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Humility as an Operating System: Faith, Growth & Leadership with Kenny Wyatt · Profitable Christian Business

• 0:00
  Hello and welcome to another episode of the Prophet Christian Business Podcast.
• 0:04
  I, of course, am your host, Doug Greathouse, and today's guest is Kenny Wyatt.
• 0:08
  Kenny is a CEO of PushPay, a technology company serving churches and faith-based organizations around the world.
• 0:14
  We're going to talk about growth, stewardship, culture, innovation, generosity, and servant leadership.
• 0:20
  And most importantly, how to grow and lead well without losing sight of your faith, your family, or the values that matter most.
• 0:27
  Kenny, welcome to the Prophet Christian Business Podcast.
• 0:29
  Doug, great to be here.
• 0:31
  Thanks for the invite.
• 0:33
  Well, one of the things that I like to do, and unfortunately we didn't get to do this, is I like to have a 15-minute call with with whoever the guest is.
• 0:41
  So this is me getting to know you, just as the audience is getting to know you as well.
• 0:44
  So I I'm excited um to learn about Pushpay, to learn about um kind of your seems like a value-led leadership style, um, and and dive right into that.
• 0:55
  So uh you lead a technology company serving churches around the world.
• 1:01
  When you're not thinking about leadership technology or growth, what is your favorite way to unplug?
• 1:07
  Yeah, I love that question.
• 1:08
  Um so we live in Colorado.
• 1:12
  my my wife and I we um as well as we've got we've got three now grown girls.
• 1:16
  I just shared with Doug right before the podcast started that we just dropped off our very last, our third and last daughter uh at at college.
• 1:23
  So we're starting a new chapter here.
• 1:25
  Uh but if it the the ways that I love to unplug uh when I'm not thinking about technology and serving the church through technology is frankly on a river somewhere in Colorado.
• 1:37
  I am an avid fly fisherman.
• 1:39
  I I just love um I I I love kind of the different side of thinking that fly fishing kind of brings brings to you.
• 1:46
  When you're th when you're, you know, we're just thinking about the left side of your brain almost the entire day, to be able to think slightly differently and kind of enjoy
• 1:53
  God's creation is uh is just uh it it's it allows me to unplug and frankly recenter, refocus uh when I'm when I'm when I'm back working.
• 2:02
  So yeah.
• 2:03
  So having not ever been fly fishing, I've been regular fishing, um, I kind of want to dive into that.
• 2:10
  Not that it's it I think it could very well could be business or even faith related for that matter, but um it seems to me like fly fishing is the most difficult type of fishing
• 2:20
  that you can do.
• 2:21
  Can you kind of go into like l well first I want to know what got you into it?
• 2:26
  And then um how hard was it to learn and what are the what are the things that you like most about?
• 2:33
  Man, it it it the the parallels to business are are there, right?
• 2:36
  So I I've I've been I've been fishing for about tw I've been fly fishing about twenty years.
• 2:40
  Um it's the classic, had a bunch of buddies that that wanted to learn uh it was something different and we just got hooked.
• 2:46
  Sorry for that pun.
• 2:47
  Um the the um
• 2:51
  Th the the the parallels to business are super interesting, right?
• 2:53
  Because it is uh I I I would say you'd never really master the sport of fly fishing, because it is so stinking dynamic, right?
• 3:02
  The the the what what fish are feeding on, what flies they're you know, the the the various stage of flies, let's start with that, right?
• 3:10
  And and how you kind of match that hatch, if you will.
• 3:12
  Um and then what what fish are feeding on, the time of day, uh the weather, the the lighting, um
• 3:20
  The flow of the river, the columns of flow inside the river is just it it is it is super dynamic and constantly changing.
• 3:28
  Frankly, not unlike business, um, where you are constantly having to adapt.
• 3:33
  Uh, you're constantly having to be a little bit more innovative than yesterday.
• 3:37
  Um, and and frankly, you're you're you're also having to trust your training, you're also having to trust kind of your own gut and and your leadership.
• 3:44
  And
• 3:45
  Yeah, I I I won't draw too many parallels, but there are are certainly parallels to kind of what I what I love to do on my off days versus what I do on a daily basis.
• 3:53
  Yeah.
• 3:55
  So you're unplugging, but not really.
• 3:56
  Subconsciously you're still doing some of the same things.
• 4:01
  Yeah.
• 4:02
  your skills in a way that uh that that allows your brain to rest on one hand, uh, allows you to enjoy creation on the other, which is probably my favorite part of it, honestly.
• 4:11
  I could I could fish all day and not catch a single fish.
• 4:14
  Uh but but just fall in love with just whatever river I'm on and just uh you know, enjoying the the creation around me.
• 4:20
  So yeah.
• 4:21
  Make no mistake, I love to catch fish, right?
• 4:23
  And I'm competitive from that perspective.
• 4:25
  But uh the the the fallback is a bad day on the river is uh is just an amazing day in creation.
• 4:32
  Sounds like how I feel about golf.
• 4:34
  Um, but I I don't plu I don't I I I don't call it golf what I do.
• 4:40
  I call it hitting balls into the woods in the w water.
• 4:43
  That's what I do.
• 4:44
  right.
• 4:45
  Well they c they don't call it catching for a reason.
• 4:47
  they call it fishing, right?
• 4:48
  So there is pursuit, there is there is difficulty against it.
• 4:51
  So yeah.
• 4:52
  And and as as a marketer, all the things that you were talking about with fishing, it's like, wow, there's so many parallels.
• 4:58
  What fly do you use?
• 4:59
  What where where are they biting at?
• 5:01
  All of that sort of stuff.
• 5:02
  Um, so so cool.
• 5:05
  Um, so let's talk about leadership a little bit today and how um some of this sports and and and things like play into that.
• 5:15
  So outside the boardroom and outside of fishing, let's just keep it there.
• 5:19
  Maybe you learn this from family, you learned it from church or another season of your life.
• 5:23
  What shapes the way you lead today?
• 5:26
  Man, it's such a great question.
