Brandon West: From Control to Stewardship in Leadership

Episode Transcript
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(00:00):
.Brandon West: Oftentimes my sense of success and identity are tied

(00:03):
to things they shouldn't be.
My bottom line, my bank account,my reputation, and they're going,
I know that's not the way it'ssupposed to be, but I'm having a
hard time getting unstuck from that.
And I'd like to trade the soul crushingweight of outcomes for the soul
lifting joy of a life lived for God infaithfulness and surrendered to His plan

(00:28):
Um, uh,

Tim Winders (2) (00:40):
How do you measure true success in leadership?
Today we're joined by Brandon West,a man of many roles, author, speaker,
entrepreneur, and pastor at just26, Brandon founded FOSS creative,
a strategy first digital marketingagency that has earned accolades from.
to the Best ChristianWorkplaces Institute.
Beyond his professional success,Brandon is passionate about nurturing

Tim Winders (01:03):
faith in the marketplace, mentoring at Salt Church and enjoying
life's simpler pleasures with his family.
We'll dive into his new book.
It's not your business to succeed,which challenges conventional success
metrics and guides leaders towards alife of lasting impact and purpose.
Join us as we explore howBrandon's journey can inspire

(01:23):
your own leadership path.
Brandon, welcome to seek, go create.

Brandon West (01:28):
Tim, what a joy, man.
So excited to be with you today.

Speaking about life's simpler.
Pleasures.
How's your wife Shelly doing

Yeah, my wife, Shelly.
Amazing, amazing woman.
We've been married for 18 yearsnow, and she's an avid rock climber.
We live in Gainesville, Florida,so Tim was guessing whether or not
we were on a mountain or in a gym.
Let's just say that we probablycouldn't rock climb a mountain for
miles and miles, even if we wanted to.
So in a gym, spiral fracture onher finger, had to have Surgery,

(01:58):
but I was able to be by her bedsideyesterday and pray over her and make
her laugh coming in and out of nerveblocks and all kinds of surgery.
She's doing great.
I was confident walking out of therethat the Lord was with us the whole
time and that, he met us and heard ourprayers and the fact that any one of
us can say that about God's presence,given who we are, and our brokenness,

(02:21):
our sinfulness is just an amazing.
Privilege and delight.
So she's doing great.
Super thankful.

Good.
Now, is she gonna, is there any discussionyet about when she's going to get
back on the wall or climbing again?
Or is it, she's going to haveto like take a pickleball or
what's, what's happening there?

Well, fortunately she likes pickleball as well, so that'll hopefully
be sooner, but she's also like, am Igoing to be able to grip the paddle?
I don't know if it was her, shewould be back on the wall tomorrow.
So we'll see.

Well, anyway, we got the message like, we were
supposed to hit record yesterday.
Glory got the message.
So we did pray for y'all andexpected good things from that.
And, anyway, I've got more questionslater about family and things like that.
But let me dive intoquestion number one here.
And it's kind of my, it usedto be sort of icebreaker issue.

(03:10):
Now it's kind of got a little bit deeper.
So here's your choices.
Okay.
Brandon, you could either answer thetypical networking, what do you do?
Which is fine.
I love that question.
Or you can answer the much moremetaphysically deep, who are you?
Question.
So which question do you wantto take and run with and go

(03:31):
ahead and answer it for us?

I'm going to answer what you do, but I'm going
to answer it for this reason.
I love and I am inspired by livesof men and women whose answer to
the question, what you do beginswith a definition of who you are.
I love when men and women, leaders whoI respect, leaders worth following.

(03:58):
are doing what they do based on adeep understanding of who they are.
I am a man created in the likeness ofan eternal God who was once separated
from him by my sin, my rebellion,who God in his kindness sent his son
to be a sacrifice for my sin so thatI could be freed from my sin, And

(04:22):
live for him and for his glory bydelighting in him for all of eternity.
He has created me in Christ Jesus forgood works and by his grace, he's opened
my eyes to moving away from a life ofselfishness and pride and rebellion to
one lived in surrender and joy for him.

(04:43):
And that leads me to get to do thethings that I feel he's called me to.
Each one of us created with aunique purpose inside of that unique
Positioning of who we are in Christ.
my personal mission is to pastorleaders in the marketplace.
That's what I do.
I do that through a reallycool agency called FOSCreative.
And I get to do that in my home.

(05:04):
When I walk home to my wife and to mykids, and I get to pastor them, I get to
do that when I walk into my church herein Gainesville Salt Church, I get to do
that when I walk onto a stage like this.
I get to do that when I walkinto a small group of young
married couples that we lead.
Everywhere I go, by the grace of God,lean into who he's created me to be,
to do what he's created me to do.

That's a great response there, Brandon.
You know, there, There's a lot ofwords that we throw around in our
culture today, especially in the,we'll call it the Christian circles,
you know, purpose and impact and,you know, word, words like that.
I was joking with someone I wasinterviewing that long ago that when
I was a full out heathen, I neverthought anything of that, you know,

(05:49):
it wasn't even didn't cross my mind.
But when, you know, cause I, I knowyour, I think you're in your thirties.
Is that correct?

just 38.

Okay.
All right.
it's time's marching on Brandon.
So I just turned 61.
So let me I can give you a glimpseof the future but When how long do
you think you would have responded?
That way to that question.
I mean like go back 10 years 20 30,whatever Or was it last week that
you rolled out of bed and say oh nowI know Who I am and what did it give

(06:21):
me a little bit of perspective of?
When you have stepped into that, Whoyou are and what you do type response.

Yeah.
Tim, I fully agree with you that purposeis sort of a first world problem.
And I get it.
Like, I remember two years ago, I'mdriving down to this big party that
we're doing for foes, rent out this giantmansion to celebrate 10 years in business.
And on the way down, the podcast I choseto listen to was on Purposed as an Idol.

(06:54):
As much as I love living from Purposed,Purposed can Almost be distracting like
I'm seeking something that isn't God Itspurpose is not God purposes from God it
you know people in the the developingworld Often don't talk about purpose.
It's hard to translate into otherlanguages I think where I'm coming from

(07:18):
it's I have this revelation recentlythat my Christian journey It started 20
years ago, actually began with Purpose.
I was reading Rick Warren's ThePurpose Driven Life, and he was talking
about giving your life to Christ andpurpose, like, write this letter to God
surrendering your life and like callingout for God's purpose in your life.

