September 26, 2024 • 41 mins
What does building a strong leadership team for a values-based organization take? Join us for a thought-provoking conversation with William Vanderbloemen, the visionary founder of Vanderbloemen Search. William shares insights from his entrepreneurial journey, from his childhood experiences to founding a firm that helps churches recruit pastors efficiently and with heart.
For more information on Modern Church Leader, visit https://www.mclconference.com
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Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:04):
Hey guys, frank here with another episode of Modern
Church Leader.
I am here with WilliamVanderbloemen, the founder of
Vanderbloemen Search.
William, it's great to have youon today.
Thanks, frank, it's good to bewith you.
So you put William.
Do you go by William, or dopeople call you?
Speaker 2 (00:20):
Yeah, I have a.
So first of all, little advice.
If there are any listeners outthere that are thinking of
having children never, ever,make your child go by their
middle name.
It's terrible.
I'm a junior.
I'm actually Bruce WilliamVanderbilt Jr.
And dad was Bruce and momdidn't want two Bruce's in the
(00:42):
house, so it's William, but thenshe was Persistent would be a
nice way to say it about it onlybeing William.
So I don't even say Bill or itdoesn't.
It's not like it's, I don'tcare, but it just doesn't even
get from my brain.
Speaker 1 (00:57):
You know it's like yeah, I get, I'm a Franklin
named after my grandpa, but I goby Frank.
It's always been Frank, it'salways been Frank, it's never
been Franklin.
You know, but I get the middlename.
The middle name thing wouldthrow me off if I started
calling my kids my middle names.
Speaker 2 (01:12):
The only upside, frank?
The only upside is if I get aphone call and somebody says hey
Bruce, they're either runningfor office or asking for money
and I can hang up real fast.
Speaker 1 (01:21):
So it's like got it wrong.
You don't actually know me,Right, oh my gosh.
Um well, thanks for doing this.
Speaker 2 (01:32):
I know you're, you're traveling and speaking at some
cool conferences and everything.
Um, but man, you like my homedecor.
I mean, this is pretty awesome.
Speaker 1 (01:39):
I was going to say with the suitcase on the bed.
That's amazing, that's right.
Well, I get the two beds.
Speaker 2 (01:43):
I don't do the king, and that way I've got a place
for my things and a place for me.
So a hundred percent.
Speaker 1 (01:48):
I'm the same way.
It's like I don't use thecloset in a hotel room.
That's work.
Speaker 2 (01:53):
No, that's just a recipe for leaving something at
the hotel.
Speaker 1 (01:56):
So I've totally done that and I'm like yep left it in
the closet.
Speaker 2 (02:00):
No, it's a pretty cool thing.
I'm speaking tomorrow to theCEOs of the larger homeless
missions in the United States,so it's a really interesting
crowd with a very unique puzzleto solve, so hopefully I can
learn from them and maybe evenoffer something that will help
them.
Speaker 1 (02:17):
How many of them are there?
That seems like a fairly nichecrowd of CEOs, but how many of
those are there?
Speaker 2 (02:25):
Yeah Well, first of all, if you say CEO, then it's a
pretty good size.
You call it gospel rescuemission, right?
Okay, I think there are acouple hundred here.
It's a very small gathering.
No sponsors, no, like we weregoing to bring somebody and set
up a table like no, no, no, no,no, no.
This is a quiet thing.
So it'll be fun to go and learnfrom these guys.
I would bet they are a littlecloser to Jesus than I am Right,
(02:47):
yeah, I mean they're doingthat's tough work.
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (02:52):
A hundred percent.
A hundred percent, Well, that'scool.
That's not necessarily you'respeaking to this group, but you
were obviously invited there tospeak because you've built a
pretty awesome company over thelast 15, 16 years.
Speaker 2 (03:08):
Well, maybe we do a lot of whether it's awesome or
not, we'll let God decide laterbut we have to work for members
of this group and I wrote a booklast year about kind of
standing out in the crowd, andright now the pastors, your
listeners, can relate to this.
It's harder to stand out infront of donors.
(03:29):
Yeah, like overall benevolentgiving.
United States is going down,not up.
The church is doing better thannon-church, but, um, you know,
those guys raised 42 cents ofevery dollar in their budget in
the month of December, yeah,which, by the way, is when it
gets cold and homelessnessbecomes a problem, right, so you
(03:49):
know they got that.
And then there's volunteer, andthen then there's the whole.
Like the number one headache isis what we're doing?
Working because people don'twant to give their money to
something that's just thrownaway, or so it's a fascinating
studying for them and trying toto figure out how to help them,
how to help.
Speaker 1 (04:06):
Yeah, I mean.
Good luck when you go.
Thanks, Tell us about thesearch firm that you started,
though.
Like give us?
Speaker 2 (04:14):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (04:16):
Maybe you can go, you can step before that and like
what got you connected to churchand what you want to start
serving.
I know you do searches for morethan just pastors, but you
obviously serve a lot ofchurches and pastors.
Speaker 2 (04:26):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (04:27):
Kind of got you into this.
Speaker 2 (04:29):
Well.
So what got the search firmstarted was a question, one
question Can we help churchesfind their pastor faster and
better?
And it's since grown into someother things.
But let me drop a little bitbehind that.
And it's since grown into someother things.
But let me drop a little bitbehind that.
I was, you know, the chronicentrepreneur as a kid and we
(04:50):
could spend a long time talkingabout that.
But, like you know, I would buyup extra paper routes and sell
off the parts I didn't want andlike that's dysfunctional.
That's weird thinking for anine year old.
But that was me.
And and then I went to collegethinking I would finish my MBA
in three years and then by 30,have most of the Western
(05:14):
hemisphere under control.
And you know I was going tothis, was it?
And then in college just didthis prodigal journey.
And man, was I good at that?
I did all the wrong things andI'm everything my daughters
better not bring home.
That's what I was yeah, okay,all right, and had a a pretty
(05:35):
significant um conversionexperience or warming the heart.
Grew up going to church but youknow where.
They say that the farthest sixinches in the world is from the
head to the heart.
You know it never got from headto heart so, but it got to
heart and it got real and Iwanted to go tell other people
about this.
And so I was going to do a PhD.
(05:55):
Went to Princeton for seminary,go somewhere, I could be a
college professor.
Then thought, well, they sit inlibraries, who, who talks to
people about Jesus all day.
Well, that's a narrow careersearch.
So I went into church ministry,was a pastor, was a senior
pastor of about 15, 16 years,left the church world, went
(06:18):
through a divorce which I wouldnot recommend.
It wasn't anything interestingenough for tabloids to pick up,
but it was still just tragic andfound myself as a dad with four
kids and, not knowing so, wentinto the corporate world and was
at a Fortune 200 company oiland gas very large company.
(06:41):
They were putting me in like amanagement rotation sort of
thing, and the first year I wasin HR and the CEO of the time
been there nine and a half years.
He said that's long enough timeto find a successor.
Nine and a half years isforever for a CEO for a company
that size.
Yeah, I didn't know that theyhired this thing called a search
(07:01):
firm and I was in the HRdepartment so I was kind of like
I guess, if our ambitions, I'dsay I was on the succession team
.
The reality is I was like thethird string water boy for the
team.
So you know it doesn't matterand I've watched him use this
(07:22):
search firm and I'd never seensuch in the in the church we
didn't have anything like thatRight, and the church that I had
been serving most recently,first person tree in Houston,
fantastic church, wonderfulpeople, world beaters of people.
I mean just amazing.
They took three years to findme.
I was there, six.
They thought that was allnormal and, and you know, you
(07:44):
leave with a divorce.
There's a little bit of choppywater, but the church is way
bigger than me, it's the oldestchurch in the city of Houston
5,000 adults, 3,000 kids, aschool, a whole everything.
And they took three years tofind my successor.
So 12 years, six years with asenior pastor, six years without
.
And this oil and gas companycompany which, if you don't live
(08:07):
in texas.
I live in houston.
If you don't live in texas, oiland gas companies are are the
death star of the galaxy, likethey're the worst thing in the
whole world, right?
So evil, death star oil and gas, yeah, 90 days, 90 days, frank,
90 days.
They had had a new CEO,seamless, right.
(08:30):
And I look at that.
And then I look at the church,six years with six years without
, and I was like and I can sayit cleanly now, but but there
was a discontent in me that waslike, yeah, why does the
business world have a bettersolution than the bride?
Does the business world have abetter solution than the bride?
And I had gotten married,adrian and I had just blended
(08:51):
our families.
We had six kids now a house wejust bought that we could barely
afford.
And I came home and said hey,babe, I think I'm supposed to
quit my job and start somethingnew for churches.
So she looked at me and shesaid oh, oh, that's because
(09:12):
churches love new ideas, right?
Yeah, yeah, said no one everJust ask Jesus.
So, anyway, she should havesaid I love you, I love your
vision, go back to work.
We got miles to feed, yeah.
Instead she said let's give ita try.
And oh, frank, she listened.
Speaker 1 (09:36):
She heard you and didn't walk away.
Speaker 2 (09:39):
Yeah, so it was the fall of 2008.
So it was the fall of 2008.
