E.63 Leading Second, Building Teams, and Burning the Ships with Pastor Joe Negron

Ever felt overwhelmed by the pressures of leadership? Wondered how you could build a dynamic team without burning out? Join us for a thought-provoking discussion with Pastor Joe Negron, the campus director at Grow Church South and founder of My Home Project. Joe shares his wisdom on effective leadership and team-building, the art of delegation, how to recognize and harness each team member's unique gifts, and how to ensure that you avoid feeling drained or overwhelmed in your role. Joe provides valuable insights into the pyramid structure of leadership and the role of Jesus's teachings in leading teams.

In our conversation, we also turn our attention to the significance of cultural alignment in leadership. Joe talks about the importance of language, behaviors, and core values to shape an organization's culture. Joe shares his thoughts on the inspiring story of Juan Cortez and how his narrative can be a metaphor for team leadership. In our final segment, we venture into the world of accountability, values, and nonprofit work. Pastor Joe talks about the power of a clear vision and mission in fostering accountability and aligning decisions with values. He also talks about  My Home Project, his Christian non-profit organization partnering with communities to restore children and families in crisis. Join us for a fascinating episode with Pastor Joe Negron!

https://www.myhomeproject.org/
joe@myhomeproject.org
Instagram: @joenegron

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Transcript

Speaker 1: 0:00

Hi there, welcome to Conversations where we seek to advance your leader in team excellence by discussing relevant topics that impact today's organizations. Welcome to the show. Oh, welcome to Conversations where today we have Joan Nodone, the campus director at Grove Church South and Sunny Naples, florida, and founder of my Home Project helping children and families in crisis in the country of Guatemala. Specializing throughout the years in missions and outreach, joe uses that experience to build teams, pastor people and help transform lives through the message of Jesus Christ. Amen, let's go For all you. Strength enthusiasts, pastor Joe leans with positivity, strategic achiever, developer and futuristic. Welcome to the show, joe. How are you today?

Speaker 2: 0:54

Thank you. I'm doing so well. I'm excited. It's going to be a great conversation. Can't wait to see what God does.

Speaker 1: 1:02

He's always showing up. We had we'll just tell the listeners we had a pre-call on a week or so ago and I said we should have been recording that. That's as much fantastic.

Speaker 2: 1:14

Yes, we had a great conversation and looking forward, looking forward to even more.

Speaker 1: 1:19

That's right. Well, we're going to just roll right into it. I know that you have a passion around building teams. Why don't we jump off there and then we'll see where we go with everything else? How's that?

Speaker 2: 1:35

Okay, let's do it. I love, first of all, building teams. It's so necessary. Talking about, I would say, even starting with the portrait of a leader, what a leader looks like and what that entails. The fact is that once we say yes to God or to positions, or to everything that we so desire these positions right we don't take under consideration that we are leading people. The minute that we step into a role, that someone's looking at us. We're leading people. That means all around us. It could be a job, it could be your calling, it could be at home, it could be just children looking at you.

Speaker 2: 2:19

Even the other day, I had a little girl just passing by one of the daycares at Grove. She said, hey, you're the camera guy, because I did photography at the church for many years and I would take pictures of them. Then she says, and I said yeah, that's me. I said, hey, how you been? She goes well, I've been good. But my brother, he loves you, he actually imitates you. Wow, then I thought to myself, what is he imitating? Yeah, that is the portrait of a leader.

Speaker 2: 2:51

We are leading in one way or the other, but we don't know exactly the influence that we're having unless we're intentional about it. We are going to influence, but how are we influencing? That would be the question at hand. I learned throughout the years that the way that I was leading was not the best. That even in itself kind of burnt me out. It led me to realize how important teams are and the heart behind it, and what Jesus even says about it. I can't wait to share some of that. But it's so important to have teams around us so that we could build people, empower people, and not do this alone, because the results could be catastrophic actually.

Speaker 1: 3:33

You mentioned a really big word, and that is burnout. When we're not being an effective leader and delegating to our teams, that's what happens, yeah.

