Show Notes
Success is often more dangerous to a leader’s soul than failure because it creates an isolation that makes honest feedback nearly impossible to find.
On this episode of Nuance, Case interviews Peter Greer about the subtle mechanics of “mission drift,” not just in organizations, but in the hearts of those who lead them. Peter shares vulnerable insights from his tenure at Hope International, discussing how easy it is to focus so hard on the work of the ministry that you lose connection with the God of the ministry.
This episode dives into the counter-intuitive strategies for staying grounded, including why you should schedule time to write your own eulogy and how to identify when you are paddling hard but looking down, unaware that you have drifted far from shore. They also tackle the uncomfortable reality that talent and track records are no guarantee against losing your way, emphasizing that the most successful leaders are often the ones most in need of a “mission audit” to ensure their outer success matches their inner integrity.
Episode Resources:
How Leaders Lose Their Way And How to Make Sure It Doesn’t Happen to You: https://www.peterkgreer.com/how-leaders-lose-their-way-2/
Peter Greer’s website: https://www.petergreer.com/
Learn more about Hope International: http://www.hopeinternational.com/
Episode Discussion Guide: https://docs.google.com/document/d/1XNIdpcjhM00UOndp7e2V6rALsgqf0boBHqOGUyre4qk/edit?usp=sharing
Nuance is a podcast of The Collaborative where we wrestle together about living our Christian faith in the public square. Nuance invites Christians to pursue the cultural and economic renewal by living out faith through work every facet of public life, including work, political engagement, the arts, philanthropy, and more.
Each episode, Dr. Case Thorp hosts conversations with Christian thinkers and leaders at the forefront of some of today’s most pressing issues around living a public faith.
Episode Transcript
Case Thorp
Today I’m joined by Peter Greer, President and CEO of Hope International and co-author of a new book, How Leaders Lose Their Way. Now this book grows out of lived experience. It asks not only how leaders fall, but how they can remain grounded, humble, and faithful for the long haul. So, Peter, welcome to Nuance.
Peter Greer
Thanks for having me.
Case Thorp
Well friends, this conversation comes to you in a way that you can share it with others. And I was reviewing stats the other day and so it really helps others get to know us and hear this good word about how to live their faith in the public square. So today, our guest is quite an individual. As president and CEO of Hope International, he leads a global Christian microfinance organization. They serve families and entrepreneurs across Africa, Asia, Latin America, and Eastern Europe. He’s also a widely respected voice on leadership and mission and the co-author of numerous books including Mission Drift, Rooting for Rivals, and now this book, How Leaders Lose Their Way with InterVarsity Press. He has co-authored it with Jill Heisey. Now I’ve got a picture of it here. Please go and follow in our show notes and get your own copy.
Now this book is a sober, hopeful examination of how leaders are formed and deformed, sometimes by power or pressure, the lure of a false success, but on the other hand, how the practices of humility, accountability, and prayer can keep leaders rooted in Christ. So today we’re going to focus on the book on leadership.
And then next week, we’re going to go more into the world of microfinance and its evolution over these many years. So I’ve actually included for the first time a one-page discussion guide for this conversation. You’ll find it in the show notes. And I would encourage you to check it out for your own time in prayer or to have a discussion about this episode with a group of leaders, other followers of Jesus. Well, Peter, again, thanks for being here. Tell us why this book, why now, especially in light of all the others you have written.
Peter Greer
Yeah, and a huge disclaimer is I never write anything claiming to be an expert in it, but I start with a question and it’s a question that is not some sort of a theoretical question. It’s a question that we’re wrestling through at Hope International or in my own life. And with this particular book, I really started by reading a study that found that only one out of three leaders in scripture finish well. And then the author went on and to say, it’s probably not too different today. About one in three leaders finish well. And “finish well” meaning that they did not significantly abuse their power, their platform or their privilege. And then you look around…
Case Thorp
That really worries me.
