Latest / Topeka Bible Church Audio Archive / January 11, 2018 | Men Of Success - Winter 2018, Session 1 - Good to Great

Transcript

January 11, 2018 | Men Of Success - Winter 2018, Session 1 - Good to Great · Topeka Bible Church Audio Archive

• 0:00
  SPEAKER_01: All right, good morning, men.
• 0:02
  SPEAKER_01: Welcome back to uh another semester of um men of success.
• 0:08
  SPEAKER_01: Had to think there for a minute.
• 0:09
  SPEAKER_01: I mind was moving ahead on what I was gonna say.
• 0:13
  SPEAKER_01: Um I was rummaging through a drawer this morning looking for some other papers and came across a book, Good to Great.
• 0:20
  SPEAKER_01: Don't look just like the one that these guys are gonna talk about, but it's good to great in God's eyes.
• 0:25
  SPEAKER_01: It's written by Chip Ingram.
• 0:26
  SPEAKER_01: And uh got me uh got me thinking about, you know, as we talk about being men of success, success is defined in a lot of different ways.
• 0:34
  SPEAKER_01: Success in business, and we're using business books.
• 0:37
  SPEAKER_01: Uh success as a husband, success as a father.
• 0:40
  SPEAKER_01: I know we were challenged, at least at our table one time this past year by Tommy uh about gee how to apply these things in our family.
• 0:47
  SPEAKER_01: So just uh thinking about this year, maybe just to throw out a challenge to uh start the new year to uh kind of you and God talk about gee, God, how would you define success in my life?
• 0:58
  SPEAKER_01: I might define it one way, but uh what does success look like in uh in God's eyes?
• 1:02
  SPEAKER_01: So uh I'm gonna turn it over.
• 1:03
  SPEAKER_01: I think Jim's on a tight timetable, so uh kick it off, guys.
• 1:07
  SPEAKER_01: Thanks, Paul.
• 1:09
  SPEAKER_02: I bet you wish you were in Los Valley Ranch with your wife and daughter, yeah.
• 1:14
  SPEAKER_00: And can we just give a quick quick hand to Eric and Wes for getting all this breakfast and all that kind of stuff together?
• 1:22
  SPEAKER_00: That's awesome.
• 1:23
  SPEAKER_00: Because Tom is sick or something, right?
• 1:25
  SPEAKER_00: Coming coming through in the clutch.
• 1:26
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 1:29
  SPEAKER_00: Um Tom wasn't feeling good, and so these guys stepped up and and did a great job this morning.
• 1:34
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, no kidding.
• 1:35
  SPEAKER_00: Oh, also, if you I know some of you guys asked last semester for the slides from each of the sessions.
• 1:43
  SPEAKER_00: If you go to discovertbc.com, there's the audio, but then uh for last semester, there's also the slides from each of those sessions that are on there that correspond with each audio uh session.
• 1:55
  SPEAKER_00: So that's for you to know if you're interested in in checking that out.
• 1:59
  SPEAKER_02: And this morning, okay, so we're planning 12 classes uh going up the, I think it's the week before Easter.
• 2:06
  SPEAKER_02: That would be through March 29.
• 2:08
  SPEAKER_02: It'll either be that or 10 classes, but right now we're planning on 12.
• 2:11
  SPEAKER_02: I got two lot, too big a stack of great business books.
• 2:14
  SPEAKER_02: But this morning we're gonna start a two-week session in the most famous and maybe the best business book written in the last 20 years, very famous, Good to Great, Jim Collins, subtitled Uh, Why Some Companies Uh Make the Leap and Others Don't.
• 2:30
  SPEAKER_02: And sorry, I gotta I gotta talk at the Capitol uh legislator's breakfast at seven, so I gotta run.
• 2:37
  SPEAKER_02: So we're gonna do the first four chapters.
• 2:39
  SPEAKER_02: There are actually eight chapters in this book, and they're so good, so good.
• 2:45
  SPEAKER_02: In fact, something from chapter three, in the middle of a board meeting in San Francisco day before yesterday, they were discussing hiring a CFO, a financial officer, and so forth, and saying, I feel like we've been looking for nine months, we just haven't found one, but we found some decent ones.
• 3:01
  SPEAKER_02: I'm thinking we ought to just hire one.