Speaker 2: 3:46

Yeah, burnout is unfortunately real. I experienced it. I guess there was good intentions behind my work, as I look at it. Obviously I was doing even missions at the time where I got burnt out. My heart was to help people to do all the great things that a missionary would do. The problem was that I came from a structure of leadership that the leader was on the top and the people were at the bottom. It's like the pyramid, or you have to close fist of leadership. Unfortunately, that wasn't working. I was telling people to move out of the way. I got this because apparently they weren't doing it the way I wanted to. I was leading from a place of perfectionism. I call myself a recovering perfectionist because of the fact that it is real. We expect so much out of people. We really disqualify not just ourselves for many things we disqualify others. For that reason, I wasn't building myself. I wasn't building people. I ended up literally burning out by trying to do it all myself and not realizing that I could invite God into the picture.

Speaker 2: 5:07

Not only that the Bible, for those of you that might not know much about what the Bible says but Jesus calls us the body of Christ. That's the church we are gifted. In many ways it identifies that there's a five-fold ministry, that there's different people with different spiritual gifts and talents. We can see that around the world. Right, the church does not operate in the way that the world operates, which is through competing or wanting to advance your own agenda. This is more about hey, how can we advance together? We need each other, we recognize each other's gift, we pour into each other. By knowing God, really getting to know his heart, we get to know our own identity in him and then we could see the identity that God has for others. Without that competition, right, without that tug-of-war, yeah.

Speaker 1: 6:00

It's almost as though we're thumbing our nose at God, saying he doesn't know what he's talking about. Right, don't do this.

Speaker 2: 6:08

Right, it's not my style, it's not my way. Hey, and so because of that, then I'm going to step in. Move out of the way. God, I really even felt like I did that at points. Move out of the way no-transcript.

Speaker 1: 6:21

Yeah, yeah, and I went to that too and I thought that I was the only one that could do certain things within the organization was a nonprofit and I was not delegating and I Went through burnout, was very, very ill and it took me a long time to get back into the office and then realize, you know, sometimes God puts you down and teaches you lessons and and it was a revelation about delegation and the importance of Delegating and allowing other people, regardless of how it gets done, let them step up and in, and it's saying that I trust this person to get it done and if they need me, if they need you know, I will come along with them and help them, but it's really important for that delegation to be happening All right.

Speaker 2: 7:15

I think that most people would like that, and I used to say I wish I could clone myself. Who would say that? I don't know, it doesn't even a thought on another human beings, but I really thought I wish I had a team full of myself. Well, you actually can do that. You can train people.

Speaker 2: 7:33

You can duplicate right you can duplicate yourself exactly. And so the culture of empowerment. We teach a lot, a lot at Grow Church. It's to see the potential and cultivate it. We identify it, and, and that requires that we see things God's way. It's not like something that we are taught to. Let's say, in the world Everything is, it's very self-centered, and there are jobs that do it well, but there are jobs that don't. And there are places that do it well, but there are places that that obviously stay away from that because of the competitiveness and the competition, I would say and. And so I think and it was a GLS that I learned the word get mo, or the acronym get mo yes, good enough to move on. Wow, that that was life-changing. You know that, a project that I remember that it took me 60, 60 hours one week. The next week I did a similar project and it took me four hours.

Speaker 1: 8:31

So drastic time we waste? Yes, no, it's like, oh, it's got to be part, you know, back to that perfection, it's got to be perfect, it's got. No, it does that it does not good enough to move on. Yeah, and so for those listeners next.

Speaker 2: 8:49

Right for those listeners that are it's like hey, what, what do you mean? Good enough to move on? It's not. So is Rather than having a perfection at like as the goal? A perfection is not really, and should never be the goal. The goal should be like excellence we're doing because we have a heart behind what we're doing, but we're never gonna get it to that place. We're always gonna find something. It's like cleaning a car with our moral. It just goes on and on and you start seeing every little detail and you get so annoyed at the end they like forget it. I should have just taken this somewhere else, because you know we're seeing all the imperfections in the car, all the Parts that need to be shined. It's ongoing, and so we don't want to you, we don't want to lead ourselves into a place that we're gonna waste our time when, in reality, no one's really noticing those little details. It's a waste of time. So good enough. To move on is just like can you get it to a place? Whereas good enough, what can you do? So let's say, like an 80% is what actually?

