Christian Business Concepts
Christian Business Concepts
Faith, Fortune & Fearlessness: Leading Boldly Without Compromise
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If you’ve ever felt pressure to “keep faith private” so your business can stay safe, you’re not alone, and you might be paying for that split in ways you can’t measure yet. We sit down with Harold Milby, founder of Christian Business Concepts and a John Maxwell certified coach, to talk about what it actually looks like to build a successful company without compartmentalizing your relationship with God.
We get into the real turning point: the difference between being a Christian-owned company and a Christian-run company. Harold explains why the stewardship mindset changes decision-making, reduces emotion-driven leadership mistakes, and brings a surprising sense of peace even when the biblical choice feels costly in the moment. We also talk workplace faith, what “bold as a lion” looks like in practice, and how leaders can share conviction without forcing it on anyone, including a clear reminder that religious expression in many business settings is legally protected.
From there, we zoom out into leadership development, why Harold pursued John Maxwell training to add value faster, and how businesses can fight quiet quitting by creating alignment, investing in employee training, and clarifying mission. We also share details on the Central Kentucky Christian Business Leaders and Owners Forum coming May 21 in Lawrenceburg, Kentucky.
If you’re a Christian entrepreneur, business leader, or simply someone who wants faith-based leadership that works on Monday morning, this conversation will give you language, examples, and next steps. Subscribe, share this with a leader who needs it, and leave a review with the biggest takeaway you’re going to apply this week.
Welcome And How This Happened
SPEAKER_01Welcome to the Christian Business Concepts with your host, Harold Milby. Christian Business Concepts is dedicated to guiding companies and business owners in becoming effective, efficient, and successful through God's word and godly principles. Now, here's your host, Harold Milby.
SPEAKER_00Thanks, Kelly, and welcome everyone to this week's Christian Business Concepts Podcast. I'm so glad that you're here today for this special podcast that we uh did on the None Better uh podcast show. Uh I was a guest there uh this week and I wanted to share that with you. I just thought it would be uh something that you would find interesting as we uh talked about CBC and uh about some of the things that we do. And uh I I just thought it was a great interview, so I wanted to share that with you. Uh before we get started, uh again, I just want to say thank you to everyone who downloads this podcast each and every week and makes really CBC a part of your uh your weekly growth program, and you tune in every week, and and uh I'm just so humbled by it, especially for those of you around the world. And uh I just want to give a big shout out to my home state of Kentucky for all of those of you who listen and tune in every week. I thank you and I appreciate uh you very, very much and uh and all that you do in supporting this podcast. And uh and with that in mind, I'd like to ask you if you would uh share this podcast with two or three or four other people that you feel like it would be a help to. And uh also uh be sure to post a link uh to our podcast on your Facebook and LinkedIn pages uh that will tremendously help us uh to uh continue to grow the CBC community. So thank you so much, and I just want to jump right in to the podcast where we were a guest on the None Better Podcast.
SPEAKER_02What's good and what's happening, and welcome to a new episode of the None Better Podcast. Today I have a special guest with me, one I'm really uh pleased to interview. Uh he is the founder of the Christian business concepts, he's a John Maxwell certified coach, he's a motivational speaker, he's been helping many people and business leaders grow purpose faith here for years. He's also my uncle, Harold Bilby. How are you doing, brother?
SPEAKER_00Doing great.
SPEAKER_02How was your uh trip down from Kentucky?
SPEAKER_00It was great. It was great. So excited to be on the None Better Podcast and be a part of that. Man, yeah. It's exciting times.
SPEAKER_02Absolutely. Uh you know, I I'm excited to see you and McKenna come down and spend a little time with us down for a week or working some work down here.
SPEAKER_00We've done some work down here, so yeah. Yeah.
SPEAKER_02Nice, nice.
SPEAKER_00Good opportunity. Yeah, good opportunity.
SPEAKER_02No traffic in Lana on your way down?
SPEAKER_00Uh there's always traffic when you're in Florida.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, that's true nowadays for sure. Um well uh I just want to ask a little bit of how you've been doing personally. Like how you been? Like I think good?
SPEAKER_00Yeah, I you know, things have changed a lot in the last year, you know, uh doing more uh of the uh speaking, training, coaching. Uh so that's been a a big change, I think. You know, and I've done a lot of that over the years, but not uh focused on that. And so been through a certification process, gotten a lot of certifications uh on some of my coaching. Uh so I'm a certified um uh confidence coach, a certified purpose coach, a certified uh John Maxwell coach. Yeah, so you got that real not too long ago. Yeah, right. And so uh got to spend some time with John Maxwell and uh just tremendous time with him. And uh, you know, it's been it's it's been a lot of uh things going on this year, a lot of a lot of balls up in the air. Uh, but it's been exciting and an exciting time in my life as I as I approach the sunset of my life. Um you know, I I know this is gonna be a big part of what I do uh as I uh continue uh to work with uh business leaders of all kinds and uh especially Christian business leaders.