(07:39):
And I just thought, I'venever done this before.
And I just wrote, DearGod, you know, come up.
And I'm writing this letter like,I don't want my life anymore.
I want yours.
And I think that was thefirst time I stepped.
towards purpose.
All of us have the exact same purpose,go and make disciples of all of the
world, baptizing them in the name of theFather, the Son, and the Holy Spirit.

(08:01):
That's everyone's purpose.
And yet there are these uniquecomponents where we can just go,
look, it doesn't define who I am topursue or do this one specific thing.
People's purposes aren'ttied to activities.
They're tied to Who we are becomingbecause as soon as you say, well, my

(08:21):
purpose is doing this thing and thenyou lose that job You lost your purpose.
My job was my purpose and now God's like,I don't want to strip that from you.
That's not your purpose Your purposeis for me Blessing my people bringing
something to the world and who youare and the message that I've given
you to steward I think purpose isa long journey And we asked simple

(08:44):
questions along the way to define it.
we make small steps towards abrave, long journey towards purpose.
Andy Stanley would say thispurpose is found at the
intersection of a broken heart.
Opportunity and skill.
What breaks your heart?
Where is there brokennessand opportunity in the world?
And what skills do you have tobring to the table to solve that

(09:06):
brokenness and step into those places?
Purpose You can do that beinga fry cooker at McDonald's.
You can do that tillingthe soil in a farm.
You can do that as an entrepreneur.
You can do that, wherever God'scalled you to, and in the middle
of that, you can find purpose.

Yeah, I do.
It's interesting.
Something that just came to mind and Idon't remember the exact source of this,
but it was someone who is, it was in abook, I believe that was talking about,
they were talking to their grandfatherabout what his purpose had been.
And this was someone who'd come throughthe depression and things like that.
he kind of scoffed would be a niceword to say what his grandfather said.

(09:48):
Purpose.
He goes, I got up every day, I attemptedto get to my job so that I could bring
money in to keep food on our table.
That was what I was there for.
So I do think there's a certain degreeof, like you said, first worldness
that maybe allows us a little bit oftoo much luxury to think about this

(10:09):
and maybe even overthink about it.
I know that you are in a college town.
Sarah, I know there's acommunity college there.
Is there a universitythere in Gainesville?
I can't recall.

There's a giant community college,

There is.

And then there's this other big school called
the University of Florida wherethe Gators play and Tim Tebow

Yeah.
so my point is, being originallyfrom the Atlanta area and all,
and I went to Georgia Tech, but mywife went to University of Georgia.
So there's probably something therethat we don't need to get into, but
there's a lot of young people around and
I'm guessing there's a heavy,heavy young population there.
What are you seeing?
What are they going through?

(10:54):
What's the biggest challenges?
What are they facing in this world thatwe're in today, where we're recording
this in late 24, people might be listeningin, in 2025, give me some observations.

Yeah.
I'm going to speak from theperspective of where I sit right
now, We live in a generation fullof anxiety and anxiousness and
Gainesville, the University of Florida.
is full of that.
it's interesting because theuniversity is pumping out the anxious

(11:26):
generation of people who believethat the career they get and the
money they make is their purpose.
It is the definition of who they are.
And when the position is highin the organization and the
salary is high, I am successful.
And when those things are low, regardlessof what I do, I am not successful.
I've missed something I havemissed out on my potential in life.

(11:49):
And we see those things as thegreatest evil in our society, and
what they do is they create anxiety.
They create a sense of our definition andworth tied to what we do, what we make.
And I am so tempted to do that,even in my own leadership.
When things are up and to theright, I am a great leader.

(12:11):
And when things are flat or down,I'm thinking, Lord, what have I done?
what sin did this man's parentscommit that he would be born blind?
Like, we're just tempted to go there.
Everything broken in my life is broken.
In me, and that is a really hardplace to anchor our identity.

what is it like?
Cause I know you have a business in that.
atmosphere.
You also have a church,so you do ministry.
what is it like for you personallyjust to be in that atmosphere?
But first of all, justhit each one of those.
What's it like to have a ministrywhere you're attempting to be
salt, I'm assuming, in thatatmosphere, in that environment?

(12:49):
And then maybe talk about what it's liketo have a company in that environment.

Well, here's the first thing that I would say.
Um, I don't see the work that I doat my church as ministry and the
things that I do at my business as mycorporate marketplace leadership, when
people ask me, Oh, you're a pastor.
So you're like full time there.
I'm like, no, no, no.
I'm just, I'm a volunteerelder and pastor.

(13:15):
They're like, Oh, okay.
So you're not in full time ministry.
So no, no, I am in full time ministry.
And they're like, but you said youweren't full time in your church.
I was like, yeah, I'm in fulltime ministry at my business.
We We call it business as a ministry.
Bam.
That the reason that we exist is notsome lifestyle business where I'm
trying to raise up as much money aspossible so I can go play pickleball and

(13:36):
rock climb with my wife all day long.
I'm not trying to raise up so muchEBITDA in the company that I can
go have some big exit one day.
I'm seeing actually right now.
Day to day, quarter by quarter and yearby year, the grace of God displayed
in us chasing not fame, not glory, notmoney, but using everything we've been
given every platform, every influence,every bit of power and control or

(13:58):
finances that we've been, we've beengranted to see it as a steward to
go and leverage it for care, love,compassion, evangelism, and ministry.
Our mission.
As a company is to cultivatetrue flourishing in people and
organizations while reflectingthe love of Jesus to the world.
Our Our vision is to launch 30 carecenters around the world that care

(14:22):
for women and children impacted byextreme poverty and sex trafficking.
We just launched our 17th carecenter now in 11 different
countries serving over 2, 400.
women and children.
To offer that, that is, that is ministry.
Even Billy Graham said that he believedthe next big movement of God was
going to come through the marketplace.