Speaker 2: 9:49

Craig Rochelle is the one that did this amazing teaching and he said take it to the 80%. Once you get it to the 80%, then what can you do with that extra 20 that would have taken you to take it to the 100? And so, once you get it to that, to that 80%, do something else with that 20, because in reality You're not adding more value to that project or to whatever you're doing, just by adding that extra 20%. And so he takes it like okay, once you get it down to that point, to that 80%, the extra time that you have you could use it and then do something Important with it. It's almost like what are you compromising? Are you compromising your time? Are you compromising your family? Are you compromising exercising your peace of mind, other jobs that you could be doing, and so, you know, I just loved when I heard that and I said, okay, that's amazing.

Speaker 2: 10:40

But then he takes it a little further and he says, okay, once you get it to the 80% and and you're a rock star at that you kind of like got it down to the point. He's like now how can we bend the curve on that, meaning you're doing the same thing at an 80%, but because you got kind of like the flow of it, I would say just a pattern of doing things right, then you could actually do it in a faster time, and that is what it really. That's what quality means. You're not adding more time, more money to the project. You're actually doing it to a percentage which is good enough to move on. It's with excellence, but you're not wasting your time, you're not wasting your resources, and we're so easy to do that.

Speaker 2: 11:23

Oh, it needs a little bit more of this a little bit more money, a little bit more time and in reality, that's not a good return in our investments and, as leaders, we need time. Yes, we do.

Speaker 1: 11:36

Yeah, and when I think about that whole excellence versus Perfection, when we think about perfection, we're really leading out of fear, right, for that it's not gonna be good enough, or we're not gonna be good enough, or whatever. It is Right, instead of rising into excellence. God never created us to be perfect, you know, you know.

Speaker 2: 11:58

Right. We are on our path to perfection will be perfected, the Bible says, into the day of Jesus Christ. Yeah, meaning that there is a process and his goal is that we are dependent of him, not independent of him, and Therefore we are gonna need him. We are the ones that are need to be clinging on to even Solidify our identity day by day, just to to know that that you know he is our all. We don't have to take on the burden of Of all the pressure that this, even a leadership position, has and that's part of burnout, like the pressure of I gotta do all of this, I gotta take care of this, the worries that I didn't answer all the emails. And then, in the middle of the night, you're like some you know some of them that have experienced anxiety, panic attacks, different things that you just can't control your environment, so they lead you there and it's just Beautiful to be freed from that. That's right.

Speaker 1: 12:59

Who doesn't want to live free? Right? Some people just don't know they don't know, and that's the thing. They just don't know. And they wake up day after day after day and they think that they need to live that way and they really don't. But it's a decision and it's. It's about learning, it's a journey. Yes, people for sure.

Speaker 2: 13:23

For sure, I gotta enjoy that journey.

Speaker 1: 13:26

No it. Well, let's talk a little bit about I know the growth. Grow has two campuses Right. I'd love to talk a little bit about the culture and how you help people kind of embed in the culture the people that you, you lead, kind of what that looks like.

Speaker 2: 13:47

Well, we have an amazing culture. I think that we've solidified it even more as we were thinking about opening another campus and what that looked like. I think that Culture allows us to have a sense of understanding that we are in and like, let's say, in unity, that we are walking together, that we're going after the same things, and you know you can't really lead or walk together and you know you can't really lead or walk together Unless we have an agreement good communication. So culture is about that. It's about establishing communication. That's a common word that we throw around Business environments and also around church, but some people get don't realize how important culture is. I believe that even when selecting people, culture is, should be a priority even rather than gifting, because someone that really understands the culture and honors it and respects it, that's, that's an amazing fit. Now you're as strong as your weakest link in reality. So if you have strong people that understand the culture, you could, you could teach them, you could be that leader that then empowers them to take, you know, to go to that place. But if you have great leaders but then they don't even respect the culture or they don't even embrace it or they come against it because they're now I have a better way of doing things than we're going to be clashing, and it's going to be a competition or just you know, there's going to be tension, I would say, around whatever we're trying to lead, and we'll feel it. We just sometimes won't even know what it is. What's that tension? And it's because somebody, someone's not embracing the culture.

Speaker 2: 15:30

Now, culture, I would say, is defined, even something like the language that we use, our behaviors, the things that we see but we like, and some things that we see and then we don't like. Even knowing what we like and what we don't like is important to celebrate the things that we like, that we want to replicate, right. But then there's the things that we don't like and hey, we shouldn't be doing that, that's not us. Well, that needs to be also called out. We call it a church wins and ops, where we celebrate the wins, what people do, and then we speak about the ops because we want to make sure that, hey, either we either don't do it again, right, just plain as if, but don't do it again.