Now, if you're old enough toremember the economy, then
that's arguably the dumbest timein the history of America,
except October of 1929, to quityour job and start something new
for churches.
So I don't know what we werethinking.
(10:01):
We were idiots.
But we decided we'd start on alittle card table no debt, no
investors, just try and build itfrom scratch and see what
happens.
And we're still learning as wego.
But it's been a fun.
Fun 16 years, yeah.
Speaker 1 (10:15):
I mean, 16 years is a testament to it Doing very well
.
And also man, yeah, 2008, notthe greatest time on paper, but
also you start something in atime like that and you get it to
work.
That's kind of like trial byfire and starting it during a
(10:35):
hard season not necessarily likethe easiest of times.
So there's something to be saidabout you know making it work
in those times.
Speaker 2 (10:42):
I wish I could say I was that smart.
I'm not looking back.
I do think the need was thereand we did market research.
It wasn't some, you know Iheard from the Lord when it was
actually a bad burrito the nightbefore.
It wasn't anything like thatLike we really did the research
and I think the need was muchbigger than I realized.
And I really think the economicslowdown of 2008 was a gift
(11:06):
from God for us.
It allowed us time to practicethe craft before it really took
off, because it grew prettyquickly and then it grew really
fast for a long, long time.
So I think it was kind of likewe got to do a year of wax on,
wax off before we had to go tothe dojo, yeah.
Speaker 1 (11:27):
And so for those that don't know I assume most
listening probably know, but forthose that don't know, what
actually does the business do?
Speaker 2 (11:35):
What actually could repeat the question.
Speaker 1 (11:37):
What does the business do?
What do you guys?
Yeah?
Speaker 2 (11:39):
So we don't do karate and if and if for those who are
listening who are not ancient,that was a reference to Karate
Kid as an old movie.
There was sound then, but justbarely color.
So what does our company do?
We started with this idea, thisquestion could we help churches
find their pastor better andfaster?
(12:00):
And then it spread out to anyfull time employee of a church.
And then, oh, we have a school.
And so we started working withschools, and then gospel rescue
missions and then nonprofits,and now, in addition to all that
kind of the easiest way to sayit is the chick fillets of the
world, kind of the values-basedbusinesses that need top talent.
(12:22):
We do some other things alongthe way that just kind of are a
natural outgrowth of our work.
We'll do compensation studies,because we have all the salary
information on all those thingsI just listed, which is very
hard to aggregate.
We do culture studies, sayhow's your workplace?
Do people like being there ornot?
We do a lot of successionplanning, but at the end of the
day, it's like I don't knowanything that slows a church
(12:45):
down quicker and more thoroughlythan people.
Problems Right, and I meanstaff problems.
They're not just like memberscan't get along.
So internally it's not a verysexy vision statement, but
internally what we say you won'tread our website is we help
team Jesus go farther and fasterby solving people problems.
(13:08):
And most of that is getting theright team on board Right.
Speaker 1 (13:12):
Right, where do you spend your most time?
Or, like the business?
What types of roles do you findyourselves working on most, or
is there anything?
Speaker 2 (13:20):
like that, like we do , this place, it comes and goes
like like you know, if you askme that in April, I'd say
student pastors, cause in Aprilis when they all quit, and then
you need somebody by camp.
I mean, I'll stay throughgraduation, but then so there's
that.
you know, there's the cyclicalstuff, head of school stuff
contracts go out in March, sothe searches are kicking up
(13:40):
right now.
But but the better answer toyour question is the people that
are most satisfied with ourwork are people that asked us to
hire high on the org chart, sothe higher up the org chart it's
almost like we're called to dothat, more than the sound
engineer for our sixth campus oryou know stuff like that.
(14:01):
And I probably ought to payattention to that.
I, I, you know probably oughtto, but it just doesn't feel
like we're something we're verygood at or maybe even called to
Right Right.
Speaker 1 (14:12):
Right, and maybe the impact that you're having by
hiring those positions is likebigger for the organization.
That's where they maybe lookfor this kind of help is with
those higher level positions.
I want to get on to the othertopic here, but this is
fascinating to me.
So one last question what's thehardest part about hiring the
(14:33):
new senior pastor?
Speaker 2 (14:49):
I think the thing that I'm learning to focus on,
frank, is asking myself and Idon't mean this in any
disrespectful way is the searchcommittee in touch with reality?
Okay now, what do I mean bythat?
A?
Speaker 1 (14:57):
couple of different things.
Speaker 2 (14:59):
I work for one church , a super wealthy church outside
of New York City full of CEOsand executives.
This was 15 years ago and wecouldn't bring them anybody.
That worked and it was awful.
It was like I wish I'd havefilmed it all and said how not
to do a search, because you knowit's like listening to your
early sermons why did anybodyever come back to church?
But these folks were reallypretty funny.
(15:20):
I won't out the church.
But one of them you know wewere like, okay, that didn't
work, that didn't work.
What are you looking for inpreaching?
That would be better.
And one guy said you know, I'vebeen listening the last couple
of weeks to this guy, andyStanley, and why don't you just
go get?
him and I'm like well, you know,andy's lived in Georgia his
whole life.
I don't know that he wants to.
I was trying to be nice aboutit and the guy looked at me and
(15:42):
said just tell me what thenumber is, I'll write the check.
Just tell me what the number is.
And I'm like you are not intouch with reality.
Okay, so that's one form.
Now it takes a much more commonform.
Where you've got a searchcommittee of people who have
real jobs right.
Where you've got a searchcommittee of people who have
(16:03):
real jobs right, they work 40,50 hours a week and then they
coach their kid's soccer team orwhatever the thing is, or take
care of their mom that's inassisted living or whatever it
is, and then oh, by the way,serve for three hours at night
on a search team.
I mean, these people love theirchurch, right, which is such a
positive.
The shadow side of it is theythink everyone's going to love
(16:24):
their church just as much asthey do, and it's actually a
pretty competitive job market.
So I think I'm trying to learnhow to study.
Are they in touch with me?
Are they a little too proud?
Are they a little too bashful?
Are they a little too bashful?
And then another area that we'restill figuring out but we're
(16:45):
better than we used to be isdoes the search committee's
appetite for change match thecongregation's?
So sometimes you get the peoplewho are very optimistic, very
entrepreneurial, want to get newfamilies, want to bring new
people in, make some changesaround here, but that's not a
true reflection of thecongregation.
(17:05):
So we've found ways to kind ofstress test the church a little
bit.
You can get a great, talentedperson who changes things too
fast and they're done.
So it's really the easiest wayto say it is.
Socrates said, the key towisdom know yourself.
If a search committee reallyknows their church, like what
(17:27):
the church can tolerate, what itcan't, if they really know that
they love their church but it'snot the only church in the
country, then expectations startto align with reality and it's
a lot easier.
Speaker 1 (17:40):
So not bad people, not, it's just, uh, it's just
the nature of the way things goyeah, but navigating all of that
, um like, as you're saying itand I'm going, yeah, I can
totally understand how thosedifferent parts and pieces all
make it either more complicatedor more easy, depending on kind
of where it's all.
Speaker 2 (17:59):
How long is a sermon, Frank?
Yeah, no really.
That's a real question.
Believe.
Speaker 1 (18:06):
Yeah, you probably spent six.
You have the perfect or asperfect as it can get and you're
probably getting better everyyear.
Like way to ask all the rightquestions of you know.
Speaker 2 (18:16):
Search the church is endlessly nuanced and I'll tell
you, I tell our new people andif you're listening today and
you're like, well, our church isdifferent, our church is unique
.
Here's what I tell our newpeople After working with 5,000
churches, finishing 3,500searches, doing succession
planning, let me just saysomething If you've seen one
church, you have seen about onechurch.
That's it.
(18:38):
They're all very, verydifferent.
They're all very unique andyou're right If you think your
church is unique and anyone whocomes to you with any solution
at all that says this is thecookie cutter and it'll apply to
you because you're the same, asthey're run away from.
People who people who aresuccessful at church work know
that every church is unique.
Speaker 1 (18:58):
Yeah, yeah, that's good.
I mean, that's good feedbackright there for everyone
listening.
Right, it's like you, you areunique and you have to look at.
It's like even it's not yourbusiness or even what we do
really, but like as everyone,COVID and everyone's going
online and social media andstreaming and all of a sudden,
everyone feels like they have tobe like elevation or something
like that you, but it's likewe're not all that.
(19:18):
They're that and you can be youin your context and at your
size and where you sit and youknow, frank, I'm pulling this
off topic.
Speaker 2 (19:26):
I'm sorry, but my pastor I won't out him.
He's just one of the nice.
He's going to have such a niceplace in heaven I hope I get to
visit.
It's probably a gated part ofheaven that I won't get to go to
, but he was so worried afterthe pandemic that people weren't
going to come back to church.
I'm like, why are you worried?
He said I don't preach as wellas Stephen Furtick.
And now everyone knows they canfind him online and Stephen is
(19:52):
unbelievable.
I mean, he's Rain man ofpreachers, right, right, right.
And I just looked at him andsaid, tom, you're the only
pastor for this zip code, forthis six blocks, and I bet
people want to hear what youhave to say about that.