• 3:03
  SPEAKER_02: Well, I pulled out chapter three, good to great, where he says, unless you find the absolute right person, don't hire.
• 3:10
  SPEAKER_02: And uh it made the difference.
• 3:13
  SPEAKER_02: So uh let's let's take a look.
• 3:15
  SPEAKER_02: The in there's an introductory chapter.
• 3:17
  SPEAKER_02: I'm gonna take that, uh, and then Derek's gonna oversee the very first important chapter.
• 3:22
  SPEAKER_02: But the first chapter I thought it was good for us because it's because it's biblical.
• 3:26
  SPEAKER_02: Good is the enemy of great.
• 3:28
  SPEAKER_02: And he starts his book with these words good is the enemy of great, and that is one of the key reasons why we have so little that becomes great.
• 3:36
  SPEAKER_02: We don't have great schools, principally because we have good schools.
• 3:40
  SPEAKER_02: By the way, you do know that all the schools in town have been called off, right?
• 3:43
  SPEAKER_02: My wife called off care parabell at five o'clock.
• 3:47
  SPEAKER_02: We don't have great government principally because we have good government.
• 3:50
  SPEAKER_02: Few people attain great lives, in large part because it is just easy to settle for a good life.
• 3:56
  SPEAKER_02: The vast majority of companies never become great precisely because the vast majority become quite good, and that is their main problem.
• 4:03
  SPEAKER_02: So they looked at companies which, in the last, this book was written in 2003 or four.
• 4:09
  SPEAKER_02: Yes, looked at companies which had become super great uh between 1975 and 2000, and looked at their direct comparisons, companies that were exactly where they were or ahead of them in 1975, compared them, did a lot of research.
• 4:23
  SPEAKER_02: So, for instance, uh the first company they talk about, uh the they had comparison companies.
• 4:29
  SPEAKER_02: So they compared Walgreens, which has become one of the top retailers in America, with Eckert Drugs, which was number one back in the 50s, 60s, 70s, and uh run by a famous guy named Jack Eckerd.
• 4:42
  SPEAKER_02: And then they have successful ones like Abbott and compared it to Upjohn, Circuit City, which went crazy compared to Siloff, Fannie Mae as versus Great Western, and so forth and so on, Pitney Bowes as versus addressograph.
• 4:54
  SPEAKER_02: And when they discovered the key to why some companies moved from good to great, they found it was not any of the things that they expected.
• 5:04
  SPEAKER_02: It was not celebrity leaders brought in from the outside to run the company, superstar leaders.
• 5:10
  SPEAKER_02: It wasn't super salaries, it wasn't some special compensation program by which they motivated people out of their gourd.
• 5:17
  SPEAKER_02: It wasn't some super strategy that was better than everybody else's strategy.
• 5:21
  SPEAKER_02: It wasn't super tactics or technology management or motivators.
• 5:26
  SPEAKER_02: What they found was, and these are the six chapters we'll look at, they found level five leaders, first who then what.
• 5:34
  SPEAKER_02: They confronted the brutal facts, chapter three, chapter four, hedgehog, chapter five, culture of discipline, chapter six, technology accelerators.
• 5:44
  SPEAKER_02: So uh we're gonna jump right into these and with chapter two.
• 5:48
  SPEAKER_00: Perfect.
• 5:49
  SPEAKER_00: And so the the first one that Jim mentioned, the first key component was this level five leader.
• 5:55
  SPEAKER_00: Have any of you guys ever heard of a level five leader before?
• 5:58
  SPEAKER_00: Okay, so some of us have, some of us haven't.
• 6:01
  SPEAKER_00: There's he he kind of has it on this this scale.
• 6:04
  SPEAKER_00: So from one highly capable individual, two contributing team member, three, competent manager, four, effective leader, and five is this executive level.
• 6:13
  SPEAKER_00: So this level five leader, uh you can see the characteristics building enduring greatness through a paradoxical blend of, and these are the two things that he puts together, and somehow they have to be in a person at the same time in order for them to be a level five leader, and that's humility and a professional will.
• 6:33
  SPEAKER_00: So they're they're driving towards what they know is right.
• 6:37
  SPEAKER_00: And so you can think of Abraham Lincoln, this guy who we think of, he he was very humble, but he's also very stern.