• 5:27
  I um I I think it it actually came from uh, you know, kind of growing up in technology companies, having really, really good mentors uh above me and leaders above me that it
• 5:39
  really kind of poured into me.
• 5:41
  What I learned early was at at the end of the day, it really is all about the talent you surround yourself with.
• 5:48
  Um
• 5:49
  At at the end of the day, it it it's all around as a leader, regardless of the size of company you're leading, if you have one employee or if you have a hundred and one thousand
• 5:59
  employees.
• 6:01
  At the end of the day, it really matters.
• 6:03
  What who you do, who are you going to surround yourself with?
• 6:05
  What culture are you going to build uh for that company?
• 6:09
  How are you going to reinforce that culture on a daily basis?
• 6:12
  I think that's oftentimes what leaders forget is how do they reinforce culture?
• 6:17
  Reinforcing culture is the practices you put in place, how you model it yourself as a leader, who you hire and who you fire at the end of the day, right?
• 6:25
  To to to to reinforce that culture.
• 6:28
  And so surrounding yourself with the right talent, it it is the key.
• 6:31
  Key lesson to me from a leadership perspective.
• 6:33
  How do you develop them?
• 6:34
  How do you give them room to fail?
• 6:36
  How do you empower them on a regular basis to carry out your mission?
• 6:39
  Um, and and from there your business will thrive.
• 6:43
  I'm I'm convinced because it has, I've seen it you know, dozens of times in my career, uh, that it when you focus on your leadership team, when you focus on your culture and and
• 6:52
  your people, your business is going to thrive.
• 6:54
  Um, what this all centers around is, you know.
• 6:59
  I like to think about uh humility as an operating system, right?
• 7:02
  At the end of the day, uh you you as your s you as a leader have to have a ton of humility because you're hiring people that probably know a lot more than you do, frankly, about
• 7:11
  about what they do.
• 7:12
  Uh, but it's also humility in things like empowerment, it's a humility in just letting go, it's it's humility in you know believing the fact that you've set up the right systems in
• 7:22
  place to hop to and accountability to to to allow your business to thrive.
• 7:26
  Um and to give your people the room to run and actually thrive inside of those systems.
• 7:31
  So um yeah, that's that was a key lesson for leader for leadership for me early on and it it it plays out even today.
• 7:40
  I love all that and we talk about culture a lot um in interviews on this podcast and um I think unfortunately and let me know if you agree with this that the idea of creating
• 7:52
  culture when you're starting a business is like on the back burner and then you get you get so far along like wow we never thought to install still values or culture or anything
• 8:01
  like that.
• 8:02
  And I've seen the difference kind of like you're saying in companies that make culture a priority versus ones that don't.
• 8:09
  Um, so I know you've dived into it a little bit more a little bit already, but could you dive into that a little bit more?
• 8:15
  Yeah, I mean I listen, I even as a sole proprietor, right?
• 8:19
  He's even as a founder led business, even if you're an employee of a company of one, culture's important, right?
• 8:26
  And that's weird to say because you think, well, culture doesn't happen until you have dozens or hundreds or thousands of people.
• 8:32
  No, uh how you model it even for yourself as a sole proprietor, you know, running a cr a Christian business, how do you spend your time?
• 8:40
  Right.
• 8:40
  Um what how do you spend your day?
• 8:42
  Are are you are you spending it with customers?
• 8:45
  Are you s are you uh you you do you have a you know kind of big ears for listening to kind of what your customers are telling you and where how your business is shaping around those
• 8:53
  customers?
• 8:54
  Um that in and of itself is culture, right?
• 8:56
  Um and certainly as as your business grows, as you continue to scale, that has to be a critical part of kind of the center of the business, and that's through other people that
• 9:05
  you reinforce it.
• 9:06
  But you've you've got to model it uh as as a even as a sole provider, um even on on kind of how you spend your day and how you spend your time.
• 9:15
  Um and so I I I I I reject kind of the notion you weren't setting it up that way, Doug, but I would reject the notion that culture is even about big companies.
• 9:24
  Um no, culture is about the company of one.
• 9:27
  Um and it starts it starts from there and scales.
• 9:31
  Yeah, recently I I think kind of parallel to that is I recently had a conversation on the podcast with when we talked about authentic authenticity, right?
• 9:41
  Um and that that is part of it.
• 9:42
  Um being in the the solopreneur, your authenticity and how you're building trust.
• 9:47
  Um, not even like you may not have employees yet, but how are you really building trust with the market, with your with your vendors, etc.?
• 9:53
  Um it it's very, very good.
• 9:56
  The other question I kind of want to ask you kind of
• 9:59
  Um, 'cause you you said um hiring people that know much more about what they do than you do.
• 10:05
  Um I kinda wanna dot go here.
• 10:07
  Like how important I don't know if you want to give percentages, but I often feel like hiring the right person, like skill skills can be taught, right?
• 10:17
  But I think hiring the right person for the culture uh is is almost more important than hiring the skill set.
• 10:24
  100%, Doug.
• 10:25
  A hundred percent.
• 10:26
  Um listen, the the the the way I the way I reinforce culture on a daily basis is actually through hiring.
• 10:34
  getting the right people in the right in the right leadership roles or on the right teams.
• 10:39
  Um and that that that's that's how you, you know, frankly that that that's how you have leverage it it in your culture is through the people that you hire.
• 10:49
  are they aligned to your values?
• 10:50
  Are they aligned to your mission?
• 10:52
  Do they have clarity of purpose?
• 10:53
  That's first and foremost, right?
• 10:55
  Um, you know, I I I I say this to my team regardless um of of what we are building as a product, right?
• 11:04
  I I've led a lot of different teams over my career.
• 11:06
  Um, and you know, even today as we serve the church, what I tell the teams are, guys, you've got to be in love with the mission of the church.
• 11:13
  You've got to be in love with the problem we're trying to solve.
• 11:16
  for the church through technology.
• 11:18
  And if you don't have passion around that mission, if you don't have passion around the impact that we're having on that end customer, then man, there's so many more things you
• 11:27
  could be doing uh to to to to to to grow to grow your career.
