Biblical Business Radical: Motivations and Jesus

 There are a set of motivational categories that we'll briefly discuss here. All (or most) of our guiding values instigate these motivations. We are motivated by all of these but one or two more than any others. Marketers try to get a hit on several with some of their tag lines. When you think about choices, opportunities, activities, etc. that excite you, to what ones are you more attracted? As you recall some of those driven, exciting times, see if you can find yourself in the motivational categories. Here are the categories:

Utilitarian: "What's in it for me?" "I'm motivated by the concept if it's useful and practical." There has to be utility. Perhaps even a future gain. You can hear this in people who talk about rewards in heaven. Also, as people talk about gaining rewards here on earth--peace, prosperity and so on.

Theoretical: "Teach me something new." "Knowledge is power." People here are looking for the next great idea. They're motivated if they can get a greater understanding of the situation especially if it leads to improvements or opportunities.

Aesthetic: Pleasing forms and formats, harmony, creative expression. They want to make the world a more beautiful, livable area. 

Social: "We're in this together. We need to work as a team." People-focus and reduction of conflict--"Can't we all just get along." Kindness, altruism, empathy, generosity are prime desires and drivers. You can read a lot of this in the Greek scriptures' epistles on how to have community life. Dickens' A Christmas Carol is thought to refute economic utilitarianism and point out its lack of emotional appeal on these grounds.

Individualism, Politics: Looking for power and retaining power and influence over others. Recognition and being viewed as important--through formal or informal leadership channels--are prime for this person. We can see some of this in the twelve disciples especially the ones vying for places next to Christ. They may not like Christ's message of "the last shall be first" and if you want to lead, you have to be their servant.

Traditional, Regulation: "She's the boss. Let's do it." "Ours is not to question why; ours is to do or die." (Tennyson's Charge of the Light Brigade) Situational ethics need not be applied, i.e. the rules don't change depending on who's involved or what's happening; the rules and traditions dictate how we understand our roles and decisions. Order and structure, policies, procedures, hierarchy reduce chaos and create a sense of well-being. You might see some of this in Christ's reassurance that He came not to abolish the Law but to fulfill the Law. 

As you read the scriptures, where do you see God's motivation for different people?

We also know that we're motivated if we quickly see results in our actions. Exercising and eating right are maintained if we see some quick results. This is why quarterly, semiannual and annual bonuses are popular in business. Likewise, if we see some quick answers to prayers, we keep praying. If we tend towards being a  little ADD or impulsiveness, we might not be able to sustain any long-term motivation. Thus, heavenly rewards may not be enough for some of us.

We also know we can maintain motivation if we have a social network--aka peer pressure and camaraderie in effort--structural support, and opportunities for personal development and gaining the necessary aptitude. Here the church excels in providing this. Is this enough to keep us going?

Change is hard. Most of us don't change without some motivation. And it's not a crisis that will do it in the long-term. More than half--some studies suggest up to 90%, even of "change leaders" like CEOs--of heart patients don't change their lifestyle after a crisis moment. What motivated you to decide to follow Christ? How motivated are you to do the things that maintain a relationship with Him? Remember the first article in the series shows a low-level of commitment among professing Christians. I think we revert back to old habits without intentional motivation to maintain participation in faith development and ministry activities that show commitment, enthusiasm (engagement). We may have faced a crisis that urged us to confess a faith in Christ but then we often go back to our normal lives. Same things happen after a retreat, camp, revival or other "mountain top" experience.

Soon, we'll get back to discussing typical workplace motivators and the better ones of choice, content, collaboration and progress appear in Christ's leadership of the His church and followers.

Biblical Business Radical: Motivation and Engagement Foundations

 Sometimes in churches on autumn Sunday mornings, you’ll hear a more raucous response to a mention of a pro football team than a mention of a transformed life, miracle or the sovereignty of God. I’ll often hear people talk about the latest communiques from a celebrity or business icon. I rarely hear people talk about what God is saying or doing in their lives or in others’ lives around them. They have no connection to the celebs, Elon Musks, Jeff Bezos or Bill Gates of the world. Christians are supposed to have a relationship with Christ and intimately know and be known by Him. So how come our enthusiasm and commitment is higher with people we don’t know?

