Posted on 11/12/2006 7:14:22 AM PST by Alex Murphy
Tampa, Fla. — When Mark Dillon has a management problem, he heads straight to the Bible.
The president of closely held Tampa Bay Steel Corp. changed how the metals distributor pays its bills with help from the Book of Proverbs. He turned to the Book of Matthew for advice on dealing with a delinquent customer. Agonizing over a pre-Christmas layoff, he took comfort from Jesus' admonition to “do to others what you would have them do to you.”
“I thought: 'Do unto others,'” recalls Dillon. “If I was going to be laid off, I'd rather know before I spent all that money on Christmas presents.”
Dillon is one of a number of top executives using religion — especially evangelical Christianity — to guide decisions he makes each day at the office. The chief executive of staffing firm Kforce Inc. says Biblical principles led his finance chief to choose a pricier software vendor over a cheaper but less scrupulous one. The chairman of poultry producer Pilgrim's Pride Corp. says he rejected a bank's cost-cutting plan because it didn't show enough compassion. Kforce and Pilgrim's Pride are publicly traded.
Experts say U.S. workplaces have become more religiously diverse, forcing companies to rethink everything from vacation policies to the cafeteria menu. And though managers of all faiths are bringing a spiritual touch to the corner office, in the U.S., evangelical Christians are the most active.
Christian titles such as “Jesus, CEO” and “Joy at Work” appear on business best-seller lists. Christian publisher Thomas Nelson three years ago started a unit devoted to business books; in the year ended March 31, that division had $9.5 million in sales, 73 percent more than the year before. The business school of Regent University, which advertises on its Web site that it “supercharges students for success in God's eyes,” saw enrollment rise 44 percent last year. And C12 Group — a network of executives, like Dillon, who meet monthly to discuss management trends and the tricky intersections of religion and commerce — has grown from three sets of 12 Christian business executives in 1992 to nearly 550 members today.
Christian managers say there's no inherent contradiction between running a company — even a public one with its commitment to maximize shareholder value — and behaving spiritually. And lawyers say it's generally not a problem to run a public company on faith-based principles, as long as the executives make those principles clear to shareholders, and make sure they don't follow faith to the exclusion of investor interests.
Skeptics say religion in the executive suite can alienate people with other beliefs. Federal law prohibits discrimination in hiring or promotion on the basis of religion. Employers may express religious views as long as staffers of different faiths don't feel pressured or unwelcome. “It's pretty much a balancing act,” says Dianna Johnston, assistant legal counsel for the U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission.
That leaves a lot open to interpretation. Complaints to the EEOC of workplace religious discrimination — mostly claims that employers didn't accommodate religious requests — rose to 2,340 in the fiscal year ended Sept. 30, 2005, from 1,581 in 1995. In contrast, complaints to the EEOC about workplace discrimination on the basis of race and sex each declined by more than 10 percent during the same period.
At a recent meeting of Dillon's C12 chapter recently, an executive raised a question that shows how difficult it can get. Whom should he choose as operations chief, the executive asked, the devout Christian who's less apt at the business, or the strong manager who's not very religious?
The room exploded in discussion. Can the devout manager be trained? Can the other be coached spiritually? If the executive explained his concerns honestly to the less religious supervisor, would that constitute discrimination? (Yes, say lawyers.) The executive who asked the question says he hasn't yet made a choice.
Dillon and others say executives can't and shouldn't separate their religious beliefs from their work. They say honesty, integrity and respect for family make good business sense and are core Christian principles. Dillon says at the office he stays away from hot-button issues like abortion.
Others say moral values transcend belief in a specific faith, or in God at all. “It's not just a Christian thing,” explains Tampa Bay Steel purchasing manager Cordreanne Richardson, who says she believes in God but doesn't share Dillon's beliefs.
Michael Ratzker — an observant Jew who closes his company on Jewish holidays and invites rabbis to lead study sessions at lunch — says he runs Midland Metals International, one of Tampa Bay Steel's biggest suppliers, along the same principles Dillon uses. Rather than Jesus, he cites a Talmudic story in which a rabbi challenged to teach the Torah while standing on one foot replies, “Do not do unto others what you hate being done to yourself.”
Last year, the two men traveled to Asia together on business. Ratzker didn't want to drive on the Jewish sabbath so Dillon ate with him at their hotel. On Saturdays, Ratzker went to synagogue; on Sundays Dillon found the local church.