SPEAKER_02Well that brings it back to the I guess point of the comp or part of the conversation I'll talk about is we want to talk about your podcast or Christian business concepts. Sure. And uh if I am mistaken, you're probably I think I looked around 180 episodes in right now.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, we're getting real close to 200 episodes. Uh we're in over uh sixty countries uh worldwide as far as the uh people who are downloading. Uh the number one city, not the number one country, but the number one city for downloads for my podcast is Sydney, Australia.
SPEAKER_02Sydney, Australia.
SPEAKER_00Sydney, Australia. I don't know anybody in Sydney, Australia, but somehow they like me out there in Australia. And uh, you know, the number one country for downloads obviously is the United States. Um but uh yeah, it it's been exciting and especially for something I didn't know anything about when I started.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, well, you started, I think it was in 2022, if I remember right. So you've been doing this now for a little while. To have unrated episodes, you have to be doing it for a while. I mean, where does I mean I have to ask, because I'm a new podcaster, so you know you always think about episodes like how does one come up with 180 topics of faith leadership? No, I get it. Yeah, that's a lot of content.
SPEAKER_00It is a lot of content. And and so I had someone tell me a long time ago, uh, and this goes back to when I was pastoring, when I was preaching, and uh, you know, I was told you can't draw water from an empty well. So you constantly have to be feeding yourself. You constantly have to be reading, you're reading books, you're taking notes, you're uh having experiences, you're getting in the right room with the right people.
SPEAKER_02Um I've been in your office and your book library is pretty extensive. I don't do that.
SPEAKER_00I have a big library. You're absolutely right, I do. And most all of those books on my shelves I've read, at least once, sometimes twice. But yeah, I think you have to feed yourself so that you can constantly uh be thinking about themes and things to look at. Um also uh you know, with Christian business concepts, uh, because it is kind of a combination between uh biblical concepts that are business related and then how the those those things particularly apply uh to business in the world today in in common business practices. And uh so so then you kind of look at the balance between the spiritual side of business and then just the the actual financial uh the leadership side and and the natural side of business, and then how do those two go together? And sometimes I'll focus uh on more of a spiritual side, spiritual maturity to bring spiritual maturity to business leaders. And so I'll focus on some of that stuff, but then we'll get into the you know, we'll get into customer service, we'll get into sales, we'll get into uh all kind uh KPIs and all of the things that you have to do as a business. Yeah, yeah. And so we we get into all of those things, but each week it's all about what does the Bible say about it? What what what do we know? Because you know, but most people look at the Bible and then think that it applies today in today's day and time, when in reality almost everything I've learned about leadership and business has come from that book.
The Calling Behind The Podcast
SPEAKER_02All right, well, we'll go back into a little break there. So I guess the next question Carol would ask you is you know, what kind of guess you st why did you want to start the podcast to begin with? Like what was the uh was the purpose of that? I didn't want to.
SPEAKER_00You didn't want to because I didn't know what it was. I didn't listen to podcasts, I didn't know anything about podcasts, I didn't know anything. Yeah, yeah. And so to just give you a little bit of history of what happened, so I was speaking at a couple of conferences and they were months apart, uh, two different conferences, and I was speaking there, and these were uh uh these were Christian conferences, so this was more of a spiritual type conference. And I was speaking there, but but because of my experience, because I spent 25 years as a as a senior VP of a company, there's a lot of the business applications. It just kind of came out in some of the things that I was talking about at these conferences. And so at both conferences, I had two different people come up to me and say, you know, you wouldn't you should consider having a podcast where you combine your spiritual experience with your business experience, because I think those two mesh together. And so the first time I heard it, I thought, okay, thank you. I appreciate the compliment. Thank you very much. I'll consider that. And I didn't consider that, I just told him that, but but anyway, the second time it happened, I thought, okay, God, are you trying to tell me something? And so I started thinking about it and I started praying about it, and uh, and then one day I was just sitting downstairs uh watching TV and uh turned the TV off and I clearly heard, and I know it was the Spirit of the Lord, but I clearly heard Christian business concepts. And I just stopped in my tracks and I thought, well, where did that come from? What is that? And so I got my phone out and I just put in Christian business concepts and nothing popped up. So then I heard it again. And so I thought, Lord, are you trying to tell me that I'm supposed to do this podcast and it's called Christian Business Concepts? And I felt like the answer was yes. And so at that point, and this is like midnight, and so I get on Amazon and I buy a couple of books on how to do a podcast. What is a podcast, you know? And so I started reading, I spent about three months studying what kind of equipment do I need, what what quality do I need? How can I start? How do you market it? And so at first I just thought, I'll do a podcast just because it helped it gives me some way to give. And and I thought of nothing else. I thought, well, my grandkids will have these podcasts, my great-grandkids, my great-great-grandkids will be able to hear me and some of the things that I would want to share with them uh years from now, because I'll have this podcast. Uh, but then as I started to do the podcast, I felt really good about it. I didn't do any social media or anything. And then all of a sudden, I look about six months later, and I'm looking, I'm going, good grief, I've had thousands of downloads already in the last six months. I've not I've not done anything. And then I found out that the company that I use to produce my podcast has has a lot of statistics about who listens. And then I'm looking at all these countries. You know, countries like China, Russia, Iran, Iraq. I mean, countries that I'm thinking, why would you listen to me? Yeah, yeah, yeah. Why would you listen to this guy from content?