So if you're out therestruggling today as a leader and
a preacher, or your business,or I'm looking at the giving and
(20:15):
what are we going to do and allthat, I think if you'll focus
on your local six blocks, ifyou're super hyper local
ministry there's no one elsecalled it up at you Right, your
expression for your communitywill never be usurped by some
national chain.
Yeah, yeah, I love that.
Speaker 1 (20:32):
I love that.
Ok, you also.
I mean, you've written a fewbooks, but your most recent book
is called Be the Unicorn, and Ilove the title.
I live in startup land, so Ihave one version of a unicorn in
my head.
That's not what you're talkingabout.
So it's a leadership book andyou're coming to our conference
in October.
You're going to talk about it.
But, yeah, what was theinspiration?
(20:52):
Why did you write a book about?
Speaker 2 (20:53):
Yeah, Well, I'd love to say something noble, but it
wasn't.
It was selfish motivation andnot selfish like I'll write a
book and make a lot of money.
You don't make money writingbooks unless you invent Harry
Potter.
So you know, you just don't.
So we were doing a very selfishresearch project, and it was
during the shutdown of thepandemic, because none of our
(21:15):
clients were even meeting, muchless hiring, right.
So it wasn't.
I mean, we had nothing to do.
That's a whole other podcastabout how God saw us through
that.
It's amazing.
But we did realize we had sometime to work on the business
rather than just in it, becausewe can grow, grow, grow, grow,
grow.
You know.
And we started to say, likewhat are the very best
(21:36):
candidates we've everinterviewed have in common?
Do they have anything in common?
Right, and it's like the Idon't know.
Have you met somebody before?
Maybe it's in an elevator,maybe it's a job interview,
maybe it's a social function ora church, and you meet this
person and within five minutesyou're like this person's
remarkable.
I want to sign up for theirnewsletter, I want to listen to
(22:00):
their podcast, I want to go outwith them, I want to hire them,
like there's a magnet, thingthat very few people have that
stands out of the crowd, right.
So we were kind of asking howmany of those have we
interviewed and could we figureout if there are any common
denominators?
Well, long story short, in anysearch we're looking at
(22:22):
literally over 1,000 people forany one search.
But when you get down to thevery end, the most qualified
people get a long-formatface-to-face interview with us
and then they're the mostqualified after that.
Well, the most qualified afterthat.
We have now done 30,000long-format interviews with
these folks and tracked everynote and tracked where they went
(22:43):
in their career and trackwhether they got promoted and
track.
So, like we've been able to say, all right, these really are
the ones that you would meetwithin five minutes and you'd
say this one's a winner.
And then we started to say dothey have anything in common?
And it was so interesting.
I mean, the answer is yes, theydo have things in common, yeah
(23:04):
that's fascinating.
Speaker 1 (23:05):
And the answer is and then you're able to kind of
scour it, you know yeah yeah?
Speaker 2 (23:09):
Well, the answer is yes, they have things in common.
And then the second answer isand it's not what you would
guess.
So, like I had somepreconceived notions in my head
yeah, you know what they sayabout assuming right, don't do
it.
You know, I thought, like Ithought it would be the head
cheerleader, the quarterbackright Went to the Ivy League
(23:31):
school, or for your youngerlisteners out there, like in
finance, 6'5" trust fund, blueeyes, the whole thing.
Right, I thought, for sure,that's what it is right?
Not at all.
(23:54):
It was habits, not traits, notthings.
They're born with, not silverspoons.
Habits that all of these peopleshared in common, that are
incredibly uncommon for the restof us, incredibly uncommon for
the rest of us.
And we saw common threads,these habits, and then we
realized these are teachablehabits.
These are really simple lessons, and the hope was, rather than
(24:14):
just William's 12 opinions onwhat he thinks makes a great
person, no, no, data-drivenhabits.
Right, that if you develop them, you will stand out in the
crowd.
Or if you're a church leader,if you can develop a volunteer
team that practices these habits, your church will be one that
(24:37):
people won't just visit once.
Right, they will come back.
And so it's soft skills, it'shabits, and you know we kicked
around lots of titles.
Standout was one, but there arelike a million books called
Standout.
Yeah, boring.
Speaker 1 (24:51):
And.
Speaker 2 (24:51):
I was sitting around cleaning out the kids' room
We've got seven kids now and sothere's lots of toys and things
that we've aged out of you gothrough all the stuffed animals
for cleaning stuff out I noticedthe only thing that stood out
was the unicorn Not all themenagerie of stuffed animals
that we have, and so I thoughtwell, that's it, and I know it's
(25:12):
a tech term, you know SiliconValley and all that, but, like
most people get it, the unicornis the rare.
Speaker 1 (25:19):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (25:19):
They're very hard to find.
They the unicorn is the rarethey're very hard to find.
They're unmistakable once yousee them and you really want to
be around them.
And that's kind of the guy youmeet in the elevator, the lady
you meet at a social function,whatever the thing is.
So we called it Be the Unicorn12 data-driven habits that
separate the best leaders fromthe rest.
And the cool thing is these30,000, there is, we look to see
(25:43):
.
Do they have race in common?
No.
Do they have gender in common?
No.
Do they have an age?
Do they have an educationalbackground?
Is it socioeconomic?
None of that matters.
Speaker 1 (25:54):
How did you get to, how did you identify, uh, the
actual, the fact that it washabits, and then the actual
habits, like how do you get tothat level of knowing these
people?
Speaker 2 (26:08):
Yeah, well, we get paid to know people better than
what they present online, right,right, yeah, so, um, we, we
have a pretty formulaic way.
It's not cookie cutter, butit's.
It's got a rhythm, it's got aflow of interviewing people to
test them for certain things andover many conversations leading
(26:30):
up to our study, we asked ourconsultants over the years who
stood out, why they stand out.
I mean, it's been a runningconversation because, selfishly,
if I can find those peoplefaster, you're going to hire me
more.
And, by the way, the church cango farther and faster because
we're solving people problems.
(26:50):
It's a really selfish exercise.
But when we realized this is aroadmap, we've got to write a
book, we've got to get it inpeople's hands because if it can
help the church and people bebetter and a lot of individuals
buy it like job seekers.
I just signed 200 copies for agraduating senior class.
Speaker 1 (27:09):
Yeah, so like I mean, I already see the next book,
like volume two.
Is you and James clearpartnering up on some kind of
book about habits?
And I mean atomic habit has gotto be like one of the best
selling books of all times.
Speaker 2 (27:22):
Oh it's amazing.
Right, it's amazing, and Ioften say, if I could recommend
you know, amazon says, since youliked this, you might like that
.
Yeah, read my book to learnwhat the habits are and then go
read James's book about how toactually build the habits in
your life.
Speaker 1 (27:37):
I mean, it's to this day like my favorite book ever,
so I'm definitely going to readyours.
Speaker 2 (27:42):
But I'm going to send you.
I'm going to send you a Bible.
Frank, you need to expand yourreading.
Ok, done.
Speaker 1 (27:52):
I'll start in Genesis and I'll read all the way
through.
Speaker 2 (27:55):
Yeah, yeah, yeah OK let's.
Speaker 1 (27:57):
I mean, I could like have I geek, but um what?
Let's pick maybe two or three,you've got 12.
You're also going to speak atthe conference, but what are two
or three of the habits thatyou're like?
These are, these are some keythings that anybody could go
take and develop, and I don'tknow if they're like an ordering
of them, where you think aboutthem, like if you do this one,
then that one, then that one, orif it's just right, right one,
(28:22):
or if it's just right right,right, right.
Speaker 2 (28:25):
Well, so, interestingly, um, everybody
needs a different order, so wewrote the book to be
non-sequential.
Okay, got it, so so, like now,what do I mean when I say that
everyone has a different areathey need to work on?
Speaker 1 (28:32):
right right, I just, and some people like sorry, uh,
william, I just literally justtook six different like
leadership assessment profilethingies over the last like
month, so I'm all, I'm all inthe like.
We all have things to work oncamp right now well, there's.
Speaker 2 (28:48):
Let me give you a seventh.
Uh, we built the vander indexwhich is around these 12 habits,
okay, and you can see where youplace.
We interviewed the 30 000 okay,and surveyed them extensively.
Then we also surveyed 250,000,just general population to see.
How do you stack?
Where are you good?
Where's an action plan?
What are you good at?
(29:08):
You can start there.
Some people like to start withtheir weaknesses.
Whatever, that's fine.
I don't know what's mostimportant.
I do know that when I'm tryingto make a change in my life,
seeing momentum makes all thedifference.
I finally ran a mile.
Now I can run a mile and aquarter.
(29:29):
Right, I lost that first threepounds, or whatever Progress.
Momentum is the friend ofchange, and so we started our
very first chapter.
I believe is the easiest habitto adopt and we'll give you the
(29:51):
quickest win, so you can feelsome momentum, start to get
noticed and move to the nextones.
They're not written simplest tohardest, but the first one is
definitely this is low hangingfruit.
And we can talk about it alittle bit.
I will be talking about itquite extensively at the
conference, so let me just giveyou a little piece and see if
it's helpful.
And that's this the unicornsare fast.
Yeah, first chapter, the fast.
(30:14):
And the book, by the way, is 12.
It might be 13 or 14 chapters,but the 12 chapters, one for
each habit.
