What's up guys people? I'm your host Jay wheel. This is inspire guys people where we balance faith and business to guide you to your purpose And I have a guest today the founder and CEO of Yakobod and also the Arthur author of at work as in heaven Mr. Scott rise or how you doing today Scott.
I'm doing great. Sure, man. I'm looking forward to taking in with you Yeah, I appreciate you, you know jumping on and having this conversation Scott like you know I told you prior to recording, you know I've looked and looked at a lot of your content I think we got a lot of things in common. So I'm looking forward to learning even more about you And I think the audience is gonna be able to grab a lot from your experience as a CEO like for if I'm not mistaken When I was looking at 20 plus years, let's just start right there.
It hasn't been 20 plus years since you started your business I'm not so young anymore, german Great hair all came for the business, but you know praise God here we are I can only I can only imagine but like the first thing I was really thinking about Scott before we even like getting to Learning a little bit about you. I was just like thinking like me like you have actually endured as a CEO Multiple recessions and then recently a pandemic and so like the first thing that came to my mind is like how have you sustained that because I know like a lot of our listeners are either entrepreneurs or business professionals or aspiring for either of those and like For a lot of people just this one pandemic, you know has kind of shaken up a lot So how have you over the last 20 years of an economy changing? Booms and busting and different things that happen in the world 911 like all type of tragedy tragedies and things How have you sustained a business for that long and like what advice would you give? Someone in business for you know, who's just going through a pandemic or maybe even starting a business on the back end of it Yeah, so it's even worse than you're thinking german because I started right before the dot-com bust You know that was a long time ago, right?
But you know all dot-com and everything cratered right then I have started just right before that with and and honestly You know I talk about it in the book and just to keep it brief I came to my faith later in life and when I came to faith like I knew like I'd gone to church on Sunday my whole youth and never knew God Right, so when I finally made the decision later in life that you know when he caused me to confront my spiritual condition Like I'm like it well if this doesn't work on Tuesday No reason for me to go to church on Sunday, right? I got plenty else to do so so when I made the decision to come to faith in my late 20s I was all in and that met my Tuesday was all in you know And so you know I've got busy trying to figure out how this stuff applied at work And and so when I started the company to you know get to the chase here I knew that the company had no chance of making it less God was in it and I had enough faith that if he was in it It was gonna work now If I knew now what I knew then I mean if I if I knew then what I know now, right? I didn't realize how little I knew back then so it's probably good I was so naive because that's the only way I actually had the faith to trust God I probably would have scared myself out of it. You know what I mean?
But I like that I you know in his grace We've navigated all these different cycles and and you know I'm not suggesting it's easy But you start to see the pattern of God providing and and things are going well Then things flow up and it's out of your control when you have God provides and you start to see that pattern over a long period of time And you just get that much more peace as you push in with him You said something that's like like really deep there Like you said that you were almost like speaking to the like your naive nature of like I was so naive That if I would have known now what I knew then I might have given up So like I'm just curious just off of that Like do you think there are some value? Sometimes in being a little naive like not ignorant right like not just yeah, but like is like sometimes do we know too much is what I'm asking Yeah, man, absolutely. Sometimes you can talk yourself out of it But all you really need is some childlike faith right when you just need and I was a child You know not physically but spiritually I was a child back then but I was all in so I just had to make the decision to trust God And that got tested right away of course But like I said you keep trusting and but if I didn't know as much as I know now You know like I didn't even know the difference high hardly knew the difference between sales and marketing back that I hardly knew what we were selling even right so And somehow he sustained this and that's the beauty of God's grace right like he he meets you where you are and and if you're just A little baby steps. Well, that's okay.
He's taking little baby steps with you You know what I mean? He's not mad because you aren't running yet. So that's that's funny Scott like thinking about so the difference between sales marketing and business development I actually heard you speaking about that and it's funny because I've worked in all of those three Fields in one way or another and you are right like on out from the outside looking in they all can look the same But when you are either running a business or working at a corporation you understand that there are very specific Responsibility skillsets required to operate in each of those and oftentimes as a CEO or entrepreneur You find yourself working in all of those fields. So it's super important to kind of understand the difference now Scott I kind of jump right into asking you about that But let's just take a step back tell us a little bit about yakobai which I know means the glory of God or God's glory Tell us a little bit about your business Which is the interesting thing to me is that it is you are in software in Security software if I'm not mistaken seems like some pretty high level stuff to be honest But can you just tell us like how does a security software company carry the name of God's glory like make that connection for us So the people out there we're like I'll get it.
That's the big question is it is it possible right can you do a company for God's glory? And and that's the question I was pushing into and you know I was just like I said child like babe I'm just gonna put the name on the wall and those are the days of Enron too if you remember and and so I kind of called it my anti-enron device Right, we'll just put it right out there to keep me, you know focused on yeah that instead of my own ego, right? So um, so we started out back then as a Really a consulting company wanting to be a software company um much more consultative and then a mentor of mine introduced me to a mentor of another guy and we connected my business partner Scott He was a believer. He had software and no clients and I had clients in a consulting company But no software so in about 2003 we put that together and we got the intellectual property core Which was good, you know because we weren't gonna be able to bootstrap it But it's been a long slow process of us learning how to turn from a complex consultative solution sale like a platform company And how to turn or an integrator if you will and how to turn that into a niche product company And that's been a long process but praise god We've been able to bootstrap that the whole way and and learn on our nickel instead of somebody else's and and so where we are now We've ended up we're purpose-built case management for security professionals It's not just that the software is secure.