• 11:32
  It's just not gonna be here.
• 11:34
  And the same is true, for instance, when when I we I was helping build a payroll product, right, at a at at a startup that that scaled really, really massively several years ago.
• 11:43
  Uh the same is true there, right?
• 11:45
  If you don't have passion around the small business, if you don't have passion around the plight of the small business and how they run payroll and how you can take the that that
• 11:55
  complexity off their plate so they can focus on their core business, then man, don't don't come.
• 12:00
  Don't don't don't don't be at this company.
• 12:03
  Uh go somewhere else where you you can truly be aligned and have passion around that mission.
• 12:08
  So uh it it starts there, frankly, uh as you start to build culture is making sure you've got aligned values, you've got aligned vision, and there's clarity of purpose around the
• 12:17
  the customer you're served.
• 12:19
  And then it's things like just just expecting things from that team, right?
• 12:23
  Expecting strong performance, expecting that um
• 12:27
  Performance and mission are not mutually exclusive because they're not, right?
• 12:31
  You can still build a high performance team and have mission and have per clarity of purpose on on your end customer.
• 12:38
  and and you do that just through kind of reinforcing what who you know who you're hiring and what skill sets you're you're you're looking to hire too.
• 12:45
  But I I'd I'd agree with you wholeheartedly, Doug, that um you know hire for those things first because the jacks are better to open.
• 12:52
  The things that are that are um kind of minimum viable.
• 12:55
  will be the functional expertise they happen to bring to the table.
• 13:01
  Awesome.
• 13:01
  So I feel like we haven't let the audience know enough about what pushpay is.
• 13:06
  So um as a C because they're getting a real um glimpse into how you operate, but let's talk about what you operate.
• 13:13
  So kind of uh give us a synopsis of what pushpay is.
• 13:17
  Yeah, I'll I'll do this super fast.
• 13:19
  Um we were we were founded fifteen years ago uh when two founders actually sitting in Auckland, New Zealand had this epiphany on why is it so easy to transact?
• 13:30
  i i in every place except for the church, right?
• 13:33
  If I want to be able to give to the church, why is that not easy?
• 13:36
  And they started a company called Pushpay to make it super, super easy and frictionless to be able to give uh to a a local church.
• 13:46
  It moved to the US very, very quickly because guess what?
• 13:48
  The the market in New Zealand was was uh rel was going to be relatively tapped out, uh just kind of given its size.
• 13:54
  So they moved it to the US.
• 13:56
  And over time, um, we we've built other products around that donor management platform, what we call the donor management platform.
• 14:03
  We've built a CHMS, which think about this as like a CRM or an operating system for the church.
• 14:09
  Uh we've built a a
• 14:11
  streaming platform uh because the church is more than just the four walls that people sit in.
• 14:15
  Uh and then we've we've built in fact we just uh brought on a brand new company into the pushpay family called nurture which allows um executive pastors and their staff to really
• 14:26
  understand and know who their flock is and the spiritual condition of their flock.
• 14:30
  And so all of this is driven by software, all of this driven driven by technology, but the heart of all of it
• 14:35
  is how do we how do we serve the church so that they can focus on their ministry uh through technology.
• 14:41
  that's that that's it.
• 14:43
  we wake up today as one of the largest um processors of donations for our churches.
• 14:49
  We do that in a very, very efficient way to kind of keep the cost down.
• 14:53
  But it's much more than that.
• 14:54
  It's providing key insights to literally every person that interacts with that church, regardless if they're a seeker all the way to a disciple, and kind of
• 15:03
  Igniting technology so staffs can really understand and know their flock in a more meaningful way so that they can minister to them better.
• 15:10
  That's it.
• 15:10
  That's the that's the company.
• 15:12
  I love it.
• 15:13
  I lo I love I love it was seemed like it had a heart.
• 15:16
  There's a there's a true heart to the mission.
• 15:18
  Um and those are the type of companies that that are just awesome to me.
• 15:23
  I I do have so my next question is because you're a technology company and kind of what you've just shared is technology discernment.
• 15:29
  We're in the age of AI, right?
• 15:31
  Um as a technology company, how do you like evaluate technologies as using as tools or the next piece of technology that you that you put out there?
• 15:41
  Yeah, I mean it it's kind of back to basics, honestly, Doug, right?
• 15:45
  It's um we have an ideal client profile.
• 15:48
  We know we know kind of the lane we need to stay in, right?
• 15:51
  And that is serving the executive pastor of churches full stop, right?
• 15:56
  Um it's not the lead pastor, we love our lead pastors, but they they they they have a different job than what I call the COO of the church.
• 16:04
  Uh and that is our ICP, that's our I ideal client profile.
• 16:08
  And so every decision we make uh on technology, including now a ton of AI, as you can imagine, we're doing j we're I I would consider as on the leading edge of AI on the
• 16:17
  church, but doing it also safely, uh, is is put through that lens.
• 16:21
  Who is our ideal club client profile?
• 16:23
  Let's make sure we stay laser focused uh against serving that ICP.
• 16:28
  And anything else is just noise.
• 16:30
  Anything else is just a distraction, which is by the way, is a killer of culture and also a killer of companies.
• 16:36
  And so that's that's the lens by which I make technology decisions.
• 16:40
  As you can imagine, as a geek in technology myself, but also surrounded by what I'd say are a lot of geeks in technology, because that's who we hire to, uh we we could get
• 16:50
  distracted pretty easily, right?
• 16:52
  We could we could chase a bunch of different technologies to serve different pieces of the church.
• 16:56
  And it's my job and my leadership team's job job to keep us focused on our ICP and make sure we're we're serving them to our best of our abilities.
• 17:04
  Yeah.
• 17:04
  Th this is one of those moments, um, audience, it's a rewind moment.
• 17:08
  Like if you're looking for um some some real good insights on how you should operate your business, the whole thing about the ICP and catering, making sure you stay in that lane
• 17:18
  with your ICP, listen to what Kenny just said again.
• 17:22
  Rewind go go back to the when I first asked that question and listen to that again because that that is super powerful.