Here's where we saw it inpeople.
Here's the responses from ourunicorns when we question about
it.
Here's a case study.
Here's how you apply it.
Really, no one will read thisbook and say William is
definitely going to cure cancer.
That's not going to happen.
(30:35):
When you read this book, it'ssimple cookies on the bottom
shelf, kind of stuff.
And when I say fast, it's onlybecause I want a one-word title.
You say I'm not fast, I'm notfast.
I'm not fast either, frank, I'mDutch.
You know we are not built forspeed, we're built for wind
resistance.
We look like this so you knowit's….
Speaker 1 (30:57):
But fast is important and hard.
Speaker 2 (31:01):
Well, if I could title it accurately and not the
way you have to title things forpeople to read books, the title
would be the intentionallyresponsive.
I mean, here's the thing Humansare horrible at getting back to
one another.
Yeah, terrible, just awful atit.
(31:22):
I mean, we we looked at, andthe unicorns are not.
They're almost maniacal aboutgetting back to people, enough
that they end up getting closeto burnout somewhere in life and
they have to put guardrails upand how do I know when to
respond and when not to?
But they are driven to get backto people and I thought well,
that's easy, but just do it.
(31:44):
But most people don't, and someof this is born out of when we
started the company in the fallof 2008.
What was I thinking, frank?
What was I thinking um?
Speaker 1 (31:57):
you, you, you know this, you were gonna, you're
gonna write a book about these12 things and you're gonna know,
what actually?
I was just 12 things, andyou're going to know what
Actually?
Speaker 2 (32:04):
I was just envisioning getting one contract
so I could go buy groceries.
Speaker 1 (32:08):
Yeah, that's what I was.
Speaker 2 (32:09):
I get it Shoot.
So you know, if you called meback in those days where we were
on it literally on a card table, guess how fast I got back to
you.
If you called and said couldyou talk to me about me coming
to help me find?
Speaker 1 (32:23):
a fill in the blank If you didn't pick up the phone
right when they called.
I'm sure you could talk inminutes.
Speaker 2 (32:28):
And email.
We were right on the front endof blogging.
We're right when Twitter cameout the same month.
We started.
So like there's all this sortof inbound marketing starting
and I didn't realize it.
But we got back to peoplereally fast.
And the longer we did that, themore we realized and we just
did it out of necessity, like Ididn't have anything else to do.
(32:49):
People kept saying you just gotback to us so fast and
intentionally.
It wasn't like an auto response.
You mentioned our weather orsomething about the Air Force
Base in San Diego or whatever.
And the longer we do that Ithought they were just paying
(33:10):
lip service.
But I started realizing no,actually that's kind of weird to
get back to people quickly andthat was one of the things we
noticed in the unicorns is thatthey're the same way.
They're driven to get back topeople really quickly.
Most people are not Sales andmarketing.
We talk to people that work insales and when marketing gives
(33:32):
them a lead whether that's aform filled out online or
whatever how quickly do theyrespond?
Because speed makes all thedifference in a sales
conversation.
We need the lead.
Speed makes all the differencein a sales conversation and I
won't bore you with the detailshere, but it was staggering how
slowly salespeople got back toleads.
(33:53):
It was staggering how slowlypeople on dating websites get
back to.
Here's someone you might beinterested in.
Like, we're terrible at gettingback to people.
If you will find a way to justintentionally respond quickly
without blowing up your liferight, you will stand out of the
(34:15):
crowd, I promise you.
Speaker 1 (34:18):
I mean, it makes sense.
It sounds so simple, but itdefinitely makes sense that like
oh, the public.
Speaker 2 (34:23):
And so, behind BTS, behind the scenes, right, the
publisher hated the title.
Like we went round and round.
Like I paid for an online A-Btest of titles to prove to them
that Uniform would work.
Like we're not doing it, we'renot doing it.
Great publisher.
I'm using them again for thenext book Comes out next year.
Nothing but good things to sayabout him, but we did fight over
this.
Speaker 1 (34:42):
Okay, you know the alternate title we kicked around
at the office was well, I guessmom was right that one could
have worked too, though I likeit.
Speaker 2 (35:01):
Well, it's kind of yeah.
Mom always said write the thankyou note as soon as you get the
gift.
Mom always said you know, yep,so it's not rocket science, but
nobody does it.
Yeah, very, very few people doit, and it's like we figured out
just by accident how to buildthe magic treadmill that will
(35:21):
cause you to lose weight.
Look great, run faster thanever.
This is the one, and you stillhave to get on it and use it
Right?
Speaker 1 (35:31):
Yeah, I get it.
Okay, give us another one.
Give us another one.
Speaker 2 (35:34):
Yeah, I'll give you, I'm not going to bore you.
I've already gone past the time.
You told me Maybe one more, andit's kind of ironic Self-aware.
Speaker 1 (36:08):
I and it's kind of ironic Self-aware I'm not,
you're getting you're gettinglike real stuff and you're out,
you're like I want to grow Well,even just starting it.
So even getting people to wantto do that kind of stuff is
probably hard, and then when youdo it now, you've got to try to
take action on it.
So it's just hard, it's hard.
Speaker 2 (36:24):
It is and that's why we built the.
If you go to vanderindexcom youcan see the little software
tool.
We built it for teams whereyour whole staff can take it
together and see where you'regood, and all that.
But it is a bit like me goingto my physicals once I turned 50
.
It's a different game and youdon't want to know all the
information Painful to find outand then painful to hear.
(36:50):
So you know it is hard.
But the unicorns here's what'sinteresting.
We had the unicorns forced rankwhat am I best at of these 12,
and what am I worst at right?
And it was all over the boardwho was best at this?
And this?
The one consistent answer wasthe unicorns ranked
self-awareness as their worsthabit of the 12.
(37:11):
They're the most self-aware.
When we polled the 250,000general population lovely people
to see how they do, one of thequestions was rate yourself in
each of these 12 areas, andself-awareness is one and it's
one to five.
You know, like not good at all.
(37:31):
Sort of good, good, really good, excellent, right.
91% of every normal personsurveyed, 91% said that they
were better than average.
Now there are people-.
Speaker 1 (37:48):
That doesn't surprise me, and it's also shocking all
at the same time.
Speaker 2 (37:51):
Well, there are some bean counters listening right
now, I hope people that managethe money or the finances of the
church and you're like, I meanI'm no math major but I'm pretty
sure 91% of a group is notabove average at anything.
Yeah, like 50% is above average.
Right, but that's the punchline.
The people who are mostself-aware think they have so
(38:12):
much more work to do, right.
And the people who lackself-awareness think I got that,
it's like this, and okay,you're going to hear this again
at the conference.
So like sorry, but I'll giveyou this one little illustration
.
I went to Princeton forseminary and so we study, and
you know all the academics andall that, and I took a class in
(38:33):
Galatians.
Galatians takes about four anda half minutes to read.
I took a whole semester in it.
So that's how geeky I am.
But one thing and I know thateverybody listening has
Galatians memorized.
But just for memory's sake,let's think back to the
beginning of the letter which,by the way, I believe and most
scholars do it was probably thefirst letter Paul wrote that
(38:55):
ended up in the New Testament.
Speaker 1 (38:57):
Earliest one.
Speaker 2 (38:59):
So what's our first picture of Paul?
Here's how he starts his letterPaul, an apostle called by God,
not by men.
Now, that's a guy with verylittle self-esteem issues, right
.
Speaker 1 (39:12):
Called by God not by men.
Speaker 2 (39:14):
Right Fast forward to arguably the last letter Paul
wrote that ended up in the NewTestament.
How does he describe himself?
I am the chief of all sinners.
The longer you walk with theSavior, the more amazed you
(39:37):
become with his grace, and it'sthat self-awareness that
unicorns whether they'reChristians or not.
The unicorns are really sort ofhell bent on figuring out what
makes them better and doing iteven when it's news they don't
want to hear.
So that's two, and I can geekout on all kinds of data, but
(39:57):
we'll have more time together inDallas and maybe some of the
folks listening today will getto hear it.
Speaker 1 (40:01):
I love it.
I love it.
William, thanks for coming onthe show.
The book sounds amazing, I mean, and for like lots of reasons,
like not just for Christians,not just for this audience, it's
like really for anybody.
So people should go check itout.
Should they go to your website,or should they?
Speaker 2 (40:16):
go to Amazon.
I never saw this coming growingup because I hated my name, but
the reality is my last name isso messed up you can misspell it
into Google or Amazon and it'llshow up.
Speaker 1 (40:27):
It'll come.
That's amazing.
Speaker 2 (40:28):
It'll come and you know it's interesting.
I didn't see this.
We wrote this for people thatwant to stand out in the crowd,
but so many people buy it fortheir kids for graduation gifts.
Yeah, heck, yeah, it's becomelike one of the two, three, four
top job hunting books on Amazonand kind of staying there.
So that's cool.
If you're trying to get ahead,it might help you.
Speaker 1 (40:48):
Yeah, love it, love it.
Well, thanks for coming on theshow.
Thanks, guys, for listening.
Definitely go check out thebook and come to the conference
to hear William speak live.
You can get the book and thenhe'll autograph it in a session
at the conference, maybe.