• 6:45
  SPEAKER_00: He was also very steadfast in what he believed in doing what he knew was right, even when people thought that he was crazy, even when people were against him, you know, for trying to end slavery and do all these different things.
• 6:58
  SPEAKER_00: And you can also think of Jesus as this level five leader, the the epitome of humility, completely humble.
• 7:10
  SPEAKER_00: He he's our example for humility, but he also had this strong will.
• 7:15
  SPEAKER_00: He drove towards what was right, he drove towards doing the right thing, even when it was difficult.
• 7:22
  SPEAKER_00: So you can think of him when you know people are in the in the temple and they're trying to turn it into a little market selling different things, and he comes in and flips tables and stuff like that and says, No, this is not what we're gonna do.
• 7:35
  SPEAKER_00: Because he could have easily been just the just the humble guy and said, Hey guys, uh maybe this isn't so good, but if you want to do it, it's okay.
• 7:44
  SPEAKER_00: No, he said, This is my stance, this is what's right, we're sticking with it, all in humility at the same time.
• 7:50
  SPEAKER_02: I love extreme personal humility, intense professional will.
• 7:55
  SPEAKER_02: Now he sort of fleshes those out in this, in this, uh I don't know if anybody can see this uh chart.
• 8:01
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, so if you guys look on there, you can see some of those characteristics of humility, so the the modesty, not being boastful.
• 8:10
  SPEAKER_02: Umesty, yeah.
• 8:13
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, that's that's interesting.
• 8:15
  SPEAKER_00: And so when he goes through the book and he's highlighting different CEOs, he's looking at them and realizing that these level five leaders are not the guys who are huge in the press.
• 8:28
  SPEAKER_00: They're typically not the guys who people are lining up to interview, but these guys humbly and faithfully serve their company every day.
• 8:37
  SPEAKER_00: But one of the most important things is that as they're serving as CEOs of these huge major companies and corporations, it's not about themselves.
• 8:48
  SPEAKER_00: It's not about patting their wallet, though they're getting compensated very well.
• 8:52
  SPEAKER_00: It's not about the prestige, though they are obviously prestigious because they're leading the organization.
• 8:57
  SPEAKER_00: But their primary motivation is how do we get this corporation, this team, this group, this entity to be great?
• 9:07
  SPEAKER_00: More than how do I make myself great, or how can I be the absolute best and make sure that everybody knows it?
• 9:14
  SPEAKER_00: And so in our organizations, as we're leading, in whatever capacity we're leading, how can we be level five leaders?
• 9:22
  SPEAKER_00: How can we have extreme humility, truly careful people care for people, not be boastful, but also have that extreme will.
• 9:31
  SPEAKER_00: And so one of the positive examples is uh Walgreens.
• 9:36
  SPEAKER_00: So one of the uh one of the CEOs, I think he was one of the sons in the 80s, and uh his last name was Walgreen, and he was he was one of these guys and he made a decision to say, hey, in five years, we are completely out of the restaurant business.
• 9:56
  SPEAKER_00: He walked in.
• 9:56
  SPEAKER_00: I don't know if there's a slide about that or not.
• 9:58
  SPEAKER_02: Nope, yes, not going.
• 9:59
  SPEAKER_00: But anyway, he walked in and said, We're completely out of the restaurant business in five years.
• 10:05
  SPEAKER_00: And his team looks at him like he's you know kind of kidding or whatever.
• 10:08
  SPEAKER_02: Didn't know Walgreens did restaurants, did you?
• 10:11
  SPEAKER_00: Six months later, one of the team members they they have another board meeting.
• 10:14
  SPEAKER_00: One of the team members says, Hey guys, so you know Walgreens said that we've got five years to get out of the restaurant business.
• 10:20
  SPEAKER_00: And he says, No, we had five years to get out of the restaurant business six months ago.
• 10:26
  SPEAKER_00: Now we have four and a half years.
• 10:28
  SPEAKER_00: Get to it.
• 10:29
  SPEAKER_02: So that's kind of that that's that example will and determination.
• 10:33
  SPEAKER_00: That's that will part, which is really exciting.
• 10:36
  SPEAKER_00: And then you've got guys like Galt, who was CEO of RubberMade, and he was one of he was a level four leader where he could be really great.