Peter Greer
Right, well that’s exactly it. You look around and then you start seeing there’s a lot of case studies that reinforce that point, leaders that I have looked up to or learned from or studied under. And then you start to have this question of how does it happen? How do leaders lose their way? And then the second part of the question is how do we make sure it doesn’t happen to us? And so that really was the genesis of this project. It was saying if that is indeed true that approximately one out of three leaners finish well.
Well, if that means it’s easier not to finish well than it is to finish well, what can you and I do to make sure that we live and serve on mission? So that was the question that we started with and I am so grateful not only for my co-author Jill, but also for the friends that shared their stories so vulnerably, so transparently and basically with a cautionary tale saying here’s when I look back, here’s where I went off track and here’s what I would do differently. So I want to learn from the experience of others who hopefully have better than one out of three finishing well.
Case Thorp
Now, you’ve been at Hope, I believe, for over 20 years, and you’re at the top of your game. I imagine you see the trail coming towards retirement. Actually, the R word’s not in the Bible, you know, transitioning from your income-bearing years, as we like to say at The Collaborative. How was this topic personal to you in your walk?
Peter Greer
Yeah, I mean, in many ways, one of the most sobering pieces was I’ve had people that I looked up to that in many ways you could look at their career and say, they did so well until their 60s and 70s. And then they lost their way. And kind of like, how does this happen? And what we began with is actually this individual shared. He’s like, there is no guarantee that we will not lose our way even if we have decades of track record kind of faithfulness in the same direction. He said, we all can lose our way or as the hymn, come now fount of every blessing. I just love that line when it says, prone to wander, Lord, I feel it. Prone to leave the God I love. And I don’t think that is a young man’s song. I don’t think that is a middle…I think that is an all of us song. No matter where we are, we can still lose our way. And so what relevance does it have for me? Very clearly, I care deeply about my family. I care deeply about the mission of Hope International. I do not want to lose my way as I have this, you know, worked with Hope for 20 years and then before that I was with another organization and been married, you know, 25 years. I have my family and four kids and so I just, I don’t want to egregiously lose my way. So the question is how does it happen? How might it be happening in my own life and what changes do I need to do so that I don’t lose my way even as you have a great past but right now how do I have a great future as well focused on the mission that I believe God has given me?
Case Thorp
Now when you speak of leaders, are you speaking of leaders in any sort of industry or specific to ministry?
Peter Greer
No, I don’t think there is anything new under the sun. And in many ways, you look at the news and there are stories of individuals that lose their way regularly. But you know what there also are? Stories of people that are not in that maybe most senior leadership position, but have also lost their way. And so I think this is really a human heart issue. I think this has relevance to all of us. And we defined leadership as influence. So meaning you’re a leader in, whoever is listening to this, my guess is you’re a leader in a particular domain and there’s a lot at stake. There is a lot more than we realize at stake, not just on the impact of ourselves, not just on the impact of our faith, but on those that are around us as well. You know, in some ways how leaders lose their way, I think that is a broad definition of leader, intentionally broad definition. Ministry, for-profit, non-profit, doesn’t matter. Leader at the home or leader in a different context. I think we all are leaders. We all have significant influence and how can all of us make sure that we are not losing our way?
Case Thorp
Well, Come Thou Fount is one of my two favorite hymns, the other being Blessed Assurance. And that line, prone to wander, that really fits the theme of your book, because it’s not prone to fall off the cliff or prone to wake up one morning and blow everything up, but your book talks about how usually leaders rarely fail all at once. They begin to drift. Talk to us about what that drift can look like in life.
Peter Greer
Case, this was one of the other things that we heard again and again where they at some point said all of a sudden dot dot dot and then they filled in the story.