Maybe you got to get in line,so there you go.
Speaker 2 (41:05):
I'll stay as long as Frank lets me.
Speaker 1 (41:07):
All right, thanks guys.
We'll catch you later.
Hey guys, frank here with another episode of Modern
Church Leader.
I am here with WilliamVanderbloemen, the founder of
Vanderbloemen Search.
William, it's great to have youon today.
Thanks, frank, it's good to bewith you.
So you put William.
Do you go by William, or dopeople call you?
Speaker 2 (00:20):
Yeah, I have a.
So first of all, little advice.
If there are any listeners outthere that are thinking of
having children never, ever,make your child go by their
middle name.
It's terrible.
I'm a junior.
I'm actually Bruce WilliamVanderbilt Jr.
And dad was Bruce and momdidn't want two Bruce's in the
(00:42):
house, so it's William, but thenshe was Persistent would be a
nice way to say it about it onlybeing William.
So I don't even say Bill or itdoesn't.
It's not like it's, I don'tcare, but it just doesn't even
get from my brain.
Speaker 1 (00:57):
You know it's like yeah, I get, I'm a Franklin
named after my grandpa, but I goby Frank.
It's always been Frank, it'salways been Frank, it's never
been Franklin.
You know, but I get the middlename.
The middle name thing wouldthrow me off if I started
calling my kids my middle names.
Speaker 2 (01:12):
The only upside, frank?
The only upside is if I get aphone call and somebody says hey
Bruce, they're either runningfor office or asking for money
and I can hang up real fast.
Speaker 1 (01:21):
So it's like got it wrong.
You don't actually know me,Right, oh my gosh.
Um well, thanks for doing this.
Speaker 2 (01:32):
I know you're, you're traveling and speaking at some
cool conferences and everything.
Um, but man, you like my homedecor.
I mean, this is pretty awesome.
Speaker 1 (01:39):
I was going to say with the suitcase on the bed.
That's amazing, that's right.
Well, I get the two beds.
Speaker 2 (01:43):
I don't do the king, and that way I've got a place
for my things and a place for me.
So a hundred percent.
Speaker 1 (01:48):
I'm the same way.
It's like I don't use thecloset in a hotel room.
That's work.
Speaker 2 (01:53):
No, that's just a recipe for leaving something at
the hotel.
Speaker 1 (01:56):
So I've totally done that and I'm like yep left it in
the closet.
Speaker 2 (02:00):
No, it's a pretty cool thing.
I'm speaking tomorrow to theCEOs of the larger homeless
missions in the United States,so it's a really interesting
crowd with a very unique puzzleto solve, so hopefully I can
learn from them and maybe evenoffer something that will help
them.
Speaker 1 (02:17):
How many of them are there?
That seems like a fairly nichecrowd of CEOs, but how many of
those are there?
Speaker 2 (02:25):
Yeah Well, first of all, if you say CEO, then it's a
pretty good size.
You call it gospel rescuemission, right?
Okay, I think there are acouple hundred here.
It's a very small gathering.
No sponsors, no, like we weregoing to bring somebody and set
up a table like no, no, no, no,no, no.
This is a quiet thing.
So it'll be fun to go and learnfrom these guys.
I would bet they are a littlecloser to Jesus than I am Right,
(02:47):
yeah, I mean they're doingthat's tough work.
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (02:52):
A hundred percent.
A hundred percent, Well, that'scool.
That's not necessarily you'respeaking to this group, but you
were obviously invited there tospeak because you've built a
pretty awesome company over thelast 15, 16 years.
Speaker 2 (03:08):
Well, maybe we do a lot of whether it's awesome or
not, we'll let God decide laterbut we have to work for members
of this group and I wrote a booklast year about kind of
standing out in the crowd, andright now the pastors, your
listeners, can relate to this.
It's harder to stand out infront of donors.
(03:29):
Yeah, like overall benevolentgiving.
United States is going down,not up.
The church is doing better thannon-church, but, um, you know,
those guys raised 42 cents ofevery dollar in their budget in
the month of December, yeah,which, by the way, is when it
gets cold and homelessnessbecomes a problem, right, so you
(03:49):
know they got that.
And then there's volunteer, andthen then there's the whole.
Like the number one headache isis what we're doing?
Working because people don'twant to give their money to
something that's just thrownaway, or so it's a fascinating
studying for them and trying toto figure out how to help them,
how to help.
Speaker 1 (04:06):
Yeah, I mean.
Good luck when you go.
Thanks, Tell us about thesearch firm that you started,
though.
Like give us?
Speaker 2 (04:14):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (04:16):
Maybe you can go, you can step before that and like
what got you connected to churchand what you want to start
serving.
I know you do searches for morethan just pastors, but you
obviously serve a lot ofchurches and pastors.
Speaker 2 (04:26):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (04:27):
Kind of got you into this.
Speaker 2 (04:29):
Well.
So what got the search firmstarted was a question, one
question Can we help churchesfind their pastor faster and
better?
And it's since grown into someother things.
But let me drop a little bitbehind that.
And it's since grown into someother things.
But let me drop a little bitbehind that.
I was, you know, the chronicentrepreneur as a kid and we
(04:50):
could spend a long time talkingabout that.
But, like you know, I would buyup extra paper routes and sell
off the parts I didn't want andlike that's dysfunctional.
That's weird thinking for anine year old.
But that was me.
And and then I went to collegethinking I would finish my MBA
in three years and then by 30,have most of the Western
(05:14):
hemisphere under control.
And you know I was going tothis, was it?
And then in college just didthis prodigal journey.
And man, was I good at that?
I did all the wrong things andI'm everything my daughters
better not bring home.
That's what I was yeah, okay,all right, and had a a pretty
(05:35):
significant um conversionexperience or warming the heart.
Grew up going to church but youknow where.
They say that the farthest sixinches in the world is from the
head to the heart.
You know it never got from headto heart so, but it got to
heart and it got real and Iwanted to go tell other people
about this.
And so I was going to do a PhD.
(05:55):
Went to Princeton for seminary,go somewhere, I could be a
college professor.
Then thought, well, they sit inlibraries, who, who talks to
people about Jesus all day.
Well, that's a narrow careersearch.
So I went into church ministry,was a pastor, was a senior
pastor of about 15, 16 years,left the church world, went
(06:18):
through a divorce which I wouldnot recommend.
It wasn't anything interestingenough for tabloids to pick up,
but it was still just tragic andfound myself as a dad with four
kids and, not knowing so, wentinto the corporate world and was
at a Fortune 200 company oiland gas very large company.
(06:41):
They were putting me in like amanagement rotation sort of
thing, and the first year I wasin HR and the CEO of the time
been there nine and a half years.
He said that's long enough timeto find a successor.
Nine and a half years isforever for a CEO for a company
that size.
Yeah, I didn't know that theyhired this thing called a search
(07:01):
firm and I was in the HRdepartment so I was kind of like
I guess, if our ambitions, I'dsay I was on the succession team
.
The reality is I was like thethird string water boy for the
team.
So you know it doesn't matterand I've watched him use this
(07:22):
search firm and I'd never seensuch in the in the church we
didn't have anything like thatRight, and the church that I had
been serving most recently,first person tree in Houston,
fantastic church, wonderfulpeople, world beaters of people.
I mean just amazing.
They took three years to findme.
I was there, six.
They thought that was allnormal and, and you know, you
(07:44):
leave with a divorce.
There's a little bit of choppywater, but the church is way
bigger than me, it's the oldestchurch in the city of Houston
5,000 adults, 3,000 kids, aschool, a whole everything.
And they took three years tofind my successor.
So 12 years, six years with asenior pastor, six years without
.
And this oil and gas companycompany which, if you don't live
(08:07):
in texas.
I live in houston.
If you don't live in texas, oiland gas companies are are the
death star of the galaxy, likethey're the worst thing in the
whole world, right?
So evil, death star oil and gas, yeah, 90 days, 90 days, frank,
90 days.
They had had a new CEO,seamless, right.
(08:30):
And I look at that.
And then I look at the church,six years with six years without
, and I was like and I can sayit cleanly now, but but there
was a discontent in me that waslike, yeah, why does the
business world have a bettersolution than the bride?
Does the business world have abetter solution than the bride?
And I had gotten married,adrian and I had just blended
(08:51):
our families.
We had six kids now a house wejust bought that we could barely
afford.
And I came home and said hey,babe, I think I'm supposed to
quit my job and start somethingnew for churches.
So she looked at me and shesaid oh, oh, that's because
(09:12):
churches love new ideas, right?
Yeah, yeah, said no one everJust ask Jesus.
So, anyway, she should havesaid I love you, I love your
vision, go back to work.
We got miles to feed, yeah.
Instead she said let's give ita try.
And oh, frank, she listened.
Speaker 1 (09:36):
She heard you and didn't walk away.
Speaker 2 (09:39):
Yeah, so it was the fall of 2008.
So it was the fall of 2008.
Now, if you're old enough toremember the economy, then
that's arguably the dumbest timein the history of America,
except October of 1929, to quityour job and start something new
for churches.
So I don't know what we werethinking.
(10:01):
We were idiots.
But we decided we'd start on alittle card table no debt, no
investors, just try and build itfrom scratch and see what
happens.