SPEAKER_02How would you even know I exist?
SPEAKER_00Yeah, how would you even know I exist? So evidently people are looking for information and because of the tags that I put on it, they're finding the podcast through that. And it's just really been a grassroots growth. It's just grown because people are sharing. I ask people every week, hey, please put me on your LinkedIn page, put me, put, you know, put the link of the podcast on your Facebook page and do that, and then it in turns it it's just been growing kind of more of a as a grassroots.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, well, I've been an avid listener from since you started, and uh every time I put it on, well, I like the fact it's it's only 30 minutes, so it's not super long. Right. So you and you can actually take what you uh hear into your podcast, and yeah, it applies to business, but it applies to uh in a personal life. So you really don't have to be a business leader necessarily to listen to this podcast to get anything from it. It just helps that uh if you're a business leader or uh uh you know anything in that realm, that it helps you just give you good nuggets every time you listen to this thing on how to apply godly principles to what you're doing and different after, whether it be sales marketing, uh even if you're just a warehouse worker, you can still apply these things to your life. Absolutely and it works. You know what I mean?
SPEAKER_00You know what amazes me is that I'll sometimes I'll I'll get a text uh from a woman that says, Hey, I'm a stay-at-home mom. I listen to you every week, and I get so much out of your podcast.
SPEAKER_02That's what I'm saying.
SPEAKER_00It doesn't transcend. It transcends even business. I mean, yeah, that's the focus uh for Christian business owners. And the the other reason that I started it was because I believe that some of the great revivals that have happened in the United States have started, uh, one of them started on Wall Street. It's one of the greatest revivals that started and swept through America, it was off of Ross Wall Street. And it started there. So I believe God wants to use business, and I believe God needs Christian businesses.
Hurdles And Finding Your Voice
SPEAKER_02Let me ask you this. So you've been uh doing this for three, four years now, I guess.
SPEAKER_00Yeah.
SPEAKER_02What was uh what was the biggest challenge or hurdle that you kind of ran into to get this thing off the ground? Did you even start? Like there were some moments that you're like, dude, I don't why am I doing this? Or I can't do this, guy. Like, where's are you having those moments that you can do?
SPEAKER_00Yeah, yeah, I think it goes back to what you said earlier. It's like, I uh what am I gonna talk about? You know, I had the first five episodes and I'm thinking, uh what do I do now? Uh what what kind of topic am I gonna have? I don't I don't know what to do. And so that was a challenge, and I I think just the fact of starting where I didn't even know what a podcast was was a big challenge because I didn't know anything about it and I didn't even know how to approach it. Uh and and and having a quality, you know, you want a quality podcast, you know. And uh so working through the equipment and and all of that kind of thing and making it work right, and I've changed a few things here and there, but but I think the big thing is just it and it continues to be that uh what do I talk about next week?
SPEAKER_02Yeah.
SPEAKER_00Uh you know, you get done to recording the podcast and you think, man, I think I hit a home run. I think that was really a good podcast. And then you and then five minutes later, when I'm walking out of the studio, I'm going, okay, that was great. Well, I'm gonna do next week.
