Faithful leaders seeking to lead with faithful integrity can get detoured from the ancient path toward business a better way. The world--and our culture--does not want a faithful leader on the ancient path. But the world and our culture are not the only stumbling blocks that can lead a faithful leader with the best of intentions to "miss...
Words are important and powerful, and some words can inspire. In 2011, the simple phrase "All In" inspired the N.Y. Giants to turn around a dismal season and win the Super Bowl. This past weekend the world was introduced to a new inspirational phrase likely to go viral--"Play Big". It is the phrase that carried Wyndham Clark to...
ESSENCE: Integrity Ideas are specific actions a faithful leader can consider in leading faithfully through business a better way. INTEGRITY IDEA: Keep Your Word 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, Owners, Suppliers/Vendors, Community Most Integrity Ideas are practical actions toward implementing a bigger WHY for the organization. "Keep...
Words are important and powerful, and the culture of the world is filled with words that blind us to God’s purpose for work and business. In particular, the concept of "retirement" from "work" is built on a deception about the very nature of "work" and why we were created. Not only does "retirement" rob a person of their God-given purpose...
ESSENCE: Integrity Ideas are specific actions a faithful leader can consider in leading faithfully through business a better way. INTEGRITY IDEA: Reward Rest COVERT-OVERT CONTINUUM (six Continuums for action): Policies COVERT-OVERT RATING (several levels from Highly Covert to Highly Overt): Highly Covert STAKEHOLDERS SERVED: Employees Most Integrity Ideas are practical actions toward implementing a bigger WHY for the organization. "Reward Rest" is about instituting policies...
ESSENCE: Integrity Ideas are specific actions a faithful leader can consider in leading faithfully through business a better way. INTEGRITY IDEA: Optimize Compensation 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, Owners, Community, Kingdom Most Integrity Ideas are practical actions toward implementing a bigger WHY for the organization. "Optimize Compensation"...
Organizational cultures that are broken through the toxic assumptions and motivations of business as usual lead to "work" in those cultures becoming something far from God's good and life-giving design in Genesis. There are four key aspects of toxic work as usual that flow from the attributes of business as usual: Idol and Identity; Money and Power; A Burden; and Unhealthy...
Understanding the challenge of leading faithfully through business a better way and the existential threat of AI both require understanding "priorities". Implementing business a better way in an organization requires recognizing the nature of priorities as well as common "priority problems", assessing the real "priorities" in an organizational culture, identifying and implementing priorities that align with business in accordance with...
Because the key attributes of business in the "way" of the world do not align with a culture of Shalom built on Biblical principles of relationships, community and human dignity, the "way" of the world often brings the inherent “beauty-potential” of business (solutions, prosperity and jobs) with an ugly cost of "wrecking" work as God designed it. What we...
ESSENCE: Integrity Ideas are specific actions a faithful leader can consider in leading faithfully through business a better way. INTEGRITY IDEA: Segregate Sacred Space COVERT-OVERT CONTINUUM (six Continuums for action): Practices COVERT-OVERT RATING (several levels from Highly Covert to Highly Overt): Highly Covert STAKEHOLDERS SERVED: Employees Most Integrity Ideas are practical actions toward implementing a bigger WHY for the organization. "Segregate Sacred Space" is about...
In order for a faithful leader to lead faithfully through business a better way--business God's "way" in alignment with Biblical beliefs, principles and priorities--it is important to understand the alternative. What we call business as usual represents organizational dynamics in the "way" of the kingdom of the world, and it is the root of brokenness in work, workplaces and workers. ...
Does Easter shape the WHY of your work, business and investing? Easter is important for every worker, business leader and investor who follows Jesus because it serves as a reminder of a bigger WHY and a sacred relevance for our work, business and investing rooted in God's Restoration plan for His Kingdom. N.T. Wright writes that the resurrection represents the...
A "WHY" wave seems to be building momentum in the United States, together with an undercurrent of mainstream cultural events tied to Biblical faith. That "WHY" wave represents a cultural momentum toward finding purpose and meaning in life and work (which God designed as an integral part of life), and we choose to see an undercurrent of faith in...
ESSENCE: Integrity Ideas are specific actions a faithful leader can consider in leading faithfully through business a better way. INTEGRITY IDEA: Adopt Adoption COVERT-OVERT CONTINUUM (six Continuums for action): Practices COVERT-OVERT RATING (several levels from Highly Covert to Highly Overt): Highly Covert STAKEHOLDERS SERVED: Employees/Community/Kingdom Most Integrity Ideas are practical actions toward implementing a bigger WHY for the organization. "Adopt Adoption" is about adopting practices...