Dillon was more hesitant about mixing religion with work in 1984 when he joined Tampa Bay Steel, now a $65 million company with 120 employees considered a midsize metals distributor. The 51-year-old accountant says he was a corporate go-getter who worked 70-hour weeks and fumed when owner and chief executive C. A. “Buck” McInnis left early to watch his daughters' softball games.
Dillon had begun his own religious transformation a few years earlier, after accompanying his wife to her boss's church as she sought a promotion. (She didn't get it.) Then, a few years after joining Tampa Bay Steel, Dillon became uncomfortable with the company's habit of paying its bills a few weeks late, even as it pushed customers to pay on time. He felt this violated a passage in the Book of Proverbs enjoining merchants to keep “honest scales.” He convinced McInnis, a Christian who says he's less “bold” about his faith than Dillon, to approve borrowing $500,000 to pay overdue bills.
In 1996, Dillon joined C12. Each month, members assign themselves spiritual and secular tasks. Following C12 advice, The man who once got angry at his boss for going to a child's ballgame cut his work hours, literally penciling time with God and his family onto his calendar. He donned a hard hat with a cross decal, prayed more publicly and sponsored Christian activities at work. Each year, the executives grade their companies on financial performance, as well as on spiritual matters like “saving souls” through evangelism at work. Last year, Dillon reported 21 people saved, 115 exposed to Christian teachings and $152,000 donated by Tampa Bay Steel, largely to Christian causes.
Not all Dillon's Christian management ideas went over well. By the late 1990s, Dillon had become wary of debt, heeding Proverbs 22:7 (“The borrower is servant to the lender”). He urged McInnis against a loan for a new plot of land. McInnis went ahead with the loan.
Four years ago, Dillon decided to craft a new company mission statement, taking his cue from Proverbs 29:18 (“Where there is no vision, the people perish”). He suggested the “do to others” passage from Matthew 7:12, attributing it to Jesus. Other company executives feared Dillon was pushing his religious beliefs too far. McInnis says he worried about offending others who didn't share Dillon's faith. The outspoken Richardson, 36, argued that non-Christian vendors would find a reference to Jesus jarring. She lobbied to also include a more secular “Honesty, Integrity, Service” on business cards. In the end, the statement cited the Book of Matthew, but didn't mention Jesus.
Richardson, who joined the company in 1994, and others say the Christian atmosphere can be overwhelming. The firm sponsors Bible study, offers free Bible camp for employees' children and hires a corporate chaplain to visit with employees.
Steve Wilson, a salesman who describes himself as an atheist, says Dillon once annoyed him with a preachy start to a sales meeting. In April, an employee who is a Jehovah's Witness asked to be excused from a company Easter picnic featuring an evangelist.
But Wilson and Richardson say they enjoy their jobs and have never felt pressured to change their beliefs. Richardson worried about her career when she recently stopped attending C12 sessions Dillon had recommended. He assured her it wouldn't affect her job.
But Richardson says working with Dillon has changed her, too. “My upbringing is, you don't mix religion and business,” she says. “But I still follow all these Christian principles with everyone I come in contact with.”
Some think that speaking too much "religion" in the work place causes problems.
Problems happen because we don't speak of God enough.
I seldom discuss religion with my employees, though some of them frequently will talk to me about their faith. But I always pray before I make large decisions, and my biggest prayer is that my employees and others I deal with will know I am a Christian by my actions.
I wish the press would stop covering Christianity and believing Christians as if they are a new anomaly in our country. Prayer before, during and after big decisions is something that has been commonplace among every level of person in our country since its beginnings. Maybe its just new to the libs in the media.
"I wish the press would stop covering Christianity and believing Christians as if they are a new anomaly in our country."
But Congress has been opening with prayers for how many years?
If it appears "new" to dishonest hearts, then it's what's revealed as prophesied.
Revelations 21:5
The one who sat on the throne said, "Behold, I make all things new."
Jesus Christ, Himself, is the Eternal Spring of Youth. All is youth for the One who danced through death's arms and over Hell's gate, who danced forth from His tomb.
Principle centered management is all this is. Plenty of secular books work from this basis. If everyone practiced this then we would not need government to stick its nose in business affairs.
I don't know if it's in the Bible... but a wise man once said... 'All press is good press.'
That would be nice. Especially as the idea of the Christian Business Man is in no way new. I have books from the eighteen hundreds that contain these principles. There have always been Christians who are in business and have turned to the Bible for guidance on how to deal with knotty problems.
Matthew 20:1-16 is a good example of a story that has some rather sharp lessons for both the owner and the worker.
The book of Nehemiah is full of business tips and of course so is Proverbs.
A similar statement is, "There's no such thing as 'bad pres'".
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