SPEAKER_02Well, when we started our podcast, you know, I thought it'd be like easy. I'll be off there's so many people I can talk to and get on the show and like you think it's that easy. And then you realize, well, are they interesting? Do I want to talk to them because they're gonna bring people want to come watch you? And is it are you gonna get something good out of it, right? Right. That's the point in my pocket. I want to sure something be good got out of this. The conversation's good. We can bring some things that people can learn from, and so then you look and well, maybe it ain't that easy. Like, I haven't had as much success bringing guests on like I thought it would, because yeah, I th who I thought might be a good guest really wasn't maybe a good candidate, right? So I've had an I've had to navigate because I'm doing more video where you're already also on the audio side, so you're not like talking that way. Although I got to be a guest on your show once, so I do appreciate that. It was an awesome experience, and it kind of got me broke in on what the podcast world is like. It's uh not as easy as everybody thinks it is. No, and having having a voice, and I'm sure if you look back from the first time you do it to now 180 episodes in, you've had uh you've seen the difference in how you speak and how you approach it. Oh, there's no question. The technique, all that.
SPEAKER_00Everything changes because when I uh when I preached, I approach I approach this like I would preaching. And in preaching, I would have notes, just some basic notes. And uh, but I didn't I didn't have to have a lot of notes. I just had some notes, and you just kind of bounced around from from each uh each uh bullet point. Uh this is different. You have to you've got to do more research, you've got to have more information, you gotta know more, you gotta understand more, you've got to write it out so that you understand exactly how this thing is gonna flow. There's no audience. You know, we're we're in here in a studio, and the only person that's in here is Ricky. Uh, you know, and he's in here and he's he's helping us to record and do all the behind-the-scenes things. I'm used to uh being in front of a few hundred to a few thousand people talking, and you you draw energy from those people.
SPEAKER_01Yeah.
SPEAKER_00Now you don't have that. So you have to create your own energy. And I think that was something I learned. So I look back and I've listened to the first two or three podcasts, and I'm like, they're horrible. I mean, they were just horrible.
SPEAKER_02Same here.
SPEAKER_00And so now I look back, you know, a few years later and I listen to my podcast, I think, yeah, that's a lot better than the first four or five podcasts that I do.
SPEAKER_02Well, you keep investing in yourself, investing in your equipment, invest in quality, all these things, you know, you get better and better. And you find your voice.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, yeah, absolutely. You find a flow every week. You find your lane. Yeah, yeah. You you you find it, and then you you have that, you know.
SPEAKER_02So let me ask you this, and we're moving a little more back to the faith part of this. So um what does it look like to you uh for running a business from a biblical principle and at the center? Like what does that look like to you?
SPEAKER_00Yeah, I I think that's where there's a difference. I did a podcast once, and I'll probably refer to a bunch of podcasts, but uh on the difference between being a Christian-owned company and a Christian-run company. And there's a difference, there's a big difference. Uh when you're a Christian-owned company, that just means that you own a company and you happen to be a Christian. Yeah. But you run your business just like a business, and you compartmentalize. So I've got my faith over here, my relationship with Christ is over here, and then my business is over here, and they're separate.
SPEAKER_02Yeah.
SPEAKER_00Uh if you're a Christian run business, which is what my goal is, is to help people find that place and find that lane to get in. Uh the difference is that you don't separate them. They're all one and the same. Yeah. So your relationship with the Lord, it includes your business. And then you begin to see why, what is the purpose? Why does God want you blessed? Why does he want your business blessed? Because he does. And I mean, you know, if we had time, we could go through that. It's a whole study in and of itself. But God wants you to be blessed and he wants your business to be blessed. Well, why is that? And you begin to learn that, and then when you do, you begin to make your decisions a lot differently. Because you learn that number one, it's not my business. It's God's business. I'm just being a steward. Yeah. I'm being I'm the guy that runs the place, but it's God's business. And I see that with C at CBC, with my speaking business, all of that. It's God's. Yeah. And so then I make decisions accordingly. I make decisions based upon well, what does the word say? How do I handle the situation? I think that's the difference.
SPEAKER_02You just filtering your business through the biblical principles.
SPEAKER_00You look at it through the eyes of what you think the Lord would look at it. And how he does it. I think that's the bigger difference between a Christian ran and a Christian no. Yeah. And I'll tell you something, you have a lot more peace doing it that way.
SPEAKER_02And I learned it through listening to your podcast, by the way. And when I first started my business, I started it with uh with integrity media solutions. I started with the non-believers, which that's hard to do in itself, right? So uh Transforce started listening to your podcast, and I realized, well, I'm not running it for God, I'm running it as a business and I have my God on the on the side. Yeah, right, right. I'm like, well, that's not gonna work, right? Not really. No, not really. Um I mean it does, but if you want to be in God's will and try to do a god a godly way, that's what you want to do. So I start applying those principles and I'm seeing the change personally, what is done for me, how I apply, how I approach things. Yes. Um, you know, the peace, the patience, the kindness that maybe you have to uh, you know, for the example I gave you a little while off record, we talked about what happened to me this week, you know, I have to kill that with kindness uh to overcome that challenge. So that wouldn't happen if you didn't have biblical principles implied, right?