• 17:27
  Um
• 17:28
  recently had another conversation where we talked about the power of no and that's kinda what you're saying.
• 17:33
  You have to say no to things that look like great opportunities often just stay in that stay in that lane.
• 17:41
  Yeah.
• 17:42
  And and and what I would say is, and this is I I'll I'll speak to kind of CEOs or founders directly here.
• 17:47
  If you personally are not spending, pick a number, fifty percent of your time uh in some way, shape, or form with your ICP, you're simply not doing your job.
• 17:57
  yeah, be because the only way you can know how your ICP ticks, how he or she, you know, what he or she needs.
• 18:06
  from a from a a technology perspective and kind of s to stay in front of them or again the proverbial puck where the puck is going is just spending time with them.
• 18:15
  Uh and kind of doing life with them, doing business with them and and and clearly understanding kind of what their challenges are so that you can go build great tech great
• 18:23
  technology to go solve it.
• 18:25
  Yeah.
• 18:26
  I I feel like we could go I don't want to go too far off on this, but kind of what you just brought up makes me think of this.
• 18:32
  Like as a company scales, the the founder or the CEO kind of can become disconnected from the I C P I believe, right?
• 18:41
  And you're relying on your salespeople.
• 18:42
  Um and so I f I feel I feel like that w we need to put a warning label out there right now.
• 18:49
  I see it all the time, Doug.
• 18:50
  I really do.
• 18:51
  Um it's a and and I get it, right?
• 18:54
  As companies scale, if you as you're now leading, you know, once you were leading dozens of people, now you're leading hundreds of people, now you're leading thousands of people,
• 19:02
  it is super easy to get internally focused.
• 19:04
  It's super easy to get focused on the systems of the business.
• 19:08
  It's super easy to get focused on kind of the the internal workings of the business and lose sight of what's what's actually happening to your product, to your service.
• 19:17
  Excuse me.
• 19:18
  in the marketplace.
• 19:19
  And the only way to do that, the only way to do it is stay grounded in your ICP.
• 19:24
  And the only way to do that is actually to get in front of them and to spend time with them.
• 19:28
  Full stop.
• 19:29
  I'm gonna ask you the fill in the blank question, which we always do on on the Profit Christian Business Podcast with a caveat saying that I think you u just answered it, but
• 19:38
  maybe not.
• 19:39
  Maybe it's a different fill in the blank here.
• 19:41
  But your fill in the blank question is a high growth company begins to lose its way when blank
• 19:47
  Yeah, it forgets its core mission.
• 19:49
  What what what built it to be d what made it successful to begin with?
• 19:52
  What was the original product market fit that allowed you to to get to some level of scale?
• 19:58
  high growth companies lose their way when they forget that.
• 20:01
  And they forget kind of the what what got you here, right?
• 20:05
  and it it's it's it's gonna I hate to be redundant, it's gonna come back to that ICP.
• 20:09
  It's gonna come back to
• 20:11
  Who is your customer and what makes them tick?
• 20:12
  And how do you how do you go build great products or services around them to continue to scale?
• 20:18
  It it's as simple and it's as hard as that.
• 20:22
  So with that being said, what are the earliest warning signs that someone would look for that you're getting away from that?
• 20:28
  Yeah, I'd I'd um I I'd I'd say the earliest warning signing signs for me uh come through listening and uh to to our to my customers.
• 20:38
  My your customers will tell you.
• 20:39
  They they will tell you in some way, shape, or form.
• 20:42
  They'll tell you through support tickets, they'll sell you they'll they'll tell you through feedback through sales, they'll tell you through churn analytics, right?
• 20:49
  They'll tell you through one of the reasons I was slightly late to this podcast, I apologize for that, Doug, was because we host a customer advisory board.
• 20:59
  every single month with different pieces of our of our of our of our customer base.
• 21:03
  And so um and and they speak into us, they tell us, they they coach us on um on on what we're doing well and what we're not.
• 21:11
  We bounce off of them product ideas of hey hey guys here's what we're thinking about.
• 21:15
  Here's here's where we think the market is moving.
• 21:18
  Here's how we think agentic payments AI for the payments organized you know
• 21:23
  uh space.
• 21:24
  Here's how we think agentic payments are starting to to to kind of play out it in the marketplace.
• 21:29
  How do you think about it?
• 21:31
  How do you think it's going to impact your church?
• 21:32
  How should we start building technology to go to go capture that as the market adapts?
• 21:38
  And so um th that's the biggest warning sign, honestly, is your customers will tell you if if you're if you're on mission or or you're not.
• 21:47
  So it goes back, I'm trying to connect all these dots.
• 21:49
  It goes back to
• 21:51
  As the leader, man, if you're not spending f more than fifty percent of your time or at least fifty percent of your time with your ICP, you're not picking up on the early warning
• 21:59
  signals.
• 21:59
  You're not picking up on signals that are there.
• 22:01
  You just gotta have the ear to listen.
• 22:05
  I wanna kinda tr I love to be able to leave practical tips, not just, you know, um things that you've done and et cetera, um, with the audience.
• 22:15
  And and one thing I think could be a practical tip if you could share it is how you kind of set up this customer advisory s advisory board, like what you went about to create
• 22:23
  that, um, and how you can stay in that fifty percent, like some practical things that you can do.
• 22:29
  Yeah.
• 22:30
  Um one is the the the customer advisory board is a great first step for companies that really want to understand their ICP.
• 22:38
  And and what I would tell you is make sure they're well represented, right?
• 22:42
  We we serve ev we we serve the largest of mega churches in the US all the way to the smallest church plants, right?
• 22:49
  And so you can't have a customer advisory board of, you know, a 30 or 50,000 person church and that and what they're dealing with.
• 22:58
  versus a church planter who's just trying to get a church off the ground, right?
• 23:01
  It it that that conversation w will not make sense to either one of those endpoints.
• 23:06
  And so make sure your customer advisory boards as you start to set them up are good representatives of the markets that you serve.
• 23:13
  And they're they're small enough and they're vocal they can be vocal enough to give you feedback on those those different market segments.
