Welcome back to the Theology of Business Podcast. I'm your host, Darren Sheer, author of the Marketplace Christian and Marketing Like Jesus. And this is a show that helps marketplace Christians department God in business and help you make disciples of your co-workers, your company, and your industry. Give more teachings and interviews like the one you're about to hear at theology of business.com. On today's episode, we're joined by Ford Taylor, and we'll be discussing a biblical model of business leadership, part two. And if you're wondering why is this part two, then you might not have listened to episode two of the Theology of Business Podcast because that's when we had Ford on and we had a phenomenal conversation. In fact, Ford, this has really been one of the most popular episodes on the entire podcast in the history of the show. And and Ford is the first three-peat guest on the show. Ford, what do you think about that?
SPEAKER_01Well, Darren, the one thing I do know is I always love being with you, whether it's face-to-face or podcast. So I think it's good to get to be a three-peat big biggest reason because I get to do it with you. So thank you for having me on again. Very good.
SPEAKER_00And and the third episode, actually, the last episode that we had Ford on was a recording of Ford's presentation at the Love2020 conference. You've heard Love2020 and the Workplace Initiative to reach uh 155 million workplace people by the year 2020. And Ford is the leader of that initiative. And by the way, want to make a plug for that, go to love2020workplace.com and sign up to be a part of that initiative, as uh several of you already have. And that was episode 36. Um today we're gonna be talking about Ford's new book, Relational Leadership: When relationships collide with transactions, practical tools for every leader. And and Ford is not only my friend, but as I've been able to just do life with him over the last couple of years, I think it's been about two years since we first connected. Uh Ford, I've I've seen this lived out in his life, and the way every meeting I've been a part of, every time we've chatted, I mean, I just see the the tools that he talks about just uh uh overflowing from his life. And you're gonna hear how he's used this model and his leadership tools to revive a fledgling t-shirt business and turn it into a $300 million publicly traded company. He's a founder of FSH, a strategy consultant and transformational leadership, specializing in consulting, leadership development, and cultural change within businesses and other organizations. And he also leads a charitable international effort that provides TL to emerging countries worldwide. Transformlead.com is the website. Ford, welcome back to the Theology of Business Podcast.
SPEAKER_01Well, thank you, Darren. It's a joy to be with you very much. Thank you.
SPEAKER_00So people heard me say relational leadership, and they're like, did Darren just stumble over his words? It probably wouldn't be the first time I did that, but but the term relational was a very deliberate term that was coined for the purpose of communicating this model and these tools. Why don't you define for our listeners what do you mean by relational leadership?
SPEAKER_01Well, this whole concept, uh, one of the biggest things that we find inside of organizations, uh, and and you know, we define an organization as two or more people in relationship. And if you have influence with one person, that makes you a leader. So whether it's a family, uh what we're focused on today is business, but a business, a government, or a classroom, one of the biggest things that we see is the inability to resolve conflicts or really conflict avoidance. And one of the big issues around conflict is not understanding the two types of people that are in every organization, every workplace. And on one end of this continuum, we call it the relationship continuum, on one end are people that are highly relational, and on the other end are people that are highly transactional or highly task oriented. And if you go into a group of rooms uh in a room with a group of people and you ask them to raise their hand, if you're highly relational, raise your hand, and highly transactional, raise your hand, and you ask both groups, what does the other group do to you? They will say terms like, drive me nuts, they drive me crazy. And the transactional people say, they drive me crazy, get something done. And relational people say, you drive me crazy, you know, build a relationship with me. And so what happens is these two people, these two uh different types of people, and there's no right or wrong, we're just different, they uh live on the continuum in a different place, and they don't even realize how much conflict takes place because of something that simple. Now, in most rooms, if you ask if you're married and you're highly relational, raise your hand. Now, if your spouse is highly transactional, raise your other hand. And if you ask that question both ways, most rooms, about 80% of married couples, just on our own little quick research, they show to be opposite. And so this alone can impact a marriage, not even realizing that's what's going on. And so this book is written using a lot of the TL or transformational leadership tools, ingredients, and behaviors to show people that are highly relational, you know, how can you become more transactional in your skill set without giving up your natural ability, uh, your natural tendency to be relational? And how can highly transactional people become more relational without giving up their natural tendency to be transactional? And when people get those tools, they call they become what we call relational leaders. In other words, they have a thick foundation of relationship. They can look down both ends of the continuum, and neither end drives them crazy because they've come to the realization that both ends need each other. Without one, most organizations would fall apiece, fall to pieces, no matter which one they would be missing. And so understanding that we need both, then you can apply the tools, ingredients, and behaviors and become a much more effective organization.