SPEAKER_00Exactly, it wouldn't. And what happens is then you start making decisions based on your emotion. And uh I've seen multi-billion dollar companies, I've seen leadership make decisions based on emotion and and not based on really good principles. And when you do that, it it really causes you to make a lot of mistakes. Yeah, and it can hurt your business, can destroy your business at times.
SPEAKER_02Oh, for sure.
SPEAKER_00And so, you know, when when when you're running it from the from the vantage point uh of being a Christian and being a believer and trying to operate it through biblical principles, uh you find out that you make decisions that are going to bless your business in the long run, even though at that point, when you look at it and you make the decision that way, you think, well, in the natural I I wouldn't choose that way to do this, but I'm gonna do it this way because that's what the Bible says. And then you come to find out and you go, you know what, it worked out right.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, yeah.
SPEAKER_00And that's all because you did it that way.
SPEAKER_02It makes sense.
SPEAKER_00Yeah.
SPEAKER_02You know, with the experience you've had with different leaders and business expenses or a business people and that sort of thing, is there anything you could say, or maybe a nugget you could throw away that would say here's some of the common, most common mistakes maybe they make trying to balance between work and their business and bringing faith into that?
SPEAKER_00Yeah, I I think uh a big part of that is is they're looking again, they go back to the the natural side of things because you know we get born again and and we've been used to being led by our own senses, our our own natural abilities, our own uh uh mental quotents uh that we have or or IQ. Uh and then when you become a Christian, that changes because we're not led by that. Now we're led by the Spirit of God that lives in us and by his principles. That's always a problem whether you're running a business or not. But with business people, that becomes the big problem, and it sometimes can become a bottleneck because we struggle with, you know, I want to know, you know, I want to make this decision, and in business, this would be the way to make it. But then you've got to look at it from the Word of God as well and make sure those two don't conflict. Sometimes they don't conflict. The way that you want to do and make that decision lines up perfectly. But if it doesn't line up, then you've got to back up and say, then I really shouldn't be making the decision this way because it doesn't line up with what God's Word says.
SPEAKER_01Yeah.
SPEAKER_00And so that's where people struggle because they still want to go back into the natural and make decisions that way. And uh maybe at the end of the podcast uh I can share a few really good uh resources for that.
SPEAKER_02Sure, we can provide that links and anything you might have.
SPEAKER_00Absolutely, we can we can do that.
Bold Faith In Public Business
SPEAKER_02If your home is going to flood, here are some most common places: your toilet, your washing machine, your dishwasher, your ice maker lines. That's why homeowners are installing the water block. It's a hundred percent mechanical overflow safety device. No power, no batteries. It gets installed between the fixture or the appliance and the water supply line. You can set your water flow from 1.3 to 13 gallons. And if the water goes past its preset limit, boom, the water block shuts off, preventing the flood and damaging your property. So protect your floors, protect your house, and for God's sake, protect your wallet. Go to imstreat.com and protect yourself with the water block. Will there be any advice you would give someone that really wants to lead boldly without compromising their faith?
SPEAKER_00Uh, well, I number one, the Bible talks about us being bold. It says that that the righteous are as bold as lions. So, yeah, we should be bold. We should be bold about our faith. There's nothing to hide. Um, you know, a lot of people say, well, in business you can't share your faith. Absolutely, you can. It's protected. Uh actually, many people don't know this, but but uh our Christian beliefs in our business atmospheres and cultures. Is protected by the Civil Rights Act. And so you can't, you know, you can't cram something down somebody's throat. I had a business tell me one time that I had worked for for so many years. We had Thanksgiving dinner, everybody brought something at this one particular facility, and I said, Well, I'm going to pray with everybody. And the manager there said, Well, you can't do that. I said, Well, I can't do what? He said, Well, you can't pray. Because this is a business. You have to have separation of church and state. I said, Oh, no, no, no, no. I said, I have an absolute right to pray. Now, nobody has to pray and nobody has to participate. If they don't want to be in the room when I do that, they're for absolutely they're free to walk away, not be a part of it at all. But you can't stop me from praying over this food. That's just you can't do that. That's a that's a civil rights violation. And a lot of people don't know that, and businesses are afraid because they've been told you can't do that.
SPEAKER_02Especially in today's temperature, you know, in our society right now.
SPEAKER_00Absolutely in today's political environment.
