Jerry Bowyer - CEO of Bowyer Research

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Jerry Bowyer joins me this month to discuss a wide array of topics concerning leadership and career paths. Jerry has a fascinating and diverse background and thinks deeply about subjects impacting all leaders.

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Episode Transcript

Jason (00:00):
Welcome to the biblical leadership at work podcast.
I am your host, Jason watered onthis month's episode.
I was very honored to have as myguest, Jerry Boyer.
Jerry is the CEO of Boyerresearch and host of the meeting
of the minds podcast.
Aside from being an author ofseveral books, including the
makers versus the takers.

(00:22):
And a commentator on Foxbusiness, Fox news and CNBC.
Jerry has written for the wallstreet journal, world news group
Forbes and the national review.
Jerry has a fascinating anddiverse background, spanning
industries, such as radiofinancial auditing, wealth
management, and think tankleadership.
In our interview, we cover awide variety of topics and Gerry

(00:44):
provides practical and thoughtprovoking insight into each of
them.
So now let's get into the show.
Okay.
Jerry Boyer, brother, is superexcited to have you on the show
and have the guests learn aboutyou and a very diverse,
fascinating background.
So thank you brother for takingthe time to join us today.

Jerry (01:02):
my pleasure, Jason.
Thank you for the invitation.

Jason (01:05):
So let's get started.
Uh, learn a little bit aboutyour background.
I know you've done a lot ofthings professionally.
Can you kind of give us asummary of that?
And then also your educationalbackground.

Jerry (01:16):
Well, goodness.
Um, it's a very, it's a variedcareer.
It would be hard to kind ofsummarize it, um, unless I very
much, um, you know, go to kindof 35, 000 feet to summarize it.
Um, so the, what I would say isthat throughout all of my life,
um, I have at the same time Beensomebody who's been involved

(01:40):
with money, uh, actual money,uh, either finance auditing, uh,
um, uh, you know, investmentmanagement, forecasting, et
cetera, uh, actual business.
And also on a track that ismedia thought leader worldview
ish.
So those have always been goingon.

(02:03):
Um, sometimes I've been more onone than the other.
Right.
Sometimes.
So there was a time when I waswith, you know, a big six
accounting firm, um, auditing,uh, mutual funds, uh, but also
doing a little radio hosting onthe side.
And there are sometimes when Iwas running a think tank and

(02:23):
doing lots and lots of policywork, um, you know, and debate
and dealing with big issues, uh,but also maybe sitting on an
investment committee on theside.
But they've always, both ofthose things have always been in
a parallel track.
Um, and recently they've cometogether a good deal more in

(02:43):
that the work that I'm doing infinance is to a large degree,
what's growing for us.
And we maybe get into this alittle bit later.
Is interacting withcorporations, um, from the
standpoint of their investors,trying to get them back on
track, focused on their corebusiness issue.
And out of dabbling in thecultural revolution, um, you

(03:08):
know, you know, companies liketarget and Disney, but not just
them, everybody to one degree oranother.
Uh, so, you know, I help withsay ETFs, which I, if someone's
not in finance, you know, mukind of, kind of mutual funds
now are ETFs.
The, the thing that a lot ofpeople grow up and they thought
about as mutual funds, prettymuch, people don't really start

(03:30):
mutual funds anymore.
They start something called ETFand then they don't even know
it's different.
So it's an investment fund, youknow, helping the investment
funds we work with.
Institutional investors, um,advocate, uh, for their
worldview with these companiesso that these things are kind of
merged together to a degree.
They've never been mergedtogether before.
So, uh, uh, you know, I, um, wasa, an accounting major in

(03:55):
college.
That was Robert Morris.
Um, and I came out of their workfor Arthur Anderson, um, Uh,
then worked for a family officefor a family that owns a very
owned and does own a very largemutual fund family.
And then from there it was apension administrator for an
actuarial firm.
And then I went and did thethink tank thing for a while,

(04:17):
then media.
Um, and, um, also serving on anumber of investment committees
about 12 years ago, um, I gotinvolved with some institutional
investors and some largeChristian.
Financial advisors, uh, helpingthem to, uh, build out, um,
solutions in investing and alsoto do macroeconomic forecasting.

(04:39):
And in the past, say, fouryears, and really a lot in the
past two years, um, I've reallygotten into the area of proxy
voting, um, which is a highlyspecialized area, but extremely
important, uh, where investors,whether it's an individual
investor or a fund owner, Theyhave votes, um, and so they can
elect boards of directors or notreelect them.

(05:00):
And they can vote on variousproposals, uh, having to do with
governance issues orincreasingly ESG proposals that
are political.
And that's kind of like, that'sthe growth side of, of the
business.
Also, there's always been acertain amount of church
involvement.
Um, I'm an ordained deacon.
Um, so in the tradition that Iwas working, that's, that's

(05:23):
clergy, not if you're a Baptistor if you're a deacon, you're on
the deacons board.
Usually that's like a boardmember, but that's, but, um, uh,
in the tradition which I wasserving, that's ordained, uh, so
there's guest preaching anddoing various sorts of ministry.
So that's the, that's, that's,uh, as much as I can summarize
it without getting into.
a long, long history, whichsomeone can read on the

Jason (05:45):
Yeah.
And as I, as

Jerry (05:46):
or the Wikipedia

Jason (05:47):
as I, well, and I read that, yeah.
As I prepared for this and readthat, I'm like, this, Jerry's
done a lot and you're stilldoing a lot.
And we'll talk a little bit inthe end about how people can
connect with you or follow you.
I know that you write for WorldNews Group, which is, uh, I'm a
huge fan of and following thoseguys for a decade.
So, uh, yeah, like to follow youon there and many other places.
So,

Jerry (06:07):
Yeah.
I have a piece in a world todayas of the time of this
recording, right?
Which is largely a review ofDavid Bonson's new book, um,
about work, work and the meaningof your life or work, the
meaning of your life, which is aterrific book.
Um, and, uh, so I've got a pieceon wng.
com, uh, today talking about

Jason (06:27):
that was a great book.
And I was, uh.
Yeah, I ate that book up inabout a week and then I was
super excited to interview himand I get that out there, too.
Hey, Jerry, tell us a little bitabout your family, on the
personal side.
Where do you live?
Family?
Wife?

Jerry (06:42):
I live in the Pittsburgh area, um, with my wife and one
of our kids.
Uh, the other kids have movedout.
I've got seven kids.
Uh, five of the seven I seepretty much every day because
they work for the familybusiness.
So, you know, we're here in ourhome where our offices are.
My wife's right there.
We're at our dining room.

(07:03):
Um, we've been joking that if wenamed our business, if we gave a
name to our businessconglomerate, we would call it
the dining room group, uh,because that's where we are
right now.
Um, and we bought a big oldfarmhouse and before we owned
it, it had been, um, uh, achiropractor's office.
And so he had waiting rooms.
And so those waiting rooms noware the various offices for the

(07:25):
members of our family who, uh,work for a Boyer research.
So Christopher, Jeremy, grace,hope, mercy, Charlie, and Jack.
Uh, and, um, threegrandchildren.

Jason (07:36):
How old are your grandchildren?

Jerry (07:38):
Uh, so let me see.
Um, Arthur is five and Ina istwo and Felix is

Jason (07:49):
Ah, we have a five year old and a one year old, both
granddaughters.
What a joy.
What a

Jerry (07:54):
Yeah.
Oh, very much so.
We're looking forward.
It's, uh, it's a Memaw weekendcoming up this weekend.
So, uh, uh, we're lookingforward to them being over here
and having a sleepover.

Jason (08:04):
Tell us a little bit about your faith, Jerry.
How did you, did you grow up inthe church?
Like what would that look likecoming to Christ?
And you talked a little bitabout your church tradition.
I'd be interested in what thatis.

Jerry (08:13):
Yeah, I, I grew up in the Methodist church.
Um, and I, I mean, when I wasborn into that church, it was
very fire brimstone holiness,you know, perfectionism, sort of
Oberlin, you know what I getkind of, um, right.