• 10:45
  SPEAKER_00: He brought the company to great levels, but as soon as he left, the company falls apart because he was in it for himself, he wasn't that level five, he didn't exhibit that humility, though he was very talented.
• 10:59
  SPEAKER_00: He did not build up the organization, did not build up the team to be great beyond his presence being there, which is something that a lot of organizations have, kind of the the hero leader.
• 11:12
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, it's uh what did you think in the mirror window thing at the end of the chapter where level four leaders, there's a mirror and there's a window.
• 11:19
  SPEAKER_02: When things go really well, the level five leader looks out the window and says, it was them who did it, or it was luck.
• 11:26
  SPEAKER_02: Now, oftentimes they use the word luck.
• 11:28
  SPEAKER_02: I was lucky, or it was other people that made us successful.
• 11:32
  SPEAKER_02: Level four leader looks in the mirror at that point and goes, it was me.
• 11:36
  SPEAKER_02: And when things go badly, the level five leader looks in the mirror and says, I'll take full responsibility.
• 11:42
  SPEAKER_02: It must have been me.
• 11:43
  SPEAKER_02: Whereas the level four leader is going, oh, it's the culture we live in, or it's the society, or it's this other company, or it's you know, I had a bad vice president.
• 11:51
  SPEAKER_02: I thought that was really a great example.
• 11:53
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, so looking at who we blame.
• 11:55
  SPEAKER_00: And so the X factor, look at that.
• 11:57
  SPEAKER_00: The X factor of great leadership is not personality, it's humility.
• 12:01
  SPEAKER_02: And that's really uh biblical.
• 12:03
  SPEAKER_02: I mean, uh uh uh Proverbs, uh pride leads to disgrace, with humility comes wisdom.
• 12:08
  SPEAKER_02: One of the greatest, if not the greatest, leader of the Old Testament.
• 12:11
  SPEAKER_02: Moses was a humble man, the most humble man on the face of the earth.
• 12:15
  SPEAKER_02: I think this is the most surprising thing about the book when it came out was the focus on humility.
• 12:20
  SPEAKER_02: So um, do you want to read this uh final quote uh chapter two?
• 12:25
  SPEAKER_00: It says level five leaders channel their ego needs away from themselves and into the larger goal of building a great company.
• 12:31
  SPEAKER_00: It's not that level five leaders have no ego or self-interest.
• 12:35
  SPEAKER_00: Indeed, they're incredibly ambitious, but their ambition is first and foremost for the institution, not themselves.
• 12:42
  unknown: Wow.
• 12:42
  SPEAKER_02: Isn't that good?
• 12:43
  SPEAKER_02: That's huge.
• 12:44
  SPEAKER_02: Okay, so I I feel like there's a lot of similarities between that chapter and the next one, which is the second issue, is these companies focus first on the who and then the what.
• 12:56
  SPEAKER_02: The chapter begins with these words.
• 12:58
  SPEAKER_02: When we begin, we expected to find that the first step in taking a company from good to great would be to set a new direction, a new vision, a new strategy for the company, and then to get people committed and aligned behind that new direction.
• 13:14
  SPEAKER_02: We found something quite the opposite.
• 13:17
  SPEAKER_02: The executives who ignited the transformations from good to great did not first figure out where to drive the bus and then get people to take it there.
• 13:27
  SPEAKER_02: No, they first got the right people on the bus and the wrong people off the bus, and then figured out where to drive it.
• 13:35
  SPEAKER_02: They said, in essence, look, I don't really know where we should take this bus, but I know this much.
• 13:41
  SPEAKER_02: If we get the right people on the bus, the right people in the right seats, and the wrong people off the bus, then we'll figure out how to take it someplace great.
• 13:51
  SPEAKER_02: And that's probably the other biggest point that people remember from this book, this whole idea that there is a bus, and the first thing you should be concerned about is getting the right people on your bus, the wrong people off your bus, and then move the right people around until they're in the right seats.
• 14:09
  SPEAKER_02: Isn't that cool?
• 14:10
  unknown: Yeah.
• 14:11
  SPEAKER_00: But it takes some courage and some guts to make some of those moves.
• 14:16
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, he says that's the hardest thing is those people moves.