• 23:19
  Um I would say d you know use them as listening opportunities, right?
• 23:25
  You know, put put both prospects, and this is important, both prospects as well as customers in your in your customer advisory board, because they will tell you the things
• 23:33
  you're doing well and the things your competitors are doing well.
• 23:37
  and it'll give you insights uh in order to change a process, change a system, change, you know, uh how you think about technology, change your product roadmap.
• 23:44
  So those will be the practical practical tips I'd say on setting up a customer advisory board.
• 23:48
  But I would say just get going and start it, right?
• 23:51
  Just regardless of what product or service you have in the marketplace, regardless of how big you are, set up a quote unquote advisory board of your customers that can help guide
• 24:00
  and steer you so that you can again stay close to that ICP.
• 24:03
  On the practice on the on the personal side or the practical side, um, what I would say is this this also comes with some sacrifice, right?
• 24:11
  Um
• 24:12
  If you looked at my calendar, Doug, if you looked at my at at kind of where I spend my time, um, I I am on row nineteen seat F about three days a week, three days out of any
• 24:24
  given week.
• 24:27
  and it's it's just a it's just a sacrifice and a um and a commitment that I've made back to our churches and our customers to go listen to them and to and to go interact with them
• 24:38
  and and in their own in their own environment.
• 24:41
  get in front of them and and make sure we're aligned and and kind of the products and services that we're that we're serving them.
• 24:47
  So um it it doesn't come without some personal sacrifice obviously to to do this really, really well.
• 24:55
  I love that and I love that you shared that just there because I feel like in our technology age we're los we're losing that handshake, that being in person thing with with
• 25:05
  Zoom, ex you know, we went through COVID and that kinda amplified the moving apart.
• 25:09
  And I feel like now people that actually or companies and CEOs that actually do this, that go shake the hand, um, go sit down with someone are are starting to be the outliers.
• 25:20
  Yeah, yeah.
• 25:21
  It's not to say you can't use technology at your back.
• 25:23
  We do a lot of business.
• 25:24
  We we serve we do a lot of serving, if you will, through through technology and Zoom and and and others.
• 25:30
  But at the end of the day, you can't curate a hallroom conversation.
• 25:33
  You can't curate a whiteboard session.
• 25:35
  You can't curate a feedback session that uh that that maybe takes some twists and turns so you can explore and kind of see body language and and better understand kind of the
• 25:45
  passion behind uh behind the statement.
• 25:48
  And you also just can't curate being inside of someone's own environment.
• 25:52
  Because at the end of the day, as as a technology provider to churches, I want to be in that environment.
• 25:57
  I want to I wanna feel kind of what they're feeling.
• 25:59
  I wanna see how they're serving, and I wanna build technology to to serve that environment better.
• 26:05
  Um and I can't do that sitting on a on a Zoom.
• 26:08
  Just can't.
• 26:11
  Now I'm gonna get to what I feel like might even be the heart of of of this interview.
• 26:16
  Um so because I want to dive into faith here.
• 26:20
  So what is the secret to building a high growth business like yours without losing sight of your faith and values?
• 26:25
  You talked about sacrifice a little bit, maybe there's a little bit of that in here.
• 26:29
  Yeah.
• 26:29
  Yeah.
• 26:30
  I you know, I um I I try to take a Philippians two view of my leadership and I try to model my my leadership around Philippians two.
• 26:40
  Um if you remember kind of how Paul uh kind of laid out um I think the f some of the very first servant leadership words, right?
• 26:50
  Uh do nothing out of selfish ambition or vain conceit and humility, value others above yourself.
• 26:55
  Doug, I think it starts there.
• 26:57
  I really do.
• 26:57
  And you heard me say earlier that humility as an operating system.
• 27:01
  I really I really try to to put that into kind of my leadership tenets every single day.
• 27:06
  Um and that that that plays out in a multitude of different ways, right?
• 27:10
  Who you hire, how you hold them accountable accountable to performance, how you empower them, um, you know, uh how how you allow them to to to fail uh and learn from the failures
• 27:21
  and and kind of move on.
• 27:22
  I know that sounds that that that sounds trite and
• 27:25
  but it's but it's so important to to kind of leadership lessons.
• 27:28
  And so for me kind of this collision between faith and leadership starts there in Philippians two.
• 27:34
  and and how do I wake up every single day and and with my customers and also more importantly with my employees and my leadership team, not have selfish ambition or vain
• 27:43
  conceit conceit.
• 27:44
  And I fail on that regularly, by the way.
• 27:46
  Uh but but it's and I'll never perfect it.
• 27:51
  But it's it's it's my goal as as a leader is to live Philippians two out every single day.
• 27:56
  Full stop.
• 27:57
  Um so so so that's that's where it starts.
• 28:00
  Um and and and then from there, right, you can you you it it takes on several different forms, right?
• 28:07
  Of of uh if you start your day there, if you start your day in prayer there and and making sure you're aligned to whatever it is, whatever whatever scripture is that's driving for
• 28:17
  me, it's Philippians two, but whatever scripture scripture is driving your leadership.
• 28:21
  uh then then from there the the you know the the the the day is gonna i is gonna give you the opportunity to to test that.
• 28:29
  and that's that's where the metal is built for sure.
• 28:34
  Um, I love all that.
• 28:37
  so one of the things you brought up, um you said uh during what you're saying, operating system.
• 28:43
  And it's just so funny.
• 28:44
  I feel like there's a theme going on right now through the through this podcast about um we talk a lot about systems and you have systems to help you scale your business.
• 28:52
  But the one of the recent conversations I have is about the internal operating system of the CEO, right?
• 28:58
  And I think you kind of alluded to that a little bit.
• 29:00
  So
• 29:02
  Can you kind of go into how you set up your internal operating system?
• 29:07
  Yeah.
• 29:08
  I mean it's it's super easy to say.
• 29:11
  It's it's really, really hard.
• 29:12
  It's really, really hard to implement as you can imagine.
• 29:15
  Um I mean, at the end of the day for me as CEO, uh titles fade, right?
• 29:22
  Title doesn't really matter.