(08:34):
But, but, but that was kind ofbefore I was conscious of
anything.
So.
That pastor retired, by the way,that, that pastor is my wife's
grandfather, but we didn't knowthat, like, we, we, we, you
know, we, we met, you know,eight, 18, 19 years later, 400
miles away, and then we, youknow, I started talking about my

(08:57):
church and she's like, wait, Youknow, you were in Easton?
Uh, yeah.
First United Methodist?
Yes.
Was your pastor named ChesterBuzzard?
Yes, so.
Um, but we didn't know that weknew each other until, um, until
much later.
Uh, by the time that I was awareof things, probably like 8, 9,
10 years old, he had retired.
And it was basically kind ofSimon and Garfunkel songs and

(09:18):
encounter groups.
And, you know, they kind ofreacted and went in the other

Jason (09:22):
Yeah.

Jerry (09:23):
Uh, none of it stuck.
Really, with me, um, as ateenager, I read a lot of
atheist stuff, Marx andNietzsche and Frome and, and
others and, you know, um, so Iremember talking to the pastor
about it and telling him that Ididn't believe in God and he was
surprised by that and he askedme why I didn't believe and I

(09:44):
asked him why I should believeand he said because your mother
and, and father believe and Um,I don't, you know, I don't think
it's genetic.
So that wasn't, that wasn'tpersuasive to me.
Uh, so did a lot of reading,basically spent most of my high
school career skipping class,hanging out in the library,
reading through Morton Adler'sgreat books collection, um, kind

(10:06):
of working my way throughAristotle and Thomas Aquinas and
a bunch of the rest.
Um, and, um, that, thatconvinced me that Christians
were intellectually respectable,but it didn't convince me that
Christianity was true.
Uh, and then later, about age19, uh, I met a Presbyterian
pastor, uh, OrthodoxPresbyterian Church pastor, who

(10:28):
introduced me topresuppositional apologetics in
the work of Cornelius Van Till.
And he seemed to be the only onewho was dropping depth charges
down deep enough at thepresuppositional level to kind
of really deal with the issuesthat, that I was dealing with.
Right?
Because I'd always read thesepeople who were critical

(10:49):
thinkers, and now we havecritical race theory, and
there's, you know, there'scritical legal theory, and
they're all basically the samething.
They're basically Marxistphilosophers saying, don't
believe authority.
Don't believe the authorityfigures.
It's all a power game.
Or it's all a wealth game, orit's all a male domination game,
or it's all a sexual repressiongame.

(11:11):
But I came to realize throughreading Van Til that they would
do that to everybody else'spresuppositions But they never
allowed anyone to do that totheir presuppositions.
They never turned theircriticism, their critical stance
on

Jason (11:24):
Yeah.
I never turned it inward.
Mm

Jerry (11:28):
Marx says everyone does everything because of economic
interest.
It's like, well, how about youCarl?
Do you or Freud says everyonedoes everything because they're
because of their sexualrepression is like, okay, how
about you, Sigmund?
Does that does that apply toyou?
Or Darwin says everyone who's,you know, has an opinion.
It's really just instinct andUh, it's like, okay, Charlie,
how about you?
Are you, are your theories justinstinct?

(11:50):
And at that point, I realizedthat you're either going to have
Christian presuppositions oryou're going to have utter
collapse.
Um, and so I became a Christian.
And, uh, um, was in the OrthodoxPresbyterian Church for a while.
I've been in a number ofdifferent church traditions,
most recently serving in theEpiscopal Church, um, in, uh,

(12:11):
the Pittsburgh area.
But at some, uh, there came apoint where, as an outspoken
conservative, my position nolonger became tenable.
It was no, you know, I was nolonger able to serve.
So I tried to just follow theexample of the apostles, which
is to stay until they push youout.
So that's kind of the situationnow.

Jason (12:32):
Yeah.
Yeah.
Unfortunately, some of themainline denominations of, uh,
yeah.
Gone now.
Gone the wrong way.
So it's, it's tough.
Yeah.
To make that decision.
I think, you know, I know peoplethat have had to think through
that.
Do I stay and try to make adifference or do I just leave
and, you know, and, and moveinto something else that, you
know, that's more in line with,uh, the truth and orthodoxy.

(12:54):
So, yeah.

Jerry (12:55):
Yeah.
And we went through that becauseour diocese actually underwent a
split.
And some people said, you know,I'm going, I can't stay.
Um, and some of us said, well,we're going to stay until we
can't.
Right.
Um, and, but, and eventually itgot to the can't.
Uh, but you know, our, ourconviction.
Not saying that someone's wrongto leave.
Our conviction is not until theypush us out the door, not until

(13:21):
they say you're not a deacon,you can't preach, you can't
serve the Eucharist, you can'tanoint the sick, don't call us.
We'll call you right at thatpoint.
Um, then there's really nothingelse to do.

Jason (13:31):
we'll keep fighting the good fight, brother.
That's good.
Hey, Jerry.
So this podcast is, as we talkedabout earlier, is a leadership
podcast.
We're here to learn from peoplewho have been in leadership
roles over a course of decades.
And look at your background.
I mean, you've, uh, you've donea lot of leadership in various
capacities.
So, uh, one of the questions Ialways like to ask people is

(13:53):
what is, what is your, coreleadership principle that you've
developed over the years kind ofthat thing you you know
leadership to you is thefoundation for you that you
think about

Jerry (14:04):
Core leadership principle.
That's interesting.
Uh, I don't know if there's onecore, um, uh, kind of a lifelong
theme is You know, um, seekafter, after wisdom more than
after silver and gold.
And with all thy getting, getunderstanding.
So I've tried to pursue that asa leader and as a follower.

(14:25):
Uh, so there are times whenthere was more power or wealth
available, but I've tried tofollow the principle of, I'm
going to do the thing where I'mlearning, where I'm gathering
wisdom.
I think another, uh, you know,another theme would be.
a strong focus on diligence,which I've tried to instill in

(14:46):
the whole family business withJoseph the Patriarch, you know,
in Egypt under Potiphar, uh, asan example, just to be a load
bearing structure, knowing thatover the long run,
responsibility will gravitatemore and more to people.
who competently bearresponsibility.

(15:07):
Uh, and a related one to that isJesus's parable about when
you're invited to a dinnerparty, sit at the foot of the
table, not at the head.
Um, so that because if you sitat the head, um, the founder of
the feast might say, go down tothe, down to the foot, but if
you're at the foot, he can say,come forward.
So I think I've tried togravitate to places where, where

(15:27):
I've learned.
Not, yes, not fret about the orgchart a whole lot or the resume.
Um, you know, sort of building acorporate resume, just try to
go, go, go where the learningis.
Try to be diligent there.
Try to be the person who someonecan depend on to get the thing
done that needs to be done.
Um, not put myself forward inthat role.

(15:50):
Not say, I'm the leader, make methe leader.
Uh, but just do that and thensee what God does with that in
terms of.
I'd say those would be the, uh,the

Jason (15:59):
Yeah, I like that.
I mean, that's a really I thinkgodly humble approach and
sometimes as leaders we getcaught up in building that
resume and It's it's it can be atrap and as to me what you said
about continuous learning.
And I can tell you, I mean,you're an intellectual, you
study, you read deeply when youwere young.
And I found that, um, as aleader, I mean, you can never

(16:24):
stop challenging yourselfbecause you never, that's
something you never master.
I just, I mean, I've, I've hadthe privilege of leading people
in some contexts for 25 years.
And.
I just continued to want tolearn about it.
And I just, I just read a book acouple of weeks ago on
leadership and still pulledthings from that, that I had
never really thought aboutbefore.

(16:45):
And, you know, much of it wasthings I had thought about and
needed reminding, or it's kindof like scripture, you know, you
keep reading it cause you needto be sharpened and convicted.
And, you know, things come atyou a little different way if
you're in a different area oflife.
So continuous learning is, ishuge.
I, it's, it's, it's gotta be alifelong pursuit, I think, for,
for leaders and believers.

Jerry (17:06):
Yeah, I, I used to read a lot of leadership books, and I
like leadership books.
Um, so, when I say used to, thatmakes it sound like I don't
think they're a good idea.
I do think they're a good idea,but um, I did them because one
of those phases in my career, Iwas a radio talk show host.
Um, and I did something that,um, we called leadership radio,

(17:26):
which is, we had a, a kind of a,a mantra for that, you know,
spend some time every day in thecompany of the greatest and
wisest men and women who've everlived.
So it was leadership books,leadership studies, biographies,
and histories.
Um, so what was interestingabout that is I was on a radio
station where.

(17:46):
You know, there's some radiostations because of their, uh,
the, the regulations, they'relow power until sunup.
Um, I don't know if you're

Jason (17:54):
No, no.