SPEAKER_00So we're combining the transactional side, what what some people might call the hard side, with the soft side of the relational, what some might call a servant leadership approach. In fact, you talked about this, uh you started to talk about this a bit on the first time that I interviewed you back on episode two. But uh, what are your thoughts on the servant leadership model and sort of the tension there? Isn't there some tension there with the servant leadership model and more of a get or done type of model of leadership?
SPEAKER_01Yeah, Darren, most people that do the kind of work that you might call what we do is when we go into a company or organization and do quote consulting, unquote, most people would say pick one of the two models that are out there, and one is a top-down model that most people call command control. You know, where basically everything has to come back through the leader. And there's a second model that you turn that model upside down, and it's called servant leadership. And typically what we show is why neither one of those models are all that great. A command control model, a company might be highly profitable, but the people are high stress, typically low trust. And so the turnover rate might be higher. Again, they might have to pay their employees more just to pay for the stress. So people have a lot of anxiety going on, a lot of conflict, and they still don't deal with conflict well, but they might deal with discipline a little bit better. When you turn the model upside down to a servant leader model, historically, when those first start off, relationships are pretty good. But over time, because in those models, typically conflict is not dealt with. As a matter of fact, it might even be avoided more. You know, performance is not dealt with because it's it's more taught, you know, be nice to each other, you know, serve, serve, serve. And so neither one of those models on their own, in my opinion, are the right model. Because yet they are in pretty much total conflict with one another, but you can get the same outcome with a lot of conflict and a lot of unresolved issues.
SPEAKER_00What would you say is biblical? I mean, obviously it's very easy to see a lot of biblical application here, but what would you say is biblical about this model of relational leadership?
SPEAKER_01Well, you know, when you when you take the top-down model, if you could picture an organizational chart in your mind of top-down, and if instead of getting rid of it, let's just change the name of it. Let's not call it command control, let's call it visionary. And then let's turn the model upside down and let's call it servant leadership. But instead of just serving, let's call it serve, teach, train, and equip. And so if if the visionary, if the person who carries the vision for an organization casts that vision, it's clear, it's concise, it's inspirational, and the people that follow them, if they see to it that it's that person's job to see to it that their team is served through teaching, training, and equipping, then these two models can morph together, which we call the functional responsibility model, and they start morphing together and they look much more like an organism. Well, as those models continue and the relationships get closer, so if you can imagine instead of boxes in your mind, just imagine circles and this organism connected by lines that we call functional responsibility, which is what we call stage three, we call visionary stage one, the servant leadership stage two, functional responsibility stage three. Think of those lines getting fatter and closer together, and so those circles coming in closer. We call that the relaxational model. Because now those highly transactional people and those highly relational people are now starting to work closer and closer together, and then eventually that turns into a fifth model where those circles, if you will, overlap, and we call that the continuous improvement model. And so if you think about biblically that we're all part of the same body, every part is equal, but we have different parts, and so we're functioning differently, so we're functionally responsible. So in the model that we teach, that relational and then the continuous improvement, it looks much more like the biblical model. All different but equal parts, but each has a role to play. So even in that model, you know, the CEO is still the CEO. Mom and dad are still mom and dad. The classroom school teacher is still the classroom school teacher. But they're doing it with the tools, ingredients, and behavior where there's not as much conflict. They are driving to try to get consensus on what we're going to do to move to the next level. But if there is not consensus, it's not a big deal because the person that's functionally responsible, you know, that that part of the body, that CEO, is still the CEO. And so they have to step in and make the decision, but not from a command control perspective, but from a functional responsibility perspective. That is their responsibility if there's if they can't get the consensus. And so when you walk out of a room that's operating in this model, even if you and I don't agree a hundred percent on what we're gonna do, we've agreed a hundred percent to go do it together because we know if that's not the best answer, we're gonna come back into the room under the continuous improvement model and come up with a different answer. But we're not gonna be in conflict on what we're doing because we've agreed that even if we don't agree, you and I aren't on the same page. The CEO has said, this is what we're gonna do, we're in agreement, we're gonna go do it, knowing that if it's not the best answer, we can come back and change course.