• 29:23
  Um I mean I I I get to steward right a a a fantastic company uh for some period of time.
• 29:30
  Uh God will know what how long that is.
• 29:32
  Uh but at the end of the day those that title will fade.
• 29:35
  The only leg lasting legacy I have uh as as CEO and as leader is the people I develop and the culture I left behind.
• 29:44
  That's it.
• 29:46
  That's it.
• 29:47
  Um and so you know again, if you're not spending time kind of thinking through how that then gets that seeps into every single thing you do every single day, what def what
• 29:59
  leaders am I developing?
• 30:01
  What
• 30:02
  What experience am I giving them?
• 30:04
  How am I empowering them?
• 30:06
  How am I am I making sure I reinforce ah kind of the the the mission that we're on and stay and keep the team focused there?
• 30:15
  How do I make sure that I reinforce that by sometimes you make bad hiring decisions by by by returning people to the marketplace that don't fit your mission, right?
• 30:25
  That don't that don't fit your culture.
• 30:27
  That's just as important.
• 30:29
  And the all all of that is uh you know, I try to do with the with the spirit of humility, in putting other others first.
• 30:36
  Um and you know, some people believe I've heard it many times that, you know, it's uh in leading a Christian business that you know, high performance as well as being mission
• 30:48
  driven or having humility are are mutually exclusive.
• 30:51
  I I I I couldn't disagree anymore with that with that statement.
• 30:55
  it can be done.
• 30:56
  It can be done in love and humility.
• 30:57
  You can h hold people accountable.
• 30:59
  You can you can reach goals that you that you know, individuals otherwise wouldn't believe that they could reach.
• 31:05
  You can set
• 31:06
  standards and you can set metrics uh i in order to to make sure that you're constantly growing, you're co constantly striving.
• 31:13
  And you can do it in a spirit of humility and love that that develops and and kinda grows people around you.
• 31:18
  Uh and th th that's that a as a leader, that's what I spend my time doing.
• 31:26
  wanna kind of dive into kind of what you talked about with firing.
• 31:29
  I'm I'm gonna when I was um in corporate back in the day, um I and I was a a manager among a few managers, I fired more people than any of the other managers.
• 31:40
  Yet I was known as the nice manager because I kept culture, right?
• 31:44
  Because culture was more important.
• 31:46
  And honestly, I think it was more important for me to serve the greater the the the majority of the people than that one person, right?
• 31:54
  Um so
• 31:56
  I I don't know if you wanna um give some insights around hiring and firing, but um that might be helpful here.
• 32:02
  Yeah, I mean as leaders we all have to do it, right?
• 32:06
  It's just it's just part of it.
• 32:07
  You've it as I mentioned or you make bad hiring decisions sometimes.
• 32:10
  sometimes people fall out of kind of the passion that they have for your customer, which is in my mind one of the most important things some an employee can bring to their job
• 32:19
  every single day is a passion for for your customer, whoever it is.
• 32:24
  Um and sometimes you just fall out of alignment there.
• 32:26
  And um it is the right thing to do.
• 32:29
  It's the right th and I've seen it dozens and s dozens of times in my career, Doug, where I release somebody back to the marketplace.
• 32:37
  they find something that they're much more passionate about.
• 32:40
  And I get a call back.
• 32:41
  I I I got a I got a call.
• 32:44
  kid you not, I was on a trip to uh to California several weeks ago and I got a call from somebody that from a number I didn't recognize.
• 32:52
  Usually I I ignore those calls for whatever reason I decided to take this call.
• 32:56
  It was from an employee that I that I released 10 years ago.
• 32:59
  Um and I I won't I won't describe the reason behind it, but and he
• 33:06
  called to thank me uh because his his life at the time was in was in tatters.
• 33:12
  Um I felt like, you know, he he needed, you know, for a variety of reasons, I I had to I had to let him go.
• 33:20
  Um it it created an opportunity for him to go get his life back in order, uh, to go focus back on his marriage and to heal.
• 33:29
  And he called me 10 years later just to thank me.
• 33:31
  Uh
• 33:32
  Just to say, you know, thank you for for seeing what I couldn't see in my own life.
• 33:36
  Uh thank you, thank you for kind of giving me the jolt and the shock I needed to go focus on um on on what I need to focus on in that period of my life.
• 33:46
  Most importantly, thank you for doing it with humility and with grace.
• 33:50
  and you know, I I I I I'd be lying if I said that was the only kind of time that that's happened.
• 33:57
  It it's happened dozens of times.
• 33:59
  And so I what I would say is, you know, in in everything humility, put yourself uh before others, even in Firec, right?
• 34:07
  honor that person on the way out.
• 34:08
  Honor their honor the the the work that they brought, the you know, the the service that they provided your company.
• 34:13
  Um and honor the fact that, you know, um you're you're you're gonna you're gonna help them in some way find a a new passion and therefore find better alignment for what they do
• 34:22
  every single day.
• 34:25
  really good.
• 34:27
  So I want I want to dive into stewardship because it kind of touched on it a little bit there.
• 34:31
  I I want to talk about your I want to get some insights from you about stewardship when things get tough, right?
• 34:37
  Because often that's where values tend to get tend to be discarded sometimes.
• 34:42
  Um so keeping um true stewardship um when things are are difficult.
• 34:50
  Yeah, yeah, and it and it happens, right?
• 34:52
  It's um leading businesses, leading companies, leading teams of any size is not for the faint of heart.
• 34:59
  It's just not.
• 35:00
  Um, you know what what what I would say is um continue to play the long game, right?
• 35:08
  you know, stewardship in my mind is is how do you how do you continue to invest in the resources that God's given you and your company?
• 35:20
  in a way that honors him over time.
• 35:22
  And that's obviously it's the three Ts.
• 35:24
  It's it's time, it's talent, it's your treasure.
• 35:26
  But that's true for a company as well, right?
• 35:28
  how do you continue to invest your time as a leader um into your people so that you can then you you then can have leverage for for your passion and your mission for your
• 35:38
  customers.
• 35:39
  Um how do you continue to invest your treasure?
