Donnie Smith | Men of Memphis Conference 2018

Hey guys, it's great to be with you. So before I get started, let's huddle up for just a minute. This morning, I don't know how many years I've read through the Bible. I use the one-year Bible as structure. I've got ADHD so bad I need structure. And this morning, the passage in the Old Testament began in the back half of Exodus 17. Exodus 17, by the way, Exodus 17 and 18 are great passages of scripture around leadership principles and organizational development principles, but that's beside the point right now. So at the end of chapter 17, just talking about, you know, that the children of Israel have been, you know, maybe out of Egypt for not more than two months, right? And the Amalekites came to attack them. So Moses says, 'Hey Joshua, I want you to get the right number of men and I want you to go fight the battle. I want you to go beat the Amalekites. And I'm gonna be up on the hill and I'm gonna be holding the staff of God.' Now you go down and start the battle. So the battle starts and as long as Moses' hand, you know the story, as long as Moses held the staff high, the Israelites were winning on the battlefield. But he got tired. And I got to thinking about Pastor Steve. You know, our pastor, Dr. Ronnie Floyd, was the previous president of the Southern Baptist Convention just the term before Brother Steve. And so, and I'm on our church's board, so I have seen what it's like for the pastor to carry the burden of his church while leading the convention at the same time. That's hard. It takes a tremendous amount out of the man of God. And I tell you what, and at that time, I believe, I think the devil, you know, it says he comes to steal, kill, and destroy, right? And you know the devil hates your pastor's guts. He wants to kill his joy, he wants to steal his influence, and he wants to destroy his ministry every day. And sometimes, Pastor Steve, I'm gonna guess your hands get tired. And it gets tired. And the Bible said that Moses got tired and his hands dropped. And when it dropped, the battle changed. But thank God there was Aaron and Hur on that hill with their pastor, with their leader, and they held his arms up while he was holding up the staff of God. Now folks, I've been coming to this church on and off for, I say I got married in '80, so 37 going on 38 years. And this church is an icon in the Southern Baptist Convention. It's an icon in America. And the devil hates it. And he double hates its pastor and its staff. And that's where you come in, men. Listen, it is a privilege. And for me, this is hallowed ground. I am not worthy to stand on this stage where great men of God have preached for decades. And here's where you come in. You need to hold your pastor up in prayer. You need to make it a daily, and I'm sorry, I'm kind of getting on you before I even met you, but you need to make it a daily habit to lift that man up to the Lord. You do. You do. Now let me ask you something. Let me ask you something. Hang on, I'm trying to be really, really practical. Let me ask you this straight up, man to man: Will you commit to daily pray for your pastor? If you will, say 'I will.' If you will, say 'Go Vols.' Ah, hurts you didn't listen. You pray for your pastor. He's a great man of God. Thank you, brother. All right, so here's what I want to do today. Every man in this room has a person of influence. You can influence somebody. You may be, leadership takes a lot of different forms. You may be coaching a baseball team or a basketball team, or you may be, you know, leading a Sunday school class or a Bible study class, home group, whatever we call them these days. You may be leading a team at work. You may be leading your family. But we all can have influence, and leadership is influence. And I want to talk to us today about how we lead. You know, I read a book. Dr. Howard Hendricks always taught us that readers are leaders and leaders are readers. And I was reading a book, and I read all kinds of books. And my chief information officer gave me a book called 'Orbiting the Giant Hairball.' It was written by the creative director of Hallmark gift cards, a guy named MacKenzie, and it was about innovation. But in that book, I found an illustration that, to me, is perfect to contrast the two different leadership styles that I have seen throughout my business career. And so I want to share a little bit of that illustration with you because I think it makes a great point. You know, most organizational structures are shaped like a pyramid, right? And you know, the environment I'm familiar with, you had a CEO at the top. Y'all probably can't see that. Oh, you can? Oh, you got it? Okay, good. All right. And then under them, it's a few EVPs, and then under them were senior group VPs, and then under them were group VPs, and under them were senior VPs, and then under them were VPs, and then under them were the VP wannabes, and then under them were the senior directors, and then under them were the directors. Do not get that confused. Under them were the managers. Under them were the assistant managers. And then, bless God, there was the people that actually worked. I mean, you know how that goes, right? Yeah. That's a way through. And you know, you've heard forever about the corporate ladder, right? Well, there's the corporate ladder right there. There's all the rungs on the corporate ladder. Now here's the problem. Too many people, by the way, because it's convenient, get their idea about the leadership model or how they should lead out of the organizational structure. And let me show you what problem that faces. Let's take this senior VP right here. Now in most companies, here's a senior VP, and then let's contrast them to this assistant manager down here. Okay. Now in most companies, how does that senior VP view themselves in relationship to that assistant manager? Well, just look at the organizational structure, right? They're higher up on the ladder, so obviously they're more important and they're more valuable and they're worth more. I mean, think about it, they got senior VP behind their name. They live on the golf