But it was never all of a sudden. It was never like one moment. You could actually trace it back and realize it was small compromises compounded by time. It was never all of a sudden. And I think just in talking about this big subject, I think the reality is every single person is drifting. The question is, how far have we gone down that path of drift? And I can tell you it is far less painful. The earlier you identify drift, there is less pain involved getting back on mission, getting back on the right direction, the further that arc goes, the further you are along in the story of personal drift, the more difficult it is and the more painful it is for yourself and for others. So all of us are drifting and I think the earlier we identify it just the better. It’s like if I were to go out and I were to find a very small seedling, a little acorn that had just taken root, I could pick it out in a very easy time. You ignore that little growth and you wait a decade and it is not going to be an easy project to remove what at one point would have been real easy to address.
Case Thorp
Sure. Yeah. Well, we’re drifting. Are we drifting back towards the harbor? Are we drifting out to choppy seas? I remember once many, years ago, a very prominent pastor here in Orlando had an incredible moral failure that led to his departure from their church. And our senior pastor called an immediate meeting of our pastoral staff. We’ve got, gosh, six, seven pastors. And the first thing out of his mouth was, may none of us think we’re immune to such difficult circumstances. And the first thing out of his mouth wasn’t, my, how could he? Or, how might we benefit from people coming here? But I respect how well he handled that. And he said, all right, I’m expecting every one of you to have your calendar shared with your spouses and your secretaries. And I expect a whole method or list of practices that help us to try to stay above board and watch for that drift.
Peter Greer
That is wisdom. That is such wisdom. And I would say for all of us, the next time we hear a story of someone losing their way, that’s the right posture. Not I can’t believe they did that, but Lord help me to live and serve on mission. So good.
Case Thorp
Right, the president of my seminary once said in a sermon, every time you’re pointing the finger at somebody else, don’t forget, you got three pointing back at you. So I thought that was helpful. Now you’re pretty honest in the book about how success can become spiritually corrosive. And I love that way of thinking about it, spiritually corrosive. So have you seen success shape leaders in our life for good or for worse?
Peter Greer
Absolutely, and you know, I think the reality is the more “successful” you are, the more at risk you are for some of these things. I’ll give you an example. The more successful you are, how easy is it for people to tell you the truth? The more successful you are, it’s just the more successful, how about your pace of life?
Do think there are more or less opportunities for you to keep going and traveling and running your soul ragged? And so I think there is more danger in success. And the converse perhaps is true. I think that success is more dangerous spiritually than failure. When you have a significant issue, that’s where there is receptivity. That’s when you are reminded you can’t do this on your own. Success leads to exceptionalist thinking. Well, the rules don’t apply to me. But when you’re in failure, you’re like, I need help. So a lot of the issues that we talk about in the book are accelerated or exacerbated by success.
Case Thorp
Well, I have noticed 20 years now as a pastor at First Pres Orlando that that thought can come to my mind of, the rules don’t apply to me anymore. And that is not good. It doesn’t build team dynamics and it doesn’t help me in my personal integrity or leadership skills. So after a few little hiccups, I’ve had to say to myself, you know what?
Follow the rules, you know, don’t feel like you’re above that. Now you’re a leader of a large organization. How do you make sure that people are telling you critical things that they think you may not want to hear?
Peter Greer
The alternative is not great, right? Even if you don’t want to hear it, the alternative is worse of having some sort of a huge blind spot that you’re not aware of. And so I think there’s two things that help. One is to actually publicly share when you’re with the broader team how much you appreciated when this particular person gave this particular feedback. And this happened, yes, absolutely, this happened recently. I made a comment in a staff meeting and I didn’t know there was a backstory and it hurt one of my staff members again. And so just to publicly, the next time we’re all together, say, hey, I am so sorry, I was not, just own it.
Case Thorp
Normalize it.
Peter Greer
And then the second thing is to actually train all of us. What is our response when we get that feedback? And for me, the only response is thank you very much for sharing because that sets a precedent for the future. And the more is, wow, you’re, you’re questioning me. Am I now questioning your loyalty to the organization? I expect blind obedience. No, like you have to have a posture that the only response in the moment when feedback is giving is thank you very much. I needed to hear that.