SPEAKER_02I want to say difficult. It's you're trying to balance, do you want customers? Yes. Do you sacrifice customers because you want to stand? And I guess so. I think people balance or have a problem sometimes struggling with standing boldly, but then without and not sacrificing that and thinking they're oh, am I gonna lose people because I don't I don't think that way because I feel like I'm just gonna stand boldly with what I believe in. And if you want to use my business, you do. If you don't, you don't want to be able to do that.
SPEAKER_00But Johnny, a lot of business owners feel that way. They struggle with it. Yeah. But let's look at a couple of great examples. First of all, it's Hobby Lobby. Great example. Great example. Yeah, they they they have a lot of people say a lot of bad things about them. But but the uh but the thing of it is they're running a business. And so it's all about it it's all about the bottom line, the profits. I know people don't like to hear that, but if you're in business, you're in business to make money. Now, what you do with that money is a different story, but I'm saying a business is a professional endeavor that brings in revenue. Yes. And that's what we're talking about. Well, if you look at at the stands and the bold stands that Hobby Lobbies made where they've been actually drugged into federal court uh over providing certain things in their health care that they don't believe in, like abortion, and uh they've been dragging the court. But their business, their business has flourished, it's grown. Uh if you wanna you want to look at another one, is Chick-fil-A. So there was a whole lot of people that got very upset with Chick-fil-A a few years ago over some things that they stood for very boldly. But what it did is it increased their business, it didn't hurt their business.
SPEAKER_02Yeah. Well brought attention to them.
SPEAKER_00It brought attention to them, and there are people that supported them because of what they believed. So they didn't want to they didn't want to open their stores on Sunday, just like Hobby Lobby didn't want to open their stores on Sunday. That cost them millions of dollars not to be open on Sunday. But they did it because that was part of their uh of their belief and part of what they felt like they had to do, their commitment to the Lord. So it didn't matter about the money in that particular case. And so you see those successes, and there's many others. There's Interstate Batteries, another great Christian company. Uh so you know, you should be bold. There's nothing wrong with trying to be bold, and I think you'll find out that when you are bold, you'll be more blessed than what you think you ever could have been.
SPEAKER_02Well, I don't want to leave out the uh you with the John Maxwell leadership. I mean, so that's pretty new for you in the last couple of years. You started working through that, right?
SPEAKER_00Right, right. John Maxwell has probably mentored me since 1991 uh when I was a pastor. He was still pastoring at the time. John Maxwell was. John Maxwell, of course, now is the number one uh most followed leadership uh trainer and teacher in the world. Uh he's had a large organization uh with a lot of employees, and uh and so I wanted to be a part of something that I could build a business with. I looked at the Dale Carnegie, they had a franchise. I looked at um the American Management Association, they had some ideas too. I looked at all of them, and then I looked at John Maxwell's program, uh his certification program, and what they do and what they offer, and that's who uh I felt like would be aligned more with what I want to do because I want to add value. I want to add value to business leaders, I want to add value to employees, I want to add value to businesses as a whole. I want to add value, and that's the whole John Maxwell philosophy is adding value. So I train, I coach, and I teach. Those are the three things that I do, uh, or I speak, I should say. And uh so uh I've been doing that and uh it's starting to grow, and I'm starting to see some really positive things through that, uh, mostly in my region, so within probably four or five states, but also uh I'm getting some inf or getting some uh interest in in other parts of the country, which with technology.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, with Zoom and everything now, you can be anywhere.
SPEAKER_00You can do it anywhere.
SPEAKER_02I mean, I deal with people from overseas sometimes, so it's not hard to do now with Zoom, just to schedule a call and get on there and do it. So it's not hard to do. Yeah. Um what separates a leader who talks with from a you know, um let me back up actually before I even ask that when you started John Maxwell and you went down that path. I mean, that started about two years ago, like with the actual certification part of that. Right. And you want to do that with something that led you to want to do John Maxwell, like a coach and all that kind of thing?
SPEAKER_00Yeah, again, it goes, it went back to okay, I'm I'm pretty successful with uh Christian business concepts, I felt like. But I wanted to do more. I wanted to have more of an impact, I wanted to add more value. Yeah. And so I thought, I need the material, but uh at my age, I don't have the time to build this material. I I need the material. So John Maxwell's written over a hundred books, all of them bestsellers, uh, developing a leader within you, how to become a person of influence, uh, developing a leader uh around you, uh, those types of books. And so what happens when you become a John Maxwell certified trainer and and speaker and coach, you get to use all of his material. And and so that made it made it really easy for me because number one, he he he coached me and he uh was my mentor. So I knew his product and I knew what it meant and I knew what it was about and I really believed in it. So this gave me the ability to teach it, to train with it, to speak with it, and then I have my own as well. So I have some signature programs that's just mine. Yeah, yeah, you know, and uh and so um I but the but the bottom line was that what I wanted to do is figure out a way to add more value to Christian business owners and to business owners as a whole.