SPEAKER_00And you've pointed out the example in the Bible of Mary and Martha as an example of that tension between the transactional approach of the task orientation with the relational approach of the more uh people orientation. What would you say about the application there?
SPEAKER_01Well, I mean, that they're just a perfect example of someone who's highly relational compared to someone who's highly transactional. And I don't ever remember either one of them being corrected or told that they were wrong. I do think Jesus wanted transaction to come sit with him and be with him, but I don't think he was saying, therefore, don't ever go get the job done. Uh and so, you know, I don't know this for sure, but it wouldn't surprise me if Paul and Barnabas weren't on opposite ends of the continuum based on what happened between them. I don't know that for sure, but it wouldn't surprise me that we find that out one day. But if we understand that both those people exist in our organizations, we need both people. You know, the world says it's it's bad, it's unhealthy to have a need to be needed. Well, in the same where Paul writes this organizational model, we're all part of the same body, he actually says we need each other. Well, if we need each other, that means we have to have some level of a need to be needed. Now, can you have an unhealthy need to be needed? Absolutely. But the truth is, relational, this relational leadership that we're talking about, we need relational people and we need transactional people on our team. But if we can operate from a relational lens, it allows those people to defer to wherever they need to defer to when it's time. An example on our team, we've made a decision, we have an agreement that we are moving towards the transaction. And if we get on the phone, if there's any relational issue, and I say on the phone because we all are you know different cities all over the world, but if we if there is a relational issue that exists, we will stop the transaction and deal with the relational issue. And the reason is because we know when the relationships are good, the transactions soar. And when the relationships are bad, there's low trust, the cohesiveness goes away, the unity goes away, and so the very transactions themselves suffer because the relationships aren't good. And so that's just a decision we've made, but we know that the hard side benefits from having the hard the soft side to use your terms, having the soft side in place.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, I love that. So give us an example, and you have lived this out and all different facts. You point out that this this stuff works in the private, public, social sector, in your family, in your school. It works just all over the place with anyone uh with whom you have influence. And and but there was a particular example of how you live this out as when you turn around this company that was bankrupt, losing about a quarter million dollars a month, and you turn it into a $300 million publicly traded company. I think a lot of people, when they think about going in to do a company turnaround, they they get the image of somebody coming in there with the iron fist that just is firing people left and right and you know, just hammering it, pointing at the bottom line. But as I and and full disclosure here, folks, um my company, Hybridge Books, published this wonderful book by Ford Taylor. So I want to make sure y'all understand that uh, you know, a little bit biased, but I can tell you that I have not come across, and and I'm not by any means the first person to say this, that this is the most practical, uh applicable leadership book that you will may ever read. Certainly that I have uh have ever read. And I actually got the privilege to be able to work on this book with Ford. So, you know, if there are any uh you know typos or anything like that in there, don't blame Ford, you know, send me an email and uh we'll get it we'll get it taken care of. But but there was an example of how you turn this company around, but using what some would consider the soft side, it's like you know, how like it all it is almost uh counterintuitive, paradoxical that you're gonna come in there with such an emphasis on the the people side versus the transactional side. But but tell us that story. Go ahead and set the stage for that particular story, and then like to get into three of what really are my favorite tools that you talk about in the Relational Leadership book. Um, but but set give us a context for what was going on there.