Case Thorp
Yeah, well, and for the cadre of folks here and there that I’m honored to lead, I will go so far as to say, please tell me. I give them permission. I ask them, tell me what’s not working here, working on a book, and I will share it with some folks to ask for their feedback. And I’ll say, if you don’t give me true critical feedback, it’s not going to help it be better. So I’m not going to let you read it unless you’ll really tell me the truth. So give him permission.
Peter Greer
I love it. That’s so good.
Case Thorp
Well now you briefly mentioned hurry just a minute ago. On your book, in your book, page 113, you quote Carl Jung, the very well-known psychoanalyst of the 20th century. You quote him saying, “hurry is not of the devil. Hurry is the devil.” I think it reminds me of the woman that led me to Christ would say, if the devil can’t make you bad, he’ll make you busy. How does hurry get in the way and cause leaders to fail?
Peter Greer
I think just one of the real practical, if you look at the image of drifting through life or losing your way, sometimes it’s because you don’t know where you’re going or sometimes it’s because imagine if you’re in a canoe and you’re out on the water, you got your paddle in your hand and you’re just paddling so hard, but you’re just looking down. What are you not seeing?
You’re not seeing where you’re going because you’re so focused on just every day. And I think that is one of the key pieces for leaders is that they are so focused on all of the going on all of the activity that they haven’t had the ability to look up and see what is the direction. What is the direction where I’m going? And so I think this is why with leaders, you’re not going to be able to identify drift, the small seeds of drift if you do not find a way to get your internal RPMs down, if you do not slow down, and I think that’s really the invitation for all of us. If we are going so hard 24-7, we are going hard, but we don’t know where we’re going. And I think that’s why there’s such a connection between the ability to periodically slow down, or as the Psalmist writes in 139, search me and know me, see if there’s any offensive way and lead me in the way everlasting.
Ask that question if you’re going so fast. You can’t identify where you are unless you get the internal RPMs down and ask that question and sincerely look at where am I having drift in my life. So speed is dangerous because you don’t realize the impact on others. You don’t recognize if you are off track without slowing down those internal RPMs.
Case Thorp
Right. I once had a direct report who felt like I was pressuring her to go much faster or carry the sort of load I carry. And I am, and I don’t say this to point the finger at me, but I mean, I’m monstrously high capacity and there’s that hurry. And it’s a struggle. I mean, I have to intentionally take things off the plate, say yes to the most important things, no to a lot of wonderful, cool things. But when she revealed this to me, it broke my heart, number one, because, my goodness, I never had thought or expected that of her. But it dawned on me, my frenetic pace was sending messages, not the good ones. And I learned throughout her tenure with us to repeatedly affirm I am not expecting this of you. You’re doing solid amounts of work. From my perspective, your plate is full. But it had an unintended impact that I didn’t expect.
Peter Greer
How did you recognize that? When did you realize the impact on others?
Case Thorp
When she shared it in a review. And I was grateful for her sharing it, but boy, it hurt my heart. Because if anything, I wanted the opposite for her. I wanted good rhythm and doing good work well and not feeling like she needed to be stretched thin. So it was a learning process for sure.
Peter Greer
And my guess is her courage to share that impacted the way that you lead and engage with others. I can hear the receptivity in you from that comment.
Case Thorp
Well, in learning, okay, even with other people that I may be colleagues or my superiors, own openly that I put too much on my plate. And while I feel like I’m pretty good at turning things off and having downtime, I’m not good at filling that plate up with so many things that then some of them begin to get neglected. The other day with too many plates in the air I realized two of them hadn’t been attended to in a while and that was just due to pure load rather than, I guess it was a form of neglect, it wasn’t intentional neglect, and I thought, you know what, I am at capacity. I need to start to take some things off and reset.
Peter Greer
Yeah, that’s good.
Case Thorp
Yeah. Well, Jill Heisey is your co-author in this. Tell me about why Jill, what did she bring to the conversation, and what does it look like to author a book with someone?