Speaker 2: 16:16

The other thing would be like all right, that was good, but there's, these things need to be adjusted and just bring in. Okay, how can we make that better? So, working together, and it allows us to always continuously stay teachable, and that's even part of our culture. That's how we make sure that everybody's kind of walking speaking the same way, talking the same way, and that doesn't mean robots, it just means that we function with an understanding that our vision and our mission it's aligned. It has a way so that we could go towards the mark together rather than separate, and it's powerful when it's done right.

Speaker 1: 17:01

And you're obviously doing some things right for sure, and when I think about when an organization, whether it's a ministry, a church or whatever, and they break off and they start growing and having different locations, that could be tricky at times, and so I'd love to hear, maybe, about how you found success. I know it's through the culture, but how do you bring another location into the mix? Was it easy? Was it difficult?

Speaker 2: 17:32

Let's talk about that. We know that nothing that really is worth fighting for comes easy. I would say one of the most difficult things that I have done and yet one of the most rewarding. I think that this is used. I think it's Juan Cortez that he has. He's coming to discover America and doing different, just bringing people from Spain, basically just to discover the lands. Let's just say that because I know that some people don't like those topics of conquering and discovering and because there was people in those places already, obviously. So here comes Juan Cortez. I hope I'm saying the name right. But Juan Cortez does get to this place in Mexico where he's got a crew of people that are so tired, they're exhausted, and these people they don't want to go into conquering this land. And yet he's like, hey, we got here, let's do this. And he makes a call and the call is to burn the ships. I mean I would have probably passed out if I'm in that crew. And it's like how do we get back when you've gone through storms and trials and tribulations? And he's kind of like saying there's no going back. He is calling the shots by saying I'm going to burn the ships. What does that do? Is. It gives no option but to go forward, go forward with the plan.

Speaker 2: 19:06

I think that I've done that plenty of times. I don't know if it's liked by people, but sometimes I just step away and that's because I'm trusting that God is going to do something after I have led, after I have done my job. To empower someone. Jesus did it with three steps. He did with hey. People started following him. He's like, ok, follow me and you watch what I'm doing. And he's like, ok, I'm doing this Kind of like, just watch. There's no, it's kind of like a shadow. We call it a shadow Just watch. And again he's like I'm going to actually watch, you do it. And so now we got the disciples that followed him and watched them. Now he's like, hey, go feed the people while he's there. It's like nobody was complaining that Jesus wasn't doing anything. They saw him do enough.

Speaker 2: 20:02

So, as a leader, we do our part to make sure that we are leading well. So then, when the time comes for us to step out, I know there's going to be a few that are not going to like it. There's always going to be a few that are going to come against that. But whoever gets it will love the empowerment that they're getting, because it's for the benefit of the entire team that the leader at one point steps out and allows somebody to do it. You do that well, by the way, kelly. Dr Kelly, you do amazing.

Speaker 2: 20:32

I've seen you say even hey, would you take ownership of that or would you step into that? And it's like so good. I'm like, yes, he empowers people quickly. Love it. Love it, because if not, then it's all on us. It's learned, yes, and so then Jesus then does something that many people don't know how to do, and that's his third step. He steps out, completely out of the picture, because he already trusts that what he has shown, what he has also taught in the second step and directed if there was any mistake, he's not leaving them alone in the second step. But now he's like OK, you're good, but that's also giving them permission to fail. Yeah, like he knew they were going to fail. He knew we were going to fail, right, absolutely. So that's actually empowerment and that has been the best thing that I have done.

Speaker 2: 21:28

And sometimes that empowerment of releasing it all requires to burn the ship and just sometimes not show up Like we think that it's not going to happen because we're not there Sometimes.

Speaker 2: 21:39

I made the call, even bringing a leader along to a group or something that I'm leading a team or a group, depending.