SPEAKER_01Okay. Uh first of all, yes, Darren, you've been so helpful. Uh maybe the listeners ought to hear this. Um, I'm a lover, not a fighter, I'm a talker, not a writer. And so the way that you stepped in and helped me with the writing and the publishing, but Darren, I I think one of the things in that process that brought me to a little bit of tears is I know that you've done this with a lot of people. You know, and when you told me that this was going slower, because it's the most practical book you'd ever read or been a part of, and that you were finding yourself wanting and needing to apply it as you were writing it, I just said, man, that that for me, that just brought tears to my eyes. Because a man who's done all that that would make that comment of, hey, I'm gonna have to go a little slower because I'm applying this as I go, uh, that meant a ton to me. And it made me know that you know we got the right guy helping us here.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, that's exactly what happened. I mean, like I would get a hold of something and I would I would start. I mean, my wife got a fair dose of of uh you know my reflections on on your book and on on this on these principles and tools. And it it just really because that's the thing about when you read a book that's practical like this, there are many uh just kind of very intellectual, conceptual books. But when you're when you're faced with a tool, you know, Ford's putting this tool in your hand, now you have a decision to make when you close that book and get up and walk around your office or go back to start interacting with customers, whatever you're doing. Am I going to implement this stuff? And you just see the opportunities all around you. So uh, you know, definitely commend uh the the what you've done here forward. I I know that it's already helped uh thousands, tens of thousands, maybe hundreds of millions of people. Um, and uh, you know, so now let's get back to the uh the question at hand. So um want to hear about this this story of this company turnaround and how you use these tools.
SPEAKER_01Okay, let it it's basically a couple of stories. One is, you know, when I was 25 years old, we bought a company that had one foot in the door bankruptcy. The bank was going to close them down. And over the next nine years, we had a lot of success and growth. Uh some venture capitalists called us and said, hey, we'd like to buy a part of your company and use what you're doing and buy bigger companies that are broken, because that was our strategy. Buy broken companies, fix them and turn them around. And then, as you've read, over that 16-year period, I found myself being the CEO of this publicly traded company with really no dream or desire to ever do that. So I ended up owning a smaller piece of a much bigger thing than what we had grown originally. Uh then, uh, as you know, I we became number one in our industry in the trade journal, which led to a lot of pride, a lot of arrogance. And I found myself that my private life and my public life did not line up. And because of that, I had to go confess to my wife after God got back a hold of me of how I had cheated on her and in this season and thank goodness she forgave me. Well, when God got a hold of me and said, I want you to quit doing what you do for you, I want you to do it for me and for others, I had not realized uh that so much of what we had used to turn companies around, I had not applied to my personal life near as well as I applied to my business life. And that's this whole thing that you're trying to teach, this theology at work is understanding how it's all connected, that your church life, your business life, your private life, there should be no different person. In other words, Ford Taylor ought to be the same no matter where he is. But I wasn't at that time. And and as I, as God got a hold of me, I took this material, you know, to my pastor and asked him by any chance, was it in the Bible, and then the three other pastors, and they all came back and said, You have no idea what you have. And I said, So it's in there? They said, Yes. I said, Where? They said, Find it yourself. So I started realizing as I read the Bible that so much of our success had been based on the fact that these were kingdom principles. And, you know, I was arrogant thinking I was God's gift of business when all along He had given me a gift of business at these tools that work for everybody. And so when I started intentionally using this material, as opposed to just kind of doing what I had done that worked. And and while it was intentional, I didn't necessarily go in with the acronyms and the things. So we started putting it together in a way that we could intentionally show other people what we had done. Well, one of those was a company that had was losing about $250,000 a month, and the bank had given them seven weeks to get fixed, or they were going to take the company away. They were going to close the doors. And this is one of the stories in the book. And what happened was the bank said, if you'll use our turnaround specialist, we'll give you longer. Well, the owners of the company with me, because they asked me what would you do? I said, I would use their turnaround people. Seven weeks is not long. This company's a mess. And they got on the phone with me in the room and called the bank and said we've decided to use Ford and TL as opposed to your turnaround guy, your turnaround experts. And in that seven-week period, the bank said we've never seen this kind of turnaround before this fast. And over the 90-day period, you know, we took them from losing about $250 a month to making about $250 a month. And that company is still thriving today. So, but yes, when we go in, you know, we do have to, especially a turnaround, you do have to look at the transactional as well as the relational side of what's going on. But if you don't have some relationship built, it's very difficult to have those tough conversations around the transactions. You can't have those tough conversations. This particular company actually appointed me as the interim CEO, but I don't do that often. But they just had such a short window to get it fixed. But yeah, so we go in on day one and we actually put tools into place on how to resolve conflict. And we go through some of the relational stuff to lay the foundation on day one. And all those companies that we bought and turned around, and I'll call it my first career. You know, that's what we did. We'd go in on day one and we'd put these tools in place to be sure that people knew the guardrails by which we were going to operate and get this company turned around. And those were highly relational. But that quickly moved us. It had to be quick because these companies were turnarounds. It moved us into being able to have some difficult transactional conversations to get things fixed and get them fixed very quickly.