Peter Greer
Yeah, well I don’t know what it’s like to not author a book with someone. Every single project I’ve written with others. And so I can’t speak of what it’s like to do solo, but I can tell you that personally it is a far more engaging experience to go on the journey with others. And I just find it to be, for me, when you play a game of ping pong or tennis, it’s just more fun. I remember one section I was working on and I sent it to Jill and she sent it back. And I just, I literally laughed out loud because it sounded so much better when Jill was done rewriting it. She’s terrific. So she’s been a colleague for a long time at Hope International. We’ve done a number of different book writing projects together and it’s been a great joy to partner with her and with others on a variety of books.
Case Thorp
I’ve got those people in my life for sure.
So she’s on your staff, that’s unique. Well, speaking of your staff and your organization, how do y’all keep mission drift from occurring? So if you have leadership drift, large organizations, especially nonprofits, can fall into that mission drift temptation. What does that look like?
Peter Greer
Yeah, and we didn’t really cover this yet, but in many ways…this book is the sequel to a book that we wrote a decade ago called Mission Drift. And Mission Drift, that’s exactly right. You got the central premise exactly right. It is how do organizations slowly drift from their founding purpose and passion? And we found some amazing examples. But did you know one of the early mission statements of Harvard University was to be plainly instructed and consider well that the main end of your life and studies is to know God and Jesus Christ. That was the mission statement of Harvard University. And then you look at other examples of just across the board and mission drift, there are stories in health care, there are stories in education, there are stories in nonprofits where they slowly but steadily moved away from their identity, from who they are. And so that was a decade ago and unfortunately we’ve had a number of additional stories that we’ve heard in the last decade of organizations that are moving away from their Christ-centered mission and identity.
Case Thorp
Yeah. Now, what would be the difference between mission drift that’s unhealthy versus mission renewal and clarifying and evolving with the market, whether it’s a for-profit or the social scene?
Peter Greer
Great question. Right, intentionality versus unintentionality. The word drift is so powerful because you’re just not even aware of the currents. And I don’t know if you’ve ever had this experience to be out on the water. You just relax for a few minutes. You don’t think you’re moving. And then what happens? You realize, whoa, we are far away from where we started. And so I think that is the difference. I am all for organizations regularly saying, is this still true? Is there a way to be a truer version of ourselves? What do we need to change and adapt and create? And all of that, good, important conversations. But most of the stories that we heard, you couldn’t point to a moment of intentionality.
You could point to a slow drift. Then one organization said this, they said, you change slowly. And then all of a sudden you realize that you are not doing the mission. And, and they were doing this in affirmation of a completely secular version of what it was that they were created to be. And so I think that is the big difference for me is it intentional or unintentional? And we’ve done a lot at Hope International to say, we want to make sure that it’s intentional.
We’re not able to change our purpose without a unanimous decision from the board in three consecutive years. That’s really difficult to do. It’s not impossible.
Case Thorp
Wait, I’m sorry. What was that about, unanimous vote?
Peter Greer
So this was something that we learned from an individual, his name was Chris Crane, and what he said is you want to make it difficult to change your primary purpose. Not the method, not the means, not the operational model, but the core of who you are.
Case Thorp
OK. Right.
Peter Greer
And so we copied from him and said to change the primary purpose of the organization requires a unanimous vote from the board of directors in three consecutive years. So meaning like there couldn’t just be one board meeting and there’s some important issue and hey, all in favor change it. So it brings a level of structure that says, hey, for who we are, we want to safeguard that mission. We want to make sure that that is true for decades to come. And so I guess that’s the difference between like mission and means.
Case Thorp
Yeah. So that was written into the governance plan, which makes it very stable and secure. Well, I hear the difference between drifting and tacking. Tacking’s intentional. Well, I learned this the hard way. My wife loves to go scalloping. And where are you in this recording right now?
Peter Greer
I’m in Lancaster, Pennsylvania.