• 14:20
  SPEAKER_02: Now, at level four leaders, that is really good leaders, uh, but not level five, are always about first the what, a strategy, and then the who.
• 14:30
  SPEAKER_02: And a quotation here the contrast between Jack Eckard, who is this remarkable CEO of Eckert Drugs, built the whole thing.
• 14:39
  SPEAKER_02: It was his personality, he was brilliant.
• 14:41
  SPEAKER_02: The contrast between Jack Eckard and Cork Walgreen is striking.
• 14:45
  SPEAKER_02: Whereas Jack Eckard had a genius for picking the right stores to buy, that's strategy.
• 14:52
  SPEAKER_02: Cork Walgreen had a genius for picking the right people to hire.
• 15:03
  SPEAKER_02: You know, they've just gone downhill, and uh Walgreens is great.
• 15:07
  SPEAKER_02: So um he has this quote in the book: great vision without great people is irrelevant.
• 15:15
  SPEAKER_02: Ecclesiastes 10 7 agrees.
• 15:17
  SPEAKER_02: I have seen servants, that is, inferior leaders upon horses, and I've seen princes, that is, great leaders in menial positions or on foot.
• 15:28
  SPEAKER_02: So first who, then what?
• 15:31
  SPEAKER_02: Now we're gonna move uh that's the first two chapters, and to become great, he has three categories disciplined people, and that's what you and I have just taken.
• 15:42
  SPEAKER_02: We've talked about the people.
• 15:43
  SPEAKER_02: Now we move to disciplined thought, and we move to chapter four, and uh next week we'll finish disciplined thought and get into disciplined action.
• 15:53
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, so here's here's an interesting.
• 15:55
  SPEAKER_00: How many of you guys remember A P?
• 15:58
  SPEAKER_00: Okay, they they used to be the powerhouse in grocery stores, they had grocery stores everywhere, and they that's a choir singing right now, I think.
• 16:08
  SPEAKER_00: That's hallelujah.
• 16:09
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, we should put that on here.
• 16:13
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, so back in the 50s, and then we see on here from 75 to 2000, Kroger generated returns that were 80 times.
• 16:23
  SPEAKER_00: 80 times AP.
• 16:25
  SPEAKER_00: And so one of the really interesting things about how you don't see AP anymore, but you see Kroger across the nation, and you see all the subsidiaries of Kroger, you see the Baker, you see uh the quick, the quick shops, and all that's Kroger.
• 16:41
  SPEAKER_00: So they've got branded, they're completely branded, different parts of the country, all that kind of stuff.
• 16:46
  SPEAKER_00: But they are huge now, and one of the big reasons for this, and and it comes down to change, because during this time they started to re both companies actually started to realize that people no longer wanted the the traditional grocery store where you just come in and get groceries and then you leave.
• 17:07
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah that's it.
• 17:08
  SPEAKER_00: No, they wanted the drugstore to be in there, and they wanted to be able to buy paper products while they were in there, and they wanted to be able to buy, you know, all these different things, kind of a one-stop shop, and they they actually both did the research.
• 17:21
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, they both did research and they both came to the same conclusions that this new model of kind of the one-stop shop is what people wanted.
• 17:30
  SPEAKER_00: And AP even opened up a kind of a test, kind of a pilot store called, I think it was called the Golden Key, where it was this one-stop shop, and it was it was successful, and people were going to it.
• 17:44
  SPEAKER_00: But the difference between these two companies was that Kroger decided, okay, this is what the customers want, this is where the demand is.
• 17:53
  SPEAKER_00: We're gonna get out of this traditional grocery store setting and we're gonna start going to to these bigger models, these kind of one-stop shop kind of places where AP had the exact same information, exact same research, pretty much, and they said, No, we're gonna try to stick it out, even though we know this isn't what the customer actually wants.
• 18:15
  SPEAKER_00: And we come to today and we don't see AP anymore, but we do see Kroger's left and right all across the country.
• 18:22
  SPEAKER_00: And so when we get into this, the the title is Confront the Brutal Facts, yet never lose faith.
• 18:28
  SPEAKER_00: And so the brutal facts were the customers want the bigger stores.
• 18:32
  SPEAKER_00: But AMP didn't want to face that and didn't want to change and adapt to that, whereas Kroger did, which is really interesting.