(14:43):
I love what I get to do at Salt Church.
It's one aspect of my ministry.
But if each of us would justsimply go, no, no, I am a full
time minister of the gospel.
Every single leader is a pastor,because you have influence and
you're working with people.
You get influence of people, you getto lead people, you get to manage
people, you get to shepherd people,you get to guide people somewhere.

(15:05):
And all of us are doing that.
The question is, who are they becoming?
Under our leadership, under our ministry.
that's leadership worth investing in.

But Brandon, you know this, that a lot of people really
do believe that you're supposedto keep those things separate.
I'm not saying that I do, but,I bring this up often here.
I spent some time at Bible school ahandful of years ago and there really
is this pecking order of, you know,this is the way you serve God, you

(15:38):
missionary in a third world country.
That's like the most virtuous.
And then it just keeps kind of goingdown, but you know, you're Speaking
my language here, what do you say topeople that say, Oh, come on, Brandon,
you need to keep these things separate.

Yeah, first, I empathize with the people who believe
that church, faith, religion andbusiness should be kept separate.
That is the resounding marketplaceposition for any Christian leader.
And we only need a single cake baker.

(16:15):
Or another person to make the newsor wind up in the Supreme Court being
sued for their Christian positioningin the marketplace to believe that
doing so is a waste of our resources.
I remember hearing about, David Green,the CEO of Hobby Lobby, once speaking

(16:35):
to one of his executive board membersabout, They're positioning in the
marketplace as a business, as a ministry.
And one of their risk analysis guyscame by one of their legal people
and said, like, why would we do this?
Like what a risk.
And he sat there and told theman a story about the gospel
and the gospel going forth.
And the man with tears in hiseyes left his office and he

(16:57):
didn't ever ask him again.
David's point was, why wouldwe risk, why would we take
all these risks for business?
Debt, expansion, marketplacedomination, new product lines,
new service, new people, open anew store, all these huge risks.
Huge risk with giganticpossible downsides.

(17:18):
But then over here, we're like,Hey, we have an opportunity here.
All these people who walk in every dayfor the gospel, for love, compassion,
ministry, empathy, discipleship,Bible study, prayer, growing them
as spiritual leaders in their home.
too great of a risk.
I empathize with the personwho goes, you know what?
I bought into everything Igot on the news yesterday.
I think I'm going to step out.

(17:38):
And that's one option.
Do your business, do great work.
You know, even Martin Luther wouldsay, you don't have to put a Christian
fish on the side of your shoes to bea God pleasing Christian shoemaker.
You don't have to do that, but man,what an opportunity when we give up that
we give up when we waste our business.

(17:59):
We waste our business on the next earningsreport when people are broken and people
are hurting and people are suffering.
And we have the best answer in the world.
And the best that we could tell themis no invest in these docs over here.
And I'm sure you'll be fine.
One day, what a, what an inappropriateanswer for somebody who truly believes

(18:20):
that, The best answer to all of theirbrokenness isn't more finances, more
pharmaceuticals, more fill in the blank,and we're going, actually, this gospel
message is really good news to you.
It's good news to your soul.
It's hard.
There's a lot of risk involved,but where would we rather take
the risk as a faithful leader?

And what's truthfully, what's the alternative?
If people really understand thealternative, it is the choice.
Did you grow up?
In and around the church, I mean, wereyou, you know, from reading through
your book here, it is not your businessto succeed, which fits so well into
what we do here at, Seek Go Create.

(19:03):
did you grow up in and around the church?
Do you think you might be moving intolike a traditional ministry role or
give me a little bit of your background?

Yeah, so good.
I was interviewing somebody the otherday and we were, I was attempting
to test their level of desire tojoin a company whose mission is by
choice, exceedingly Jesus centric.
And she turned to me and herresponse was, I'm, I'm good with it.

(19:32):
I speak Christian.
Bye bye.
And we, her and I both just startedlaughing out loud because we knew
exactly what she was trying to say.

Yeah.

I told her, I was like, look, we do not hire here based
on any preference, any position.
We hire everyone in the marketplace.
I just want every single personon the team to go, we have this
mission and it's about reflectinglove of Jesus to the world.
I see in that historical figure,a love worth exemplifying.
I'm excited to be on this team.
We've had non, non believers on thisteam say that to me, and I turned to

(20:06):
them and said, that is why I hired you.
That is why you are here.
I didn't grow up, around, youknow, Strong, faithful, gospel
centered, Bible driven, churchfocused leadership in my home.
I grew up in a loving home with parentsthat loved me really well, did fun things

(20:27):
with me, made life really enjoyable,took me to Bible camps and took me
to church on Easter and Christmasand a few times in between, but there
wasn't a deep love and affectionfor Christ and the gospel and Jesus.
But I'm thankful for theplatform that they gave me.

(20:48):
I think I met Christ most face to facereading that book that I mentioned, The
Purpose Driven Life by Rick Warren, butit came out of a summer in which I had
met a man at a Christian summer camp whoto me, Seemed like the best example of a
true Christian that I had ever met before.

(21:10):
There was something about himwhere I said, man, whatever,
whatever joy juice you're drinking,like, I want some of it, man.
Because whatever you are, Iwant to be when I grow up.
And I think the Holy Spirit eventuallybrought to me this message of either
The conviction of my heart was eitherthey're like a really super Christian
and I'm just like a nominal Christian,or they're a real Christian and I've

(21:31):
actually never tasted of the gospel.
And, when I was 16 years old,surrendered my life to Christ,
writing that Dear God letter.
And God's just taken me at each stepand gone, I have something more for you.
And it's, it starts witha deep affection for me.

Did that, were you thinking at that point that you were going
to do something in a ministry space?
Were you going to go outinto the marketplace?
where was your path leading andguiding you at that late teenage?
Because we all know exactly what we'regoing to do when we're 16, right?

I think growing up, I wanted to be whatever every
other young boy wanted to be.
I wanted to be an astronaut or a jet pilotor something awesome or work with, you
know, big trucks and things like that.
Eventually you start going throughthese classes in high school
that are talking about careersand you're like, This is real.
This is a thing.