Speaker 2: 21:47

We have groups that we gather together and we do studies and I always try to bring someone along from the beginning that I'm actually teaching how to lead a group, teaching the culture, teaching how to lead and lead well, and I let them know. There's one day, maybe in the third, fourth, fifth week, that I might not show up. I'll give you a very short window and I'm going to prepare you for that day and I want you to be prepared that at one point or the other I won't be there. And it's worked. It's worked. I never thought it was possible, but it's worked throughout the year. So I think that by knowing I'm training right, coaching right, as I, you know, thinking about the possibility of once my next move to step out, and then, when I step out, then I could see a flourish and I just water it once in a while, making sure that it's still going, that I'm taking care of them and that I'm following up with whatever they're doing so that they can stay on track, and I'm always available. I'm going to be available.

Speaker 1: 22:52

I love that story and the progression and how it's a biblical principle of how you are leading people and that's beautiful, and so it's always amazing that the Bible is just so full of wisdom for so many different situations. It's like, yeah, you just need to know where to go and how to understand it.

Speaker 2: 23:15

Right, right, it allows us to, not in this case, in the campus. My pastors, I mean, they're amazing leaders. Pastor James and Pastor Tracy Boyd they are. They have led by example.

Speaker 2: 23:31

They love empowering others, and he was the one that actually told me about Get no, he's like. He's like you're putting too much pressure on yourself and on other people. Don't disqualify other people. And I realized I was like, wow, I'm disqualifying people because I was disqualifying myself, you know. So the fact that he, like, brought me into that culture of empowerment by saying this is what it looks like, this is what you need to do, these are your next steps, which is part of our culture as well to give next steps, never allowing for someone to stay stagnant. If not, we're not going to be a growing church and we're not. Like Jesus said, go and preach the gospel into the world is the great commandment, right. And so for that to happen, we need to empower others. Allow people to do what it is that we have called them, god has called them to do, but allow them to do what we've taught them, because sometimes we teach but we don't release.

Speaker 1: 24:36

Yes, oh, and I think more people need to understand that the whole release part of it for sure, and understand when to do that. And somebody may not just you know, like you mentioned in your story, something may not always be ready, but if you don't give them the opportunity to rise up and in, how are you going to know? Right, and how are they going to know?

Speaker 2: 25:01

Right, and how is God going to step in and do something in their lives? The way that he did it in ours yes, Like we're not, like you know number one, or like in the favorites of you know of God's list, is like he loves us all unconditionally and he's got a plan for all of us. And so now I get it. I'm like, oh, you want to use me so that I could see the plans that you have for other people, but that requires a dying to self.

Speaker 2: 25:31

That is very difficult. That means that selfish desires that we have, we got to lay them down and see the bigger picture. And I've let dreams go more than I wish I did at points. But in the end the result is so gratifying because we have a good God and then it builds us so much as people that if that wouldn't have happened, I just wonder where would I be or how would I have limited God to work in other people. I'm sure he would have found someone else, but the fact that he saw me to be part of that plan, that's incredible and you know it's an honor. We have to understand that it is an honor.

Speaker 1: 26:15

You know. That reminds me. I think it's also important for people to understand that just because you let go of a dream, I mean it may be yours, but if it is part of God's plan for your life, he will find a way to bring that back around, because I've seen that firsthand with me.

Speaker 1: 26:33

And so he is a good God. And if it is, if it's for him, if it's really a desire of your heart and it's of God's heart, then there will be a way. And it may not be today, tomorrow, next year, maybe 10 years from now, but he does have a way of making good on his promises to us, right?

Speaker 2: 26:54

That is. That's such a good point, because I don't want to pick or kind of like point. I got as in he's a dream killer right. Because I want to make sure that there are dreams that I needed to give up on. They were disaster streams, they would have led me to this, to this lifestyle of basically of the world, of being able, you know, of our culture, of just looking at what can I gain out of this situation, you know, and I could go into that, but let's just leave it there. Everybody could use their imagination to think about how selfish we could be, but when God right invites us into this story, into this vision, into this dream and I often think I don't know if you've seen that movie Inception- oh no, you were telling me about the action I'm going to have to see we can get it.

Speaker 2: 27:48

I did after Leon, leonardo de Caprio. I say it very Spanish, but Leonardo de Caprio is actually the main character in the movie, and there is. It's just about getting into some dreams. But I'm not going to be a dream, you know. I mean a movie spoiler here, so I'm just going to leave it at that. They go from a dream to another dream to a dream.