Leading faithfully through business a better way requires getting across three "gaps": Sunday/Monday, Sacred/Secular and Knowing/Doing. The journey across those "gaps" starts with RENEW--renewing the faithful leader's mind about God's purpose for work and business, which reveals the sacred nature of work and business. Moving across the three "gaps" of faith/work integration equips a faithful leader to see...
Business as usual is broken because it reflects a broken world. It results in brokenness of work, workplaces and workers--its brokenness is breaking us. It has led to our relationship to work and our relationships surrounding work bearing little resemblance to God's design for humanity and work in Genesis. Sadly, business as usual creates work cultures and environments that, more...
ESSENCE: Integrity Ideas are specific actions a faithful leader can consider in leading faithfully through business a better way. INTEGRITY IDEA: Cancel Cursing COVERT-OVERT CONTINUUM (six Continuums for action): Policies COVERT-OVERT RATING (several levels from Highly Covert to Highly Overt): Highly Covert STAKEHOLDERS SERVED: Employees Most Integrity Ideas are practical actions toward implementing a bigger WHY for the organization. "Cancel Cursing"...
ESSENCE: Integrity Ideas are specific actions a faithful leader can consider in leading faithfully through business a better way. INTEGRITY IDEA: Buy Tickets COVERT-OVERT CONTINUUM (six Continuums for action): Practices COVERT-OVERT RATING (several levels from Highly Covert to Highly Overt): Overt STAKEHOLDERS SERVED: Employees, Customers, Suppliers/Vendors, Community, Kingdom Most Integrity Ideas are practical actions toward implementing a bigger WHY for the organization. "Buy Tickets" is...
Leading faithfully through business a better way is a journey. Leading an organization in alignment with Biblical beliefs, principles and priorities requires finding the on-ramp, getting on, and then not stumbling off an ancient road of Jeremiah 6:16. We have developed a four-step process called Integriosity® to help a faithful leader navigate the journey, each of which...
Are you on the path that leads to where you want to go? Every faithful leader is on a path of some sort, but leading faithfully requires getting on, and staying on, the right path. There are really two main paths--business in alignment with the kingdom of the world and the ancient path of business in alignment with the...
The right WHY is central to leading faithfully in alignment with Biblical beliefs, principles and priorities. Doing the right thing for the wrong reasons looks good and probably "does good", but it is missing God's heart for our work. When an organization puts in places practices, or takes positions, that care for (or appear to care for) people (or...
Integrity is far more than honesty or incorruptibility—it means complete and undivided. Leading faithfully through business a better way requires a faithful leader to live a congruous life of “faithful integrity” in which all they do at work is informed, guided and part of their faith. At the core of faithful integrity is an alignment of organizational purpose, values and...
As a faithful leader seeking to lead faithfully, you face a foundational choice between two starkly different options with profound implications. One option is business as usual — business in "the way of the world" or, more precisely, according to "the kingdom of this world." We call the other option business a better way — business aligned with Biblical beliefs,...
ESSENCE: Integrity Ideas are specific actions a faithful leader can consider in leading faithfully through business a better way. INTEGRITY IDEA: Banish "Bribery" COVERT-OVERT CONTINUUM (six Continuums for action): Policies COVERT-OVERT RATING (several levels from Highly Covert to Highly Overt): Highly Covert STAKEHOLDERS SERVED: Kingdom Most Integrity Ideas are practical actions toward implementing a bigger WHY for the organization. "Banish Bribery"...
As faithful leaders enter 2023, we want to share the four "first things" to "keep first" in leading faithfully--they are actually captured by the word Integriosity itself. In our last post, we described the first two. In this PART 2, we will describe the second two. A key element of the RENEW step of Integriosity is re-ordering disordered priorities, because...
As faithful leaders enter 2023, we want to share the four "first things" to "keep first" in leading faithfully--they are actually captured by the word Integriosity itself. In this PART 1, we will describe the first two. In our next post we will cover the second two. A key element of the RENEW step of Integriosity is re-ordering disordered priorities,...
ESSENCE: If you are a faithful leader leading an organization, the start of 2023 is a great time to begin being more intentional about leading faithfully. In fact, the best time is always "today". A key element of the RENEW step of Integriosity is re-ordering disordered priorities by looking at Biblical principles for work and business. It is important to go back to first principles by...
