“The reality is that the moment you get a new position you start looking for the next one. That’s how you survive,” he said.
I was having lunch with Skip, a professional colleague with whom I had once worked at Microsoft. I’d long since left with a few guys and a couple million bucks of angel funding to start something new, but he was still there many years later.
He’d figured out how to play the game.
The Microsoft of that era re-organized at least twice a year. Skip had figured out that the game was one of making allies who’d want you on their team when the next reorg happened so you didn’t just become a casualty of another structural change. I learned from him that another former colleague, Don, had been laid off and re-hired three times. He wasn’t let go because of work performance; he was in the wrong place at the wrong time.
What does that tell you about the underlying leadership philosophy?
It’s summed up well by another acquaintance of mine:
Some people move numbers; some people move people. ~ Justin Foster
In other words, Microsoft — or more accurately someone at Microsoft — didn’t see Don as a person. He was seen as a number.
A Christian worldview invites us (or even challenges us) to see things differently. Let me explain by way of another situation.
Years later I’m in a conference room with a VP who’d hired me to consult on some product development and go-to-market stuff. But at one point the conversation turned to an issue he was having with one of his direct reports. The employee’s productivity was sub-par, explainable in part due to legitimate difficulties she had going on in her life. After asking a few questions, here’s a line of reasoning that I shared with him.
The Bible records a story of two widows, a Moabite woman named Ruth and her mother-in-law, Naomi, an Israelite. The story begins when Ruth’s husband — Naomi’s son — dies and Naomi decided to return to her native Israel. Ruth wants to go with her and pleads, “Your people will be my people, and your God will be my God.”
Since they were widows, they’d likely be at the low end of the economic class structure. Israelite law provided for their own widows by way of commands to the patriarchs who were landowners. At that time in the Ancient Near East, it was radically humane compared to the surrounding nations. Interestingly, the Israelite law also included similar provision for — to use contemporary language — a naturalized citizen who, you guessed it, had to agree to civil, ceremonial, and moral laws of the Israelites. And such would be Ruth as she trusted and followed the Israelite God as her own.
Enter Boaz, an Israelite and relative of Naomi’s, a wealthy landowner who happened to take his own relationship with God seriously. One of the Israelite laws, which Boaz made sure was enforced among his workers, was to not harvest all a field. What was left would provide for those less fortunate Israelites who would come along behind them.
“To be sure,” I told Scott, “as Christians we are not under the Old Testament civil law. But there is a principle that I think still applies — the command to have compassion on widows and orphans and the poor.
“There is also clear individual mandate to work and be productive that goes back to the creation of Adam and is corroborated in the New Testament. The principle found throughout Scripture is one of stewardship (or being a good manager), the clear meaning of which is that you’re managing something that is not your own, namely God’s. You have a responsibility be faithful to shareholders with your promise to deliver the best return on their investment that you can, and so also your employees have the same responsibility to you. To be fair, that sometimes may call for normal business stuff like letting an employee go.
Scott pondered for a moment. “So how do I balance the two?”
“Remember what Paul wrote in his second letter to the church in Corinth — God loves a cheerful giver? What’s he saying? He’s not writing that they should follow a formula or policy or ancient law, he’s telling them that the consequence of trusting God produces a reward that you, in turn, should use to bless others and bring Him honor. We do that when we are stewards consistent with His heart, and He clearly has a heart for widows and orphans and otherwise hurting people.
Here’s the catch: it’s not an act of love on your part if it’s coerced. A government law or corporate policy or set of rules may coercively force you to do something, but God wants your heart to be like His, regardless of rules or laws, your actions flow from your heart.
“I acknowledge that your employee is basically costing you money, and I think you’re morally in the clear whichever way you go. It looks to me like the question before you is what ‘leaving the corners of your field for the gleaners’ means to you in your walk with God?”
I’d known Scott to be a great guy before he became a Jesus-follower, and yet I also saw beautiful transformation afterwards that could only have happened with a Spirit-filled heart. He was sharp. I didn’t have to explain. He was the Boaz in his own life story.
After a moment he said, “The board will understand. I think I will be acting in their best interest if I cut her some slack, and if they don’t, I’ll take the heat myself.”
Some people move numbers. Scott? A mover of people. Just like Jesus.
***
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Roger Courville, CSP is a globally-recognized expert in communications, an award-winning author, and a passionately bad guitarist. A five-time entrepreneur and certified John Maxwell Team leadership coach, his latest endeavor is For The Hope, a daily Bible and apologetics podcast and training company equipping on-the-go professionals with confidence and courage for marketplace relationships. On Twitter can follow him @RogerCourville and/or his podcast @JoinForTheHope, or get all updates by email subscription at www.forthehope.org.