It's specifically designed for security professionals like She can information security officers or insider threat teams or counter-insale and as crazy as the world is that's more and more important than companies You know and government agencies these things so Joshy, so your your target audience kind of it's interesting. It's in a very serious industry of the world right very important when you think about yeah Security and it sounds like you do, you know, you mentioned some government things like that like do you ever? Does the name Yakobah right in the one to mean in of it? And I know you I'm assuming you get the question of like what does that mean?
Does that ever come up from a client standpoint like do your clients ever ask or is it in that field? It just doesn't matter and you're just kind of doing what they do Well, if you remember when we started like um back then I don't know how in touch you were with that market back then But everybody was making up names to get domain names right it was the domain name land ground and so everybody was making up names So it wasn't unusual that I had this funny name. It's just that everybody was Persian word for surfer dude Like that's a great. I you know depression sir Like I that's awesome, you know, it's you know, but but none of those were relevant to me So it was you know, I went whole testament, you know, Yakobah Kabad the heavy weighty mighty glory of God and I was counseled by a lot of people back then that it was a really bad name Because people would be turned off by the whole god thing and but again, I was just like well, you know, I don't care You know, it's not gonna work if he's not in it So I'm not backing down to that and now I learned over time to you know, I don't like put it right in people's face But everybody back then asked me literally 100% of people asked me now.
We're down to about maybe 50 or 60% Okay, I still get asked all the time and um, I just you know tell them and employees know again We are employees are believers so they they know they can just deflect that to me is I don't know y'all look at the website I got you know, but I love it But I usually I don't get usually the reactions are fine You know, even the ones that I've learned to soften it a little bit and say yeah You know, it means God's glory and I just keeps us focused on our own egos and you know I'm not forcing them to make a face decision or force them I face on them But you know, I mean come from when you think about it though, right? Like how many other company names means something right? Some whether it be, um, you know, some myth some Greek mythology or other things like all type Nike, you know, all of these companies Have some sort of background that is in the case of Nike in particular because I read the book shoot dog And I've kind of understand and learned the entire story about how they came about like a lot of times like you as a founder and ceo That is actually part of what you're doing when you create a company from scratch is that you are weaving in your beliefs in the fabric of who you are Um, so it seems like sometimes people only have a problem with that when you're doing it from a christian perspective But um, I love it. I also love the fact what I really like about the way, um, and I don't know that you intentionally, you know Created it this way, but because the name yakabad doesn't have anything that directly to do with your industry It also creatively is just kind of like it's just there Right, at least some room for either assumption or to ask a question, but it doesn't even conflict with any of the work you do So I kind of I like that.
It's it's very the other thing I've discovered is it's really sticky People really remember it in a way I couldn't have predicted but I think that's because Ichabad everybody's heard of Ichabad Crane You know and in the bible Ichabad was what I saw some zibley, but it means no glory the glory has departed You know and it was a tragedy or people remember Ichabad and they hear yakabad and so You know, it's kind of cool the way that's worked out. That is cool So like can you tell us a little bit Scott about like who are you growing up? What i'm interested in now is like, okay How does how do you right? How did the younger you become the you today?
Was it was it obvious? Like if anybody who knew you growing up in high school or whatever may be met you today like oh, yes That makes all the sense in the world what he's doing like what was your reputation? Who were you growing up? Um and again, I'm curious like did you become who you obviously seem like you were on a path to become it or did you become something?
Something different Um, I would suggest that the people that are connected with me on fake book that are high school friends I would suggest they you know, they would recognize, you know, it wouldn't seem terribly out of sorts But but I will and I grew up in small town, Ohio like Midwestern Rust Belt It's got a lot of great stuff out of there the Midwestern work ethic or about I think you know, you got the same thing you're up in Michigan You got the same thing going on there. You got the loyalty to the community the community was for you not against you But but either I'm sure you also remember, you know, the Rust Belt collapsed, you know, and you're still dealing with uh, like we were already on the way Down when I was in high school and we didn't know it yet It was still Mayberry but but the steel plants were all closing down and the auto plants were right and so there's all this goodness that came out of there Um They gave me a good foundation, but let's face it. I you know, then this isn't unique a lot of 16 17 18 year old boys Or this way I was way too much about me You know, the world involved around me and I said god was trying to you know work on me a little bit But I didn't you know, I was too busy with me and um, you know, I continued to my late 20s So so that's selfishness that self centeredness, uh, even selfish ambition that that god had to peel that off Um, so like in when I in high school, I was voted to class radical Um, so I was the one stirring stirring up, you know, everybody at the football game or whatever And and I can see now it's just that I didn't have an outlet for the thing, you know, god You know, god has put me in this position to help change the way people think over time ultimately if you want to look at it's It's an apostolic call to use the church word, you know, he's giving me an apostolic kind of that That's what I'm supposed to do and I was trying to do it back then I was just trying to do it without him and so, you know, it just went all kinds of weird directions Always find that interesting when like elements of who we were Are so much of even if they were misused, right? A lot of times we have gifts.