• 18:40
  SPEAKER_02: You see this in churches, you see this in families and homes and so forth, where where you see where trouble is developing.
• 18:47
  SPEAKER_02: And then, you know, the husband goes, you know, he ignores it, or the pastor ignores it, or or the boss ignores it.
• 18:54
  SPEAKER_02: They don't want to confront the brutal facts and actually deal with it.
• 18:57
  SPEAKER_02: It's easier to just sit on the couch.
• 18:59
  SPEAKER_02: And and uh so I I thought this was really fascinating.
• 19:03
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, I read this book a few weeks ago, and not good to great, but um it's a book actually about church theft.
• 19:12
  SPEAKER_00: And there's a company and they go and they study different churches and they help churches out and see where's the embezzlement happening, where's the theft happening?
• 19:21
  SPEAKER_00: And it's amazing to me in each of these stories how different people within the church would suspect that something was going wrong, suspect the embezzlement, but they wouldn't take action, they wouldn't take courage, they wouldn't face those brutal facts and actually do something about it because they wanted to believe, well, they're a nice guy or they've been here for so long.
• 19:42
  SPEAKER_00: How could it possibly be when all the signs pointed to this is happening, this is there.
• 19:48
  SPEAKER_02: We're uh um and in a few minutes uh we're gonna move you to group discussion, and you'll notice question number four here.
• 19:57
  SPEAKER_02: We're gonna, it'll be a group group discussion starter.
• 19:59
  SPEAKER_02: In your experience, do people confront the brute fracks or avoid them?
• 20:04
  SPEAKER_02: Are you yourself a confronter or avoider?
• 20:07
  SPEAKER_02: Now there is one more thing in this chapter I thought was so important about the Stockdale paradox?
• 20:12
  SPEAKER_00: Stockdale paradox, which is interesting.
• 20:15
  SPEAKER_00: Stockdale was he was a prisoner of war in Vietnam.
• 20:19
  SPEAKER_00: Okay, we'll see ya.
• 20:20
  SPEAKER_00: Have a good breakfast.
• 20:22
  SPEAKER_00: This Stockdale paradox.
• 20:28
  SPEAKER_00: So Stockdale, he ended up being a prisoner of war over in Vietnam.
• 20:32
  SPEAKER_00: And he's in this camp, he's in this prison, and he had this mindset that he thought that he was going to get out.
• 20:41
  SPEAKER_00: He thought, eventually I'm going to get out.
• 20:43
  SPEAKER_00: And so he's continues in the camp, continues in the camp, and he constantly sees his comrades who are also POWs, and they start to die off, start to die off, start to die off.
• 20:55
  SPEAKER_00: And he eventually does make it out.
• 20:58
  SPEAKER_00: And he said that one of the differences between him and all of his comrades, who not all of them, but several of them who died during that process is that some of his comrades thought, man, I'm gonna be out by Christmas, and then it didn't happen.
• 21:14
  SPEAKER_00: I'm gonna be out by Easter, and then it didn't happen.
• 21:17
  SPEAKER_00: I'm gonna be out by the fall again, then it didn't happen.
• 21:21
  SPEAKER_00: And so the the perspective was different, and then he said something that was interesting, interesting.
• 21:28
  SPEAKER_00: He said, a lot of these guys died because of a broken heart.
• 21:33
  SPEAKER_00: Whereas his view was a little bit different, and you see, kind of retaining the faith, but also facing the brutal facts.
• 21:40
  SPEAKER_00: His view was different that he thought, man, I'm going to get out.
• 21:44
  SPEAKER_00: I don't know when, but it will happen at some point.
• 21:48
  SPEAKER_00: And so somehow that gave him some motivation, some drive to be able to face the brutal facts that, hey, we're stuck here.
• 21:55
  SPEAKER_00: We don't know when we're gonna get gonna get out.
• 21:58
  SPEAKER_00: But also having faith to say, Man, I really believe that we are gonna get out of here at some point.
• 22:03
  SPEAKER_00: And then you see Churchill, he had something that was very similar and he was big on the brutal facts.
• 22:11
  SPEAKER_00: He was, he was, he thought it was so important that he actually created a council called the Statistical Office.