And we're still learning as wego.
But it's been a fun.
Fun 16 years, yeah.
Speaker 1 (10:15):
I mean, 16 years is a testament to it Doing very well
.
And also man, yeah, 2008, notthe greatest time on paper, but
also you start something in atime like that and you get it to
work.
That's kind of like trial byfire and starting it during a
(10:35):
hard season not necessarily likethe easiest of times.
So there's something to be saidabout you know making it work
in those times.
Speaker 2 (10:42):
I wish I could say I was that smart.
I'm not looking back.
I do think the need was thereand we did market research.
It wasn't some, you know Iheard from the Lord when it was
actually a bad burrito the nightbefore.
It wasn't anything like thatLike we really did the research
and I think the need was muchbigger than I realized.
And I really think the economicslowdown of 2008 was a gift
(11:06):
from God for us.
It allowed us time to practicethe craft before it really took
off, because it grew prettyquickly and then it grew really
fast for a long, long time.
So I think it was kind of likewe got to do a year of wax on,
wax off before we had to go tothe dojo, yeah.
Speaker 1 (11:27):
And so for those that don't know I assume most
listening probably know, but forthose that don't know, what
actually does the business do?
Speaker 2 (11:35):
What actually could repeat the question.
Speaker 1 (11:37):
What does the business do?
What do you guys?
Yeah?
Speaker 2 (11:39):
So we don't do karate and if and if for those who are
listening who are not ancient,that was a reference to Karate
Kid as an old movie.
There was sound then, but justbarely color.
So what does our company do?
We started with this idea, thisquestion could we help churches
find their pastor better andfaster?
(12:00):
And then it spread out to anyfull time employee of a church.
And then, oh, we have a school.
And so we started working withschools, and then gospel rescue
missions and then nonprofits,and now, in addition to all that
kind of the easiest way to sayit is the chick fillets of the
world, kind of the values-basedbusinesses that need top talent.
(12:22):
We do some other things alongthe way that just kind of are a
natural outgrowth of our work.
We'll do compensation studies,because we have all the salary
information on all those thingsI just listed, which is very
hard to aggregate.
We do culture studies, sayhow's your workplace?
Do people like being there ornot?
We do a lot of successionplanning, but at the end of the
day, it's like I don't knowanything that slows a church
(12:45):
down quicker and more thoroughlythan people.
Problems Right, and I meanstaff problems.
They're not just like memberscan't get along.
So internally it's not a verysexy vision statement, but
internally what we say you won'tread our website is we help
team Jesus go farther and fasterby solving people problems.
(13:08):
And most of that is getting theright team on board Right.
Speaker 1 (13:12):
Right, where do you spend your most time?
Or, like the business?
What types of roles do you findyourselves working on most, or
is there anything?
Speaker 2 (13:20):
like that, like we do , this place, it comes and goes
like like you know, if you askme that in April, I'd say
student pastors, cause in Aprilis when they all quit, and then
you need somebody by camp.
I mean, I'll stay throughgraduation, but then so there's
that.
you know, there's the cyclicalstuff, head of school stuff
contracts go out in March, sothe searches are kicking up
(13:40):
right now.
But but the better answer toyour question is the people that
are most satisfied with ourwork are people that asked us to
hire high on the org chart, sothe higher up the org chart it's
almost like we're called to dothat, more than the sound
engineer for our sixth campus oryou know stuff like that.
(14:01):
And I probably ought to payattention to that.
I, I, you know probably oughtto, but it just doesn't feel
like we're something we're verygood at or maybe even called to
Right Right.
Speaker 1 (14:12):
Right, and maybe the impact that you're having by
hiring those positions is likebigger for the organization.
That's where they maybe lookfor this kind of help is with
those higher level positions.
I want to get on to the othertopic here, but this is
fascinating to me.
So one last question what's thehardest part about hiring the
(14:33):
new senior pastor?
Speaker 2 (14:49):
I think the thing that I'm learning to focus on,
frank, is asking myself and Idon't mean this in any
disrespectful way is the searchcommittee in touch with reality?
Okay now, what do I mean bythat?
A?
Speaker 1 (14:57):
couple of different things.
Speaker 2 (14:59):
I work for one church , a super wealthy church outside
of New York City full of CEOsand executives.
This was 15 years ago and wecouldn't bring them anybody.
That worked and it was awful.
It was like I wish I'd havefilmed it all and said how not
to do a search, because you knowit's like listening to your
early sermons why did anybodyever come back to church?
But these folks were reallypretty funny.
(15:20):
I won't out the church.
But one of them you know wewere like, okay, that didn't
work, that didn't work.
What are you looking for inpreaching?
That would be better.
And one guy said you know, I'vebeen listening the last couple
of weeks to this guy, andyStanley, and why don't you just
go get?
him and I'm like well, you know,andy's lived in Georgia his
whole life.
I don't know that he wants to.
I was trying to be nice aboutit and the guy looked at me and
(15:42):
said just tell me what thenumber is, I'll write the check.
Just tell me what the number is.
And I'm like you are not intouch with reality.
Okay, so that's one form.
Now it takes a much more commonform.
Where you've got a searchcommittee of people who have
real jobs right.
Where you've got a searchcommittee of people who have
(16:03):
real jobs right, they work 40,50 hours a week and then they
coach their kid's soccer team orwhatever the thing is, or take
care of their mom that's inassisted living or whatever it
is, and then oh, by the way,serve for three hours at night
on a search team.
I mean, these people love theirchurch, right, which is such a
positive.
The shadow side of it is theythink everyone's going to love
(16:24):
their church just as much asthey do, and it's actually a
pretty competitive job market.
So I think I'm trying to learnhow to study.
Are they in touch with me?
Are they a little too proud?
Are they a little too bashful?
Are they a little too bashful?
And then another area that we'restill figuring out but we're
(16:45):
better than we used to be isdoes the search committee's
appetite for change match thecongregation's?
So sometimes you get the peoplewho are very optimistic, very
entrepreneurial, want to get newfamilies, want to bring new
people in, make some changesaround here, but that's not a
true reflection of thecongregation.
(17:05):
So we've found ways to kind ofstress test the church a little
bit.
You can get a great, talentedperson who changes things too
fast and they're done.
So it's really the easiest wayto say it is.
Socrates said, the key towisdom know yourself.
If a search committee reallyknows their church, like what
(17:27):
the church can tolerate, what itcan't, if they really know that
they love their church but it'snot the only church in the
country, then expectations startto align with reality and it's
a lot easier.
Speaker 1 (17:40):
So not bad people, not, it's just, uh, it's just
the nature of the way things goyeah, but navigating all of that
, um like, as you're saying itand I'm going, yeah, I can
totally understand how thosedifferent parts and pieces all
make it either more complicatedor more easy, depending on kind
of where it's all.
Speaker 2 (17:59):
How long is a sermon, Frank?
Yeah, no really.
That's a real question.
Believe.
Speaker 1 (18:06):
Yeah, you probably spent six.
You have the perfect or asperfect as it can get and you're
probably getting better everyyear.
Like way to ask all the rightquestions of you know.
Speaker 2 (18:16):
Search the church is endlessly nuanced and I'll tell
you, I tell our new people andif you're listening today and
you're like, well, our church isdifferent, our church is unique
.
Here's what I tell our newpeople After working with 5,000
churches, finishing 3,500searches, doing succession
planning, let me just saysomething If you've seen one
church, you have seen about onechurch.
That's it.
(18:38):
They're all very, verydifferent.
They're all very unique andyou're right If you think your
church is unique and anyone whocomes to you with any solution
at all that says this is thecookie cutter and it'll apply to
you because you're the same, asthey're run away from.
People who people who aresuccessful at church work know
that every church is unique.
Speaker 1 (18:58):
Yeah, yeah, that's good.
I mean, that's good feedbackright there for everyone
listening.
Right, it's like you, you areunique and you have to look at.
It's like even it's not yourbusiness or even what we do
really, but like as everyone,COVID and everyone's going
online and social media andstreaming and all of a sudden,
everyone feels like they have tobe like elevation or something
like that you, but it's likewe're not all that.
(19:18):
They're that and you can be youin your context and at your
size and where you sit and youknow, frank, I'm pulling this
off topic.
Speaker 2 (19:26):
I'm sorry, but my pastor I won't out him.
He's just one of the nice.
He's going to have such a niceplace in heaven I hope I get to
visit.
It's probably a gated part ofheaven that I won't get to go to
, but he was so worried afterthe pandemic that people weren't
going to come back to church.
I'm like, why are you worried?
He said I don't preach as wellas Stephen Furtick.
And now everyone knows they canfind him online and Stephen is
(19:52):
unbelievable.
I mean, he's Rain man ofpreachers, right, right, right.
And I just looked at him andsaid, tom, you're the only
pastor for this zip code, forthis six blocks, and I bet
people want to hear what youhave to say about that.
So if you're out therestruggling today as a leader and
a preacher, or your business,or I'm looking at the giving and
(20:15):
what are we going to do and allthat, I think if you'll focus
on your local six blocks, ifyou're super hyper local
ministry there's no one elsecalled it up at you Right, your
expression for your communitywill never be usurped by some
national chain.