I was a class clown So, um, I would actually think that probably most of my classmates would maybe be surprised Um, or so, um, because I was on the path and everybody's mind of probably being a comedian I was pretty outrageous in that regard. However, what I can tell you is that the funny thing is that like my job Am I worked out even with this podcast consists of a lot of Meeting people being being willing to reach out public speaking, right? And um, it's funny as a class clown like you have to be willing to throw yourself out there So I'm like that's the fabric that I that I've kept I'm still goofy and silly and it comes out in this show at different times But um, I think maybe at first glance people might be like, hmm, like he's a little different, um, than I thought but it's I think it's also giving you an authenticity You're just you're just relaxed and natural interacting with people and that probably comes from some of that, you know, from those class clown days You learn how to be natural and authentic. You aren't performing.
You're just being natural You know, it's funny about the way like the fact that you called that out is like what a lot of people don't understand about being a class clown Or I'm not gonna speak for real comedians But like it's really a service like when you when I was in high school so much of it was about me taking joy In giving people laughter and whether it was my teachers or my peers or whatever I had a lot of teachers that were like a fan of my Craziness, so um, yeah, like you said, it's just kind of me being me. So that's pretty cool. Um, I want to ask you about like this entire um idea of like a christian business versus a kingdom business I've heard you talk about that a lot and it's an intriguing dynamic to me and understanding the difference and specifically for our listeners because so many folks are Um, starting businesses or have businesses and it's a challenge for a lot of people to figure out What is the healthy balance or the proper way to inject my christianity in business? So can you kind of share what your perspective around that is?
Yeah, so um, it's it's funny german because I wrote my book is like 300 pages longer, right? Longer and yeah, it was just even half a long after that's been published and I addressed this a little bit in the book But but it was just only about three weeks ago that god really gave me the succinct way to describe it right? I would love it. Um, so So early on when I was trying to figure out can you build a company for god's glory?
That was the question and you know, and I knew it was about more than integrity and ethics, right? I know that's just table stakes, right? Of course it's got to have that um and and I wasn't sure what a christian business was I kept running into those right? I kept running, you know, and I just wasn't sure what that meant Is it because you only hire christians and I wasn't sure that's even legal, right?
Um, yeah, it could just mean the owners of christian and what does that mean for the rest of the employees? Does it does it mean that you like i met one software company back then that was only building software for like churches and christian organizations? Is that what I mean? Is it you know, that what it means only your customers are christians and and I just I was confused like because a lot of the ones That I saw trying to do that were really they were trying to do church stuff and just map it into business And that's because christian as an adjective describes a person right and a collection of christians is a church not a business A business has an entirely different organizational structure and purpose than a church and so you don't need the business to replicate church stuff That's what the church is for you know, that's why we have godly pastors and you know and and women and men of faith that are equipped by Gotta do that thing, you know business is a different thing.
So so trying to make the business look like a person christian the adjective christian Describing a business. It just doesn't like it's confusing and and eventually in my journey god, you know kind of expanded the questions You move me beyond this kind of company bring um, you know glory to god Like it was a long period. I didn't know at first that what he was saying I just know I needed more of his presence But eventually I came to understand he was saying I no longer call you servant but friend You know in other words, it was time to move beyond doing stuff for him and into doing stuff with him And in that point the question shifted it no longer came became kind of company bring god glory That's that's servant and that's good But the bigger question was good. I partnered with him that worked every day And then since he's playing by a different set of rules things work different in his capital k kingdom Could I make the company look more like his capital k kingdom?
And just a couple weeks ago as I sit down a right of blog post He said well, that's because of christians a person but a kingdom's a place like oh you're right makes this You can make the business you can't make the business look like a person But you can make the business look like a place. He's capital k kingdom, right? So I love that. That's that's it.
I can't take credit for that You can read 300 pages where I didn't get that yet It's funny though Like I kind of gotten that from you and like looking at a lot of your content Like you talk a lot about the questions Um that have evolved as you've grown as a CEO as a leader Um and as a believer um throughout time and it seems like that's kind of how the lord deals with you like in In the form of like these progressing questions that cause you to go deeper And like what I got it from that on this show a lot of we talk about through the years Scott is that it's a process from episode one Yeah, um, I'm really big on encouraging and inspiring the entrepreneurs and business professionals out there like don't try to do it All that was like yeah, you got a crawl before you walk you got to be willing to take that first step So for you as the questions have progressed Like how have you noticed that they change you like do I'm assuming that the questions that are presented send to change you and how has that happened through the years and are there new questions Still like that the lord is still dealing with you that you're still figuring out throughout this 20 year process right now as a leader Yeah, yeah, there's bigger questions ahead that beyond what I can even push into right now with y'all come on I know what i'm doing next because he's already giving me the questions Clearly that i'm supposed to be pushing into that um, but but I think the biggest change germane You probably recognize this in yourself is you build his history with god and in my case as he shifted these questions I just process things different But like you know if we hit a cash flow crisis in year two with a company if we would have I had to process that one way You know, but even just you know here we're 20 years in and well We were 18 years in at that point a couple years ago all our contracts blew up and it was nothing to do with us We were performing great on all of them like it one got shut down because we were too far ahead of the other teammates Like who like who does this happen to you know where we got penalized because we're the only ones performing You know And they all blew up like that and all of a sudden instead of wondering how we're gonna hire six or eight or 10 more people I'm wondering if we got six too many and and and now I process that like the fear fear and panic because I can feel it trying to get on me Right, it's real i'm laying in bed in the middle of the night wondering if we're gonna be in business And I can you know right now you and I talking I could we could probably brainstorm and come up with 25 scriptures that talk about God's provision right? Consider the Ravens and either so to reap or store up and bar and jail you're having the right we could go down the list We could come up with a bunch and probably not pause and the only one I could think of in the middle of the night there when this fear trying to get on me Is Is the lord is my shepherd? I lack nothing psalm 23. I can't even remember the rest of Psalm 23 All I got is the first verse but it says I lack nothing And and now I'm not processing it as a cash flow problem or a this kind of problem or how am I gonna accelerate some payments or how we gonna Cut something like I'm not processing it that way.