There will come a time when a faithful leader who has been leading an organization faithfully in alignment with Biblical beliefs, principles and priorities is ready to leave. "Leaving faithfully" is an essential element of "leading faithfully". It is a critical aspect of stewardship, and it an aspect of stewardship that sets Biblical stewardship apart from worldly stewardship. Biblical stewardship requires...
ESSENCE: Integrity Ideas are specific actions a faithful leader can consider in leading faithfully through business a better way. INTEGRITY IDEA: Use Tech "WHYsely" COVERT-OVERT CONTINUUM (six Continuums for action): Policies COVERT-OVERT RATING (several levels from Highly Covert to Highly Overt): Highly Covert STAKEHOLDERS SERVED: Employees, Customers/Clients Most Integrity Ideas are practical actions toward implementing a bigger WHY for the organization. "Use Tech WHYsely" is...
Hopefully, Thanksgiving is still recent enough to offer a silly analogy. If Thanksgiving was your business, what would "profit" represent in the Thanksgiving preparation and meal? Remember, profit is NOT bad, and the creation by business of economic prosperity is good. Profit in a business is necessary for good stewardship of the business, which means it is necessary for the...
ESSENCE: Integrity Ideas are specific actions a faithful leader can consider in leading faithfully through business a better way. INTEGRITY IDEA: Listen to a Life COVERT-OVERT CONTINUUM (six Continuums for action): People COVERT-OVERT RATING (several levels from Highly Covert to Highly Overt): Highly Covert STAKEHOLDERS SERVED: Employees, Customers/Clients, Suppliers/Vendors Most Integrity Ideas are practical actions toward implementing a bigger WHY for the organization. "Listen to...
The Faith Driven Entrepreneur blog featured an article by Integrous Founder Paul Michalski. The title of the article is "Succession or Secession: The Unique Test of Faith-Driven Stewardship"...
ESSENCE: Integrity Ideas are specific actions a faithful leader can consider in leading faithfully through business a better way. INTEGRITY IDEA: Pick the Right "Peter Principle" COVERT-OVERT CONTINUUM (six Continuums for action): Practices COVERT-OVERT RATING (several levels from Highly Covert to Highly Overt): Highly Covert STAKEHOLDERS SERVED: Employees Most Integrity Ideas are practical actions toward implementing a bigger WHY for the organization. "Pick the Right...
ESSENCE: From time to time, we are devoting posts to describing specific actions a faithful leader can consider in leading faithfully through business a better way. We are calling these Integrity Ideas. INTEGRITY IDEA: Remember the Fourth COVERT-OVERT CONTINUUM (six Continuums for action): Proclamation and Policies COVERT-OVERT RATING (several levels from Highly Covert to Highly Overt): Highly Overt to Highly Covert STAKEHOLDERS SERVED: Employees Most...
ESSENCE: From time to time, we are devoting posts to describing specific actions a faithful leader can consider in leading faithfully through business a better way. We are calling these Integrity Ideas. INTEGRITY IDEA: Understand Your "Real" Culture COVERT-OVERT CONTINUUM (six Continuums for action): Practices COVERT-OVERT RATING (several levels from Highly Covert to Highly Overt): Highly Covert STAKEHOLDERS SERVED: Employees Most Integrity Ideas are practical...
ESSENCE: From time to time, we are devoting posts to describing specific actions a faithful leader can consider in leading faithfully through business a better way. We are calling these Integrity Ideas. INTEGRITY IDEA: Set a Values "Plumb-Line" COVERT-OVERT CONTINUUM (six Continuums for action): Proclamation COVERT-OVERT RATING (several levels from Highly Covert to Highly Overt): Highly Covert STAKEHOLDERS SERVED: Employees, Customers/Clients, Suppliers/Vendors Most Integrity Ideas...
What's your noun (no, not your "pronouns")? We’re talking about the word that describes your primary identity--the identity you will protect at the expense of all other secondary identities. Secondary identities often show up as adjectives that give extra color to how you live out your noun. The culture of the world is filled with words and phrases that blind...
The Faith Driven Entrepreneur blog featured an article by Integrous Founder Paul Michalski. The title of the article is "Is Jesus Just Your Adjective?: The Problem with "Christian Entrepreneurs."...