(22:31):
And one of the first questionsyou start asking is how much
money do each of them make?
And so you just, you go up the chartto the one that has the highest number
and you say, fine, I'll be that.
And for me, that, that numberon the top was a lawyer.
I was like, Oh, I lovedebating with my mom.
And that, that lawyer hasa lot of zeros behind it.
Like I can do that.

(22:51):
I'll figure it out.
By the time I got to college,God had renewed my heart
and given me a fresh desire.
It was, I wanted to dosomething that I loved to do.
Joined the University of Florida,started in the graphic design program.
But I'm literally, my wife is an artist.
I'm in this graphic design programbeing told, you're not going to touch

(23:14):
a computer until your third year.
So I'm over in my kitchen painting BobRoth, while she's over in her apartment,
dying doing chemistry and mathematics.
So we would just switch.
She'd be painting my landscapes and I'dbe doing her math homework and both of
us were like, I don't think we're atthe university for the right things.
So, we got married after our firstyear of college, moved in together.

(23:38):
At 19, we had our first kid.
At 24, we had our second kid.
And then at 26, I started, my company.
As I finished out the University ofFlorida, uh, I was like, this is, I
didn't come to UF to paint paintings.
So I switched to family youth andcommunity sciences, believing that

(24:00):
that was the best thing UF had tooffer me to go into pastoral ministry.
But then when I talked to mypastor a year later, he was like,
If you want to be a pastor, whyaren't you studying the Classics?
And I was like, what is that?
I don't even know.
And he's like, that's Greek and Latinlanguage, Greek and Roman history.
And I was like, that's JohnMacArthur's secret sauce.
That's why he's so good at teaching.

(24:22):
So I switched over, I completedmy degree in Classical Studies
with an emphasis in Koine Greek.
A business administration minor, andbasically what I got from all of that
was the name of my company, Phosts,which is the Greek word for light.

I'm glad you explained that because I told you
I'm going to need to ask that.
But I want to say I want to back up justa second because we have from the RV here,
the 39 foot RV, we have an incredibleresearch staff that's in the back there.
And in the midst of the research forthis interview, Brandon, we did find out
that you may have had one of the best.

(25:00):
I don't even know if it's a pet.
Pick up line or a way to find a, anincredible woman that we may have heard.
And so we are going to need to getyour tips on how to find a wife.
How did you capture this Shelly?
Who's rock climber, brilliant,always sound like that.
So you gotta, you gotta give the tip here.

(25:21):
Our research staff did the research.
So tell us that story.

I will submit to you that while I'm about to give you this and have
recommended to my sons that they followin like path, they have disagreed with me.
on the effectiveness of this particularmethodology for finding the woman of your
dreams that God's called you to be with.
So we're in high school and when wego to the same youth group, we don't

(25:46):
realize it's at a big megachurch.
we had this, this, friend in common.
So I didn't know Shelly.
She didn't know me, but weboth knew this one friend.
Well, they had this runninggag going back and forth on
So that night, Mike walks into youthgroup, it's near Christmas, about
this time of the year, and Shellyhands Mike this Christmas present.

(26:10):
And it is a bag full ofsix rolls of toilet paper.
So in the middle of youth group, heand I go out to the parking lot and
from head to toe wrap her yellowHonda civic hatchback in toilet paper.
So you, it was, it turned white.
We took every single one ofthose toilet paper rolls and hung
it on her antenna on her car.
After youth group, she comes out,sees this, has a great laugh.

(26:34):
And we hop in her vehicle.
And that night, Shelly and Ifall in love talking about.
scuba diving, Jesus, music, toiletpaper, each other's cars, and she
teaches me how to, how to drive stickshift in the middle of our So my
sons disagree with me disobediently,but yeah, I mean, if it worked for

(26:54):
me, it must work for all other men.
See if you can toilet papertheir vehicle, like Target,
church, wherever it needs to be.

Yeah, I think maybe there's more a message
of God's sense of humor, grace.
Maybe you think, or is that a tactic?
I mean, do you, I mean, I, you know,a little, a little booklet on, you
know, toilet paper, her car, she'lllove you forever and I don't think so.

Gary Thomas's five love languages.
Like, it's an extra one for some womenwhere it's like my love language.
is toilet paper.
So it's just, it's a sixth one.
You rarely get to thatone in the book though.

Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.
But, anyway, I, yeah, we, wesaw that somewhere and said,
oh, that's pretty humorous.
So.
Alright.
So, so somewhere along the way, and,and I wanna jump a little bit to
the topic of your book, which is,it's Not Your Business to Succeed.
I had to read that like a few times tokind of grasp it, but it fits so well

(27:55):
into this foundational thing that I wantto kind of ask right now, which is at.
At that time in your life, you kindof did a real quick of college.
You did some work, then youstarted your company at 26.
But how were you defining success?
What was success to you duringthat season of your life?

I think success to each of us, like we define it
differently, at least when it'shealthy, but when it's unhealthy,
most of us define it the same way.
If I get this salary, if I'm able toachieve this income level, once I have
this much in my savings account, onceI'm able to check off these number of

(28:41):
countries that I've visited, Once I havethese, this number of kids, once we have
this number of bedrooms in our home, onceI have this many followers on Instagram,
fill in the blank, once I have power,once I have money, once I have prestige,
once I have fame, I will be successful.

(29:05):
I think when I started my company,really all I wanted to do at
the time was to be successful.
Was just do what I loveddoing all day long.
I remember when we built thefirst ever website for folks and
my wife and I, my wife just askedme this very simple question.
Will there be anywhere on thewebsite where the name Jesus appears
like anywhere on the website?

(29:25):
Will you see the words,the word Jesus anywhere?
Is it going to be whiteon white backgrounds?
This is going to be anywhere throughthe little fish at the bottom.
And we just decided, no, no, weare going to do work excellently.
Amen.
for God's glory, and that's goingto be enough, and that is enough.
There is a beauty in thisand a simplicity to that.

(29:45):
I was reading Gary Thomas's book rightnow, Sacred Marriage, and he opens up
with, the father speaking over the son.
this is my son in whom I'm well pleased.
And he goes, what did Jesus donein his ministry at that point that
the father could say over him?
You are my son in whom I'm well pleased.
Like, what had he done?