Speaker 2: 28:13

It's a great movie, but we are normally like that in life we have a dream within a bigger dream, and sometimes we think that our dream is just bigger than everybody's. But in reality, if we're able to listen to God's voice, he is the dream giver. He is the one that's giving everyone dreams, but they're under his dreams, yes, and it's amazing. And we're like over here thinking that we're going to make it happen without him. No, he's the one that placed it in your heart, so he's going to partner us as a church. That's what I found at my church. I found that my dream fit within the dream and I was able to really come to terms of wow, these people have everything, everything that I am looking for, rather than, oh, my dream is different than their set apart. It looks the same, but it doesn't fit. I, you know, I submitted and I said, lord, what if it looks, if it sounds the same, what about it? Once I submitted to that and I was able to see that God really had a purpose in that, I started leading second, like, let's say like in the leading second role. Very well, it's almost like I understood that they were for me and not against me, rather than you know, because that's what I saw from other churches, I said, well, like, I'll do my own thing while I'm going to this church, but they're really not pouring into whatever God is trying to do through me. They don't see it. Yeah, my ministry is so big over here and you know I don't need anyone to interrupt it. No, no lies, it was all lies of the enemy so that I wouldn't have a beautiful covering.

Speaker 2: 29:58

People to do life with, family, people to that would keep me accountable. You know people that would say, hey, you know what you're doing, that wrong, but also celebrate with me and say, hey, you're doing that right and push me and say, hey, you know, not like a push, but you know, like, push me to do things that I thought do I have the knowledge, the wisdom to do this? Of course you do. They're like you know, and if not, we're going to teach you, we're going to guide you there. And the beautiful thing is that they're so transparent that sometimes it was like, hey, we don't know either, but we're going to trust in God. And sometimes I'm like is that a cop out? But in reality, no, we're all leading from a place of the unknown. At points, we just have to lead with confidence that we know that we've led before or we've done something. It's made a difference in people and we're just making ourselves available so that that continues. If not, we'll be stopped by fear. Men.

Speaker 1: 30:57

Yeah, and I also think that more people are looking for organizations who align with their values. You know where the values are aligning, so they can feel good going to work and having that experience like you have, Because I think that's important. We don't want to be getting up and going to work somewhere where it's just so far to the left from what we believe in.

Speaker 2: 31:22

Right Right, that environment is so, it's so good. I mean, I have friendships with people at work, but I also know that there's a challenge between having friendships and also leading with people, so that has to be really clear. That's a whole other podcast, by the way. Just leading with your friends, that's fair to be the bad guy, right.

Speaker 2: 31:50

But you know, what really helps is first of all the culture. It really helps. We could call each other out by the culture, not by our own preferences. No, the culture is. I just told someone in a meeting the other day and I said hey, I just saw what you did and it's not our culture, that's not honorable and call them out, but in a loving way. Not my opinion as a friend, I would have let that go. But we have to keep each other accountable and it is difficult. But if not, we put at risk Not us as friendships. At the end of the day, the friendship is probably going to still be there. What are we putting at risk? The vision, because now the vision is not moving forward because we're over here having a spats about what they call it. Right Spits back. I don't know.

Speaker 1: 32:50

I've never used that You've never used that, but I understand it.

Speaker 2: 32:56

I should have repeated that. So yeah, and it's very clear to us that vision and mission aligns us to be able to make the hard decisions when it comes to friendships in the work field or in leadership Right.

Speaker 1: 33:17

I would love, before we close, for you to talk a little bit about your nonprofit.

Speaker 2: 33:23

Oh nice, I want to hear about it. This movie that just came out, called Sound of Freedom, has really tugged the hearts of America. There was one of the I would say the statistics. One of the statistics they said was that right now there's more slaves than when it was legal and the majority of those are children. That's difficult to hear. That's tough.

Speaker 2: 34:02

What I've been doing throughout most of my life has been working with children. I just had a heart for children because of things that I went through in my childhood. It was a very difficult experience, from bullying to being rejected, being even at a young age already suicidal as a thought. It was often there. The enemy just really wanted to come against me and those were things that I was fighting. Although I was raised in the church, you know, and my parents being Christian parents and very loving, there was no child abuse in the home. There was nothing that in the home that would say that my life would be that. And yet it was because of the environment I was brought in and because of the environment that they were fighting to get me out of Some children. They just end up in different environments, because of poverty, because of culture, because of the situation, broken homes, so many scenarios, right Unbelief and all of that. And so I started working with children and, just really knowing that it was my purpose, at eight years old, I ended up getting a vision that I would kind of work out orphanages and own one and lead one. I was such a little kid to be able to start getting visions about that. I carried that dream throughout and when I got to the country of Guatemala for the first time after I had accepted Jesus in my heart and made a commitment to live for him, I literally asked.