I'm right into oh, I'm in a spiritual battle fear is trying to grab a foothold where there was peace You know, I'm at the level of spiritual battle and I know that the only way I'm gonna get the peace is to cling to God's promise And then you know that then I can process it, you know, I'm not back to peace It may take a couple days, but then I can process it again And it just speaks to the fact right like to your point like we you we are believers There may be a hundred scriptures It's a blessing when there's that one but we're all we're still human as well And that's why to me to process is so important understanding like, you know When you are in business or as a leader in business It is such a journey and you know, the bible says it rains on the just as well as the unjust and like the fact of the matter is Sometimes I think um and this is you know kind of going back to the christian versus kingdom business I think sometimes when we try to look at the business as a person, um, we are not we are like maybe um I don't want to say over spiritualizing it but misusing the way to we're spiritualizing it because we are not understanding that hey That the bible also says like there will be rain Ecclesiastes 3 there's a time for everything So I think it's not as much as about selling ourselves that we won't have issues Um as a kingdom business or as christians and believers But more so about like what does the lord what has the lord given us in his word to allow us to sustain during those times like us on 23 And you know, I think that's the importance of hey, david saying that word have I hid in my heart that I may not send against the The the fact of the matter is when you're in business and when you're an entrepreneur, um, you need the lord Like exponentially in certain times of uncertainty and I think Nothing like the last couple years has shown us that right like there's been there's so much Division in the world so many things going on. Um, I'm curious just as a quick sidebar for you as a leader Through the last couple years in your organization Did you get a sense that the division of the outside world had crept into your organization at all? And how did you deal with that if so or where you all kind of shielded? I'm just curious how you manage that Yeah, we've got a pretty um pretty Ideologically diverse team, you know, people think a lot of different stuff out of here But we've had a pretty strong culture for a long time where people and and that carried us for a little while into the pandemic You know when you start to lose some of that when everybody's on zoom calls instead of hanging out in this mess together, you know But we were intentional in trying to so we probably sustained it a little better But even so our culture took a big hit and just to riff a little bit on that previous story I knew we were in a spiritual battle and in that period I said all right when I finally came back to peace I said all right, I know this is a bunch of i'm gonna punch back You know and so so we're gonna take the best way to fight a spiritual battle that I know when it's trying to put us into Lack then you've talked about the poverty mindset But we aren't gonna go approach with the poverty mindset We're gonna go fight back with gratitude and generosity and not just me but we're gonna mentor our Non-believing broadly religiously and or atheistically diverse team and we're gonna teach them We're gonna mentor them and bake generosity and gratitude into our culture and we did and I even explained to him We were in a spiritual battle in a graceful way That that a couple of people who aren't believers came up in the afterwards and thanked me for it So we had the team focused on gratitude and generosity So to come back to where your point here That carried us for a while and it was genuine in our organization But there came a time in the pandemic Where it had gone on long enough and the lockdowns and the distance and remote work and all that That's some entitlement crept into a couple people that had never been there before And we didn't see so much the idyllogic or political or any of those kinds of divisions But we did start to see some Some entitlement creep in and interestingly enough So those people started leaving one by one and if we'd have drawn a list of the like we weren't gonna lay off We told everybody look we're gonna fight through this thing as long as we can and our goal is to keep us all whole You know, you know if this is trying to give us a poverty mindset instead We're gonna move forward in abundance.
We're trying to we're not gonna hunker down We're gonna invest in our future and so so if we had drawn that list though Just in case it was almost like God started picking them off from the bottom up Got it And then we took about one too far one further than we would have gotten Right That last one is like hold on we need a Johnny No, that makes a lot of sense And um, I just think you know what I love about that and really my purpose for even asking the question was like on this show in particular And I'm really proud of this because it's all documented people can go on apple podcast Look at the date and listen and see how were we talking during that time? I'm a believer that being a leader is beyond a title and that you really look at what people did during certain times and Because i've watched this guy like i've watched people literally just like switch Just over the last couple years whatever the hot topic is now they're they're identified as this now they believe this And i'm a person that is you know, I welcome diversity of thought as well But I also appreciate people who are sincere and genuine even if I disagree with their thoughts But when they show we talked a lot about being united by faith and I was really what we were speaking Um during the most divisive times In our in our world and I thought it was important as believers. You said something very interesting like so welcome non believers in like you don't have to like Shun people away I think that's the cancel culture mindset is that yeah if you disagree about anything we have to push each other away But more so welcome people in and let's let's be able to have that camaraderie and have those conversations But you said it I think zoom In in the distance i'm seeing it is still in corporate america where that camaraderie is very hard to find right now because there's so much Distance, but um, I want to I want to shift it a little bit and talk about like you talk about culture Which it sounds like you've built a good culture there, which is um commend or having to rebuild it to be fair But okay, talk a little bit about rebuilding it. Yeah, talk a little bit about that Just just in you know, we've kind of gone back to hybrid where we've got people here two days a week mandatory and But you're welcome to be here every day and we have many that are coming here every day or four days a week and we've Got some that are only here in the two days that we require but I think You know, there's this intentional deliberate act of getting us in the same space again together So we're here in our stories and so we're not just relating over the transaction You can do the transaction over like you and I could you know, maybe I could start singing again and I don't know you're in the music So I don't know what you're saying or do you play something?