As businesspeople or investors of faith, we face a choice much like Neo’s in the film The Matrix—two starkly different options with profound implications. The blue pill is business as usual — business in "the way of the world" or, more precisely, according to "the kingdom of this world." The red pill we call business a better way — business...
From time to time, we are devoting posts to describing specific actions a faithful leader can consider in leading faithfully through business a better way. We are calling these Integrity Ideas. INTEGRITY IDEA: Hire the Unhirable. COVERT-OVERT CONTINUUM (six Continuums for action): Practice COVERT-OVERT RATING (several levels from Highly Covert to Highly Overt): Highly Covert STAKEHOLDERS SERVED: Employees, Community, Kingdom "Hire the Unhirable" is about...
Does faith/work integration require Overtly faithful practices? Leading an organization faithfully through business a better way in alignment with Biblical beliefs, principles and priorities, requires a continual prayerful balancing of the call to be Courageous through Overtness and the need to be Wise through Covertness. Both the idolization of Overtness and the fear of being Overt may lead to poor...
ESSENCE: From time to time, we are devoting posts to describing specific actions a faithful leader can consider in leading faithfully through business a better way. We are calling these Integrity Ideas. INTEGRITY IDEA: Celebrate Impact COVERT-OVERT CONTINUUM (six Continuums for action): Practice COVERT-OVERT RATING (several levels from Highly Covert to Highly Overt): Highly Covert STAKEHOLDERS SERVED: Employees, Customers/Clients Most Integrity Ideas are practical actions...
Business has the potential to beautify the world--or uglify it. “Beautiful” was clearly God's design when he created everything and declared it "very good", and “beautiful” is the word that comes to mind as you read the description of the New Jerusalem that is coming--God's Kingdom on earth. In between the beauty of a garden and the beauty of a...
The Faith Driven Entrepreneur blog featured an article by Integrous Founder Paul Michalski. The title of the article is "Does Your Business Beautify or Uglify: The Call To Create With Beauty."...
There are two basic choices when a faithful leader who has faithfully shaped the purpose, values and culture of an organization no longer wants, or is no longer able, to continue to lead the organization—succession or secession . But we are not talking about who fills the leader’s seat—we are talking about what happens to the HEART of the...
ESSENCE: From time to time, we are devoting posts to describing specific actions a faithful leader can consider in leading faithfully through business a better way. We are calling these Integrity Ideas. INTEGRITY IDEA: Culture Coordinator COVERT-OVERT CONTINUUM (six Continuums for action): Practice COVERT-OVERT RATING (several levels from Highly Covert to Highly Overt): Highly Covert STAKEHOLDERS SERVED: Employees,...
The new viral concept of Quiet Quitting is about doing just enough at work to get by--minimizing "work" in order to maximize "life". We believe Quiet Quitting is "unhuman" and a consequence of business as usual. God made us to flourish through work, and we are less fully human when not reflecting our God-given creativity and productivity through work that...
From time to time, we are devoting posts to describing specific actions a faithful leader can consider in leading faithfully through business a better way. We are calling these Integrity Ideas. INTEGRITY IDEA: Intercessory Prayer COVERT-OVERT CONTINUUM (six Continuums for action): Prayer COVERT-OVERT RATING (several levels from Highly Covert to Highly Overt): Very Covert STAKEHOLDERS SERVED: Employees, Customers/Clients, Owners, Suppliers/Vendors, Community, Kingdom Most Integrity Ideas...
From time to time, we are devoting posts to describing specific actions a faithful leader can consider in leading faithfully through business a better way. We are calling these Integrity Ideas. INTEGRITY IDEA: Group Prayer COVERT-OVERT CONTINUUM (six Continuums for action): Prayer COVERT-OVERT RATING (several levels from Highly Covert to Highly Overt): Covert STAKEHOLDERS SERVED: Employees, Customers/Clients, Owners, Suppliers/Vendors, Community, Kingdom Most Integrity Ideas are...
From time to time, we are devoting posts to describing specific actions a faithful leader can consider in leading faithfully through business a better way. We are calling these Integrity Ideas. INTEGRITY IDEA: Personal Prayer COVERT-OVERT CONTINUUM (six Continuums for action): Prayer COVERT-OVERT RATING (several levels from Highly Covert to Highly Overt): Very Covert STAKEHOLDERS SERVED: Employees, Customers/Clients, Owners, Suppliers/Vendors, Community, Kingdom Most Integrity Ideas...