “just enough” to keep them (rather than what is fair).

• People will be provided benefits only to the extent necessary to motivate the desired behavior toward the goal of maximizing profit.

• Community is not prioritized, with people being motivated and manipulated to compete with each other for compensation, promotions, and job security.

In a business as usual culture, finding ways to recognize all employees will not be a priority unless it is perceived as necessary to limit employee attrition or maximize employee performance.

Leading with faithful integrity through business a better way toward Biblical flourishing requires a faithful leader with the wisdom to recognize, and the courage to root out, elements of the dehumanizing and uglifying “way” of the kingdom of the world and re-align an organization with the humanizing and beautifying “way” of God’s Kingdom.

It requires aligning the culture of the organization with Biblical beliefs, principles and priorities. “Ask for an Autograph” reflects a commitment to the Biblical beliefs, principles and priorities of Imago Dei, the Golden Rule, and the commandment to love our neighbor.  It reflects a commitment to recognizing the inherent dignity and unique contribution of every employee because God created them and bestowed them with their unique gifts of creativity and productivity.

An organization committed to operating with faithful integrity through business a better way toward Biblical flourishing must recognize the importance of Imago Dei. All employees were created in the image of God with gifts that contribute in unique ways to the purpose of the organization, and the “leaders” and “professionals” could not do their jobs without the support of all others in the organization.

Imago Dei means every single human is sacred and entitled to be treated with the same dignity. The human effort and skill involved in creating our clothing, tools, appliances, furniture, technology, and food is just as worthy of credit as the efforts of those in the C-Suite, and just as worthy of credit as the efforts of celebrities.

For a faithful leader, finding a way to give that credit is a way to live out the Golden Rule and the commandment to love their neighbor.

For employees, “Ask for an Autograph” recognizes that it is humanizing for people to be “seen”–to know they are valued and valuable and that their efforts are appreciated.

For customers, it recognizes the power of connection, reminding customers that fellow humans with families, interests, stories, and gifts were involved in Beautifying the World through the product they purchased.  It is a reminder that even our most average day is profoundly impacted by the efforts of others created in the image of God using their God-given gifts of creativity and productivity.

Biblical Support

Beyond Imago Dei, the Golden Rule and the commandment to love your neighbor, the Bible provides ample support for, and examples of, recognizing the contribution of employees. Scripture calls all members of the body — including faithful leaders — to recognize and honor the contributions of those working alongside them.

Therefore encourage one another and build one another up, just as you are doing. (1 Thessalonians 5:11)

Respect those who labor among you . . . and to esteem them very highly in love because of their work. (1 Thessalonians 5:12-13)

And let us consider how to stir up one another to love and good works. (Hebrews 10:24)

Love one another with brotherly affection. Outdo one another in showing honor. (Romans 12:10)

The parts of the body that seem to be weaker are indispensable . . . God has so composed the body . . . that the members may have the same care for one another. (1 Corinthians 12:22–25)

When a faithful leader implements “Ask for an Autograph” they communicate to the entire organization that the pursuit of faithful integrity through business a better way toward Biblical flourishing really is the heart of the organization–and that faithful integrity is not about charisma or titles but about character and care.

Scripture also includes numerous examples of people being named for their contributions to larger efforts:

• Nehemiah 3 calls out people by name for their work on rebuilding the wall. For example:

And next to them Meremoth the son of Uriah, son of Hakkoz repaired. (Nehemiah 3:4)

After him Baruch the son of Zabbai repaired another section… (Nehemiah 3:20)

• Paul frequently ends his letters with long lists of people who helped the work of the gospel. Romans 16 is the standout example. He names Phoebe, Prisca and Aquila, Epaenetus, Mary, Andronicus, Junia, Urbanus, Stachys, Apelles, and many others. Paul even pauses to recognize particular labor, writing, “Greet Mary, who has worked hard for you.” (Romans 16:6)

• In Exodus, God gives credit by name to craftsmen whom he called to help build the tabernacle.