Case Thorp
Okay, well I’m here in Orlando and so the coast is nearby and every August we’ll take the kids, charter a little boat outside of Crystal River and go scalloping. And you know, she’s quite athletic, loves this, I’m not and I’m not so good at it. So I end up pretty much just floating around. And I learned one year real quickly. Woo, tie yourself to that boat or it’s a long way to get back. Well, did you find any parallels between organizational drift and leaders drifting?
Peter Greer
So many. And we don’t have time to go through all of them. But that was really kind of the big surprise was how many of the issues actually have an organizational and a personal application. And that was really, I think, part of the fun of the project was really exploring how does it look different at a personal level versus organizational? And what are the practices, organizationally and personally, that we need to do to anchor ourselves to that core mission that we have? So all kinds, I mean we could talk about the role of money as influence.
Case Thorp
Yeah, give us an example.
Peter Greer
Yeah, I mean, so that’s one, is in a organizational standpoint, it is real easy to follow the money and to let the money pull the mission in a different direction. It takes courage to basically say, hey, before we even have an interest in receiving that money, is it in alignment with who we are? And I had a moment where I had a foundation that said, we love the microfinance model. We love the way that you invest in entrepreneurs. They said, we’re a publicly traded company. You just have to promise us you’re not going to do any of that Jesus stuff and then we’ll be able to partner with you. And to me that was a moment of…I mean, I wish I had as much clarity then as I do now. My initial response was, how can we make this work? And we ended up coming to our senses, not receiving the funding. And I think that was the biggest gift that we’ve ever been given because it clarified our mission. It clarified who we are. And then we think about the personal application. How many of us, if we are honest, have been chasing the money or letting the money lead the mission? How easy it is to justify, well, I’m gonna work a little bit harder for my family. I’m gonna say yes to this other opportunity or this other role without realizing the cost that it might have. And again, that’s one way that leaders lose their way is by letting money lead the mission as opposed to the mission leading the decision making. So organizational and personal, and again, that’s just one of a hundred different areas of application about what leads organizations and people off mission.
Case Thorp
I would imagine there’s a correlation between leader drift and institutional drift. One often goes with the other.
Peter Greer
So good. Yep.
I really should have had this interview with you before we wrote the book. You could have shortened my learning. But yeah, that was one of the other pieces, is initially we looked at the organizations, but upstream from every organizational drift was a leadership drift. And sometimes that happened from one generation of leader to the next. Sometimes it was like the passions of the first generation are the preferences of the second generation and are irrelevant to the third generation. And so that baton was not passed. And that’s from Dr. Paltrop, but I think that that idea is true that the personal drift precedes the organization. Hey, we don’t need to be quite so strong or clear in our mission. Let’s just soften that. Let’s water that down a little bit. Let’s become more like the temperature around us. Let’s maybe lose our distinctiveness. Let’s slowly water down faith so that we can be more broadly applicable and all kinds of different ways that personally and organizationally that drift is connected.
Case Thorp
I see that so often in the church when a new pastor comes, the senior pastor, the lead pastor. there sometimes, when there’s so much openness to completely change things based around his or her leadership, to me it speaks to weak elders, or at least in the Presbyterian tradition, that you don’t have that lay leadership that is trained and on top of who we are and what we’re about in ministry. I will help churches find pastors and I’m always saying to them, we need to find somebody who will pair with your vision, bring ideas and methodologies and spark to that. But I don’t think it’s helpful when a church kind of does a reset every three, five, 15 years when that new lead pastor comes.
Peter Greer
Well said, and I think part of it, you identified a huge issue, is oftentimes in our governance structure the board of elders they don’t understand that a critical component of their job is to protect the mission of the organization. Oftentimes we kind of focus on the financial compliance and financial audit and all those things are good and important but how about a mission audit? How about clarity that they’re supposed to be guardians of that core element? I think that is, and maybe doing, you asked for the correlation between organizational and personal, I think there’s a key benefit for every single one of us and who’s on the journey with us that can help us clarify our personal mission and help us identify where we are going off track.