(30:06):
He, like, obeyed his parents,gone to synagogue, helped out
in his father's carpentry.
That was about it.
And you're just like, well, hesaid that because of who he is.
And I'm like, oh, shoot.
Like, God would say over me,you are my son in whom I'm well
pleased, just because of who I am.

(30:27):
Like, there's a real beauty in you.
To that, but as we surrender to that,we also get to go now created in Christ.
And it was from there that Godbegan to open up purpose and
ministry and what that looks like.

I'm going to go to Matthew 6 and I'll say, I'll go to that scripture
that says you can't serve two masters.
and I will say that the companiesI started were looking to
serve that master of mammon.
I'll go ahead and be blunt about that.

(31:01):
What was the balance of those two?
If there was a balance at all,when you started the business,
because, here's where this really.
Becomes a challenge for people thatare wired for business These are
the people that are listening into a lot of leaders and all that.
It's like how do theystrike that balance between?

(31:22):
The master that they serve and so i'mtrying to drill down to ask you maybe
What was your journey like was it like?
Oh, no, I woke up one morning and Isaid nope I'm i'm serving the lord and
I am not serving mammon or Was therea process that you went through there?

Yeah, I will say this.
I think in a healthy company, there isno tension between profit and purpose.
In a healthy company, profitis a means of fueling purpose.
In an unhealthy company, you'relike, Well, I can't do purpose

(32:00):
because I don't have profit.
Like, well, I can't do profitbecause I'm seeking purpose
They're like, no, no, no.
We're chasing this great purpose andfinding a really profitable model.
That's going to help us sustain that.
We say at Fost that we want to run agreat business for a greater purpose.
It didn't start that way.
I did just want to run a great business.
I knew it was a platform, but it wouldbe a platform in a very personal way.

(32:25):
That's not a bad thing.
Again, back to that Luther quote, youdon't have to put a Christian fish on
a shoe to be a Christian shoemaker.
That pleases God.
But as it grows, there is this transition,these, these transitions that happen
between business for business sake.
And business for God's sake.
I've been musing on this concept recently.

(32:46):
I recently read a book called TheIntentional Father by John Tyson.
An incredible book.
For fathers, I cannotrecommend this book enough.
If I can do 20 percent of the thingsin this book, I'll be one of the
best fathers in all of history.
It is so, so good.
But one of the things I've beenmusing on, he mentions in the book

(33:08):
these five transitions that a boymakes from boyhood to manhood.
Things like, he moves from the easy tohard, he begins to think less about the
earthly, and he thinks about the eternal.
And I've been thinking, like, asan entrepreneur, this, this, this,
this transition, these transitionsthat happen over time to become a

(33:28):
real business as a ministry leader.
Those five shifts that I've beenthinking through are from profit
centered to purpose driven.
Or somebody says it was justabout profit and profit was at the
center, but now it's purpose driven.
It doesn't mean that it's profit lists.
It's not profit discenter.
That would be unprofitable for thebusiness in every meaning of that word.

(33:52):
But we shift from profit to purposedriven, purpose driven positioning.
I think that leader also shifts fromme to we, oftentimes an entrepreneur,
like you start at the center.
People love to say, Oh, Brandon, you're,you know, you're, these awards that you've
gotten for being an employer, you dosuch a great job leading your company.

(34:13):
Look what you've done.
Look what you've accomplished.
I'm like, look, first, there'sno God in that equation.
Secondly, I have an incredible team ofpeople behind this door who are leading
out on all the things that our culture is.
And our culture is strong andit's beautiful and it's rich.
Maybe it started me, but atsome point we shift to we.
We shift to shared leadership, delegation,collaboration, over competition, the

(34:35):
need for community around me to fuel myleadership, fill in for my weaknesses and
my gaps and make something happen that'sfar beyond my ability alone as a leader.
I think that that leader shiftsfrom control to surrender.
I am a recovering control freak,
Like, I want to havemy hands on everything.
I want to control it.
And then when you shift from me to we,you actually have to surrender more.

(34:57):
And you're like, okay, I'm just a steward.
I have to release myidentity from the company.
I'm not self reliant anymore.
I'm, you know, I made ithappen in the beginning.
I started this up.
It's like, oh, actually,God, you've done all this.
And if you've done this, I amso desperate for you to do more.
In the future, I think that theyshift from short term wins to kingdom

(35:18):
outcomes, where we go, it's, it'snot just about 90 day excellence.
It's about multi year legacythat I can leave in this.
And then finally, I think that theyshift from ownership to stewardship.
I'm the owner of this business.
I'm the CEO.
I call myself now, folks, the, theCPO, the Chief Purpose Officer, that

(35:42):
really at the end of the day, my jobis about stewarding what God's done,
a purpose that's worth working for, sothat these people get to walk in and
go, what a joy it is to be a part ofsomething that's so much bigger than
just banging on my keyboard every day.
So what it started as, what it is now,I think all of us as entrepreneurs,
the more we move towards business asa ministry, we shift from, you know,
Profits that are purpose driven fromme to we, from control to surrender,

(36:04):
short term wins to kingdom outcomes,and from ownership to stewardship.

I love that the way that answer flowed and it led to,
I think that exclamation pointof ownership versus stewardship.
You talk about stewardship in the bookand stewardship is something that we've
talked a good bit about here as someonewho has adhered to the statement.
If it is to be, it's up to mein the past as someone who is

(36:32):
somewhat of a control person also.
So I think that journey is.
one of the biggest challenges Thatwe go through and I think I love the
subtitle brook You can't you know whatto do in your leadership role when you
can't control your outcomes and that'skind of tough for control people.
I think that's part of our journeymany of our leadership journey

(36:54):
So let's talk a little bit aboutyour journey What has happened?
That has allowed you and I and myguess if you're watching this If we're
honest here, you probably haven't donea total surrender with the outcomes
don't matter and things like that.
So you could talk about whatthat might be, and I'm not sure
that we're supposed to, but maybethat's something we can look at.