See, I have called by name Bezalel the son of Uri, son of Hur, of the tribe of Judah… (Exodus 31:2)

And behold, I have appointed with him Oholiab, the son of Ahisamach, of the tribe of Dan. (Exodus 31:6)

• God also recognizes the broader community of skilled workers whose names are not individually preserved: “And every craftsman in whom the LORD had put skill, everyone whose heart stirred him up to come to do the work…” (Exodus 36:2). That is important. Scripture gives us examples of both named recognition and group recognition—both individual credits and team credits.

CONTINUUM: Practices

The Integriosity model organizes “heart change” along six Covert-Overt Continuums.  There is nothing inherently magic about these categories, but we believe they are helpful in thinking about practical execution of a Re-Imagined Purpose, Re-Imagined Values, and a Re-Imagined Culture.  The Continuums are Prayer, Proclamation, Policies, Practices, Products, People.

Each Continuum represents an area in which leaders can begin to think about, plan, and institute Re-Alignment changes to the heart of the organization.

“Ask for an Autograph” is on the Practices Continuum. It involves practices the organization can adopt to recognize the contributions of their employees and to create a human connection between customers and employees.

COVERT-OVERT RATING: Highly Covert

The Integriosity model breaks the Covert-Overt Continuums into six gradations—from Highly Covert to Highly Overt—that we believe are helpful in beginning to pray and think about what is most appropriate for an organization at a particular moment in time.

Most Integrity Ideas have one place on the scale.  Some can vary depending on how they are implemented.  We identify “Ask for an Autograph” as Highly Covert (an action that would be taken by a secular company), because every organization should be interested in recognizing the contributions of their employees and enhancing customer connection and loyalty.

For a secular organization, “Ask for an Autograph” might be more of a marketing gimmick than a recognition of human dignity and an effort to love employees and customers. It can be moved toward the Overt end of the Continuum by, for example, being overt about the Biblical reasons for recognizing the God-given creativity and productivity of all employees and wanting to Humanize People who are part of the organization’s efforts to Beautify the World and Glorify God.

STAKEHOLDERS SERVED: Employees, Customers/Clients, Suppliers/Vendors

When we categorize faith-based actions, we also consider the stakeholders principally impacted by the action: Employees, Customers/Clients, Owners, Suppliers/Vendors, Community and Kingdom.

“Ask for an Autograph” principally impacts employees and customers/clients. It can also impact suppliers/vendors to the extent an organization recognizes the contributions of those who supplied components or ingredients necessary for its product or service.

IMPLEMENTATION

Implementing “Ask for an Autograph” will depend on the size and nature of an organization, as well as the nature of the product or service it offers. The central question for a faithful leader to ask is “How do we make the invisible people visible?”  Implementation calls for prayerful creativity and requires a heart of gratitude and respect for the individual.

Prayerful Creativity

When considering how to implement “Ask for an Autograph,” faithful leaders should prayerfully ask God for creative solutions.

Very few organizations recognize all the employees involved in the operation of the organization on their websites. For some smaller organizations, it could be as simple as expanding the employees on the website from just a few leaders to all employees.  Genuine humility might lead to alphabetical listing rather than listing by “importance.”

For an artisanal product, it might be a card actually signed by the people who created it.  For others, it could be tracking the people involved in the production of a product and including with the product a QR code that links to information about the hands that have “touched” it.  At larger scale, the QR code could link to a particular production facility with information about the teams who work there.  There may need to be different approaches to giving visibility to those on a production line and those supporting from an office.

It would be unwieldy for organizations like Walmart, Amazon, Accenture, or Ford—with hundreds of thousands or even millions of employees—to show all employees on their website. High turnover in large, distributed workforces would make that challenge even greater, requiring an entire department to keep a website updated!