Case Thorp
Yeah, that’s right.
Well, my mind went there. So somebody listening who is trying to be faithful in their work as a Christ follower, but also thinks, wait a minute, I just kind of went to college and got a job. I mean, maybe they got to pick a career or a passion in a certain realm of work. How would you encourage or help someone think about what’s my mission so that then I’m faithful to it through to the end of income years?
Peter Greer
This might be an odd answer, but I remember I was at my grandfather’s funeral and I was with my grandfather when he passed from this life into heaven and it was just profound watching the response of my grandmother throw herself on him. They did life well together, watched family speak words of blessing. And it was a profoundly sacred moment. And if there was any doubt about whether or not he lived and loved well, that moment just, and then you get to hear at his celebration of life and you get to hear these stories that I had never heard before and they were beautiful, about the way that he lived and at that moment I don’t think I was on that same path. I was working really hard but I was struck by that moment and then I read something that David Brooks wrote about the difference between resume virtues and eulogy virtues and about the difference of those two and oftentimes we spend our careers focusing on the resume and miss out on what actually is most important if you read and reflect on a eulogy. So that Saturday morning I decided to write my eulogy and my wife came down and saw me.
And I was like getting teary and she asked what I was doing and I told her I was writing my eulogy. I didn’t give her any other details at that moment. And so she was quite concerned about what I was doing. Why are you your eulogy? But it was profoundly important for me, like profoundly important. And I actually have it on my calendar and every year, on my birthday, I read it. It’s on a, it’s just on a recurring appointment. And it is a chance for me to say, where do I need to recalibrate?
Where do I need to recalibrate? And then if I’m, you know, maybe that’s odd, but maybe even more odd is I also have written my resignation letter. And I think those two things, one reminds me that this job is temporary as much as I love it. The other reminds me that this life is temporary. And I think both of them just have this ability to reframe what is most important. What is it that’s going to be true when I no longer have the title on my business card? What is still going to be true?
And I think it pushes me, prods me, encourages me to focus on the people and on the mission that I believe I have. Those might be exercises that might be helpful. Recalibrations.
Case Thorp
Wonderful. Now when you reread those, do you ever update them?
Peter Greer
This is the exact thing that we were talking about earlier. Yes, full invitation. Every time I actually did it on my birthday this year, I made some changes to it. And I think that’s really, really helpful. I’m not holding on with a clenched fist. The goal is to clarify what matters most to me. And so, yeah, I absolutely make minor modifications and this year was a little bit more and it was just in light of some…Yeah, anyway, so those are the pieces that I found so helpful. And again, as the book of Psalms talks about, teach us to number our days. And I think that helps us live with purpose today.
Case Thorp (35:10.388)
One of the things I appreciate about the book, How Leaders Lose Their Way, everybody go get a copy, is that you have the very concrete and practical suggestions and even discussion questions at the end of each chapter. Talk to us about some of those practices you found for the one-third of leaders that finish well so that we could be thinking about them in our lives.
Peter Greer
Yeah, so when we started the book…
Well, first of all, Jill and I tried to get Ryan’s scoop. We had worked on a book together called Lead with Prayer and that was a great project. And so we asked if Ryan would work on this one, but I respect this. He had already committed nothing new in this season. So, but we did get him to write prayers at the end of every chapter that are just beautiful. I love the closing prayers at the end of every chapter that Ryan provided. And then the practices that go immediately at the end of every chapter as well. So one other piece that was so instructive is we looked at the life of King Solomon and he is a case study of mission drift. He started so well and drifted so far and yet you look in the book of Proverbs, he knew what to do. He just didn’t do it.