• 35:42
  Um
• 35:44
  We we talk about stewardship at every single stand global stand-up that I have every single month for to the entire company.
• 35:50
  Um and so I'd say find your stewardship metric.
• 35:54
  There is one, there's one in your company.
• 35:55
  For us, um, it's it's our expenses, right?
• 35:59
  It's uh how how do we be really, really good stewards of our expenses?
• 36:02
  Because every dollar we waste is a dollar we're not serving the church, right?
• 36:07
  Every dollar, every project that um you know is is done in mediocrity.
• 36:12
  uh is is time or or treasure that we've wasted on having a bigger impact on the on our church, the church who is our customer.
• 36:21
  And so find your stewardship metric um and and be relentless around around whatever that is.
• 36:26
  Uh and then finally talent.
• 36:28
  We've talked a lot about it on this on this um on this podcast, Doug, but uh you you don't settle.
• 36:34
  Uh being a good steward of the business is not settle settling for talent and making sure that um
• 36:40
  you've got full alignment with every person that you have at your that at your company on clarity of purpose, on mission alignment, and on performance and and don't settle on that.
• 36:51
  So that that's the only way I know how to be a good steward of the of kind of the the the resources that God's given us as a company is to is to continue to focus on those three.
• 37:01
  That that's awesome.
• 37:02
  Uh now I wanna kinda dive into um faith again.
• 37:08
  Following uh as a follower of Jesus, like has that helped you I don't know if you like when you came to when you were saved and when you started your your faith journey.
• 37:18
  wow.
• 37:19
  so we're we're we're pushing fifty years.
• 37:22
  Nice, nice.
• 37:23
  Um but how like when um I well I'm trying to think about the best way to ask this.
• 37:30
  So um how has that helped you define being a follower of Jesus, what a successful CEO looks like?
• 37:36
  Yeah, um
• 37:40
  You know, um it it I'll try to tie it up in some of the things I've I've I've already mentioned, right?
• 37:47
  Um, you know, Jesus surrounded himself with a leadership team, if you think about it.
• 37:52
  He surrounded himself with twelve people that um he poured into, that he uh that he trusted, um, that he um that he empowered.
• 38:04
  Some some of s some of those twelve built some of the the the largest churches at the time, right?
• 38:09
  Uh long after Jesus was was was crucified and and and rose again.
• 38:15
  And so um, you know, I I would say the the the foundation here is just surround yourself, both internally to your companies, but also externally through mentors with people you
• 38:27
  trust that can speak truth to you, that can pray with you about about your business.
• 38:31
  Um
• 38:33
  And then go out and model it using some of the tenets and principles that I've already mentioned here, just around talent and where you spend your time and how you listen to
• 38:41
  customers and so forth.
• 38:42
  Um but it it really does start with the 12, whatever that looks like for your business.
• 38:47
  Um for me, it's my leadership team.
• 38:49
  Um I I I curated when I stepped into the role 14, 15 months ago, I made some changes to the leadership team because I I I wanted I I wanted a team that um that I could trust.
• 39:02
  I wanted the team, and it's not to say that the the the ones that were on the team prior that I I wouldn't trust, but I I wanted to make sure I I curated all of the tenants that
• 39:11
  I'd mentioned earlier uh in in a leadership team and surround myself with people that are in love with the mission of the church, um, are and are customer therefore, um, are
• 39:20
  accountable to to to performance, are accountable to developing teams up underneath them that with with humility, right?
• 39:28
  That's a that's a big that's a big piece of of my leaders leadership style.
• 39:32
  Um and that where there's no daylight.
• 39:35
  Um that's that's a we haven't talked a little really about that piece of it, but you know, um chasing out daylight between between leaders and amongst functions and organizations is
• 39:45
  a big part of what I do every single day.
• 39:46
  Um and so I'd you know, I'd I'd bring it back to the twelve, right?
• 39:51
  Find out who your twelve are uh and pour yourself into them and the business is gonna thrive.
• 39:57
  Um just follow Jesus' example here.
• 40:00
  Super easy.
• 40:02
  That again, so so so many great insights.
• 40:05
  Um I think I think I'll call that another rewind moment.
• 40:08
  So rewind the also what Kenny just said.
• 40:12
  Um I I think it'll do serve you very, very well.
• 40:15
  One of the things that uh we offer is called a goal getting app.
• 40:19
  And so I like to I often ask like goal setting type questions.
• 40:23
  So um can you go can you just kind of describe how you've set goals and accomplished them through your career?
• 40:30
  Yeah, I never set goals based on run rate.
• 40:35
  There's a key learning, right?
• 40:36
  Don't set goals based on what you did last year.
• 40:38
  Uh it's lazy.
• 40:40
  It's too easy to do, right?
• 40:42
  Um regardless, Doug, if you're running a podcast or if you're running a a technology business for churches or if you're running a business for payroll, don't limit yourself to
• 40:52
  simply adding to whatever you did last year uh because it's lazy.
• 40:58
  Be thoughtful about the impact that you're gonna have in the marketplace this year.
• 41:03
  Be thoughtful about customers you're gonna serve differently through products and services.
• 41:08
  uh Spend time on, therefore, the financial metrics that from the bottom up, from the ground up, as if every customer is brand new next year.
• 41:17
  Um and and do the hard work of building a plan and building metrics from the ground up every single year or every single quarter, whatever whatever your measurement period is.
• 41:28
  Um it's too easy just to say we're just gonna grow 30% off of what we did last year.
• 41:34
  Really?
• 41:34
  How?
• 41:35
  How are you gonna do that?
• 41:36
  With what new products, with what new services, uh, what competitors have entered the marketplace fl this year versus last?
• 41:43
  Um
• 41:44
  It's just a lazy way to do it.
• 41:46
  So my leadership team, honestly, we spend we spend weeks doing this on an annual basis.
• 41:52
  It starts with strategy, it starts with really understanding kind of who we are in the marketplace, what new products we can bring to the marketplace, how we can serve the
• 42:00
  church diff better.
• 42:02
  And then it's unpacking each one of those to to end up at a set of goals that then filter throughout the entire organization.