SPEAKER_00And one of the one of the tools that you teach is the social covenant. What is that? What did that look like during the process of this turnaround?
SPEAKER_01Okay. Well, Darren, it's interesting. Of all the organizations I've worked with, there's about six things that's it's one of these six things that's almost always the biggest constraint. And I'm not going to go into what the six are. But one of those things, you can either call it the inability to resolve conflict and do discipline, you can call it conflict avoidance. But that's normal in most organizations. And so we go in and we put this thing in place called a social covenant. And we tell them we don't care what you call it, you know, when we're gone, most of them keep that name, but if that is too strong of a word for them, then we're okay with social contract, relational promise. I mean, it doesn't matter to us. But uh on they answer a question, how are we going to treat each other? And then they answer the question, how are we going to deal with it if one of us breaks disagreement on how we're going to treat each other? And pretty much everybody agrees on the words with respect and honor. We're going to listen to one another, encourage one another. You know, words like, hey, we're going to gossip about each other, we're going to show bitterness and anger. I mean, those words never come out. Well, then you ask the question, how would we deal with it? And ultimately, pretty much every kind every organization comes up with the same process. If one of us breaks the agreement, we're going to go to that person one-on-one. If that doesn't work, we're going to take one or two agreed-upon people with us to try again. If that doesn't work, we're going to bring it before a group that we agree on, and we're going to let that group tell us whether what I'm doing is inappropriate or not. So if you came to me and said, Ford, the way you do that is disrespectful, and I said to you, Darren, I don't believe that, therefore, I'm not going to change my behavior. Well, then the group may look and say, Darren, this is your issue. None of us find it disrespectful. Or they may look at me and say, Ford, you may have a blind spot, but that's completely disrespectful and it's inappropriate. Well, whoever they say that to now has a couple of choices. They can apologize, you know, as we you know, we teach six steps to an apology, or they can leave the group. But what we found, Darren, in this process is that while we say go one-on-one, which is what Jesus says to do, uh, we don't, most people aren't taught how to go one-on-one. And the one thing we hear over and over again about transformational leadership, you know, relational leaders, is that you've gone beyond the what and the why, and you're actually giving us the how. And so we have found that when someone goes one-on-one and they have these four things in place, they go in humility, which means I may be wrong. They go in pre-forgiveness. Now you can't go in humility and tell someone I forgive you, because if you say I forgive you, that means you're wrong. But it's a place of the heart. In other words, I'm going in to restore the relationship and to help the two of us, and that's pre-forgiveness. Number three, they go in love or care. In other words, I care more about you, Darren, than I do how you feel about me. Just in case I'm right. Could I share something with you? I may be wrong. I may be the only person in the world that feels this way. That's humility. Uh, can I share it with you just in case I'm right? See, that's love. What if I am right? It's affecting your, you know, your spouse, your marriage, your children, your family, all your coworkers. I'm willing to take that risk because I care more about you than I care about how you care about me. And the fourth one is to go with 100% of the truth, because sometimes the truth and the facts are not the same. And if you just go with one without the other, you may find uh that you never get to a resolution. But when you go with truth and facts, and you go in humility, pre-forgiveness, love, and truth, way over 95% of the time, the conflict is resolved in one meeting.
SPEAKER_00It's funny how intuitive this all sounds, but I can only imagine when you went into this company that, and I've read the the account of you know how it went down, but people don't, you know, they're not they're not used to that, to say the least. That it just seems so foreign that these things are actually going to be be put in place. I mean, was that the reaction that you guys, especially in a very dysfunctional organization, when you start to implement these kinds of things, what has that experience been like?