SPEAKER_02Um I think it looks your whole brand of who you know, what you're really trying to do. Yeah, of coaching, of podcasts, of Christian leaders and businesses and your vision of trying to do all that.
SPEAKER_00I've always enjoyed it. Even when I was pastoring back years ago, when I was pastoring, uh I was still actually working. I worked with, I did training for Walmart, I did training for banks, and I was pastoring. But I had a real passion for that. I love doing it. I love doing it. So this is this is about me being aligned with my pat with my passion. So once I can get into alignment with my passion, uh my life is a lot more fulfilling.
SPEAKER_02I think it's a whole other podcast you could talk about passion and being aligned with that. That's absolutely part of the topic. I mean you're saying that. Let me write that down, right? You know, I'm always looking. Um, I mean, you have so many podcasts, and I've listened to so many of them, and one of the really, I mean, going back to some more of the beginning ones that really had an impact on what I was doing was uh the stepping stones analogy you gave me. And at the time we were doing that, I was literally out on the field digging ditches. Like I'm the owner of the business, and I'm out here digging ditches with the guys because that's what needed to be done at the time. And at the time that really started implanting in my brain, like this is a stepping stone to where I'm actually trying to get to. Yeah. And uh sometimes those uh stepping stones aren't always pleasant. No. Um go through some some you know ups and downs through life, but all those stepping stones we have to do. Sometimes we're gonna uh step in some doo-doo sometimes along the way.
SPEAKER_00It happens. I mean, and God will use it, you know. It's not that God wants you to, but God uses those things because they do happen. I always think about Joseph, because Joseph went, he went from the pit to the prison to the palace. That's how I like to say it. From the pit, from the prison to the palace. And the thing about it is, is every one of those were stepping stones for him to get to the palace.
SPEAKER_01Yeah.
SPEAKER_00And so I look at my life and the job, the job that I've had, the the one I've spent 25, 30 years with uh in business, I and pastoring, I look at those, each one of those were stepping stones. I can look back and see it just as plain as day. They were all stepping stones to what I'm doing right now today.
SPEAKER_02I'm probably just gonna tell you, if you've not listened to his podcast, go listen to it. There's so much material there, hours and hours of material that will just fill you with all kinds of good stuff, your business, your business personally, all of it. I'm just saying if you haven't uh taken out had an opportunity to do that, go listen to it.
SPEAKER_00And they can go to the CBC uh website. There's all kinds of free resources on there too.
Kentucky Forum Invitation And Details
SPEAKER_02Yeah, CBC website. We'll put all these links in our bio and all that for the home for on this. But uh I do want to talk about we have an event coming up in May. Yes. It's uh well, won't you tell us the name of it and all that information about it?
SPEAKER_00It's the Central Kentucky Christian Business Leaders and Owners Forum. And we're gonna have a group of Christian business leaders, Christian business owners that are gonna come together. Uh it is a a two-hour program in person, and uh we're gonna talk about uh about three major topics there, and you're gonna be a guest speaker.
SPEAKER_02I am gonna be there to be talking. I don't know what I'm talking about just yet, but uh haven't gotten that far. Uh so but that's gonna be I'll be there in May. So if you want to come out, make sure you check that out. That's gonna be May 21st in uh Lawrenceburg, Kentucky.
SPEAKER_00Lawrenceburg, Kentucky, and uh yeah, well we can put the link on there for that. Uh but yeah, uh we're limited in our seating, so we've got 65 seats left, and and so we'd love to have more people come and be a part of that. We're excited about it. This is the first one we've done, and uh so we're excited about that.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, yeah, I'll be there talking. Like I said, I'm not I don't know what we'll be doing that just yet, but uh I'm excited about it. It'd be my first time doing this. And uh as someone who's been in business now for six years uh and own now three businesses, um I'm excited to be able to talk to people, share my experiences, and maybe hopefully my experience help somebody grow their business or wherever they're at in life, you know what I mean? Guarantee it will happen. Yeah, for sure.
SPEAKER_00I know it will.
Gratitude And Partnership In Ministry
SPEAKER_02So with that being said, we're getting out of that time of the day where the podcast has got to come an end pretty soon, but I do want to talk about a couple of little things before we get out of here. Sure. Uh a little personal reflection if you want to look back. So looking back at the most great uh the grateful thing and season that you're in right now, like is there anything you could point out like uh what you're most grateful for at this particular venture where you're at?