Uh, I rap it act like I play the piano every now and then but yeah, I come from the music So you and I if we could we could collaborate into a transaction like a project like that over zoom or you know One of the recording but but but that wouldn't mean we really know each other or have a right and you can get started But the real culture the real embodiment of that thing who you are as an organization comes because you spend time together in person And have those little random conversations that you wouldn't have otherwise Like, you know, you and I aren't just gonna run into each other on zoom and talk about my boys basketball game You know, but by the coffee pot we might and that's a part of the culture, you know, and each other is real people and not just as a transaction No, we're having to rebuild that, you know We're having some progress, you know And everybody that's here genuinely wants to be here and they appreciate what we have and they know we've got to be intentional But you know, we're getting there Yeah, and the world the world around us is changing and is challenging right like You know, my interviews are virtual when I started this podcast and was envisioning building out of studio and having interviews I was envisioning everyone actually being here and um even and this is just me I'm going off the beaten path a little bit so bear with me But like just as you talk about this world and I think it'll be valuable to the listeners to hear this is like For me, I've even found myself still struggling through In both my corporate job and my personal life because I've seen where friends and family have become lazy And less intentional about spending time with each other And if I'm being honest like it bothers me it does because I don't think people are paying attention to it I think life is just going so fast that we're not stopping to say like hey like two years ago We used to see each other every month at least or we used to do this or that and I just think those couple years in the house um really Handy-capped some folks in a way. So yeah, yeah, there's yeah, there's a there's a price to pay for all the isolation we had for sure socially, yeah, um, so so Scott, what about what about core values? um I've read again. I've looked at a lot of your content I've heard you talk about core values and I want to know like hey, how important are core values for A kingdom business any business really but but how important are they and then like how did how did you go about developing your core values?
Yeah, um I got the opportunity to set the core values since I started the company and then when I merged with my business partner scott He like we wouldn't have urged if he wasn't all bought into the core values and really I sold his wife first, you know But but core values are core values or something that comes from inside They're not something you just put on the wall so they've got to be authentic like if they don't come from inside and you already resonate with them It doesn't matter what you put on the wall. You're not gonna live them out, right? So I knew that and so they were authentic and then we learned early on how to hire against the core values So that you know and that's how we manage this broad ideological spectrum, you know, these are the things we're gonna come together on You know, you don't have to share my faith, but but we're gonna operate an integrity You know, we're gonna grace is a core value of our organization We're not gonna jump to the bad conclusion about somebody We're gonna treat them as though they're a child of god and we're gonna, you know, give them the respect that lineage before Right. So so these are core values that we all we interview them.
They don't know they don't know they're getting interviewed against them Maybe some people figured out, but you know, we actually interview against them without using the word And to make sure that there's some resonance there we hire and we fire on them, you know, the few times we got to fire It's been core value issues. So they are real and and they're important for everybody But especially entrepreneurs since that some of your audience I work with some of the local entrepreneurs here in the You know in the the local community and that's like there's one guy came to me advice He is getting right to hire a second third person and I I said dude I mean, yeah, I understand you need to do that before you do any of that You need to hire your core values I mean to find your core values because if you don't have those defined and you go hire three people and those are critical hires at this early stage You you might have hired people who you you don't want to work with a year from now because Because they don't share your core values, you know that they want to go in a totally different direction than you And so it's that important that it's ought to be the first thing you do And if you're a leader and you come into an organization and and you know It's a pre-existing and and you can you can define the core values But it's going to take you a longer process to you know, it's going to be through attrition really that they get implemented So so it almost sounds like unique core values to even establish authentic culture Yeah, I would suggest that that culture derives. It's an expression of your core values I agree with that and I think you know the struggle that some folks have of like not understanding like and that's why we're talking about this to share Like it's so important because you could find yourself otherwise like hiring folks that don't align with these core values that you haven't established But but authentic core value like genuine core values is really about you Finding a way to express what's already there, right? It's who you are is what you believe the principles but taking the time to shape them Otherwise, you're going to find yourself spending a lot of time with the wrong folks I heard you tell a story about it in early higher that the wrong hierarchy it costs you is it 20 years of Of this 20 years or 20 years of salary Yeah, I didn't come up with that status a guy top grading I wrote a book talk rating a while back really good guy on hiring and we supplement that with some core values, you know Interview stuff but his research shows 20 if you hire a wrong person it costs you 20 times When you think about how it's pretty incredible Yeah, like that's pretty crazy like but to your point like yeah It's because like if a person comes in and does a bad job it's year over year It's like in the industry I work in there are times that folks have come into it Let's use Detroit the city of Detroit.