SPEAKER_01Well, it it depends who brings us in. Uh, I personally, this is just me, I don't require this of our whole team, but I personally won't go into a company or organization unless I'm dealing with the CEO, you know, the top people. Because if the top people want to see this work, it's going to work. Now, that doesn't mean that I won't do this training with other people, but if I'm going to go in and consult, then I want the top people bought in. And so they buy in pretty quickly, especially if they're broken, because what they're doing's not working and they're open to trying about anything. However, you're right, that whole executive team, you know, when you're telling them we're going to go in humility, pre-forgiveness, love, and truth, you can be pretty sure everybody on that team's not bought in on day one, you know, because they've been dealing with anger and resentment, typically, to get in that kind of shape. That's what's been going on in that organization.
SPEAKER_00Yeah. And then a follow-up tool that you teach is the six-step apology. Uh, when you know that you're the one who's broken the covenant, that you now have the responsibility. What is that six-step apology?
SPEAKER_01Yeah, Darren, this is one of the things we get told from around the world how quickly uh marriages have been restored, uh, children and parents, uh, co-workers. The fun part about these tools, Darren, is they not only work with the boss going down, they work, it teaches people how to what I call lead up, lead across, and lead down. So they can do it in every sphere. So they can lead with, they can have influence, because that's my definition of leadership. If you have influence with at least one person, that makes you a leader. And anytime two or more people are in a relationship, that makes an organization. And so the six-step apology works across all three levels in an organization. And it it and it does have six steps to it. And let's just say you came to me with something and you are right. I did it. So, number one, the six-step works only if if you know you're wrong. Because if you have to put an if or a but in an apology, you just completely undid the apology. It lost, it just lost its value. So let's just say you came to me and said, Ford, when you did that, uh, you know, I may be wrong, it may just be me. So you approached me that way, and I looked at you and said, Wow, man, thanks for sharing that with me. I've either had a blind spot or whatever, but and I would say, I did that, and I would restate it back. Yes, I did that. Step number two is I was wrong. And when we say I was wrong long enough, guess what? Typically, that alone might get us to shift our behavior. But number three is I am sorry. And if you'll notice, I didn't say I want to tell you I'm sorry, or I would like to apologize, because those are not apologies. It's I am sorry. Or if you were raised in a home that you were told you're a little sorry, son of a gun, then just change that word to I apologize. So number one, I'm going to restate the offense. I'm going to say what I did. Number two, I'm going to say I was wrong. Number three, I am sorry. And number four is, will you forgive me? Or when you can, will you forgive me? And the reason we add the when you can is there are relationships where one person has used the forgiveness card just to get out of the conversation. They have no intentions of changing their behavior. But when you say, when you can, will you forgive me? It puts it in a whole new perspective, especially when you get to the fifth step. And I would say, and Darren, I give you permission to hold me accountable not to behave that way anymore. And then number six is there anything else that I owe you an apology for? And so when you go through all six of those steps, there's a sincerity that comes out. And when you give someone you're in a relationship with permission to hold you accountable, remember they're not accountable to hold you accountable. They have permission to hold you accountable. And you really mean that, odds are you are going to change your behavior. And that's what we call transformation. It's something that's changed, and the change sticks. That's what real transformation is.
SPEAKER_00Yeah. And I think again, that it could be easy for people to underestimate the impact of these tools because these are the tools that you're implementing at the highest level to turn around these massive companies and that that so many com I mean when we were gathering the the endorsements for this book. I mean, I'm I'm thinking I'm typically thinking like, you know, eight, ten endorsements, that's a pretty good amount put in the the front of a book, but they just kept coming in again and again and again. And they were all from leaders at very high levels uh because uh these are the tools that have made such a profound impact. And Ford knows all about theory of constraints and a lot of the you know transactional side of turnaround companies. But that was the thing that was so striking to me going through this book is that these are these are just I mean the everyday life uh skills that people need to have, and that this is the bulk of what is turning around these organizations, you know, from marriages to churches to uh to businesses. Another one that I love that you talk about, Ford, is the waddle model. What's that one all about? Because I've been using it lately. I'd love for you to teach that to our listeners.