But that doesn’t mean “Ask for an Autograph” is impossible or even impracticable for such large organizations.  Prayerful discernment is needed to find what fits. Just imagine:

• Could Accenture include in the back of its reports to clients a “credits” page listing all the people who helped in any way to bring the report to completion, including back-office people who typed, formatted, proofread, researched, or duplicated the report?

• Could Ford track a car through production and include a QR code on the “sticker”, linking to a webpage showing all those involved in the car’s design, testing, and manufacture?

• Could Amazon include a sticker on each package with a QR code that would provide information about the distribution employees who helped assemble the package? Could it include production-level information for Amazon Basics products?

• Could Walmart put up “meet our team” signage near each department, with photos and names of people working that area? Could it include a product-specific QR code on Walmart’s own brands that link to production-level information?

Particularly with products, “Ask for an Autograph” could also be extended to recognize suppliers who make the product possible. For a farm-to-table restaurant this frequently appears as recognition on a menu or board of the local farms, dairies, and other purveyors of ingredients.  For an automaker, it could be a QR code that lists all the various suppliers of parts that go into the finished product.

The possibilities and permutations of implementing “Ask for an Autograph” are endless, but it must start with the right heart and be done with prayerful discernment. It must start with, “How do we make the invisible people visible, not to make them happy or to make us look good to our customers, but because they deserve to be treated with dignity and because the organization could not do what it does without their unique contributions?”

Beyond the standard “Meet the Team” or “Leaders” sections of websites, some organizations are already implementing humanizing versions of “Ask for an Autograph.”

Mercedes-AMG. Mercedes-AMG famously follows a “one man, one engine” philosophy with each engine being hand assembled by a single engine builder. Each engine bears a hand-signed plaque from the builder.

Known Supply. One notable example is clothing manufacturer Known Supply.  Their mission is intentionally centered on relationships and human dignity:

We exist to reimagine the fashion industry in a way that puts people first — celebrating the makers responsible for crafting our garments and using clothing as a tool to connect people across the globe.

Every product bears the name of the person who made it. Armed with that fact, customers can go to the Meet the Makers page, type in the name, and learn about the person who made their garment. For each maker, you find a story and personal details such as their dreams for the future.  It is also possible to select one of their manufacturing facilities and learn about all the people who work there.

Align with Africa.  Align with Africa takes the idea of “Ask for an Autograph even further.  The customer orders a purse, is introduced through a video to the artisan who will be making it, receives video updates of the production process, learns about the community being helped, and receives a QR code to see the full history of the piece.

Astier de Villatte.  Astier de Villatte is a French company with an artisanal workshop in Paris.  Each ceramic piece is marked with the initials of the artisan who crafted it.

Ritual Coffee Roasters. Ritual Coffee Roasters  announced in February 2025 that each bag of coffee would include “a QR code for an interactive experience” about the producers and their farms.

Stonyfield Farm.  The website for Stonyfield Farm includes a “Meet the Farmers” section in which they feature stories about the family farms that produce the milk for Stonyfield’s products.

These examples suggest that the idea is not impractical or fanciful. The question for faithful leaders is how far the practice could be extended, and how it could be implemented with the right heart.

Gratitude

Implementing “Ask for an Autograph” must not come from a heart of, or be communicated as, tracking worker productivity or finding ways to hold people accountable for errors.  It must come from a heart of gratitude for those who have contributed their time and God-given creativity and productivity to further the organization’s mission.

Respect

Practically, implementation of “Ask for an Autograph” must be done in a way that respects the privacy of employees.  For large organizations, more details than a first name and last initial should only be shared with consent.  More information—such as a photo, last name, biographical information, interests outside work, favorite quote, or fun fact—can be more humanizing for the employee and create a deeper human connection with the customer, but it should be optional for the employee.

Even in professional services firms where full biographies of professionals are common, it is not unusual for employees to ask that their picture not be posted.