I managed the the city, you know Where I'm from for a while and a lot of the deals and negotiation We were doing like there was one person that went there at one point in time and did all of these very Expensive deals and I mean I'm literally talking 10 15 years later Like we were still I can't speak to it now It's been a few years since I managed in that area But I mean we were still like hurting because we were overlapping these deals because what happens is you sit precedent And that is I think as an entrepreneur and business person You're really trying to as best you can sit a healthy and good precedent. Um, yeah Yeah, and you can't be because core values come from inside you can't discipline or manage Around those right you can try and put incentives in place But you can't you know if excellence is our core value and you're you're okay with just good enough I want to get to happy hour because it's Friday, you know Like I want you to go to happy hour too. That's fine, but not so your thing is excellent, right? Right, so you've got to care enough that it's excellent and if that's not your core value We can't discipline around that we can put some we can counsel you We can say hey, you gotta be careful But ultimately if you don't care you don't care and it's never gonna get any better And we too have found issues in our codebase that were you know from some guy We hired, you know 14 years ago before we really had the Hiring process for fact that around our core values We're still paying for that one.
Yeah, I think I mean whether smaller large ways most of us have probably been here Um, I love that that whole idea of establishing culture establishing core values And I think that is I would assume as part of how you have some longevity with your business as well Um, I do want to transition and talk a little bit about your book Um at work as in heaven and I know that we likely I'm I haven't ready yet. I'm looking for it to get in uh receiving my copies on the way All right, I'm looking for yeah, I'm looking for it I'm assuming we've probably touched on some of the ideas and principles that are in the book But can you just take some time to tell us a little bit about the book like why you wrote it as work as in heaven I love the title. I'm just kind of tell us a little bit about the premise of the book and which we're looking to accomplish with it Yeah, um, yeah, I never dreamed of being an author Jermaine. I always wanted to be a rock star right so it wasn't like this isn't a new career for me or something I've still got my day job and I love it, you know, so um, it's more about I just became a parent God was putting the call in my heart that I needed to get the message out I felt on an island for a very long time pushing into these questions Like I talked to my church friends about you know like the space at work and you know a better matter on Tuesday Nobody can tell me how to do it in fact a lot of my friends just look at me like I was crazy You know kind of wrapped up in the church world, you know world instead.
How does this work on Tuesday? So so eventually I you know God kept you know kind of poking on me I knew it was time to I needed to actually write it down and then and that was interesting because once I started writing I can you know I could feel him with with me as especially when I did the rewrite You know the editors thought it was done And I thought it was done and it was just taking a pass through for a little To be typey, you know kind of stuff and I was a total restructure Like not a lot of new content but new order new string it together in a different way. I knew he was behind all that so Um, so it's really just about getting the message out the series of questions that we kind of talked about And in the next one after can you partner with God and then then if you are his things work different in his kingdom And can you make a company look more like his kingdom? And that's what the book is about really is this journey at work as in heaven his kingdom come his will be done at work As in heaven, you know As in heaven, you know in friend wherever you are as in heaven right it's on earth and earth includes my company It includes your studio, right?
So What you want to do them there? What I like Scott, um, I wrote it down you were described on the website on the book This is not a book about why you want to live out your faith in a workplace, but how I love that because and this is just me my opinion. I think there are so many Um, wise and what's floating around in social media world and we're just kind of spewing out our opinions And a lot of time no one is actually telling you like well, how do you do that? It's like if you if you make a good point like hey, we should live out our faith in the workplace Oh, it's like, okay, that may be the what we should be doing Um, and you can even tell me why we should be doing it But I feel like the how is the connection?
Um, so to a lifestyle change like understanding how to do things is what actually Um activates our faith if you will like hey, we have faith but in order for the turn into work and in the v progressive is that that house So I'm just curious like with that particular portion What was your thinking when you specifically called out that this is about the how and why was that important to you to call out? Yeah, because that's the part I was always missing, you know the how um in the other thing Let's be clear the book is not about my company like the company is the lab in which God taught me all these things But I've also read some books in the past where oh, this is and I'm sure that authors were well-meaning But it's our company and we did it this way and they're focused on process and policies and all that kind of stuff business practices And that's okay, but you'll see this the how That comes out of that work as in heaven is something different. It's not you don't do it because this is the way we did it I'm not suggesting that what I'm trying to do is show you how I pushed in with a relationship with God and he unfolded it that way in this place You push into a relationship with God and if you get nothing out of the book other than hey He really wants me to talk to him about this and you push in with him It's gonna look different in your company because your company or your area influence You know because it's he's probably got a different purpose and you're in a different set of circumstances You may be more overt where I'm or covert not more overt or you know, there's a whole spectrum of the way God can Play this out but the point of that work is in heaven is that starts with partnering with him and how do you do that? Well, I'll share there's a whole bunch of stories in there on how I did it and hopefully that'll help you as you do it You'll see it's not that hard.