• 22:20
  SPEAKER_00: He created this council called the Statistical Office because he knew that because he was the top guy, that some people would be afraid to tell him what they were seeing, tell him what they were thinking, because they were afraid of his reaction to them.
• 22:35
  SPEAKER_00: But he wanted the facts so badly that he created an entire other council so that other people could tell them, hey, here's the brutal facts, this is what we're saying, and then they would tell him, which was a huge part in him being able to have the facts, to make those good decisions, and to be able to be a conqueror, to be able to be a leader.
• 22:56
  SPEAKER_00: And without some of that information, some of us, all of us, will be short on the best information, the right information to be able to make best decisions for our specific companies.
• 23:08
  SPEAKER_00: And we see this in Christ, I think.
• 23:13
  SPEAKER_00: We see this paradox of how do we face the brutal facts, but also have faith that we're gonna win in the end.
• 23:22
  SPEAKER_00: And you see Mark 8, 31 to 33, and he began to teach them that the Son of Man must suffer many things, and be rejected by the elders, and chief priests, and scribes, and be killed, and after three days rise again.
• 23:35
  SPEAKER_00: He spoke to the he spoke this word openly.
• 23:37
  SPEAKER_00: And Peter took him aside and began to rebuke him.
• 23:40
  SPEAKER_00: But when he had turned around and looked at his disciples, he rebuked Peter, saying, Get behind me, Satan, for you are not mindful of the things of God, but the things of men.
• 23:52
  SPEAKER_00: So we see Jesus, he had to face the brutal facts.
• 23:56
  SPEAKER_00: Even at one point he says, Father, if there's another way, then going to the cross and being beaten and doing all that, if there's another way, can we do that?
• 24:05
  SPEAKER_00: And he knew that the Father's will was that this is how he wanted to save the world.
• 24:09
  SPEAKER_00: This is how he wanted to create that way of salvation for each of us who are completely unworthy to be in God's presence for any length of time, let alone be in it forever.
• 24:20
  SPEAKER_00: And so he faced those brutal facts that this was how it was going to be done, but he also had faith.
• 24:25
  SPEAKER_00: He also knew, and we see in Hebrews looking unto Jesus, the author and finisher of our faith, who for the joy that was set before him endured the cross, despising the shame, and as and as sat down at the right hand of the throne of God.
• 24:41
  SPEAKER_00: And so we see something interesting in there that it was, though it was painful, those these were the brutal, this was the brutal reality that he was gonna have to go through all of this for us.
• 24:52
  SPEAKER_00: He knew and had faith that he was going to win and he was going to be reunited with his people, those of us who believe in him as our savior, that we would be reunited and be able to live with him absolutely forever.
• 25:07
  SPEAKER_00: And so, in some of our contexts, in our lives, in our personal lives, in church, in our businesses, and things like that, how sometimes it's really difficult to face brutal facts and have faith that somehow something greater is coming along in spite of those facts.
• 25:29
  SPEAKER_00: And so to have both of those things at the exact same time.
• 25:44
  SPEAKER_00: We're gonna look at some of these principles that come out.
• 25:46
  SPEAKER_00: And one of the things that I think is really cool about Jim Collins is he has in the book, he has a picture, and his research team is like 20 people.
• 25:55
  SPEAKER_00: So he has all these researchers researching all these companies, doing interviews, doing, looking through articles, looking at all kinds of things.
• 26:02
  SPEAKER_00: And all of that comes to a head, all of that culminates in this book, which is so fascinating, and there's so many great uh leadership things for us.
• 26:11
  SPEAKER_00: So let me pray for us, and then we can go into our group discussion.
• 26:15
  SPEAKER_00: Heavenly Father, thank you for your goodness to us, thank you for your grace and your love.
• 26:20
  SPEAKER_00: Thank you that we can come together this morning, that we can see these different business principles, these different life principles, but also see how the principles that come out of the raw research, you've already stated for us in scripture.
• 26:34
  SPEAKER_00: You've told us that this is how things are.
• 26:36
  SPEAKER_00: You told us that you know humility is a key aspect of a level five leader, and you demonstrate that mainly through Christ.
• 26:44
  SPEAKER_00: Help us to be Christ like, help us to live for you each and every day.
• 26:47
  SPEAKER_00: In Jesus' name.
• 26:48
  SPEAKER_00: Amen.