(37:16):
Talk a little bit aboutthe journey you've been on.
To go from control freak to thestatement that you just made at the end
of that last, comment you were makingof thinking more of being a steward
as opposed to an owner, because a lotof people would say, Oh, you're the
owner of the company, but no, you useterms like we use terms like stewards.
So talk about the journey you've been on.

(37:37):
Cause I think people need tounderstand some steps along the way,

Yeah, it breaks my heart for myself and for the other leaders around me
that we so often tie our sense of success.
To outcomes that we cannot control.
What have I walked through?
Well, one of the things I've walked

but we think we can though, right?
Brandon, do we fool ourselvesinto thinking we can at times?

well, it's worked sometimes.
the problem is it worked sometimesyou're like, well, I set my
heart to this and it went great.
Therefore I am an awesome leader.
My control is out of this world.
And when I controlthings, I do great work.
Look at the wake behind me.
The problem is sometimes it doesn't work.
And we go, I gave myself to this in everypossible way that I could financially,

(38:28):
physically, emotionally, relationally,maritally, I gave up my, you know, you're
just like, I gave everything for thisand I didn't get anything I wanted.
And then we look at the wakebehind us and we're seeing not the
wake of mountains being created.
We're seeing like a wakeof dead bodies behind us.
And we're like, what we're tempted todo in that situation is blame it on God.

(38:49):
God, I did everything that you told me.
I listened to your voice so carefully.
And now look at all ofthese dead bodies behind me.
Like, why didn't you show up?
You're not good.
You weren't present.
Or we turn inward.
I would say, and, we turn inwardand we go, Isaac is a leader.
There's no place for me in this company,no place for me in this marketplace,

(39:09):
no place for me in this church.
Look, look what I've done, uh,or look what God hasn't done.
And so the fact that sometimes it goeswell makes us believe I am in control.
Sometimes it doesn't.
We have to, somewhere in themiddle is going, look, I'm
gonna aim for great results.
I don't want to aim for anything other.

(39:29):
In my company, nobody in my companyis going, yeah, Brandon, shoot lower.
You know, like everybody's like,just shoot lower and lower and lower.
People are going, no inflation.
I'd like to make more money.
I need more of this.
I need more of that.
Okay, well let's aim up andlet's aim as high as we can.
Let's do everything that we can inpursuit of that high place that we've set.

(39:49):
And let's leave our hands wideopen and go, if God doesn't want
those results, Let's define successin those moments differently.
There was a line in the book that I wrotewhere an outcome based mindset, you know,
I am what I do when I do great things.
I'm a great, I'm a great person.
I'm a great leader.
I have a lot of value and worth andwatch me walk into a room and I got

(40:10):
confidence because I got awesomestories about everything I'm doing.
You know, people like you're talkingabout networking events and Oh,
hi, what do you do as a company?
And then people want to know,Oh, how big is your company?
Oh, how much revenue do you do?
Cause That will tell me howsuccessful you are as a leader and
how much I want to listen to you.
We're not going to play that game.
The faithful leader says, I am successfulif only I am faithful, regardless

(40:37):
of whether or not I am effectual.
I'm successful if only I'm faithfulregardless of whether or not I'm
effectual because they go in theend, I can't control these outcomes.
I can't make sure that my beautiful80 page strategic planning
guide that I put together for2025 is, we spent weeks on it.

(40:59):
We spent hundreds of thousands ofdollars investing in consultants.
And information and datato prove this amazing plan.
Then something blows up.
You lose a key player.
The business goes under lock.
It's forced into COVID19, whatever it comes.
And all of a sudden your plans that youhave are just eroding in front of you.

(41:19):
And you're tempted to think inpursuit of what do I do next?
you're you're saying thingsabout yourself that aren't true.
You're saying things aboutGod that aren't true.
And it's because we've tied oursense of success to the wrong things.
Tightly We've got to hold tightlyto God, loosely to everything else.
And man, how that protectsour emotional wellness.

(41:40):
And to, you know, Tim, like yousaid, in all honesty, I wish I
could do that well every day.
I remember when we went throughthe first draft on the book, I
remember it was just a Google doc.
You know, you just write the book inGoogle docs, share with people, go
through the editing before you get intoa publisher and all that good stuff.
My wife was one of the firstpeople I had read through it.
And I just remember this littleGoogle comment, comments on this one

(42:03):
little line, you can see the littlebubble pop out and she goes, Can I
remind you of this in the future?
I, I wrote that book becauseI need to be reminded of it.
We just together as a team, it's, ourFOS giving party today here at FOS
and just an hour ago, we spent, uh,30, 40 minutes together as a team.

(42:26):
Just writing down thingsthat we're thankful for.
And I, as we started that activity, I justpointed out to him how many times the word
remember is in the Bible, like, rememberthis because you're going to forget.
Remember that one of the thingsmy wife wrote down a couple of
days ago in our household thatshe's thankful for two hands.
I doubt two weeks ago shewould have written that down.

(42:46):
Today, she's reminded of it.
How beautiful it's having twohands when one of them's in a cast.
We need to remember, we needto come back to God and say,
you're at the center of all this.
I just, tightly to you,loosely to everything else.

Sure.
as a leader of an organization,a successful agency, let's just
say you've had 12, sounds like 12plus years of running the agency.
what's the most important, guess,leadership characteristics, traits that
you can share with us that is important?
What's the most important thing as aleader right now in the organization?

Yeah, let me answer that, personally, and then I'll answer that.
a little bit more globally, I have beenso challenged by the leadership culture
that I'm in right now at the churchthat I pastor at, at salt church, the
leadership team there, the pastoralteam, the elder team, that shepherds
that church has taught me so muchabout this one leadership concept.

(43:47):
That I think I've highly devaluedin most of my leadership experience.
I don't think it comes naturally to me.
It's probably why I've devalued it.
I think our culture devalues itas well, but the thing I'm being
most challenged right now in myown leadership about is gentleness.
We love choleric red leaders.

(44:09):
They run the world, you know,people who can just walk in and
go, you shut up, you get this done.
Where are we at on this?
you world shakers.
And how many like, like if there's anytelevision shows out there that are
about leadership or that exemplify theconcept of leadership, all of the leaders
in those movies are all red leaders.
go this, go this way.
And then like, you got like theMarines and, and, and you got like.