SPEAKER_01Right. Well, what we encourage people is if you have a model to actually have a meeting, a management meeting, if you have a model and even have dinner with your family, uh if you have a model that you meet someone the very first time. I actually use this model even when I preach in churches on Sunday morning, if they'll let me. And the W means it's really simple, it's a welcome. And in the welcome part of the meeting or whatever it is you're going to be doing, you got a couple options. One is you might share something good going on. You know, you and I did this before we even got on the podcast. Uh, second thing is you might do an affirmation. You you look at somebody and you tell them something special about who they are, or maybe you thank somebody on the team for something they did that everybody knows you appreciated, but maybe you've never actually said it. And so in that W part, you spend a couple of minutes uh sharing some good things that are going on in people's lives, uh, doing some affirmations. Then you get down to the A, and that means as a leader, you ask a question. It might be in a management meeting, hey guys, here is the agenda for today. Is there anything else that's come up that anybody knows about that may not be on here? And you may find that as the leader, the most important topic of conversation could be what happened since you put the agenda together. Or it could be, hey, we're gonna deal with that one next week. But when you ask questions, the things that people come into the room with that they have on their mind, it gives them a chance to get it off their mind. If you're a ministry leader or a pastor, you know, most of us, most of you, you open your meetings with a prayer. I would encourage you to open it with the good things and affirmations and then ask the question, are there any prayer needs in the room? Because what happens is you're now engaging the whole room into the prayer time. If you just pray or ask someone to pray, the one that's fully engaged is the one doing the praying, but there may be other things. And when you ask those kinds of questions, if someone came in the room, let's just say somebody's mother-in-law was put in the hospital the night before or on the way to work, uh, on the way to the meeting, they're going to be sitting there almost the whole meeting thinking about that, not about what's going on in the meeting itself. Uh, you know, I've I've coached a lot of sports teams from six years old to high school, seniors, varsity uh sports teams. And when you start your coaching practice off that way, and they can share things, and especially with females who everything's connected, everything, and that's that's just the way their brain works, which is a good thing. The and they can say, you know, I made an A on my test, or whatever it is, the good thing to get it off their mind. But if you ask, what did we do last week in the game that's really good and what could we improve on, and you put something in your practice based on what they said, you can have a whole lot better practice. But this is the way you engage everybody into your meeting, and then you get to the D, which is discuss what you came to discuss. What did we come to the meeting for? And then the E is we now empower everybody in the meeting, everybody at the dinner table, you know, on what it is they're gonna do the rest of the night. You know, okay, look, if we're gonna take a shower, we're gonna get our homework done, I'm gonna go over here and work on a few emails. But if everybody has the expectation level set on what's gonna go on, the stress goes way down, even in the home, same in a company. So we're gonna leave knowing what everybody is empowered to do out of that meeting. And some of it could be delegation, but we're just gonna call it empowerment for now because people would be empowered to go do it. And then the L is launch. And launch means we're gonna connect maybe the empowerment or the meeting with some word of encouragement. Encourage people to go out. Maybe it's a poem, it could be a video, it could be a story, but different people in the room might do the launch. It may not be the leader every time, but that's what the W-A-D-E-ML stands for. Welcome, ask questions, discuss the agenda, empower people, and launch them.