We cannot be motivated by, committed to or enthusiastic about people we don’t know anything about. We might be attracted to people whose reputation we know in terms of their success. Less publicly, we might want to be like a person whose values we resonate with. Politically, we’ll emulate people who identify as part of our “tribe” and promote their ideas and proposals, while we dismiss and denigrate those suggestions and analyses from the other “tribe.” We also want to be like, listen to and are motivated by people our admirable peers follow. We want to belong to the “cool kids,” the right cliques. And we’ll do whatever it takes to stay in the tribe, the group.

At the beginning of our spiritual formation, we adopt the faith of our parents. And then reject it perhaps if our parents are untrustworthy or hypocritical. And then we adopt the faith of our peers. Until they might reject us for some reason and then we reject their faith. It becomes our faith when we engage with the living Christ and our faith is tested by crisis—such as disaster, doubt, discouragement. We come through a trial and our faith is our own and not based on our parents or our peers or celebrity endorsement. Likewise, earthly leaders will stop motivating us, enthusing us if they prove untrustworthy, too many failures, have different values perhaps by rejecting something about us (our being, our lifestyle, our aspirations).

Who is Christ that He should inspire us, increase our enthusiasm and commitment? Many authors and speakers have pointed out that Christ’s earthly life is not one to inspire us. He wasn’t wealthy, had few committed followers, didn’t erect any buildings or personally write any books like Plato did. He had many lukewarm followers who wandered away if He didn’t heal them or the opposition became too strong. He was criticized, persecuted, killed. What He left behind was a collection of people who “do things” in His Name. Most of those things and people, we like; some we don’t. Those that call ourselves followers probably started out by following others who followed Him.

We do know some things about Christ and His character. We know some things about what He values too through His teachings and earthly life. We might find Him trustworthy: I often challenge people to rate Him on a scale of 1-10 in the trust dimensions of competency, dependability, integrity, acceptance of our weaknesses, openness/communication of His vision, goals, heart. (At times, I’ve scored God low on punctuality and openness.) Like dependability and acceptance, some proponents of trust add helpfulness and gratefulness (i.e. we trust those who help us—unless you’re selfish—and are grateful when we help them). We also tend to like those who like us (not just are like us, but enjoy being with us).

We might blithely say we trust God but struggle to let go of control. Even in business, more than half of managers don’t trust upper management. A recent survey by Trust Edge put this number at 87%—almost 9 out of 10 employees. If we trust ourselves more than the other person, we’ll relinquish “control” reluctantly; those who are risk intolerant may find themselves in this boat. 

When there’s a lack of trust—more than half, 9 out of 10—it’s hard to be enthusiastic, committed, motivated to keep going in the organization—the church, as a follower of Christ. Studies and anecdotes show that methods to increase motivation fall flat because they appear manipulative if the leadership is not trusted—at minimum, doesn’t have integrity.  If we find we don’t trust Him, perhaps we need to pray like the father whose son was possessed by a violent demon, “I do believe but help me overcome my unbelief.” (Mark 9.24) Christ helped the father with His unbelief. Christ helped the disciple Thomas, who refused to believe Christ had been resurrected solely on the basis of his close friends’ testimony. He wanted to touch Christ’s body and see Him. Christ honored that; Christ allowed Him to experience what He needed to carry Him through. (John 20.25)

Believing is seeing. If we believe someone is always late to meetings, that’s what we’ll see; we’ll overlook the times he/she are on time. If we believe God isn’t dependable or have integrity, we’ll see those instances where He let us down. We’ll overlook the times He was faithful and fulfilled His promises. Perhaps like the Harvard Business Review article cited on the blog post link above, the initial elements of trust have more to do with us than with the leader who’s trying to maintain or increase our motivation. 

 Perhaps the dearth of enthusiasm and commitment on the part of Christ’s followers is because most of us haven’t learned to trust Him yet…because without trust, no elements of motivation are going to work.

Biblical Business Radical: How to Motivate Employees

 I've begun pondering the big question of how Christ motivated His disciples while on earth, and how He motivates us today. I have a theory that it's not the way we as business leaders are taught to motivate employees. My theory is that worldly research is catching up to how Christ motivates. I can think of several scriptural examples that encourage intrinsic motivational factors (versus extrinsic, which most business leaders focus on). 

But there's a danger of proof-texting: believing is seeing; finding passages that fit my conception and ignoring contrary examples. So I'm trying to stay open and objective.