Thought and prayer should be given to guardrails that protect privacy even when more information is provided.  For example, it is important to establish information that will not be provided, particularly information that would suggest a heart of monitoring rather than gratitude.

Overtness

A faithful leader must prayerfully consider whether “Ask for an Autograph” will be implemented covertly or initiated with an explanation referencing Biblical beliefs, principles and priorities such as Imago Dei and loving your neighbor.

“Ask for an Autograph” will require prayer and will require effort. It might require new technology systems to track employee contributions to products. It may also require restraint, because a practice designed to honor people can become dehumanizing if it becomes a tool of surveillance, comparison, or control.

At its best, “Ask for an Autograph” is not about giving customers a novelty experience. It is about giving workers the dignity of being seen and giving customers the gift of remembering that the products they use every day come through the creativity, productivity, care, and labor of people created in the image of God.

For a faithful leader leading with faithful integrity through business a better way toward Biblical flourishing, “Ask for an Autograph” reflects and reinforces an organizational culture that prioritizes relationships, community, human dignity, and flourishing, embraces Imago Dei, and encourages employees to live out the Golden Rule and the commandment to love their neighbors.

PERSONAL NOTE (from PM): In writing this post, I was reminded of a video that illustrated the number of people and industries required to make a “simple” lead pencil. Below is a link.  When Lisa and I were driving around the middle of America in 2024, we gained a new appreciation and increased gratitude for all the people who make America “run”–the farmers, the oil workers, etc.  It is so easy to take for granted the number of humans using their God-given gifts of creativity and productivity to provide our food, technology, appliances, fashion, furniture, entertainment, etc.  All humans made in the image of God.

I pay particular attention to how organizations recognize employees on their websites.  Is it only the leadership?  Is it only people above a certain level?  Is it alphabetical or by “rank”? Is there information that humanizes the humans, such as favorite pastimes, casual photos of families or activities, or fun facts.

There are a few times when I have been impressed by a product including a signed note or a card identifying the person who inspected it.  I enjoy seeing restaurants list the sources of their meat, fish, vegetables, and cheeses.

ESSENCE:  Integrity Ideas are specific practical actions a faithful leader can consider in leading faithfully through business a better way.

INTEGRITY IDEA: Ask for an Autograph

“Ask for an Autograph” is about faithful leaders implementing practices that make the people behind an organization’s products visible.  It is about finding ways to allow customers to learn about the humans whose skill, care, and labor went into the creation of a product they purchased—not as a marketing gimmick, but as an act of recognition, gratitude, and human dignity. We ask authors to sign books. We ask athletes to sign balls. We ask musicians to sign albums. We expect artists to sign paintings. Every movie ends with a long list of credits.  Professional service organizations frequently show “Our Team” on their websites and most organizations provide pictures of their “Leaders.” The human effort and skill involved in creating our clothing, tools, appliances, furniture, technology, and food is just as worthy of credit. For employees and suppliers, “Ask for an Autograph” recognizes that it is humanizing for people to be “seen”–to know they are valued and valuable and that their efforts are appreciated. For customers, it recognizes the power of connection, reminding customers that fellow humans with families, interests, stories, and gifts were involved in Beautifying the World through the product they purchased.  It is a reminder that even our most average day is profoundly impacted by the efforts of others created in the image of God using their God-given gifts of creativity and productivity.  It honors Imago Dei and lives out the Golden Rule and the commandment to love others. “Ask for an Autograph” reflects and reinforces an organizational culture that prioritizes relationships, community, human dignity, and flourishing, embraces Imago Dei, and encourages employees to live out the Golden Rule and the commandment to love their neighbors.  

COVERT-OVERT CONTINUUM (six Continuums for action): Practices

COVERT-OVERT RATING (several levels from Highly Covert to Highly Overt): Highly Covert

STAKEHOLDERS SERVED: Employees, Customers/Clients, Suppliers/Vendors

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Photo credit: Original image by Peter Zhan on Unsplash
(photo cropped)