Yeah Yeah, that's the key point Scott because I think sometimes we make a mistake too of like copying and pacing It's like yeah, oh this person said like Scott said it took him three years and this happened So it's gonna take me three years and it's like no there are some principles and some fundamentals that we are should be taking That's why I love business principles in general and I'm sure this book can relate to whether a person is a believer or not Again, it rains on the just as well as the unjust I think that's the importance of what you describe as a kingdom company and kingdom business is that you know It doesn't mean it's limited by the four walls of the church It definitely comes from his birth from and applies to and carries that with pride But also someone who's you know starting to eliminate standing in their neighborhood and they're not a believer They can also I'm sure grab something from those principles Yeah, that and that what you just said there and you had said it earlier too. There's kind of revolutionized You'll see that's part of the book. I've revolutionized my approach to evangelism Like you could never once I was in I was all in and you know like I'd preach from stage with my band when I was a band like my license plates Safe Raised God, you know, so it's not like I'm afraid of I'll go on the street corner right now. That's what guys told me to I'm not shy about But he's also taught me how to you know, sometimes I just need to make it rain on the righteous and the unrighteous That it's just given somebody a taste of his goodness without dumping them over their head and that goodness leads to repentance His kindness is designed to lead to repentance and I've been able to that's a lot of how I can apply that here with a Group of people that a lot of them at least yet have no interest in faith And yet they're tasting God's goodness and they know it they know they're tasting God's goodness And now it's holy spirits job though, you know And if I need to talk to him I'll talk to him because he's opened the door But you know I didn't have to say a word to show him his goodness That's important because I think it's important for us to know our role and like not feel like we have to manipulate or be forceful And I'm really I think just the nature of the world today with all the things going on I don't even have to say what they are but like there's so much force and do what I'm doing because I said I'm doing it and believe what I believe because I'm right and it has really allowed me to see The importance as believers of what that could potentially feel like if we were forcing Jesus forcing our beliefs on people You should share and like you said, it's not about being shy.
I mean my show is called inspire God's people I was very I know you understand me there. Yeah very intentional about that But at the same time, I think there's a lot of there's a lot of revelation I had as a related to like business principles because again, I've worked in a fortune 50 organization for now 16 years Um, you know three days before I graduated college. I started at this organization Yeah, through those 16 years. I've had eight jobs So on average every two years, I've worked my way up from the very bottom of entry level to where I am now and still growing my career What the Lord allowed me to see through that and the company I work for again Just look up the fortune 50 is one of those 50 has nothing to do with God at all But the principles of business are so revolutionary to me when you read the bible you realize that non-believers Leverage biblical principles in business more than believers And that's how it'd be successful.
That's that servant servant and friend kind of stage, right? You can you can operate at that servant level and definitely produce value God designed the principles that way, right? So you can follow it, but how much more power is it when you're not just naturally applying principles But you are also adding the supernatural layer where God does things that only he can do where God tells you things that only he knows Right, it just so there's nothing wrong with taking that step but just some principles That's awesome. That's why he put them there.
Yeah, but then there's a point to go beyond serving an end of friend And I'm curious what your experience has been in that big company of you because God calls us all to different places on the spectrum Your man, you know, some are supposed to be covert and some are supposed to be more overt and like where do you feel like he's has shifted in the different jobs? What's your experience that they've been hostile to your faith? What's your experience? It's very interesting.
This is a very interesting question. It's got that no one has ever asked me No one has ever asked me this question, but I've you know you something that you have actually thought about But no one has actually asked you so that you can try to explain it or express it outwardly. This is one of those things So for me, um, I would say that I have definitely been more covert However, what's interesting is the way to lure it has operated is that again? I come from a very musical family the things that I do are very public So it's almost interesting how covert it is now some of that Let me just say this is because even before covid in a pandemic I have worked in a hybrid Hybrid nature my entire career.
I've never worked in an office ever until my home office the last couple years So I work at an organization where we're out meeting with customers and clients and traveling and so I work with different individuals across the country And sometimes it's been across the state my point is I've never really worked in an office setting where you're going to the same place With the same people every day. So it is a very different world where you may see this person three times this year So the last thing I'm going to do is walk in and when I see you and say hey like do you believe in Jesus as your lord? But what has happened uh Scott this interesting is what the lure has done is strategically Allow certain people to pull back the layer and either discover some folks that file my podcast I've never said anything some folks have ended up at a church service. I was at I've never said right and so Those folks tend to then start reaching out more and we build a real relationship So through the years, I know honestly like I don't have a lot of personal relationships in in my corporate life Um, but through the years there's maybe one a year that develops right when um, it's almost like quality over quantity Where the people that know me they really know me.
They really know what I'm about and what I stand for Um, so yeah, that's I think it's about that It's an interesting effect that you just pointed out that when they discover you're kind of like a magnet And this is kind of why I had to write the book and why you're doing the podcast is because there's a whole lot of people In that unfortunate company. There's probably thousands of believers if not, you know tens of thousands scattered throughout that company that just don't Their pastor head. I'm not knocking. God loves the church, but their pastor hasn't equipped them You know, it hasn't equipped the saints the works of service that they know how to go into the workplace and carry their faith As part of them and some place on that spectrum You know of covert over and and so when somebody so they're frustrated They don't know how either and so they find your podcast and you're like a magnet because oh my goodness Like, you know, you might you might have been they might have been working with you for five years And only finally figured out right and and there's there's plenty of people in the organization where they're sitting next to somebody who's a believer But they've been they don't know how you know, they just don't know how and I can tell you that there's a hunger Yeah, I'm never surprised This is the beauty of it right.
I'm never actually surprised when I found out the people who are believers are believers And what I mean by that is like, you know These are people through their character I would have guessed it easily right like they it's not that they are at work and even myself that No one has actually ever act surprised that I was a believer So it's not like they're hiding anything But a lot of times what happens is in a corporate setting or in the world at large, right? Some people are just thinking hey, this is Scott's a nice guy man. He's cool as heck like what is it about him? And that's what that may be why people find a podcast or whatever it is I don't know sometimes people are like what is it about this person?