Jerry (17:55):
Well, the, I, the, I, the ionosphere changes with sunup.
And so the signal bouncesdifferently.
So, um, so, um, you have to below power until sunup, and then
you can be high power.
So the first hour, you know,five o'clock to six o'clock in
the morning.
Um, there, it wasn't like highstakes.

(18:16):
So I could pretty much dowhatever I wanted.
So that's when I did all thatleadership stuff.
Um, and then after the sun cameup, I had to do whatever was the
hot topic of the day, right?
Elian Gonzalez or recount inFlorida or, uh, you know, Iraq
war or, you know, or before thatClinton scandals or whatever,

(18:37):
there's always, there was alwaysa play the hits thing, but I
didn't want to play the hits,um, because the hits are crises.
That the hips are talking aboutcrises that would not have
occurred if we got leadershipright in the first

Jason (18:51):
right.
Yep.

Jerry (18:52):
So I tried to sort of tithe as much time as I could
into, uh, into leadership studyat that time.
So it was kind of my job to reada bunch of leadership books.
I still do.
I still read some, uh, just notas many as I, as I used to, but
sometimes I'll read the sameauthors over and over again.
There's some that just, youknow, I've had a much bigger
impact on me than others.

(19:13):
Um, so,

Jason (19:15):
favorites?
Who you like most?

Jerry (19:17):
uh, big influence on me is George Gilder, who people
don't usually think of as aleadership author, um, but he's
an economist and he's probablythe most prescient technology
thinker alive.
I mean, you go back, yeah,George Gilder, you know who I'm
talking about?
Yeah, uh, all right, GeorgeGilder.
Wrote, uh, the book that RonaldReagan quoted most, called

(19:39):
Wealth and Poverty.
Um, went on to write a bookcalled Life After Television in
the 90s, in which he said, Your,your, your TV and your computer
and your internet are all goingto be on your phone.
Uh, it's all going to be onething.
Uh, and everyone said he wascrazy.
Uh, and then he said, you know,what's going to happen is

(20:00):
there's going to be thesecurrencies that are,
Cryptographic currencies.
So he's been way ahead of thecurve.
And what really helped me withGilder is he got me into the
idea of the learning curve,which is that you do a thing,
and the more you do that thing,the lower, the better you get at

(20:21):
it with obvious, right?
And the learning curve is theidea that roughly in almost
every area of business, Thatwith every doubling of
production, there's a 30 percentdecrease in unit costs so that
once you have a product orfunction or service that you're
doing, scale up the volume andyou'll, you and your team will
get so good at it that you canbeat the competition, um, cost

(20:46):
wise.
Um, I mean, you can beat onquality, but you can also beat
on costs because you justbecome.
Highly efficient.
And that's the learning curve.
So that's been reallyinfluential for me.
And I read, I first read himback when I was at Arthur
Anderson, right out of collegein the early eighties.
And he said, you know, thesecomputers are going to be like
machines, like in factories, butfor knowledge workers.

(21:08):
And I took that to heart andthrew myself into Lotus and then
later Excel.
Um, and made it part of ourculture, but my, my leadership
culture and my families and mybusinesses are all the same
because it's one thing.
Which is learn technology, just,you know, uh, degrees.
Yeah, degrees, maybe, maybe not,but really just learn the tech

(21:30):
and get good at it.
Um, and, uh, that was sort ofwhen we homeschooled the kids
and what we required of them isto essentially get a good
worldview, you know, get exposedto the classics, have good
character and be productive.
And being productive was largelya matter of learning how to
apply technology.
And so, you know, two of themare successful in programming

(21:51):
and they're doing database workand now AI.
So, you know, that's, that's,that's Gilder's influence.
Um,

Jason (21:57):
What do you think about, uh, how should someone who's in
middle management, maybe uppermanagement right now, think
about AI, Jerry, and the next 10years, 15 years, I mean, there's
so many wild, Theories andthoughts on that.
I'd like to get yourperspective,

Jerry (22:12):
well, that's a good question.
I've spent very, very littletime in middle management.
Um, I spent, you know, time in,uh, kind of in consulting,
right.
Um, so we were dealing withmiddle or upper management, you
know, as an auditing firm and atax firm.
Um, So we, um, and so, I mean,we would deal with the, with the

(22:32):
controller of a company, but thecontroller would have somebody
else who actually, you know, ranthe reports who knew

Jason (22:38):
right?
Right,

Jerry (22:39):
was, there was always a Rosemary or a Sally or somebody
who kind of knew what was goingon.
She didn't have a collegedegree, so she couldn't have be
high up in the org chart, butshe knew everything.
So, um, um, so we dealt with allsorts of people and, and
they're, and they're diligent,they don't get ahead that much,
but no one dares fire thembecause The system shuts down

(23:00):
without them.
Yeah, exactly.
Um, so I haven't thought hardabout middle management.
Um, because I've always tried togravitate towards places where
if I'm right, I'm rewarded.
And if I'm wrong, I'm punished.
And the, I think the challengeof middle management is that

(23:24):
being right or wrong does notnecessarily lead to success or

Jason (23:27):
Yeah.

Jerry (23:28):
That what I've seen, what's

Jason (23:30):
It's less risk.

Jerry (23:32):
Yeah, just right.
We just survive, right?
Survive and rise gradually tothe top.
Or I've seen people who are goodkind of knife fighters.
I've seen, I've seen people failupwards in shocking ways, right?
Uh, you know that it's like theyleave the company to go, you

(23:52):
know, to another, they go to astage up in another company in
their middle management, andthey.
We're terrible in the previousjob.
Uh, so they're able to kind of,um, navigate that system.
So I, I can't be in, I can't behighly encouraging because
mostly what I've seen as anoutside observer in middle

(24:13):
management situations isproblems.
Like a lack, a lack ofmeritocracy.
Um, and I know there's sort of adebate about DEI and
meritocracy.
I'm not talking about that.
I'm just talking about peoplewho are good.
At managing their managers, youknow, people who are good at
sort of getting ahead.
Um, and I've seen, you know,that happened.

(24:36):
And so I, I don't think I coulddo that.
So my, I guess my sense is fromoutside that being a diligent
person in middle managementinvolves a great deal more
patience than being anentrepreneur.

Jason (24:54):
Yes.
Yeah.

Jerry (24:55):
because there's a, there's a.
Because entrepreneur, I mean,you went entrepreneurs, it's
hard for an entrepreneur to getahead unless they make good
decisions.
Um, and it's hard for them to dopoorly unless they make a fair
number of bad decisions,although there can be bad
timing.
But so there's so much whim in acorporate hierarchy, in my
experience, somebody just likessomebody or doesn't, uh, that,

(25:17):
uh, You know, that's got to be areally tough environment, and
that's a gift, right?
And you read in the Bible, thereare people who are stewards,
right?
There's somebody who's workingin Herod's house, you know?
Or, you know, you've got Hosea,who's the treasurer, and his
wife Susanna is a follower ofJesus.
You've got these, you've gotthese stories in the Book of

(25:38):
Kings.
You have a lot of middlemanagement in the Bible, right?
And a lot of middle managementis, Do the right thing and trust
God, but you might not berewarded.
You might just get your head cutoff, you know, uh, and you might
have a bad boss.
And how do you, how do younavigate that?
So I'm sorry, this isn't helpfulbecause I'm telling you all the
problems I see for people inmiddle management.

Jason (26:01):
Well, I think about, you know, that's why this, the whole
question

Jerry (26:03):
all the challenges.

Jason (26:05):
And the question

Jerry (26:06):
yeah.
Oh, your question was about AI.
Yeah.
All

Jason (26:08):
do we.
As someone who's in that level,I mean, you know, do we have to
be early adopters?
Should it be, we thinking aboutit every day, using it for as
much as possible, let it playout.
It's interesting because I mean,I've been in, so I work in
manufacturing and I saw, I've,I've been in it long enough to
have seen the wave ofautomation, right?

(26:30):
Robotics and, um, machine toolsthat 30 years ago people didn't
really think about very much.
And I've seen the wave comethrough and how we adapted to it
in our industry and how workershave had to adapt to it.
And I wondered to myself, isthat what, you know, is AI just
going to be another wave ofautomation for the knowledge
worker in the next 10 years,five years.

(26:53):
And, you know, people aretalking about it's going to take
over the world and we're allgoing to die.
And, you know, we know asbelievers that God is sovereign.
He will allow it only to happenwhat he wants to happen.
But so I just wonder, like, howshould we be thinking about
that?
We play with it a little bit.
We dabble in it and somecompanies are going after it
full head of steam to use it asusers, not developers.