Yeah, yeah, I love that.
Speaker 1 (20:32):
I love that.
Ok, you also.
I mean, you've written a fewbooks, but your most recent book
is called Be the Unicorn, and Ilove the title.
I live in startup land, so Ihave one version of a unicorn in
my head.
That's not what you're talkingabout.
So it's a leadership book andyou're coming to our conference
in October.
You're going to talk about it.
But, yeah, what was theinspiration?
(20:52):
Why did you write a book about?
Speaker 2 (20:53):
Yeah, Well, I'd love to say something noble, but it
wasn't.
It was selfish motivation andnot selfish like I'll write a
book and make a lot of money.
You don't make money writingbooks unless you invent Harry
Potter.
So you know, you just don't.
So we were doing a very selfishresearch project, and it was
during the shutdown of thepandemic, because none of our
(21:15):
clients were even meeting, muchless hiring, right.
So it wasn't.
I mean, we had nothing to do.
That's a whole other podcastabout how God saw us through
that.
It's amazing.
But we did realize we had sometime to work on the business
rather than just in it, becausewe can grow, grow, grow, grow,
grow.
You know.
And we started to say, likewhat are the very best
(21:36):
candidates we've everinterviewed have in common?
Do they have anything in common?
Right, and it's like the Idon't know.
Have you met somebody before?
Maybe it's in an elevator,maybe it's a job interview,
maybe it's a social function ora church, and you meet this
person and within five minutesyou're like this person's
remarkable.
I want to sign up for theirnewsletter, I want to listen to
(22:00):
their podcast, I want to go outwith them, I want to hire them,
like there's a magnet, thingthat very few people have that
stands out of the crowd, right.
So we were kind of asking howmany of those have we
interviewed and could we figureout if there are any common
denominators?
Well, long story short, in anysearch we're looking at
(22:22):
literally over 1,000 people forany one search.
But when you get down to thevery end, the most qualified
people get a long-formatface-to-face interview with us
and then they're the mostqualified after that.
Well, the most qualified afterthat.
We have now done 30,000long-format interviews with
these folks and tracked everynote and tracked where they went
(22:43):
in their career and trackwhether they got promoted and
track.
So, like we've been able to say, all right, these really are
the ones that you would meetwithin five minutes and you'd
say this one's a winner.
And then we started to say dothey have anything in common?
And it was so interesting.
I mean, the answer is yes, theydo have things in common, yeah
(23:04):
that's fascinating.
Speaker 1 (23:05):
And the answer is and then you're able to kind of
scour it, you know yeah yeah?
Speaker 2 (23:09):
Well, the answer is yes, they have things in common.
And then the second answer isand it's not what you would
guess.
So, like I had somepreconceived notions in my head
yeah, you know what they sayabout assuming right, don't do
it.
You know, I thought, like Ithought it would be the head
cheerleader, the quarterbackright Went to the Ivy League
(23:31):
school, or for your youngerlisteners out there, like in
finance, 6'5" trust fund, blueeyes, the whole thing.
Right, I thought, for sure,that's what it is right?
Not at all.
(23:54):
It was habits, not traits, notthings.
They're born with, not silverspoons.
Habits that all of these peopleshared in common, that are
incredibly uncommon for the restof us, incredibly uncommon for
the rest of us.
And we saw common threads,these habits, and then we
realized these are teachablehabits.
These are really simple lessons, and the hope was, rather than
(24:14):
just William's 12 opinions onwhat he thinks makes a great
person, no, no, data-drivenhabits.
Right, that if you develop them, you will stand out in the
crowd.
Or if you're a church leader,if you can develop a volunteer
team that practices these habits, your church will be one that
(24:37):
people won't just visit once.
Right, they will come back.
And so it's soft skills, it'shabits, and you know we kicked
around lots of titles.
Standout was one, but there arelike a million books called
Standout.
Yeah, boring.
Speaker 1 (24:51):
And.
Speaker 2 (24:51):
I was sitting around cleaning out the kids' room
We've got seven kids now and sothere's lots of toys and things
that we've aged out of you gothrough all the stuffed animals
for cleaning stuff out I noticedthe only thing that stood out
was the unicorn Not all themenagerie of stuffed animals
that we have, and so I thoughtwell, that's it, and I know it's
(25:12):
a tech term, you know SiliconValley and all that, but, like
most people get it, the unicornis the rare.
Speaker 1 (25:19):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (25:19):
They're very hard to find.
They the unicorn is the rarethey're very hard to find.
They're unmistakable once yousee them and you really want to
be around them.
And that's kind of the guy youmeet in the elevator, the lady
you meet at a social function,whatever the thing is.
So we called it Be the Unicorn12 data-driven habits that
separate the best leaders fromthe rest.
And the cool thing is these30,000, there is, we look to see
(25:43):
.
Do they have race in common?
No.
Do they have gender in common?
No.
Do they have an age?
Do they have an educationalbackground?
Is it socioeconomic?
None of that matters.
Speaker 1 (25:54):
How did you get to, how did you identify, uh, the
actual, the fact that it washabits, and then the actual
habits, like how do you get tothat level of knowing these
people?
Speaker 2 (26:08):
Yeah, well, we get paid to know people better than
what they present online, right,right, yeah, so, um, we, we
have a pretty formulaic way.
It's not cookie cutter, butit's.
It's got a rhythm, it's got aflow of interviewing people to
test them for certain things andover many conversations leading
(26:30):
up to our study, we asked ourconsultants over the years who
stood out, why they stand out.
I mean, it's been a runningconversation because, selfishly,
if I can find those peoplefaster, you're going to hire me
more.
And, by the way, the church cango farther and faster because
we're solving people problems.
(26:50):
It's a really selfish exercise.
But when we realized this is aroadmap, we've got to write a
book, we've got to get it inpeople's hands because if it can
help the church and people bebetter and a lot of individuals
buy it like job seekers.
I just signed 200 copies for agraduating senior class.
Speaker 1 (27:09):
Yeah, so like I mean, I already see the next book,
like volume two.
Is you and James clearpartnering up on some kind of
book about habits?
And I mean atomic habit has gotto be like one of the best
selling books of all times.
Speaker 2 (27:22):
Oh it's amazing.
Right, it's amazing, and Ioften say, if I could recommend
you know, amazon says, since youliked this, you might like that
.
Yeah, read my book to learnwhat the habits are and then go
read James's book about how toactually build the habits in
your life.
Speaker 1 (27:37):
I mean, it's to this day like my favorite book ever,
so I'm definitely going to readyours.
Speaker 2 (27:42):
But I'm going to send you.
I'm going to send you a Bible.
Frank, you need to expand yourreading.
Ok, done.
Speaker 1 (27:52):
I'll start in Genesis and I'll read all the way
through.
Speaker 2 (27:55):
Yeah, yeah, yeah OK let's.
Speaker 1 (27:57):
I mean, I could like have I geek, but um what?
Let's pick maybe two or three,you've got 12.
You're also going to speak atthe conference, but what are two
or three of the habits thatyou're like?
These are, these are some keythings that anybody could go
take and develop, and I don'tknow if they're like an ordering
of them, where you think aboutthem, like if you do this one,
then that one, then that one, orif it's just right, right one,
(28:22):
or if it's just right right,right, right.
Speaker 2 (28:25):
Well, so, interestingly, um, everybody
needs a different order, so wewrote the book to be
non-sequential.
Okay, got it, so so, like now,what do I mean when I say that
everyone has a different areathey need to work on?
Speaker 1 (28:32):
right right, I just, and some people like sorry, uh,
william, I just literally justtook six different like
leadership assessment profilethingies over the last like
month, so I'm all, I'm all inthe like.
We all have things to work oncamp right now well, there's.
Speaker 2 (28:48):
Let me give you a seventh.
Uh, we built the vander indexwhich is around these 12 habits,
okay, and you can see where youplace.
We interviewed the 30 000 okay,and surveyed them extensively.
Then we also surveyed 250,000,just general population to see.
How do you stack?
Where are you good?
Where's an action plan?
What are you good at?
(29:08):
You can start there.
Some people like to start withtheir weaknesses.
Whatever, that's fine.
I don't know what's mostimportant.
I do know that when I'm tryingto make a change in my life,
seeing momentum makes all thedifference.
I finally ran a mile.
Now I can run a mile and aquarter.
(29:29):
Right, I lost that first threepounds, or whatever Progress.
Momentum is the friend ofchange, and so we started our
very first chapter.
I believe is the easiest habitto adopt and we'll give you the
(29:51):
quickest win, so you can feelsome momentum, start to get
noticed and move to the nextones.
They're not written simplest tohardest, but the first one is
definitely this is low hangingfruit.
And we can talk about it alittle bit.
I will be talking about itquite extensively at the
conference, so let me just giveyou a little piece and see if
it's helpful.
And that's this the unicornsare fast.
Yeah, first chapter, the fast.
(30:14):
And the book, by the way, is 12.
It might be 13 or 14 chapters,but the 12 chapters, one for
each habit.
Here's where we saw it inpeople.
Here's the responses from ourunicorns when we question about
it.
Here's a case study.
Here's how you apply it.
Really, no one will read thisbook and say William is
definitely going to cure cancer.