• 42:08
  Um and it's hard work, but it's man, it's it's worth it because then you can measure yourself literally day.
• 42:14
  daily on on how you're doing against the those specific metrics and goals, and you can make course corrections that are needed.
• 42:23
  I love that you shared that.
• 42:23
  I don't think anybody's ever shared that on on this podcast of the way of of setting goals that way and not not just looking at what you've done but innovation, right?
• 42:33
  New strategy.
• 42:35
  rebuild the b rebuild the business every single year.
• 42:38
  Just rebuild it.
• 42:39
  Uh go back to the core of what made you great last year.
• 42:43
  Certainly start with that as a kernel, but rebuild it every single year.
• 42:48
  and and growth and growth will come.
• 42:50
  And and that helps like because things happen in the market.
• 42:53
  You're you're keeping a pulse on the market, right?
• 42:56
  Like if you just keep doing the same things you've always done, something i is eventually gonna be a disruptor and hit you.
• 43:04
  So, um, really, really good.
• 43:06
  I I do have less kind of a weird question related to that.
• 43:08
  With your leadership team when you do that, do you do that internally in the office or do you go away somewhere?
• 43:13
  Yeah, I we go away.
• 43:15
  Uh we go away to the mountains.
• 43:16
  So not surprisingly, uh I bring the team to Colorado.
• 43:20
  Uh we go escape, turn phones off, try to turn laptops off, um, get on whiteboards, share a meal, um, go on a hike, um, try try to use a different side of your brain as you rebuild
• 43:33
  the business every single year.
• 43:35
  Um and the ideas are gonna come.
• 43:36
  And then just
• 43:37
  Trust your instincts, right?
• 43:39
  I if you've surrounded yourself with the 12, right?
• 43:41
  If you've surrounded yourself with with the people you trust, the ideas are gonna be there.
• 43:47
  and and you'll you'll find new level, new gears of growth as a result of investing that time.
• 43:52
  It seems bizarre uh to go, you know, pull back from technology, pull back from uh the day-to-day, but it it's an investment well worth made because you end up with ideas that
• 44:03
  never would have have have come through just the normal operation of the business.
• 44:09
  Thanks.
• 44:09
  Yeah, and I I kind of thought when I asked that question, he's gonna say they go away.
• 44:13
  Because I think that's the most productive thing you could do.
• 44:16
  Because if you're s if you're at the office you're you're just you have all the distractions and all you're just thinking in the box.
• 44:24
  So, um, really, really good.
• 44:25
  J again, Jesus is the great guide here, right?
• 44:28
  I mean, think about the number of times where he went away.
• 44:30
  Uh sometimes with, sometimes without.
• 44:35
  and and it was it was in those moments that inspiration happened.
• 44:41
  I I ask one last qu I do I do want to share like how people can get in touch with you and all that, but I ask one last question because um I say this before I ask this question
• 44:49
  almost every time.
• 44:51
  I don't want wisdom left on the floor um here.
• 44:54
  So is there anything that you didn't get to talk about or that you feel like you should pass on that's on your heart, maybe even just the code right now, that you'd want to share
• 45:03
  with the audience?
• 45:06
  We've covered a lot of ground.
• 45:07
  We've covered talent.
• 45:08
  we we've we've covered uh you know, building on mission.
• 45:12
  We've built we've covered a bit of servant's heart, which is which that's probably a whole nother podcast, honestly, and humility.
• 45:18
  Um I I think the last piece I would and it's been threaded through all of this, but the last piece I'd I I'd say uh that I'd leave with you is is maybe a challenge to your
• 45:29
  listeners, which is how's your prayer life?
• 45:35
  Um man, it's um I am not perfect in this area at all.
• 45:41
  and what I what I find is the more time I spend in prayer around this company, around the people I've surrounded myself with, around what God wants to do with this company and how
• 45:50
  we wanna impact churches, our our customers, um, man, it comes back in spades.
• 45:56
  Um
• 45:57
  So I'd I'd I'd say don't forget the basics as a Christian leader, man.
• 46:01
  Be in prayer for your company, bring be in prayer for your customers, be in prayer for your competitors.
• 46:07
  Um I had the opportunity to pray with a competitor the other day, uh, which is so awesome.
• 46:12
  Um just just just to just to say, listen, dude, we're you know, we're the best product's gonna win, but at the end of the day, we're here to serve the church.
• 46:22
  Um and we're gonna make each other stronger.
• 46:24
  We're gonna make, you know, iron sharpen sharpens iron, all of
• 46:28
  to get to the point where you can pray with a competitor.
• 46:30
  Oh, it's a pinnacle.
• 46:31
  So um that's the challenge I leave with your for your listeners.
• 46:34
  How's your prayer life?
• 46:36
  and be be introspective about that, particularly with where you're taking your company.
• 46:40
  Yeah, thank you thank you for sharing that because again, I think it's like culture, far too often, even as Christian entrepreneurs, prayer sometimes take a takes a back seat,
• 46:49
  right?
• 46:49
  Um where it should be in the in the driver's seat.
• 46:52
  Jesus in in your prayer life should be in the driver's seat.
• 46:55
  Uh so uh so I do wanna where can people find out more about you, like any type of resources that you may have that we can share?
• 47:04
  I I'm uh pushpay is um on all the socials you can imagine.
• 47:08
  Uh www.pushpay.com is is obviously our website.
• 47:12
  We just picked up a little company I mentioned earlier earlier called Nurture, nurture.io.
• 47:17
  Those that are uh in in the faith space, those that are serving the church, would love you to kind of to to to check that out so you can see kind of where we're thinking about our
• 47:26
  products and services going forward.
• 47:28
  And then catch me on LinkedIn.
• 47:29
  Um I I I'm there often.
• 47:31
  Uh I use that as kind of my my social media platform of choice uh as I as I collide both faith as well as business uh on a daily basis.
• 47:40
  So yeah, check me out there.
• 47:43
  Thank you so much, Kenny.
• 47:44
  And until next time, entrepreneurs, keep moving forward.