(27:14):
I'm talking about just peoplewho might use it and leverage it
to do their job better.

Jerry (27:18):
I see Your question was a whole lot more about AI than it
was about

Jason (27:22):
Yeah, no, that's okay though.
Cause I, your, your insight'sinteresting.
Um, that's

Jerry (27:25):
long spiel about middle management.
Um, alright, so ai, uh, I, I am,I'm pretty much all in, in terms
of leveraging it.
Um, we use AI a lot.
We feel like it levels theplaying field for a small firm
like ours against the big firms.
So for example, um, using that,we were able to kind of leap

(27:46):
ahead, uh, of a firm that's beenaround for decades longer than
we are, um, in terms ofproducing a robust set of, of
research on a topic.
You know that we were kind of anew entrant into the field and
shoot just right over top ofthem.
Uh, and it's interesting.
It's got, um, one of our, one ofour kids are, uh, youngest

(28:08):
daughter is autistic and she'sour AI specialist and she has a
certain gift for promptengineering.
Um, you know, I think because ofher neuro diversity, right?
So she, I mean, she pretty muchsingle handedly.
You know, leapt us ahead of acompany with 1000 workers and a

(28:29):
couple of decade head start onus just by using a

Jason (28:31):
And using it well.

Jerry (28:33):
and using it well.
So I mean, obviously, you haveto be really cautious because a
I lies.
Um, it's not a truth machine.
It, um, it is an associationmachine.
It hallucinates.
Eso I like to say a I isabsolutely terrific technology
just so long as the answerdoesn't have to be

Jason (28:50):
Right.
Right.

Jerry (28:52):
when people say, Well, when doesn't the answer have to
be right?
And the, and I say for the firstdraft, the answer doesn't

Jason (28:59):
Right.
Yeah.

Jerry (29:00):
Uh, you just have to identify certain things and
certain opportunities.
Uh, so, um, I do these quarterlycalls for kingdom advisors where
we look at sort of theeconomics.
And I was looking at the futuresmarket for presidential futures.
Who's more, most likely to winthe election.
And Biden had been pulling aheadof Trump and he pulled ahead in
this probability market on March29th.

(29:22):
And I, why?
So I asked AI.
What happened on March 29th thatwould be relevant to the, um, a
political contest between DonaldTrump and, between Trump and
Biden.
And it gave me seven or eightanswers and six of them were
just nonsense.
What are you talking about?
Right.
But one of them was like, Oh,there was a huge fundraiser for
Biden that day.

(29:42):
Uh, and Clinton and Obama wereboth there and he raised 26
million.
It's like, Oh, that's it.
The party got behind him.
So most of what AI told me wasnonsense, but one of the things
rang true.
So AI can serve up options toyou.
Um, and so I, I, I love it.

(30:05):
I, I, I am not.
With with the Christians whoare, you know, always suspicious
of new technologies.
That's not my orientation atall.
I think we should be firstadopters.
And first adopters means eitherdevelopers or first adopters,
because that means we steer itin the right direction.
I can tell you, AI is our enemyphilosophically.

(30:26):
I mean, I spent an hour debatingchat GPT for about evolution,
you know, one evening.
And it just read like anotheratheist troll on social media.

Jason (30:36):
that's great.

Jerry (30:37):
you know, so it's like, all right, I know where it's
getting its information.
So I, I, I don't, so don't trustit.
Uh, but it's a pet, right?
So you got to train it.

Jason (30:46):
Yeah.
I've been able to, as Imentioned, the podcast I do here
is a, it's a ministry.
It's a hobby.
I mean, I have a full time job,but I've been able to leverage
it to put a broad in my contentand much faster and much faster.
So I've been able to use it todo a lot.
Cause my podcast all generate a,uh, transcript.
So I have the entireconversation so I can summarize

(31:06):
chapters.
All it's, it's been incredibleagain.
I'm a dabbler.
I'm not even near where you guysare, but it's, uh, it's been an
incredible tool.
But, uh,

Jerry (31:14):
we're not even near where we want to be, right?
So we're, we're, we're trying toup our AI game.
Um, I think it's a powerfultechnology.
I also think it's not the idol.
It's not the utopian idol thatthe techno utopians in Silicon
Valley make it out to be.
It's not going to become smarterthan human beings.
We cannot out create God.
Therefore, we can't createsomething that's better than

Jason (31:34):
right.

Jerry (31:35):
We are the greatest, we're the greatest thing that
God created in material reality.
There's nothing higher than usin the created order.
So, um, we can't make somethingbetter than us.
If we could make somethingbetter than us, we'd be better
makers than God.
So I'm not afraid that it willsurpass us.

(31:55):
I'm afraid that we'll misuse it.
I'm afraid that we'll make anidol out of it, thinking that it
can surpass us.
Um, but I'm not afraid that it'sgoing to get smarter than we
are.
I don't see how it possiblycould, because we can't possibly

Jason (32:08):
No, that's good.
Biblical logic on that.
Hey, different question, Jerry.
Think back when, uh, you were.
younger leader in a leadershiprole.
I like to ask people aboutsomething they struggled with
and as a leader and how theyovercame it.
Because I think there's probablyother people listening that
maybe are going through that andcan learn from your hindsight.

(32:29):
So leadership early in yourcareer, mistakes you made,
things you struggled with.
How did you learn through that?

Jerry (32:36):
Well, it's mostly been mistakes and struggles.
So it would be really hard

Jason (32:39):
That's how we learn, right?

Jerry (32:40):
to nail that down.
Um,

Jason (32:43):
A certain theme, maybe, that you had when you were a
younger leader that, uh, thatwas a little more difficult to
overcome?

Jerry (32:51):
I think the first major, um, struggle for me was that I
was an accounting major, went towork for a big accounting firm
and I was not well suited tothat.
So I was working outside my setof gifts.
Now you might say, well, youwork with finance and you look
at balance sheets or whatever.
Yeah.
That's different than being.

(33:11):
Yeah, because I mean, You know,the other thing is tick marks
and filling out forms.
And I just like hit that wall.
Um, and didn't, I had troublegetting around that.
Now I was able to succeed tosome degree cause I was
interested in informationtechnology.
So I was able to do sometechnology fixes to some things,
but just being like anotherdrone in the accounting hive,

(33:35):
you know, I failed at that.
It just was not good at that.
Um, so.
You know, I did that because itwas sort of like guaranteed

Jason (33:43):
Yeah.

Jerry (33:43):
Um, uh, the other thing was, you know, when I ran a
think tank in my early thirties,um, and it had, it had one
particular major funder, um, andwe went out there and we battled
in public policy arenas and wedid a whole lot better than
anyone ever expected.

(34:04):
Uh, we won a lot of battles andUm, that created enemies and
enemies talked to our boardmembers and funders to sort of
try to get even and I foundmyself in a position of crisis
with a major funder, despite thefact that we won despite the

(34:26):
fact we were given a mission bythis funder and and what he said
is you're not going to win.
It's not going to succeed, butwe want you to at least try.
And we tried and by God's grace,we won and that created ill
will.
And then people sort ofwhispered and cocktail parties
and all of a sudden we're introuble.
And that was one of the big wakeup calls of my life.

(34:47):
That's when I realized I did notwant to be in a situation.
I, that's what I, I didn't wantto be in nonprofit world.
Um, and particular in sort ofpublic policy, nonprofit world,
where you could almost get firedor lose funding for getting it
right.
So, um, at that point Igravitate, gravitate it over to,

(35:08):
I will take a lower status jobin a situation where if I'm
right and it works, we, I getreward to take as much whim out
of it as I

Jason (35:19):
Yeah.
Even if you're, even if you makeenemies, being right, right, in
the business world, you get

Jerry (35:24):
yeah, I mean, even if you make enemies doing the, doing
the mission, right.
You know, so, um, I'd say thoseare the two big, those are kind
of, one was in my mid twentiesand the other was in my, uh, my
mid thirties.
Um, so I think those areprobably the two big crises.
I, I suppose the other one was,you know, a little bit later, I

(35:45):
kind of got pulled into fame alittle bit too.
I did a lot of media, um, and I,and media is hard.
Everyone wants to, a lot ofpeople wanted to be on TV and
radio and I had gotten over thatand was getting on TV and radio
and I kept doing it even when itdidn't make any sense.
Because everyone wants it,therefore, it must be good,
therefore, I should do it.
And, uh, we can't get into allthis, but I, you know, read a

(36:08):
lot about the anthropologist,Rene Girard, who talks about
rivalry, imitation and rivalry,about how people want a thing
just because another personwants it.
Uh, and I realized that that wasgoing on, so I sort of dropped
out.
So, you know, there are thesecrises where I make a, where I
learn something painful and thengenerally make a career change.