SPEAKER_00Uh well I think I think the most thing I the the biggest thing that I appreciate is is is my wife and this, and I know that may sound corny to some people, but but I do, and the reason that I do is she's always been so sensitive to to help me and to f to to hear what God is saying. Yeah. Because sometimes I get so excited that I think I'm hearing something, I'm not hearing something, and so I kind of lean to her, but we are so in tune right now with this part of our lives and with what I'm doing. She's like my business partner. I mean, she's incredible. And so knowing that we're both together on the same page is huge. It's just it's it's huge. Yeah, and so I think I think that's one of the biggest things I'm thankful for.
SPEAKER_02I'm excited to see when her voice starts. See, I can see it now starting to happen. It is starting to. We're not gonna go to the back line here, but there my aunt had a medical situation for a long while where she was out, and so they had to go through a lot of stuff there that uh they're on the back end of, and now they're back and doing the things they're doing, and seeing my Aunt Mimi come back to her. Get her that get that swagger back swagger she has, her little thing she does, she has a little attitude, and but she's uh got a she's a great speaker, she has a lot to offer to people and leadership and just uh being a godly woman. Yes, uh, she's an amazing woman. So I suspect you're gonna see start her having some podcasts coming out and doing some things like that to look forward to as well. Um so I'm excited for Leafrow for that. So I got but I understand that I see the connection, like I see the the growth that's happened in the last couple years. Oh, absolutely where you uh started with that, and now she sees the same vision you're on. You're on the almost like on the you're on the same walking the same path together. Oh, yeah. You know, well she was the one that pushed John Maxwell. Oh yeah.
SPEAKER_00You know, because that was a uh a big financial commitment uh to become a part of their program. And my wife came to me. Uh you were there in town that day uh when I when I went through a two-hour program to listen about the program, and then they told us how much it was and and all that at the end. And and I mentioned it to you, I mentioned it to Mimi, and she's okay, yeah, yeah. And she came up to me that night. I was in my study, it was at 10 o'clock at night. She comes up into my study and she says, Can you still get all the benefits and everything from that program uh through John Maxwell uh that you listened to this morning? And I said, Yeah, they said they'd hold it for 24 hours. She said, You need to do it. This is the time. This is the time. You gotta do it, you gotta do it. And it it was like, you know, and she said, and when I say do it, do it now, right now while I'm standing right here. Get on there, get it, go online, do what you gotta do. Let's make it happen right now. And that's and that's kind of that was exciting. You know, you telling me. And she really she really became a part of it, you know. She really felt like that's what we needed to do.
SPEAKER_02She dug her feet in and she's gonna fall for her, yeah, move forward here. Absolutely. So I'm gonna put him on the spot a little bit here. If you don't know this by my uncle Harold, he don't talk about this, but he used to be a magician back then, and any professional one, like he was going to Vegas, all that kind of stuff. So I'm well, and he's also been a sales rep for a long time. So he knows he knows how to talk and he knows how to know how to sell. So this is my opportunity to give you my audience. You can give them your shelf stick, tell them what Harold Millie is, who you're all about, and how you can help them.
SPEAKER_00Absolutely. So, one of the things that I can do for any business is to help bring alignment to that business and to help with quiet quitting. We all have beginning to learn about quiet quitting where people, employees quit, but they don't quit. So, you know, there's a difference between efficiency and effectiveness. Efficiency is doing things right, effectiveness is doing the right things. So that's what I help come into a company. I help bring that alignment with the employee to alignment with the mission of that company. And then what we do, we go beyond that and we begin to train them because one of the biggest things that employees leave companies for, one of the biggest reasons is because they don't feel like they were invested in any kind of training at all. So we can help you develop a program that will invest in your employees and for the cost, for the cost, typically what it costs that company is less than what it will cost them to replace one management person. So the cost behind what it because that cost is normally a year and a half of their salaries, what it costs you to replace that person or retrain that person. And I can come in and do these things for less than what it'll cost you to lose that one person.
SPEAKER_02Well, it sounds like a bargain to me.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, I think it is.
SPEAKER_02So yeah, we'll find all his stuff on our post on our website, all his information. We'll make sure it's all posted up for you guys to check him out. He's on LinkedIn, he's on Facebook, I think. And so uh go out and find him, support him, give him all the support he needs, show him all the love he needs to have, and uh we appreciate your own coming in and spending some time with today, brother. Thank you very much. Thank you for coming in.
SPEAKER_00All right, thanks for having me.
SPEAKER_01Appreciate you. Thank you for tuning into this week's Christian Business Concepts Podcast. Go to Christian Business Concepts.com for more information and resources. Or be sure to check out other podcasts that will help you take your business and your personal life to a whole new level of success.