Business leaders focus on extrinsic motivational factors: bonuses and other incentives, recognition, celebration, perks, promotions, interpersonal support, clear goals...and punishments like demotion, termination, loss of prestige, etc. Especially if they're "visible"--foreseeable, to happen in the short-term.  If these are the absolute main ways to keep people motivated, you can probably know that Christ has already failed. Sure, there's interpersonal support--abundant well-being, peace, love, joy and so on. But there's very little in the way of bonuses, recognition (we are but servants), promotions and so on. The one incentive a lot of people mention is the reward of heaven in the far-off era or hell as the punishment also in the far-off. These won't keep you engaged in the short-term: how many of us maintain exercise, healthy eating, diligent work effort if we don't feel we're gaining strength/losing weight/sleeping better and having a boss recognize our improved performance within a few days or weeks. (The second Friday of January is informally known as the Big Quit Day, when most people give up on their New Year's Resolutions.)

Before we get too deep into motivation, let's step back and ask if Christ would be rated a successful leader. There have been plenty of books written about His style and techniques. He certainly has grown an "organization" with a billion-plus "employees" that have radically changed the world. (Islam's prophet Mohammed could make the same claim regarding the size of the organization and contributions to math and science.) Like many of our businesses, the level of engagement differs. Not all employees are committed and enthusiastic about accomplishing corporate goals and the company's success. Likewise, not all Christians are committed and enthusiastic. In the organized church world, there are many names for the cultural Christians, ones who call themselves Christian, but know little and do little with regard to following the Master and Teacher: CEOs, for example, as Christmas-Easter Only attenders/followers/Christians. Cultural Christians believe they're Christian because they live a mostly good life: they don't murder, don't commit adultery, don't steal... (We know from scriptures, like Galatians 5 and Matthew 5 that it's more than this, such as overcoming greed, envy, quarrelsomeness, etc.)

So does Christ motivates us beyond what even the best business leaders have done? Gallup rates employee engagement as being in the 20-25% range for the past 30 years. Despite an emphasis in that time for organization's to improve it, it hasn't changed. The obverse of this is that 75-80% of employees are apathetic or disengaged. People are excited to join the brand of the company but become disheartened with the management and corporate culture. Hardly a winning formula. 

Reluctantly, anxiously, I'm finding Christ's church not much better...at least in the US. In 2005, four out of five Americans claimed to be Christian but faith is only of primary importance for 1/6th of them. (Evangelicals scored higher than 50%, barely.) The Barna group surveyed thousands of Americans on several different aspects of commitment and the head, George Barna, summarized the results this way:

For starters, it appears that most Americans like the security and the identity of the label ‘Christian’ but resist the biblical responsibilities that are associated with that identification. For most Americans, being a Christian is more about image than action.

Surveyed in 2019, young adults in the US follow a similar pattern with two-thirds self-identifying as Christian, but only 10% finding joy in their faith, relationship with Christ and remaining resilient, acknowledging that their faith impacts the way they live. Another third of young adults are habitual church-goers but not resilient. 

In a recent conversation with an Ugandan leader, she related the same effect in her country: most professing to be Christian, but not practicing any commitment to the faith obligations.

In 2005, those who were enthusiastic and committed to faith in Christ was 16% of all adults. Young adults in 2019 were at 10%. Really, it's below the business norm of 20-25%. Less than a third of adults in 2005 had attended church, prayed or read their Bible in the past week. This is a low bar for commitment. Barna Group acknowledges that the lowest scores were for the most intense Christian level of participation, such as teaching and evangelizing. Discouragingly, the "employee turnover" rate--faith abandonment rate--seems to be growing.

Black Americans, who have come through centuries of systemic oppression and suppression (lack of developmental support), scored the highest commitment levels. Their overall level of faith--resilience, hope, forgiveness and so on--is a model for the rest of us. The God of Abraham, Isaac, Jacob and Jesus has always been aligned with the least, last, lost and left out: Israel is one of the historically smallest, least developed nations and oft overrun. Similarly, reports out of Asia are that the persecuted church there is stronger, more resilient than many American churches regarding remaining open and consistent attendance. So if Christ wanted to improve our level of engagement, should He allow more persecution?

If Christ is failing the grade, should we pay attention to how He motivates? Unlike businesses where failure is high in the first five years, Christ's Church has survived millennia despite persecution, scandals, corrupting levels of state and material power, and horrible human leadership. The Church has been robust and Christ's image has survived any tarnish--as related in the mantra "I love Jesus but hate the church."

A cathedral in Germany being renovated behind a fabric facade--author's photo