(36:29):
And, um, and sort of start overto some in each of those cases.
I sort of had to start over alittle bit.
So I've got if the career pathis like spike.
Wow, this is really promisingguy crash then spike.
Oh, wow.
Who is this guy crash?
And you know, that's kind ofbeen the pattern so far.
And right now, I'm on anupswing, but I also know they

(36:52):
don't last forever.

Jason (36:53):
Well, I, it makes me think about something I've had
to figure out in my career andthat you, uh, Eventually figure
out what you're good at whatgod's called you gifted you to
do And being comfortable andokay with that even if that's
not what other people saySuccess looks like or great
looks like I mean, I've, I'vestruggled with that.

(37:15):
Well, that, that must be right,because that's where all the
fame and glory is or whatever.
But getting to a point whereyou're like, no, I like what I'm
doing, what I get to do is whatI love to do.
And I'm okay.
I'm comfortable saying good forhim, good for her, not
interested.
And I think that's, that comeswith some maturity and some
learning.

(37:36):
Uh, at least it has for me overa few decades.
I'm a slow learner.
So.

Jerry (37:40):
Yeah, I'm kind of reminded of a conversation an
older friend had with me, advicehe gave me, during that think
tank situation, where there wasalienation from the funder and
some members of the board.
So we fought through thatactually and we won again over
the internal opposition, right?
Uh, and then my friend who wasalso on the board of directors

(38:02):
and one of the funders said, um,uh, do you want to leave or
stay?
Um, and I said, I want to stay.
We just won.
Why would I leave?
And he said, I'm asking if youwant to leave or stay.
And I realized that the onlyreason I wanted to stay is
because there had been a battlefor control of the organization.

(38:23):
So therefore it must be worthfighting for.
We were able to sort of push outthe troublemaking board members.
Um, and therefore we won theprize.
But I didn't like it anymore.
And so he had a mature Christianbeliever, mature entrepreneur
who asked a question that hadnever occurred to me to ask, do

(38:44):
you actually like it now?
And I didn't like the jobanymore.
Right?
So I ended up fighting forcontrol, fighting for survival,
surviving.
And then leaving, uh, because Ididn't like it anymore.

Jason (38:57):
Yep.
I had a, uh, one of my greatestmentors in my career told me the
day that I wake up and don'twant to come in here and do this
work, I'm just not gonna anymorebecause, and I thought that's
mind boggling to me to thinkthat, that you can do that.
But I understand more and more,you know, what he was talking
about, you know, finding joy andsatisfaction in the work through

(39:17):
the good and bad, but knowingthis is what I'm called to do.
This is what God's given me todo.
And.
It's not what everybody else iscalled to do.
It can be very different andthat's fine.
And that's okay.
I'm super comfortable.
I am super comfortable walkinginto a manufacturing plant every
day.
I love it.
I absolutely love it.
And I know a lot of people thatwould have zero desire to do

(39:38):
that.
And I'm okay with that.
And it took me a long time to belike, a lot of people think
that's bad.
You know, it's all you don'twant to go do and, you know,
work in a factory and that's notgood.
And I'm like, I've made a careerof it and love it and seen how
God's worked through me and inme and that.

Jerry (39:52):
Why do they say it's not good?
What do they think's

Jason (39:53):
Well, you know, I grew up in a very blue collar area and
it was just a lot of dead end,dead end jobs, you know, factory
rats.
That's a terminology that wasthrown around a lot.
You know, you just go do a jobthat has no, that has no
meaning.
But again, as I've also come tomature in my understanding of

(40:15):
scripture and how God has madeus to work and reading books
like David's book and otherauthors who write about that to
say that there's inherent valuein the work that you're doing,
not just in the tangiblebenefits of getting money,
getting a paycheck, providingfor your family.

(40:35):
It's more than that.
And it took me a long time toreally understand that and see
work no matter what it is, aslong as it's not inherently
sinful work, the majority ofwork isn't, but.
That that there's value in thework and doing the work and I
look at my work Totallydifferently than I used to when
I look at products that we makePeople that are being developed

(40:56):
and learning and growing.
I'm like, these are allcharacteristics of god creation,
right?
sanctification not maybe notsanctification is sometimes in a
spiritual sense in theworkplace, but that growth and
that development of the humanmind and learning and that's all
like that's all what goddesigned us to do as well as

(41:17):
Repent and believe that He iswho He says He is.
He has also created us to work.
So, anyways, um, you know,getting

Jerry (41:24):
I mean, I, you know, I read Genesis one and I see, you
know, a manufacturing process,

Jason (41:30):
Yep.

Jerry (41:30):
you know, and, uh, St.
Chrysostom called God the masterbuilder.
Um, so, you know, I think it'sthe philosophers who maybe have
to explain why, what they do fora living is

Jason (41:41):
Yeah.
Right, right.

Jerry (41:43):
I, I don't, I don't think, uh, people who work in
factories need to explain it.
I think it's, it's, uh, prettytangible.
This is a point that Peter Thielhas made a very successful
entrepreneur in another of my,sort of my favorite business
books, zero to one that, um, inour lifetime, we have
advantaged, uh, jobs and careersthat are focused in and around

(42:07):
electrons and not ones that arefocused in and around atoms.
Right.
So something weighs something.
We think that's kind of inferiorwork.
Um, and if something is justinformation, we think it's,
it's, uh, superior.
And, you know, that, thatdoesn't make any sense.
So, I mean, part of it isprobably the regulatory
environment is more favorabletowards, you know, towards the,

(42:30):
you know, the economy.
Um, but honestly, I would say ingeneral, the economy is more
likely to be parasitical.
Um, and, um, exploitative.
Then the atom economy like sothere's not a lot of
manufacturing that's going onthat I think of as Bad bad or

(42:53):
exploitative, right?
Um, I mean there's maybe somethings but I mean if someone's
If someone's making electronicgoods, if somebody's making
automobile parts or automobiles,they're making, you know,
components for homes or whateverthey're manufacturing, those
are, for the, for the most part,for the vast majority of things,
are inherently good.

(43:14):
But if you look, but if you lookat the, at the, quote, knowledge
economy, computer program,increasingly it's social media,
which is monetizing conflict andpropaganda, streaming services.
Which are in essence, addictive,really.
Um, you know, you binge watch,you know, something that's

(43:34):
addictive.
Um, and I mean, sometimes it'ssexually exploitative or
violent, but sometimes it's not.
Sometimes it's perfectly goodentertainment, but do you, do
you really need to do ten hoursof it

Jason (43:45):
Right.

Jerry (43:46):
on a Saturday?
Right?
Um, no, that's, that's addictivebehavior.
That's unhealthy behavior.
Uh, and increasingly gambling.

Jason (43:53):
Yeah.
Oh yeah.
For sure.
Yup.

Jerry (43:55):
right?
And which is starting tobasically start to dominate
sports broadcasting now andstreaming services and you go
from video games into gambling.
So, I'd say the, the electron,the knowledge worker economy is
getting to be a high proportionof the value of that is
exploitative.
Uh, and I don't think that'strue of manufacturing.

Jason (44:15):
That's a great point.
I love manufacturing now.
I love it more.
So thank you.
That's great.
No, I, yeah, I mean I've spent.
my whole adult life watchingthings get built and made.
And it's, yeah, I love it.
Love the sounds of smells ofsites.
And it's a, it's fascinating.
It never gets old for me.
We've talked a lot aboutleadership authors.

(44:36):
You've hit it on a couple ofbooks, Jerry, but one of the
things I always like to do isshare with, uh, share with those
that are listening other sourcesthat you would recommend from a
leadership perspective,podcasts, books, who you follow,
who you like, you've thrown outa couple, but any others that
come to mind, uh, That you wouldrecommend.

Jerry (44:53):
Yeah, like I said, I don't do a lot of leadership
books and podcasts just now.
Uh, I've been on a little bitthough of a Dan Sullivan kick,
the, uh, strategic entrepreneur.
I don't know if you're familiarwith him.
That's it's, it's probably the,probably the biggest of the
coaching programs, entrepreneurcoaching programs.
Um, so I, I have been listeningto that.