And I think that to me was what I was sensed as we looked at these issues. I know the importance of these things and yet I wasn’t doing them all. And so the goal at the end of every chapter is to not say what do we know but what do we do? How do we put this into practice? If we know the danger of isolation in leadership, what do we do? And so we created a practice of constellation mentoring and to create an actual map so that people can put in these different categories the relationships that matter most. Most of us are intentional about our activities, but not as intentional about the people that we do those activities with. And so just again, trying to bring a practical lens to all of these topics and to say, it’s not enough to know it, we’ve got to do it and to bring those two together.
Case Thorp
Well, I wouldn’t say it’s a workbook. It is a book. But there are so many, like you say, practical charts and two-by-twos and other things to help the reader bring it down to the everyday and the practical in their lives. And as a lover of discipleship, I find that so necessary.
Peter Greer
CanI just say that might be the biggest compliment we’ve had? I love that comment about how it might not be a workbook, but it’s pretty close. I think unless we do these things, unless we take these ideas and put them into practice, and the other reason for discussion questions is because it is not meant to be a book that you go through alone. It is best experienced with someone else. And I think by God’s grace, I really believe that the things that are in here, the topics that we’re discussing, if you do them, not you won’t be immune to drift, but you will have some much stronger safeguards in place as you go on this journey with others and put some of these ideas into practice.
Case Thorp
Well, spiritual formation is a significant part of our methodology at The Collaborative. I often say, look on your head, you’ve got all these holes, your two ears, your two nostrils, your mouth, whatever you put in your brain eventually is gonna leak. But when that heart is deeply formed and moved through prayer and spiritual formation practices, it lasts so much longer. So, a reminder to folks we’ve got that worksheet even for this episode so that this isn’t just an intellectual exercise. Peter, I want to read a bit of Ryan’s prayer that he writes for the end of chapter 8 to give our listeners a taste. “Jesus, help me trade the race of this earth for the rhythm of heaven. My restless heart once again needs to find its rest in you. Teach me your light burden. Teach me your easy yoke. I give you the weight I feel right now, the burdens weighing the core of my soul.” Good stuff, very good stuff. Well, to close us out on this first conversation, Peter, somebody who may be listening is worn out, is tired, and perhaps isolated, maybe quietly compromised, what word of hope would you offer to them?
Peter Greer
Hope comes through in all of the practices and all of these ideas and even in this conversation, I think there is grace upon grace upon grace. There is forgiveness upon forgiveness upon forgiveness because of who Jesus is and what he has done. Unconditional love. I mean, that is the good news and I am enormously grateful. And so all of this is a response to, not trying to earn. So for that individual, I would say start by coming once again to the lavish love and grace of Jesus. And keep going back to that. Keep going back again and again and again in this journey of trying to live and serve on mission.
Case Thorp
Well, is that wonderful? Come now fount says, prone to wonder Lord, I feel it, but seal my heart in courts above. And there’s that hope. Well, Peter, this has been both sobering and deeply hopeful. Before we close, how can listeners find How Leaders Lose Their Way and learn more about Hope International?
Peter Greer
Yeah, well, so grateful to partner with InterVarsity on this book and so you certainly can get more details there or wherever books are sold. It’s on all the retail platforms. So wherever books are sold and then with Hope International, you can go to hopeinternational.org. It’s a place to learn more about the mission of hope.
Case Thorp
Well, How Leaders Lose Their Way by Peter Greer and Jill Heisey. It’s an honest, pastoral, and wise book for anyone interested with leadership. We’ll have those same links in our show notes. So join us next week’s episode as we’re going to do a little something different. It’s going to be a master class format and Peter’s going to take us deep into the world of microfinance and how it’s changing things for millions of people one marketplace exchange at a time. Don’t forget in the show notes, you’ll also find that discussion guide for this episode to do on your own or with some friends. Well, thank you for inviting us into your day. If this conversation helped you think more clearly about leadership as a disciple, please share it with a colleague, post it on your social media. You can visit WeColabor.com, drop us your email and we’ll send you Zeitgeist, our journal at the intersection of faith, work, and culture. Many thanks to the Canaparo family for supporting this episode. I’m Case Thorp, and God’s blessings on you.