(44:30):
None of the soft leaders,none of the soft, let's go.
You know, there's a place for that.
And there's a beauty to that.
And I am naturally wired that way.
But man, that, that doesn'twork with everybody.
That doesn't work witheverybody on your team.
That doesn't work with allyour kids that most of the time
doesn't work with your wife.

(44:53):
Like I have been so challengedrecently to go, Am I a gentle leader?
Am I, am I a gentle person?
Do I have a gentle demeanor?
Do I have a warm persona thatinvites people into my leadership
and what God's calling me to do?
I think my global answer onwhat's most important with
leadership fits into that category.

(45:15):
A good friend of mine, John Spence,he's one of the most world renowned
leadership experts in the world.
He, does this activity when he's in aworkshop where he asks all the leaders
in the room to write down at the topof a paper of two columns, the names
of two leaders that they've, reallyloved in their leadership, like two
leaders, you've really looked up to.

(45:36):
And he asks like, write down things thatyou loved about each of those leaders.
I love this about them.
This is what And then once that wholelist is created, he says, next to them,
I want you to write down one of twothings, either IQ or EQ is this thing
that you loved about them, something thatthey did pointed to them being really
smart, really good at what they did.

(45:56):
That's why you love them or EQ.
There's something about them, theircharacter, the way they treated people.
And he said, for everyone IQ, there's nine EQ.
The things that we love most aboutleaders, we exalt the highly competent,
but we love the highly emotional, the highemotional quotient leaders in our lives.

(46:19):
At the end of the day, most of ourleadership is really just about character.
Like who we are, how wellwe care for other people.
And he said, you get a room of executiveleaders from across the world to do
that activity and see how high EQ isall of a sudden this barrier goes down
on EQs, the soft garbage of the world.
We don't need that.
You teach us how to runour scorecards better.

(46:41):
And then he runs that activity and they'relike, all right, we'll We'll listen.
Cop character.
Over competence.
That's great leadershipcharacter over competence.

Yeah, and the good thing about that, what you, this is
what I heard as you were talking,you didn't specifically say it,
but I heard gifts of the Spirit.
You know, I heard The biblical foundationof, and to me, I think there's the gifts
of the spirit are in order for a reason.
There's a reason love is first.
And then I think everythingelse spills from that.

(47:13):
But that was interesting gentleness.
that's something that I thinkI tempt to work on also.
Thanks for sharing that.
I think that was a nice littlemini masterclass that you gave.
Brandon, why write a book with the title?
I'm going to read thetitle with the subtitle.
It's not your business to succeedthat first of all, it's, it's going

(47:38):
to be right there on the shelveswith the success books, right?
It's not your business to succeedyour role in leadership when
you can't control your outcomes.
What's up with what's up with that?

C.
S.
Lewis has a book that maybe isone of the less prominent, less
known books because it's actuallyjust the collection of letters,
letters that he wrote to a friend.
It's called letters to Malcolm and inone of these letters, Malcolm had written
to him about an initiative that he hadundertaken that wasn't producing the
result that he wanted this initiative,big initiative, a lot of investment.

(48:12):
It wasn't producing the results.
And C.
S.
Lewis wrote back and he, and hewrites Malcolm and he says, Malcolm,
it is not your business to succeed.
It is only your job to do whatis right and then entrust the
results to a faithful God.
If each of us could graspthat this week, not, not the

(48:35):
leadership applications are clear.
Take your mind, take your eyes off of yourprofit and loss statements, set them on
the people around you and go, Hey, what'smost important in our purpose this week?
How do we build something that'sactually worth working for?
But there's so many more applications.
This book that I mentioned that I'mreading by Gary Thomas, Sacred Marriage.

(48:57):
How do we apply even thatsame thinking to our marriage?
It is not your business to succeed,but only to do what is right.
What's your role in leadership whenyou can't control your outcomes?
Gary Thomas would say, Hey, yourealize the purpose of marriage
is not to make you happy.
You go back home tonight and you believethat marriage is about making you happy.
Every single time your wife doesn't makeyou happy or doesn't do the thing that you

(49:18):
would have chosen to make yourself happy.
You're tempted to think, whyam I married to this person?
They don't care about me.
They don't love me.
Does God even love me?
I hate this thing.
And then as soon as we get deepenough into that, we're like, I'm out.
And we abandoned marriage.
He Gary Thomas would say, whatif the purpose of marriage wasn't
about making you happy, butit was about making you holy.
Here's another place where it'slike, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait.

(49:39):
It's not about the outcome.
Me being happy in marriage, it'sabout actually who I'm becoming.
What's my role in my marriage.
Let me ask you this.
What's your role in your parentingwhen you can't control your
outcomes, we go, Oh, you know, weask like, like older parents were
like, Oh, tell me about your kids.
What are they doing?
And we'd love to say like, Oh, he's in,he's at this prestigious university.
Oh, he just landed this great job.
Oh, they just purchased their first home.

(50:01):
And it's like, wow, you'resuch a great parent.
You can't control theoutcomes of your kids.
Like what happens when they wind up inprison, they wind up in a rehab facility.
It's like, man, I taught them the gospel.
I worked with them.
I want, you know, likeI can't control them.
It's not your business to succeed.
It's your business to be faithful,to bring them the gospel and love

(50:22):
and care and correction encouragementand counsel over and over again.
the parents who sit there and go,I've told you this a million times.
God's going to look over thoseparents and be like, well done,
good and faithful servant.
And like you're doing the right thingwhen we're doing what God's asked us to
do in our parenting, in our marriage.
In our leadership, in our business,in our ministry at church, in our

(50:45):
connection groups, in our friends,with our family, over those things, God
would say, you be faithful unto death.
I'll give you the crown of life.
That's the best.
That's the best promise we have.

Yeah.
Brandon, it sounds like.
Shelly believes this book, you wrote itfor yourself, but when you were writing
it, who, who did you have in mind?
Who was the reader?
Who was the audience goingto be as you were writing it?