(45:15):
Um, And a lot of it is about,um, kind of in that 80 20 rule
stuff, you know, where you get80 percent of your value from 20
percent of, of your, right.
If the Pareto principle, right.
Um, and I tried to practice thatearlier in life.
And then I've kind of got intojust like 80 hour work weeks
again, and I'm trying to getback to that Pareto principle,

(45:36):
finding that 20%.
Staffing up a little morestaffing up sooner than I would
have probably before.
So I listened to them.
I, you know, another area thatI, that maybe is underutilized
is I think that entrepreneurs,um, maybe need to pay a little
bit more attention to, uh,fitness, health and longevity.

(45:57):
Uh, it is an extremely highstress lifestyle.
So, you know, I've had aconversation with my
cardiologist, uh, recently, andhe's, he said there's kind of a,
you know, we see the samepattern over and over again,
he's a concierge, so he'sexpensive, so he tends to have,
you know, you know, affluentpeople, or someone who really
needed a lot of help, like me,uh, um, and, you know, he sees

(46:20):
people who, when they'refocusing on their career,
they're spiking cortisol,they're putting on weight,
They're increasing their heartattack risk, right?
Um, and then later, then there'sa crisis and then they kind of
deal with it.
Um, and I think that I, I'mbeginning, I'm beginning to
think more and more about sortof the area under the curve of

(46:41):
productivity.
So if you're doing a littleless.
But you do it for 10 more yeareach year, but you do it for 10
more years.
You're doing a lot more.
Um, so, you know, taking acertain amount of time and
setting it aside, uh, for, youknow, exercise and other fitness
activities and thinking about,you know, About those sorts of

(47:02):
things is something.
So I kind of listened topodcasts in that zone.
Like say, for instance, PeterAtiyah or Dr.
Peter Atiyah or some of

Jason (47:09):
Okay.
Good.

Jerry (47:10):
So, uh, I think that's an underutilized, I, you know, it's
almost like you can, you canonly be successful in one thing.
You think if you're going tofocus on your career, you can't
focus on the other thing.
Uh, and, uh, I think you can doboth and probably get more.
career advancement, you know, byKeeping an edge longer,

Jason (47:32):
Yeah.

Jerry (47:33):
Because, you know, as you think about it, think about
let's say somebody's in theirforties or fifties.
Um, and so their middlemanagement, they've learned a
lot, right?
Um, but also the energy startsto run down a little bit and the
cognitive edge can start to getblunted.
But imagine if that didn'thappen.
Imagine if you had your 30 yearold brain with your 55 year old

(47:56):
knowledge base.
Um, and I think that's doable,you know, to some degree, you
know, with exercise and fastingand, you know, focusing on
nutrition.
Uh, so I think there's an edgethere.
I think there's, uh, maybe likea five IQ point edge.
And, uh, if you're, um, ifyou're, if you're staying on top

(48:17):
of

Jason (48:17):
Well, and

Jerry (48:18):
I, I've been focusing on that.
I, that's kind of, most of mypodcast listening is probably
that right now.

Jason (48:22):
No, I, I mean, a couple of years ago, I moved into the
role I'm in now and came out ofa, uh, a lot more stressful, a
lot more reactive roles that Ihad been in a couple, a couple
of them and back to back.
And when I moved into the role Iam now, uh, I lost a bunch of
weight.
I lost like 40 pounds, myresting heart rate, you know,
thanks to Apple watch stuff.

(48:43):
You don't even think about.
And I was months into the job.
And I was, because I'm a dataguy, I'm looking at some charts
and graphs one night on myhealth app and I'm like, my
resting heart rate has dropped,like, I don't remember what it
was, but from like 80 to 60 or65 in the three or four months
that I took this job.
And what I'll say, going back toyour point, is that I feel way

(49:07):
more focused and sharp now, alot more proactive in how I
spend my time and how I'mthinking through my work.
You know, now I'm thinking aboutnext year, the year after,
what's our, what's our vision?
Where are we moving towards andnot, you know, in past roles
where it's, I'm going to wake upand I'm going to think I'm going
to buy, have about a one hourtime horizon today all day.

(49:30):
And then I'm gonna come home andgo to bed and do it again.
I'm going to eat like crap.
I'm not going to go to the gym.
And you're totally stressed out.
I think just a mental exhaustionand.
the stress, the cortisone orwhatever it is, it's in your
brain and you're not going outand running on or getting on the
elliptical and burning that off.
It just clouds your, it cloudsyour thinking.
In my experience, it's justabsolutely clouded my thinking.
Whereas now I feel that I amable to think a lot clearer and

(49:55):
make a lot better decisionsbecause it's really, it's really
just a physical, um, mindset,you know, what I've done health
wise.
So,

Jerry (50:04):
So you're not stealing from your career.
I mean, if you're fanaticalabout it, you probably are
right.
But if you are, if, if you'redoing, you know, um, if you're
doing exercise in some kind ofdiligent way.
Um, you're not stealing fromyour career, uh, you're, you're
helping it, um, now I'm notsaying go out and there was a
time when I was doing like 90minutes a day of cardio.

(50:27):
Well, I was stealing from mycareer, right?
Um, but you don't have to dothat, right?
Um, so, you know, someweightlifting, some sprinting,
you know, some intervals orsomething like that.
You can do that in a short, youknow, my workout, I do this, my
wife and I do sprints.
That's like a 20 minute workout,then 15 minutes of weight
training, 35 minutes, you know,and we're wiped out,

Jason (50:51):
Yeah.

Jerry (50:52):
right?
Couple times a week, orwhatever, uh, so you're taking
an hour away from your work, butyou're not.
You're making every other hourmore

Jason (51:01):
Exactly.
Well, like that's exactly right.
When you are at work, it's alittle far more productive.
Yeah.
I might, you know, my, a goodweek, a good week for me, uh, is
three times at the gym and I'm20 minutes on the elliptical,
get my heart rate up.
And then the rest of that houris a weight training.
And if I'm doing that even threetimes a week, it's, yeah, it's.

(51:21):
Huge, huge, uh, game changermentally.
Just the mental focus as well ashow you feel.
And again, you and I both havegrandchildren now, right?
So I'd like to go out and playin the yard with them a little
bit and not be totallyexhausted.
Can't keep up with them.
So

Jerry (51:34):
Yeah.
And sometimes I've gotten thesense.
I read a blog once wheresomeone, um, in, uh, was writing
for a theological, um, uh,website and he was talking about
fitness and he felt like heneeded to, there's like three
paragraphs of, I'm not sayingthat the body is more important
than the soul.
And I'm not saying blah, blah,blah.
And it's like he had to sort ofovercome some kind of objection,

(51:55):
right?
Like, That's something there's,there's something wrong with
that health focus.
And I would really love to seeChristian culture shift so that
it, instead of like, you have toexplain yourself if you're
trying to be healthier and livelonger, because that's worldly.
Um, as, as opposed to that'ssort of a default culture of

(52:16):
excellence and glory in God,glorifying God and

Jason (52:19):
Yeah.
Yeah.

Jerry (52:20):
right?
So what if, what if we have aculture of excellence?
What, what if the basic.
Baseline expectation is thatyou're a follower of Jesus.
What does the gospel say?
He does all things well.
What if what if the basicexpectation is that in every
area of your life you'reimproving to glorify

Jason (52:37):
Yep.

Jerry (52:37):
That's not shaming somebody, you know, because
everybody has areas wherethey're going to fall behind.
So if somebody's not fed It'sjust saying start out, you know,
just set to be the best you canbe in every area in your career,
in your family life.
And it's like, church is okaywith you saying it's okay to be
good in your family life.
They're all right with that,right?
Um, you know, like, you know, wejust had Mother's Day, which is

(53:01):
the highest, you know, that'sthe highest, um, attendance.
Church Sunday of the year.
So you don't have to convincechurch world that it's important
to focus on family, but you seemto have to convince church world
that it's okay to be good atyour career

Jason (53:15):
you do.
Yeah.

Jerry (53:16):
or that, or that it's okay to, you know, lift weights
and get strong and, and to watchyour diet and try to, you know,
live a long life or to readbooks and try to grow
intellectually.
I think we should, we should bestriving for excellence in all
things.
And that's spiritual.
That's a spiritual thing.
Being good at your job isspiritual.