Speaker 2: 35:39

The first thing I saw the children in the streets working, being exploited, and I started understanding a little bit more beyond what the eye sees. And I just couldn't. I couldn't stop and think about my day anymore. My day was like what am I doing? I'm so selfish. I, you know, I got everything around me and it became about how can I get back to Guatemala and from? I've been there ever since.

Speaker 2: 36:09

2003 was my first time. I even moved there for seven years in a row. I served about 14 years, and out of those 14 years then, seven of them were full time, just dedicated, and I didn't know anything about nonprofits. I had no idea what that meant at the time I didn't know what I was getting myself into. I was just going after what God told me to do, which was to help children, get them off the streets, sponsor and promote those organizations that did support them in whichever way. And so I started my own, because I just it was starting to become a little bit weird that people were just dropping money and giving me money and I was like, okay, I need to do something about it.

Speaker 2: 36:53

And so that's how that started and again it just it came from a product of just hearing what God was saying and just following that, being obedient and not worrying about how scary all of that felt, and going into orphanages. I did feel that I was like representing men I was the only man in that place and sometimes even Dr Kelly, honestly being looked at by women like who are you, what are you doing here? Almost with, like I would say, being judged, a judgmental approach and very unfortunate and, of course, well, that's what society has labeled men as. And I was just like I got to make a difference, not just for myself, not just for the children, but for the people around me, bring some awareness. And that's how my home project kind of began from a you know, from a heart, from pain, from all the things that I did not want to see but I wanted to see changed.

Speaker 1: 37:54

That's amazing, and so how can people find out more about your nonprofit? Where can they go for that?

Speaker 2: 38:04

We have a website called myhomeprojectorg and there we are now revamping certain things from the country, because the country has changed some laws with children for reasons of trying to implement more of the foster system, and so we're revamping our, even our, strategies.

Speaker 2: 38:27

We're, we have a land and we're hoping that in the future, are praying about guiding that towards being a facility where we can just help families in crisis, because, at the end of the day, is the family unit that's going to be able to help children and bring a safe place, and also partnering with the, with the actual country, because it's not my country, right, it's the one that God has called me to work with, but I can't go in there and try to set my own rules and my own ways. I have to also be obedient to, you know, to the laws of the country, but also then really see what yes, yes, very important and what does God want to do through this, and so leading and listening, and so we're we're right there, just trying to partner with God with all those things. But myhomeprojectorg is the place to go and you'll be able to see some of the things we're doing.

Speaker 1: 39:22

Thank you for sharing that. It's important we're doing on both ends with with grow, as well as your ministry and your nonprofit, so I appreciate that. Thank you, dr Cunning. Oh well, you are welcome. I want to thank you for coming on today. It's been a pleasure to have you and learn about your leadership and how you run teams and about culture. We talked about a lot of different things, which was amazing, and I know the listeners are going to have some big takeaways from this, especially that Gapmo yes, nothing else, gapmo For sure.

Speaker 2: 39:56

For sure. Thank you so much. I just if I if I wanted to say something to the people out there is give yourself permission to fail. Just give yourself permission to fail, because that's not going to hold you back. We are going to fail no matter what. So if we come to terms with that, then we'll just go full force and and just really allow ourselves to grow in the process.

Speaker 1: 40:20

That's right. It's all about growth and it's a journey. It's a growth journey. Yeah yeah, happen overnight, all right. Well, I look forward to co-MCing with you and us next month, so that's right. So I will meet you there, but I'm sure we'll be talking in between there and please come back on to conversations. I would love to have you as a guest.

Speaker 2: 40:48

Thank you so much. I'm honored and I can't wait for GLS.

Speaker 1: 40:52

I know it's going to be awesome. All right, you take care you too.

Speaker 2: 40:55

Bye, thanks for making all that space out there.