It's the honest leader.
It's this book is writtenfor the honest leader.
You who put on a mask every day andwalk into every single networking event
and every single community event andsomebody asks you, how are you doing?
To you who say, great.

(51:33):
Good, great, amazing.
Life's amazing.
God's so good every you're a liar.
You're not an honest leader.
you are broken.
and you just have a hard time beinghonest and inviting people into pain.
You would prefer, as Ido, to put on a mask.
to feign success, evenin the hardest seasons.
And we don't know how to deal withand communicate our trust in God

(51:58):
when we're struggling to understandhis sovereignty in the middle of
pain, personally or professionally.
This book is for the honest leaderwho goes, leadership is hard.
Oftentimes my sense of successand identity are tied to
things they shouldn't be.
My bottom line, my bank account,my reputation, and they're going,

(52:19):
I know that's not the way it'ssupposed to be, but I'm having a
hard time getting unstuck from that.
And I'd like to trade the soul crushingweight of outcomes for the soul
lifting joy of a life lived for God infaithfulness and surrendered to His plan

so what do you say to someone who's, they're
still listening in, let's say.
And they're, they're kind ofstruggling with this moving
from the beyond outcome based.
I know read the book is one thing.
Let's tell them to get the book,but I guess just give a word of
encouragement for someone who it'sreally hard for them to let go.

(53:00):
If they're a control freak, like we talkedabout you being in, but they know they
need to, they're being nudged pretty hard.
Give a couple words of encouragement.

let me, let me just first say, when I wrote this book
at the very last second, I was askedby my publisher Write A Forward,
and I said, forwards are dumb.
I don't read them.
And he said, you need a forward,you have to write it, Brandon.
And I said, fine.
What?
What is a good forward?
And he just said, wrote.

(53:30):
forward why you wrote the book.
I wrote that book because I need itbecause every single day when I walk
back in the office and I'm shootingfor great business for a greater
purpose, I'm shooting for a profit anda margin that fuels a greater purpose.
I am tempted to go back to theoutcome based mindset and say, yeah,

(53:55):
God's sovereign, but it's on me.
But it's on me.
We're called to be faithful.
That's a high, high calling in all of ouractivities to be like Christ, to model
Jesus to our team, our family, the world.
That is a high enough calling right there.

(54:16):
Let us not, in the same degree ofaccepting that, accept a responsibility
that lays way too much on us.
You can't control your outcomes.
If you say this is success this yearwill be us doing and accomplishing
this one thing and it doesn't happen.
You can say nothing over yourselfexcept you are a failure.

(54:38):
As a leader, as a parent, as ahusband, as a wife, whatever.
That is, that's too much.
so we run to the fatheragain and again and again.
What does running to the father look like?
Surrender.
Surrendering outcomes, surrenderingpurpose, surrendering finances, the time
that we have, the gifts that we have, andjust saying, Jesus, they're all yours.

(55:02):
They're all on the table.
My whole business, my wholelife, my kids, my parenting, my
marriage, it's all on the table.
Use it for your glory and shape me in themiddle of it because who I'm becoming is
more important than what I accomplish.
I wrote the book for me and I hope thatas you read it, you'll get a sense of that
and the true joy of coming to the Fatheragain and again and again in surrender.

I think that's good advice and coaching for the leader
that is, we'll call it burden ifthat may not even be the right word.
But Brandon, I would love rightnow for you to, there's a few
resources that I know you have.
You've got the book we just talked about.
You've got your agency and I thinkyou've got a new ebook that's coming out.

(55:50):
could you give all those coordinates now?
And then I've got one more questionthat we're going to wrap up with.

Absolutely.
Amazon has my book.
It is not your business to succeed.
My personal website,
brandonmichaelwest.
com has, our podcast that we did the top10 life and leadership lessons learned in
our first 10 years at FOS has articles,things I speak on and opportunity requests
speaking, but FOS's website, FOS creative.

(56:17):
com.
PHOScreative.
com has a ton of really cool learningarticles on marketing and branding
and consulting and leadership.
But it's also got tworeally fun resources on it.
One is an eight page prayer guidethat we made for strategic planning to
submit our plans to the Lord as we gointo strategic planning as a business.

(56:38):
And then a bigger 40 page ebook thatwe've written on, Flourishing at
work and this mission that we have tocultivate true flourishing and people
and organizations while reflectingthe love of Jesus of the world is best
seen in six dimensions of wellness,financial, intellectual, spiritual,
physical, emotional, and relational.
And we've developed a really coolframework that we've just given to

(56:58):
the world for free so that they cango implement a flourishing culture
inside of their organization.

Those resources sound good.
We'll make sure all thelinks are down in the notes.
Brandon, we're Seek, Go Create.
Those three words.
I'm going to allow you, to pick one ofthose words and why, and don't ever think
it just what resonates the most withyou means the most to you right now.
Seek, go or create.

We, our full name is two words, Fost Creative.
I'm going to have to go with create.
You were designed to go and createbig things for the Lord, whether
that's big things for one person,100 people, or 1 million people, you
are called and gifted with thingsthat can go and bless the world.
Go find those and God will use youin big ways for one or 1 million.

bringing all these topics together that have been
extremely important to what wedo here at Seek, Go, Create.
We're, we're approaching our300th episode and probably what
you've discussed and talked aboutencapsulates as well as anything.
What we're all about as faras the journey and success.
I'm going to highly recommendI've got it on my Kindle here.
I'm going to hold it up, buthighly recommend you get, it's

(58:15):
not your business to succeed.
I read that over the last few days.
Excellent book, great read, good resource.
I'm going to recommend peopleget that and check out the other
resources that Brandon mentioned.
We are seek, go create here.
I appreciate everyone listening in.
We've got new episodes every Monday.
We're on YouTube, all the platforms.
Thanks for commenting andsharing and subscribing.

(58:37):
All of those things we reallyappreciate So thanks again for
listening until next time continuebeing all that you were created to be

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.css-14f5ked{margin:0;word-break:break-word;display:-webkit-box;-webkit-box-orient:vertical;box-orient:vertical;-webkit-line-clamp:2;overflow:hidden;}Brandon West: From Control to Stewardship in Leadership