And I do think as believers and you said it earlier like I use this all differently So I'm not suggesting that everyone should be like me at all in a very unique situation We're also unable because now I'm I walk in the world and they've seen me in that world It actually brings credibility when I start talking about faith in business because there are folks that have done You know multi-million dollar, you know business partnerships with me. They've seen you in that world So like we have negotiated those type of things not my multi-million dollars, right? But you know working at a large organization, so um, you know, it's an interesting thing But I've always found that those relationships go deeper. They're not surface relationships once people discover that so um, no Thank you for asking that.
Um before I let you go Um before I will let you go. I want to ask you just One question around how do you define success? So as you know, um, you know a CEO and a leader I understand that the world has their standard of what success looks like I'm sure for a soldier's a lot of pressure to live up to whatever whatever that is and in some cases It's just factual is black and white right the the lease is either paid or is not paid on the building Um, but as as a believer as a leader a CEO, how do you balance that? I think a lot of entrepreneurs christian entrepreneurs out there struggle with like wanting to be the most successful And sometimes the things that I don't take to reach that level versus being a content where God wants me But also what in the press were the best and you know reached the height of where his will from my life is So what advice would you give and how do you view and manage through success?
Yeah, there's a lot of nuance to that question It's a simple question that ought to have a simple definition Um, so I'll try and I'll try and summarize this the best I can And often jesus, you know, there was two sides of the same coin and their intention, you know, and they're both together But you know, but their intention and and so there's one part of this that really if like when we started, you know, of course We like everybody else in that era, you know, we're gonna get a bunch of eyeballs and then we're gonna be dot com quadrillionaires, right? Or do you remember that nonsense? I was I was doing but but I was alive. So I Know about it.
Yeah, so you know, and clearly that didn't happen and is in his time went on and their expectations got more realistic I mean, I don't think if me or my business partners got what a look back on it from where we are now I don't think we'd ever imagine that we'd have been blessed as we have been and that we're 20 years in we're still at tech company That's 20 years old that doesn't happen very often right that typically obsolescence and we're just our best days are ahead We're just really coming into all that we've been dreaming about for 20 years So so there's this part of it of wow look how far God has brought us and if I really sit down and you know Like how many families have gone home happy instead of kicking the dog and yelling at the wife and how much money have they poured into their local Economies and their communities and how much have we given into the local economy and the local charities and and good works And and I look at all that I'm like wow, I'd have never imagined and then on the other side of that coin There's this kind of I had a mentor call with the holy discomfort that we are not where we want to be You know, we're 20 years in and we're still a fairly modest sized company We're you know about 30 people and and the other side of that coin is we'd have expected You know, we'd have been 500 people or a thousand people by now with with linearly exploding revenues because we're a product company Um, but you know what I think is going on Well, I know there's a lot of stuff going on and some of it's been the enemy trying to steal and kill and destroy and God's gonna take care of that Um, but I think there's this other part of it that real success in my case personally outside the business is God has had me focused on pushing Into kingdom business like and it's a lot easier to learn that and and respond to it and pivot and listen to him when you're 30 people Then when you're faced with the demands of the end 500 people It's almost like he's kept us in fact. I had this prophetic word and I'm not in a prophetic church culture So God has to work to get me a prophetic word So hey, you know, I know it's the spirit talking because it you know resume I see God planted you in this and they didn't know me from Adam They just I see God planted you like a tree in a container And you know carefully tended it and watered it and let it get solid and put its roots deep And now he's taking it and planning it in the field outside of the pot where it can grow big And that was a bit of a guy I knew nothing about me or the company and and it was a beautiful picture of what I think it's been so So in that case success has been Getting a handle on kingdom business so that I can help share that with other people so that they can do it too You know, so love it. So there's a lot of nuance to that question. No, but Thank you.
Thank you for sharing that Scott. Um, this was I enjoy talking to you. I'm definitely looking forward to Reading a book and would love you know keeping such I'll be praying for your business as you as you continue to grow and I love your content Um, you know for everyone listening, um, your website At work as in heaven calm will be in the description I'm at a bio also put the instagram links and things like that So if you want to get in touch with Scott just check the description of the show or just go to at work as in heaven Um, and scott like thank you. Thank you.
Thank you so much. This was amazing Um, and yackabot. I love that name. I feel like I'm just gonna be randomly saying that and that's not a bad thing because that's the glory of God Well, I thank you too for reaching out to remain because like I said I haven't had the chance to I'm hitting subscribe button on the podcast Then I'm gonna start listening to it regularly, but but the content of yours that I was able to go back I immediately played one of your clips for my son because I you need to listen to what your main says your man check this out And uh, and so it's good.
You're doing great stuff man. So I look forward to being connected here. Thank you And maybe we'll get off the zoom or stream yard or whatever and we'll get a real cup of coffee together sometimes I would love to do that. So let's let's make that happen one day.
Yeah, I'll let you know the next time I'm uh, you're at a maryland you said Beautiful historic downtown frittrick maryland. I'm not sure how far I was from frittrick. I was in gaithersburg a couple weeks ago Yeah, you were just up the beltway. Yeah, oh, yeah, you were a 20-minute mirror See I come down that way sometime.
So my business travels. I'll let you know if I find myself back down. You contact me. We'll get together lunch on me I'll do all right or coffee.
Yeah. All right, man. All right. See you Scott.
Bye. Yeah, bless you german. Yeah