(53:38):
Um, working on being healthy isspiritual.
Uh, and yes, being a husband,father, grandparent, that's
spiritual.
We already know that already.
Being a, you know, being a goodchurch member or clergy, yes,
that, that's spiritual.
But we already know that'sspiritual already.
What we have to do is maybe getto the point where we see all
those other things as spiritualand not in competition.

(53:59):
And this is a point that Davidmakes.
This work life balance thingthat people say is really weird
because work Is half of life at

Jason (54:08):
Yes.

Jerry (54:09):
So like, you don't say family life balance, you don't
say church life balance, right?
But somehow work has to earn itsplace at the table with the rest
of life.
So you work and then you dolife, you know, so work isn't
part of life then.
That's a very

Jason (54:25):
Well, and I think, I think that the mindset that's
crept in, and it goes back towhat I said earlier, where it's.
work is only a, uh, uh,necessary evil to earn some
money to give to the church tosupport your family and then get
out of there as soon as you can.
And then that leads to a lack ofexcellence at work because it's
not even a good thing.

(54:46):
It's an evil thing.
And if I didn't have to do it, Iwouldn't have to.
I mean, I think that thatmindset has gone from our
cultural American domain into,into the church.
And you wrote about it in thatrecent article.
You talked about, you know,we're going to work later.
We're working less.
We're retiring earlier becauseit works like, no, no, no, no.
We, we want to try to get out ofit.

(55:06):
The more I've read, like DavidBonson's book, uh, Jordan Rainer
put one out called theSacredness of Secular Work
earlier this year.
So reading these books andsharpening my own thinking, and
I think into more of a biblicalmindset of work, then I start
hearing the conversations aroundme, outside of the church, at

(55:26):
work, inside of the church attimes too, and I think, no, this
is really ingrained in ourlanguage even.
You know, that we celebrateearly retirement.
We celebrate not working, likegetting out of work early,
leaving early, working lesshours.
Let's have, can we have a, youknow, three day work week, a
four day work week.
And, uh, yeah, it's, uh, it'slike, it's the evil to be

(55:49):
avoided versus, uh, this is, Ilove to go work.
I love it.
I love to go and create and makeand fix and repair and build
relationships and build teams.
So anyways.

Jerry (55:59):
you know, how many commercials for, you know,
financial advisors are, you'regoing to retire and, you know,
run a vineyard or something likethat, or, I mean, is that the
goal to have a 20 year hobbyvacation at the end?
If you were good at your job, ifyou're good at your job, you
take from the world.
If you, if you're good at, ifyou're very good at your job and
you stop it early, you've takensomething very valuable

Jason (56:21):
Yeah.
Yeah.
David talks about that in hisbook, right?
Like all the people who areretiring early and we miss out
the generations that miss out onthat knowledge and experience
and training and mentorship.

Jerry (56:32):
And I think in the church conversation, we've kind of
gotten maybe a little bit pastthe idea that secular work is
bad where, I mean, uh, but stillyou get the cookie for the
churchy stuff.
Right?
So, Hey, Sunday school teachers,you know, stand up if you're a
Sunday school teacher.

(56:53):
Right.
Or if you run a small group,stand up, you know, that they
should, they should be honored,but how many times if you're an
employer, stand up, uh, ifyou've been at your job for 40
years, faithfully doing thatjob, stand up, um, you know, we,

(57:14):
uh, if you, if you got apromotion recently, Stan, I do,
we should, that should, that,that should be happening every
day.
As much as, oh, so and so'sgoing to seminary and has
decided to become a pastor or amissionary.
And then a wave of applause,that's great.
But, excuse me, who's paying forthat missionary salary?

Jason (57:33):
Yeah.
Now, one of the things.

Jerry (57:35):
the payroll person.

Jason (57:36):
of the things that, uh, I mentioned Jordan Rainer on it.
Do you know who Jordan Raineris?
If you, so does a lot of faithand work, uh, content writing.
Uh, he's got a podcast.
Love him.
Great guy, great brother inChrist.
He, he tells a story about beingat a youth, uh, I think a youth
conference he was speaking atand he says, uh, if I get the

(57:57):
story, right, I think I got itright.
But he says, you know, normallyyou're like, they'll say, Hey,
raise your hand.
If you're feel called tomissions, if you feel called to
the pastorate and he's like, I'mgoing to start off saying raise
your hand if you feel called togo into marketing, to go into
business, to go into, and peoplestart standing up.
And it's like, those are allcallings that God is, if you're

(58:20):
a believer and you're going todo that, those are sacred
callings.
Yes, we, we absolutely need tohonor, love, support our pastors
and our missionaries.
But to your point, there's not,all of us are called to do that
and shouldn't be and can't be.
And we need to look at ourvocations as, As a calling and
more than a mission, more thaneven a mission field to go in.

(58:41):
And I, I see value in my workbecause I can go share the
gospel and I can, but this is apoint that Jordan makes 99.
5 or 8 percent of your time.
You're not sharing the gospel.
Now, when you get to praise theLord, and if you're doing your
work, well, people may respectyou enough to listen to you.
But the vast majority of thetime, you're just doing your

(59:01):
work and we are called to do itwith excellence and do it to the
absolute best of our ability.
And glorify God through thatdoing that work that way.
So

Jerry (59:09):
And if it, and if it's a calling, it's displeasing to God
to not follow it.

Jason (59:14):
yeah.

Jerry (59:15):
So we read the story of Jonah, who was called to be a
missionary, and he pulled backfrom his

Jason (59:20):
Yeah.

Jerry (59:21):
um, and terrible things happened.
Well, what if your calling ismanufacturing, and you pull
back?
You're like Jonah, not doingwhat he's called to do.
Um, and woe be to the religiousleader.
Who tells, who somehow signalsto somebody who is called to

(59:42):
work in manufacturing that they

Jason (59:44):
Yeah, I've been in 25, 24 years.
I've been asked twice about, youknow, have you thought about
going into full time ministry?
And both times, praise the Lord,I've been like, absolutely not.
Nope.
I'll serve.
I serve as the elder.
I'll lead clubs, groups, VBS.
I'm there.
I'm there, but absolutely not.
And I think it would be adisaster because that's not what

(01:00:05):
God's called me for or wired mefor at all.
And yeah, I think that peoplemake that mistake.
So because it's, Seeing as whatmust be the best thing and it's
not for everybody.
It's not the right thing foreverybody.
Hey, another quick question onleadership for those who are
maybe earlier in their journey,uh, in their career, Jerry,
what, what would be advice ifyou came, if someone came to

(01:00:27):
you, even maybe one of your kidsor somebody, um, that, you know,
who's younger and looks up toyou as a mentor and said, I have
been given my first promotion asa supervisor, team leader,
manager, something like that.
What advice would you give themon how to approach that, uh,
that leadership position ingeneral without knowing
specifics on what the role wouldbe, but in general, how would

(01:00:48):
you, uh, direct them to startoff on the right foot as a
leader?

Jerry (01:00:53):
Uh, write things down.
I mean, honestly, I've seen,I've seen so many people fail,
uh, sort of like early in theirleadership career.
Uh, where, because they simplyjust don't write things down.
I know that sounds like so, youknow, elementary, but I've seen
it over and over again.

(01:01:13):
Yeah.
Um, and I don't, I don't know,it's partly an age at a certain
age when, when you're young,your executive function hasn't
really grown that much.
So I've noticed that for youngpeople, they can struggle if
you, if they have five things todo, they, they, um, we put it
this way, wait, you're doing athing and that's working, but

(01:01:35):
you're also managing yourselfnow.
So you have to kind of get upabove yourself.
And say, okay Jerry, you justdid item number one, when you're
done with item number one, it'stime to do item number two.
And the ability to get up above,like to get out of Lineland and
up above that.
I think doesn't really happenfor people unless they write

(01:01:56):
things down.
Now, you can, I mean, you canuse software, you can type it,
you know, in Microsoft to do orproject or something like that,
or however your neurology works.
The other thing is, maybe thisis something, different people
have different challenges.
I, sometimes young men come intoa situation and they've been
given a chance at leadership andthey think they really deserve

(01:02:22):
it finally.
They're in charge.
And so they're not listening.
They just take charge, right?
As opposed to doing a lot ofinformation gathering.
So, I would say if you're youngand you're in a position of new
leadership authority, do a lotof information

Jason (01:02:40):
Yeah.

Jerry (01:02:41):
Um, and there are people, probably people, there are
people you're leading whoprobably know more than you

Jason (01:02:47):
Guaranteed.