That's not going to happen.
(30:35):
When you read this book, it'ssimple cookies on the bottom
shelf, kind of stuff.
And when I say fast, it's onlybecause I want a one-word title.
You say I'm not fast, I'm notfast.
I'm not fast either, frank, I'mDutch.
You know we are not built forspeed, we're built for wind
resistance.
We look like this so you knowit's….
Speaker 1 (30:57):
But fast is important and hard.
Speaker 2 (31:01):
Well, if I could title it accurately and not the
way you have to title things forpeople to read books, the title
would be the intentionallyresponsive.
I mean, here's the thing Humansare horrible at getting back to
one another.
Yeah, terrible, just awful atit.
(31:22):
I mean, we we looked at, andthe unicorns are not.
They're almost maniacal aboutgetting back to people, enough
that they end up getting closeto burnout somewhere in life and
they have to put guardrails upand how do I know when to
respond and when not to?
But they are driven to get backto people and I thought well,
that's easy, but just do it.
(31:44):
But most people don't, and someof this is born out of when we
started the company in the fallof 2008.
What was I thinking, frank?
What was I thinking um?
Speaker 1 (31:57):
you, you, you know this, you were gonna, you're
gonna write a book about these12 things and you're gonna know,
what actually?
I was just 12 things, andyou're going to know what
Actually?
Speaker 2 (32:04):
I was just envisioning getting one contract
so I could go buy groceries.
Speaker 1 (32:08):
Yeah, that's what I was.
Speaker 2 (32:09):
I get it Shoot.
So you know, if you called meback in those days where we were
on it literally on a card table, guess how fast I got back to
you.
If you called and said couldyou talk to me about me coming
to help me find?
Speaker 1 (32:23):
a fill in the blank If you didn't pick up the phone
right when they called.
I'm sure you could talk inminutes.
Speaker 2 (32:28):
And email.
We were right on the front endof blogging.
We're right when Twitter cameout the same month.
We started.
So like there's all this sortof inbound marketing starting
and I didn't realize it.
But we got back to peoplereally fast.
And the longer we did that, themore we realized and we just
did it out of necessity, like Ididn't have anything else to do.
(32:49):
People kept saying you just gotback to us so fast and
intentionally.
It wasn't like an auto response.
You mentioned our weather orsomething about the Air Force
Base in San Diego or whatever.
And the longer we do that Ithought they were just paying
(33:10):
lip service.
But I started realizing no,actually that's kind of weird to
get back to people quickly andthat was one of the things we
noticed in the unicorns is thatthey're the same way.
They're driven to get back topeople really quickly.
Most people are not Sales andmarketing.
We talk to people that work insales and when marketing gives
(33:32):
them a lead whether that's aform filled out online or
whatever how quickly do theyrespond?
Because speed makes all thedifference in a sales
conversation.
We need the lead.
Speed makes all the differencein a sales conversation and I
won't bore you with the detailshere, but it was staggering how
slowly salespeople got back toleads.
(33:53):
It was staggering how slowlypeople on dating websites get
back to.
Here's someone you might beinterested in.
Like, we're terrible at gettingback to people.
If you will find a way to justintentionally respond quickly
without blowing up your liferight, you will stand out of the
(34:15):
crowd, I promise you.
Speaker 1 (34:18):
I mean, it makes sense.
It sounds so simple, but itdefinitely makes sense that like
oh, the public.
Speaker 2 (34:23):
And so, behind BTS, behind the scenes, right, the
publisher hated the title.
Like we went round and round.
Like I paid for an online A-Btest of titles to prove to them
that Uniform would work.
Like we're not doing it, we'renot doing it.
Great publisher.
I'm using them again for thenext book Comes out next year.
Nothing but good things to sayabout him, but we did fight over
this.
Speaker 1 (34:42):
Okay, you know the alternate title we kicked around
at the office was well, I guessmom was right that one could
have worked too, though I likeit.
Speaker 2 (35:01):
Well, it's kind of yeah.
Mom always said write the thankyou note as soon as you get the
gift.
Mom always said you know, yep,so it's not rocket science, but
nobody does it.
Yeah, very, very few people doit, and it's like we figured out
just by accident how to buildthe magic treadmill that will
(35:21):
cause you to lose weight.
Look great, run faster thanever.
This is the one, and you stillhave to get on it and use it
Right?
Speaker 1 (35:31):
Yeah, I get it.
Okay, give us another one.
Give us another one.
Speaker 2 (35:34):
Yeah, I'll give you, I'm not going to bore you.
I've already gone past the time.
You told me Maybe one more, andit's kind of ironic Self-aware.
Speaker 1 (36:08):
I and it's kind of ironic Self-aware I'm not,
you're getting you're gettinglike real stuff and you're out,
you're like I want to grow Well,even just starting it.
So even getting people to wantto do that kind of stuff is
probably hard, and then when youdo it now, you've got to try to
take action on it.
So it's just hard, it's hard.
Speaker 2 (36:24):
It is and that's why we built the.
If you go to vanderindexcom youcan see the little software
tool.
We built it for teams whereyour whole staff can take it
together and see where you'regood, and all that.
But it is a bit like me goingto my physicals once I turned 50
.
It's a different game and youdon't want to know all the
information Painful to find outand then painful to hear.
(36:50):
So you know it is hard.
But the unicorns here's what'sinteresting.
We had the unicorns forced rankwhat am I best at of these 12,
and what am I worst at right?
And it was all over the boardwho was best at this?
And this?
The one consistent answer wasthe unicorns ranked
self-awareness as their worsthabit of the 12.
(37:11):
They're the most self-aware.
When we polled the 250,000general population lovely people
to see how they do, one of thequestions was rate yourself in
each of these 12 areas, andself-awareness is one and it's
one to five.
You know, like not good at all.
(37:31):
Sort of good, good, really good, excellent, right.
91% of every normal personsurveyed, 91% said that they
were better than average.
Now there are people-.
Speaker 1 (37:48):
That doesn't surprise me, and it's also shocking all
at the same time.
Speaker 2 (37:51):
Well, there are some bean counters listening right
now, I hope people that managethe money or the finances of the
church and you're like, I meanI'm no math major but I'm pretty
sure 91% of a group is notabove average at anything.
Yeah, like 50% is above average.
Right, but that's the punchline.
The people who are mostself-aware think they have so
(38:12):
much more work to do, right.
And the people who lackself-awareness think I got that,
it's like this, and okay,you're going to hear this again
at the conference.
So like sorry, but I'll giveyou this one little illustration
.
I went to Princeton forseminary and so we study, and
you know all the academics andall that, and I took a class in
(38:33):
Galatians.
Galatians takes about four anda half minutes to read.
I took a whole semester in it.
So that's how geeky I am.
But one thing and I know thateverybody listening has
Galatians memorized.
But just for memory's sake,let's think back to the
beginning of the letter which,by the way, I believe and most
scholars do it was probably thefirst letter Paul wrote that
(38:55):
ended up in the New Testament.
Speaker 1 (38:57):
Earliest one.
Speaker 2 (38:59):
So what's our first picture of Paul?
Here's how he starts his letterPaul, an apostle called by God,
not by men.
Now, that's a guy with verylittle self-esteem issues, right
.
Speaker 1 (39:12):
Called by God not by men.
Speaker 2 (39:14):
Right Fast forward to arguably the last letter Paul
wrote that ended up in the NewTestament.
How does he describe himself?
I am the chief of all sinners.
The longer you walk with theSavior, the more amazed you
(39:37):
become with his grace, and it'sthat self-awareness that
unicorns whether they'reChristians or not.
The unicorns are really sort ofhell bent on figuring out what
makes them better and doing iteven when it's news they don't
want to hear.
So that's two, and I can geekout on all kinds of data, but
(39:57):
we'll have more time together inDallas and maybe some of the
folks listening today will getto hear it.
Speaker 1 (40:01):
I love it.
I love it.
William, thanks for coming onthe show.
The book sounds amazing, I mean, and for like lots of reasons,
like not just for Christians,not just for this audience, it's
like really for anybody.
So people should go check itout.
Should they go to your website,or should they?
Speaker 2 (40:16):
go to Amazon.
I never saw this coming growingup because I hated my name, but
the reality is my last name isso messed up you can misspell it
into Google or Amazon and it'llshow up.
Speaker 1 (40:27):
It'll come.
That's amazing.
Speaker 2 (40:28):
It'll come and you know it's interesting.
I didn't see this.
We wrote this for people thatwant to stand out in the crowd,
but so many people buy it fortheir kids for graduation gifts.
Yeah, heck, yeah, it's becomelike one of the two, three, four
top job hunting books on Amazonand kind of staying there.
So that's cool.
If you're trying to get ahead,it might help you.
Speaker 1 (40:48):
Yeah, love it, love it.
Well, thanks for coming on theshow.
Thanks, guys, for listening.
Definitely go check out thebook and come to the conference
to hear William speak live.
You can get the book and thenhe'll autograph it in a session
at the conference, maybe.
Maybe you got to get in line,so there you go.
Speaker 2 (41:05):
I'll stay as long as Frank lets me.
Speaker 1 (41:07):
All right, thanks guys.
We'll catch you later.
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