SPEAKER_00And again, this is not just a model that you would use for your small group, your you know, your church group, but Ford uses this when he talks about the when he introduces the the concept of rule action or leadership in the book. He actually talks about how he uses this model with those bankers that were on the verge of shutting down this company. And and so in very high stress uh environments, this model works. And and you point out it'd be the kind of thing that people could easily try to take advantage of um to manipulate people, but you're using it, the key is to use it with the right heart, the right motivation.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, we tell people that if you use the waddle model to take advantage of people, they will eventually know that's what you're doing. If you use it to make a sales call, it might not work. If you use it to build relationships, then you'll probably make the sale. If you truly mean it to build a relationship, you know, the example you use, I mean, the two bankers came in the room, and we know who they were. They only send one of these guys to the room to take the keys away from the company. That's the only reason he ever shows up. I mean, he is the hatchet man. And, you know, when they walked in, I immediately started trying to get to know them a little bit better and and try to figure it out. And and when it came down to take the keys, uh, I I actually asked them, would you mind if I had a conversation with you two without the owners in the room? And I asked the owners, do you trust me? And and they were kind of like, they said yes, but the CFO wasn't that happy. And uh I actually they said, Yeah, we'll stay. And I and I said, Could I ask you a question? And they said yes. I said, I understand that we have now found another million dollar error on the books. I get that. But look at how far this organization has come. And I said, you know, you told me about your family a while ago. You told me about how you liked a deer hunt a while ago. I just have a question for you. I mean, as far as they've come, knowing that we've done this and how much more we can still do, you know, is today the right day to take their keys? If you had asked me for these keys six weeks ago, I would have thrown them to you. But why would you today, it's just to help me. I just want you to imagine 300 families out there that are not going to have a job because you chose today to take the keys. I just want you to imagine that. And if you say give them to you, I'm gonna go out there and tell them to bring them in and give them to you. I just don't understand why today is the day when six weeks ago they were in way worse shape than we are today. And they told me to get out of the room. But they seem there. And I left and we came back in, and the guy said, We are not gonna take your keys. And when he left, the the lady in the room came up and said, I've never seen anybody not, I've never seen that man show up and walk out without the keys. What happened in there? And so, but my point is, it really was about a connection of relationship. You've got a family, I've got a family, they got families. And if you really think this is the right answer, I'm a businessman, I'm gonna go get the keys. I am with you all the way. And if you had asked six weeks ago, I would have completely understood. I just don't understand the logic behind it today, is how far as we've come. And so I connected the logical, look how much improvement they made with the relational. What about these 300 families if you're wrong? And we'll know the answer within three or four weeks anyway. What's another three or four weeks gonna hurt? But that's how you connect the two.
SPEAKER_00And and these principles and tools are all based on the scripture. You know, we brought in uh some of that foundation here in this interview, but you know, you talked about without mentioning Matthew 18, you talked about a Matthew 18 model of discipline, and that works in your company. And and so Ford, this is uh this is truly an incredible book. As speaking of the Waddle model and the L, which stands for launch, why don't you launch us out uh with a parting piece of advice for our Christian business leaders today?
SPEAKER_01Yeah. Uh if you're listening and you're you're a Christian, please know that by very definition, that makes you a minister. That makes you a shepherd, that makes you a pastor. The question is, where do you get your vocational income? And so go be that wherever you are. Be that as a father, as a mother, as a brother, sister, as a taxi driver, as a worker, as a dishwasher, whatever it is, go go worship in all you do. Go make it about the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit. Let everything you do be your worship. That's what the Bible says. Let everything you do be holy and pleasing to God. This is your true and proper worship. So be encouraged. You don't have to quit what you do, go to seminary, become a pastor. If God calls you to do that, please do it. Now, to be able to do that well, go get new knowledge, because new knowledge is what changes our attitude. And a new attitude brings new behavior. And if enough of us, enough of you inside of any organization have the same vision, going after the same vision, or going after the same one, pulling the rope the same direction, and we have a consistent behavior, we can shift the organization with as little as three to five percent of an organization. So go be who God's called you to be, go be who he's made you to be. Don't feel guilty over it, but go get the tools, ingredients, and behaviors that he would ask you to have to be able to be that in your workplace.
SPEAKER_00Well said. And this book, Relaction of Leadership, is now available for purchase as a paperback, also as an ebook. Uh head out to Amazon.com, you can get a copy of that. Uh, if you're listening to this a week after the launch, you can also get it at transformlead.com. And there are discounts for purchases in bulk. And so you can take your entire group through this leadership team, uh, group at church, you know, I find in this um and this fear of helping Christians to integrate their faith into their business is is that there are people at your church that are just thirsting for something like this. It's practical, that has a scriptural basis to it, and this would be an excellent resource to use in a format like that. Uh Ford, thank you so much for coming on today to uh know we're heading into Thanksgiving. Uh your your wife and family, they're all out right now doing some uh some wedding shopping. So glad we got to get this uh this time here so you could share with our listeners. But it's a phenomenal message. Um sure love you, brother, and appreciate your time and expertise today.
SPEAKER_01Love you too, Darren, and thank you for all you've done for me and for all you're doing for the your listeners and people around the world. You are a blessing, my friend.
SPEAKER_00Hope you've enjoyed this episode. You can share your feedback and get more information to help you partner, co-workers, your company, industry, the L.