Jerry (01:02:48):
Just because you're the leader doesn't mean you know the
most.
It might be somebody likes you,or it might be because you have
energy, or it might be becauseyou have potential.
It doesn't mean you have themost

Jason (01:02:58):
Yeah.
You don't probably most likelyyou don't.

Jerry (01:03:01):
right?
And there could be somebody whoknows a lot more than you do.
And they just don't want, theydon't want a promotion.
They like their life the way itis.
Right.
Uh, so I, you know, I'vementioned the Rosemary's and
Sally's or whatever, you know,she doesn't want to be the
controller.
She wants a 40 hour work week.
Um, she doesn't want a 60 or 70hour work week, but she knows
more than the person above heron the org chart.

(01:03:23):
So if you just got put up a rungon the org chart, Realize you
probably don't know more thaneverybody below you and you
certainly do not know more thaneverybody

Jason (01:03:32):
Guaranteed.
Yeah.
I thought somebody tell, and ifanyone who's listened to my
podcast hears me say this allthe time, I had this advice
given to me a long time ago.
Listen, learn, then lead.
Take that approach, especiallywhen you're new to a team or,
you know, you come into anorganization new.
I think the other one I'll justhit on too, the writing things
down.

(01:03:52):
It made me think back when I wasa first time supervisor and I
had a mentor who was an oldersupervisor.
And he, I remember he wouldtake, we had a daily schedule
and uh, about three pagesusually.
And he would fold that intothree where to fit in your back
pocket.
And all day long we're walkingaround the plant.
If someone asked him aboutsomething, typically our
employees, our team members,he'd write it down.

(01:04:14):
And at the end of the day,everything on that sheet was
either crossed off as he hadfollowed up with them and he
checked on this and checked onthat.
Or if not, it got transferred totomorrow's.
But everybody knew if Mark saidhe was going to do something, he
did it.
And I, to this day, I mean, Istill, I carry most of my phone,
but I have a notebook that Icarry around.
And if we're out in the shop orwhatever, and somebody, If I say

(01:04:37):
I'm going to do something, Iwrite it down because I'll
forget if not.
And then my credibility trust isjust gets eroded.
So just, just for that reasonalone, write it down.
So you don't forget it.

Jerry (01:04:47):
it's so obvious, but I've seen it violated so often,

Jason (01:04:51):
You get people that just say, I saw, I saw it become a
huge problem with team membersbecause you tell them with good
intentions.
Yup.
I'll check on that for you.
Yup.
I'll do that.
Yup.
I'll do that.
And you do none of it or 90percent of it you forget.
And now everybody just thinksyou're either a lazy or a liar
or both.
And that nobody you can't,you're not leading anybody cause

(01:05:12):
they can't stand you.

Jerry (01:05:13):
Yeah, I gave the commencement speech at my alma
mater at Robert Morris And thatwas the first item that I
mentioned I didn't do I didn'tdo anything uplifting.
It was just here's what you gotto do Uh, and the first one was
do not dare ever show up to ameeting with your boss without a
paper and pencil without a padand pencil in your hand.

Jason (01:05:34):
Yeah, that's true.
Absolutely true.
I, I, when my team does, whenwe, when we meet and I do that
with my boss, And I'm 52 yearsold and I've been in leadership
for a long time.
But if I'm going to talk to, ifI'm going to a meeting with my
boss, I've got my notebookbecause I want to make darn
sure.
But even with people who are mysay subordinates, you know,
because it's just as importantfor me there that if they asked
me to do something, I tell themI'm going to do it, I'm going to

(01:05:55):
do it.
So super important.
Uh, good.

Jerry (01:05:58):
know, there's one other thing I want to mention that I
just kind of occurred to me thatwe tried to instill in, in our
family business, which is thatif you've got a responsibility,
you've got a, you've got a,you're a, you're a step in the
process.
Yeah.
There's somebody just before youand there's somebody just after
you take extra responsibilityfor the step just before and

(01:06:19):
just after.
In other words, don't just beresponsible for your part.
You are fully accountable foryour part.
But if, if there's something,don't just, if it's not a valid
excuse, so and so didn't giveme.
The thing that I need to dosomething with talk to that
person, like double check itsame, like check after so that

(01:06:40):
there's double coverage for eachstage in the process because
everybody is checking the stepbefore them and they're checking
the step after them.
Um, related to that is somethingwe call three point
communication, which is, I guesswe don't just call it that, but
that's a common thing.
So around here.
If I, like, if I'm giving anassignment to somebody, they say

(01:07:00):
it back to me and then I say itback to them.
And we have so fewermisunderstandings.
Like, hey, I need you to runthis data on such and such,
Chris.
And Chris is saying, all right,you're saying I need to run the
data on such and such.
And it's like, that's right,Chris, you need to run the data

(01:07:21):
on such and such.
It gets said three

Jason (01:07:23):
that's intense.
That's good communication.

Jerry (01:07:26):
to lock it in.

Jason (01:07:27):
That is good.
Yeah, though the process Youtalked about the process steps
in manufacturing.
We've tried to teach for me, youknow This is probably goes back
15 years ago But we started toreally try to teach people that
they have internal customerstheir colleagues are their
internal customers So thinkabout that you're not Yeah, I
know that Joe that does the nextoperation, whatever, you don't
like them or this or that or theother thing, but he is your

(01:07:50):
internal customer.
And if you send him a bad part,he's going to, he gets to hold
you accountable because he'syour customer.
And once you get that culturebuilt in and they actually start
treating each other that way, itchanges.
It changes everything.
Um, I have a couple otherquestions for you before we wrap
up Um, I would like to ask ifyou know of anybody else it
would be a good guest on thepodcast someone You know out in

(01:08:10):
industry and leadership who canoffer thoughts and advice on uh
I'm leading and you know someonewho's been doing it for a while.
So good.
What do you

Jerry (01:08:19):
Let me think about that and get back to you because I
don't want to like put someoneon the spot publicly.

Jason (01:08:23):
That's totally fair.
Um, what would be the best wayfor people if they want to
follow you, get in touch withyou?
They've listened today andthought this is a super
fascinating guy, which I thinkso.
How, what's the best way forthem to stay in touch?

Jerry (01:08:36):
Um, I'm on social media.
I, you know, I try to share whatI'm doing out there, uh, and
interact with people.
Social media can becomeaddictive and distracting.
Um, I find it to be a value add,um, but that's because I block
everything that isn't.
So I mean, if I'm, if there'sno, if an argument is developing
with somebody, if it's likethat's not productive, just hit

(01:08:59):
the block button, only talk topeople with whom it's
productive.
Uh, so I'm on LinkedIn,Facebook, and Twitter.
I'd say probably the highestquality interaction is on
LinkedIn by its very nature.
Um, you know, that LinkedIndoesn't seem to run on conflict,
whereas Facebook and

Jason (01:09:17):
Twitter.
Twitter is like the otherextreme, right?
That's the fuel.
That's the fuel for that engine.

Jerry (01:09:22):
Now, a certain amount of my job is conflict, like if
we're holding a companyaccountable, you know, so I'll
use Twitter as a tool in thatparticular case.
That heat can, can, you know,serve, it can be a tool.
Right?
Uh, as a fallback, right?
You don't start out withconflict.
Uh, so I'm easy to find.
Just spell it right.
B O W I E R, Boyer, Bowyer,think of it that way.

(01:09:45):
Uh, and, um, yeah, go ahead andsend me a connect or, uh, you
know, a friend or, uh, connect,um, or follow me on Twitter and
be part of the

Jason (01:09:55):
great.
No, and I'll link to those inthe, uh, in the show notes.
So we'll do the, we do audio andthen also have YouTube, uh,
channel.
I see you do too for yourpodcast.
You've got a podcast.
We'll link to all that.
So people can check you out andfollow and be a part of what
you're doing and learn from you.
So, Hey, I thank you for yourtime.
I know you're super busy.
Uh, if you think of someone thatcould be a guest, please connect

(01:10:17):
me.
That's, that's how I keep thisthing going.
So I appreciate your time today,brother, and thank you for what
you're doing.

Jerry (01:10:23):
appreciate, appreciate, uh, your time.
Thank

Jason (01:10:25):
All right, man.
Thank you And thank you for onceagain, joining me.
As we meet another leader,striving to honor Christ in
their work.
Please take a moment to rate theshow and subscribe to our
YouTube channel until next timeI pray, the Lord will bless your
work for his glory.