course. I think they got a Mastercraft. They got, you know, four-wheel drive dually truck, whatever. But you know, they've got more stuff. And so they're more valuable. The company pays them more, so they view themselves as more valuable and more important than this person. And that starts affecting how they treat people. You see, for that senior VP, and I'm going to call this the self-serving model. In this self-serving leadership model, and that SVP's mindset, it's all about what you can do for me. Your job is to make me look good, right? And I'm going to tell you two things that drive these self-serving leaders: fear and pride. They are so proud of what they've accomplished, right? They're, hey, they're a senior VP at so-and-so company. They're a big deal. And what are they scared of? What is the worst thing that could happen to that SVP? To get fired. To get demoted. Why? Because all of their self-worth is built into their job title. And if you took that away from them, they would absolutely fall apart. And that's why they will never hire anybody that's better than them. Why? Oh, they may show me up and make me look bad and they'll fire me and you let them have my job. All right? They'll never send people to the boss. They'll always take people to the boss because they want to be in control of the conversation. And I'm going to tell you, this is the way that most leadership, not just in America but in the world, happens. This is the model you will see most of the time. Now, let me contrast that with a different model. Okay, over here, I'm gonna draw a peach tree. Now our peach tree is gonna have black peaches, but don't think they're rotten, it's just unimaginative in my number of markers. Okay, roots. All right. Now when I look at an organizational structure, look, I know there's the, you know, I know the pyramid's there. There's one CEO, there's five SVPs, there's 15 senior group, I know all that. But when I look at the structure, I don't see the pyramid. I see a peach tree. Now in the pyramid, where's the CEO? In the pyramid, absolutely top, star of the show is at the top of the tree, right? Who's, where, where is the seed? Let me ask you this question: Who is the star of the show here? The fruit. The peaches. It's a peach tree. All right. Now let me see this. Where are the peaches on the pyramid? Right? Hey, they're peach juice. I mean, they're just getting crushed by all this bureaucracy and all these egos, just trying to come to work, get the job done every day. Now where's the CEO on the tree? That's exactly right. Right down here. What does the CEO do? Bring stability, structure, resources, whether they're human or capital. That's the role of a CEO. Provide direction. If the trunk's pointed this way, where's the tree gonna be? Over here. If the trunk's going that way, tree's gonna be over here, right? That's the role of CEO. See, it was not supposed to be the star of the show. The CEO serves a group of leaders who support the real star of the show, the peaches. Same thing in the church. We got way too many people that think that the people that are supposed to be doing all the ministry here are the ones y'all pay. That ain't right. They are to equip the saints to do the work of the ministry and building up the body of Christ. That's their job, to build us up to get out there rubbing shoulders every day. I love the fact that the Great Commission starts with a participle. It more properly translated would say, 'Going, make disciples.' As you go, mate, as you go to work every day and rub shoulders with every lost person in Memphis or wherever you are, make disciples. Right. Now here's what I want to do. This servant leadership style begets a leader that has certain characteristics. You have to have a different heart. You have to have different things in your head. You have to have different habits to lead this way than you do this way. You can't fake it. So let's do this. If we could take this servant leader and we could just open them up and see what's inside of them, I'm guessing that that would be really instructional for all of us in how to improve our game in leading. What do you think? A good use of the next 30 minutes? All right, let's do that. I want to look at the servant leader's heart. I want to look at the servant leader's head, what's in their head, and then I want to look at their habits. I've got four things that I think separate the heart of every servant leader from other leaders. There's one thing in their head, but there's four components to it. And then I think there's six habits that every servant leader that I've ever studied consistently models and exhibits that make them different. So let's dive in. The first thing, the first thing in the heart of every servant leader is they're caring people. I don't know where it originated. I heard it first from a guy named Cliff Jenkins, but there's a phrase that says, 'People don't care what you know until they know that you care.' That is so true. So here's two questions for you. Ask yourself these two questions: How am I showing the people I'm trying to influence how I care about them? There's a lot of ways to do it. Pay them a fair wage. Keep them a safe work environment. Develop them so they know exactly what you're expecting of them. Here's one. Here's one that's so important for a leader to show you care. It's how you listen. Do you listen? You know, as a parent, and I mean, Jonathan was strong last night when he said, 'Put that phone down and look your kids in the eye and have a conversation with them and not be distracted.' On the plant floor, somebody comes up to us with an issue and we're talking, 'Yeah, yeah, okay, got it.' And you walk away, you have no idea what they told you. You don't know what to follow up on. You don't know what their problem was. Why? You don't care. You got your stuff to worry about, right? But let me tell you something. If you want to really show people you care, you listen to them. Because it says, 'You are valuable enough for me to put me aside and put you first and hear what you have to say. I value you.' So ask yourself the second question. Don't just ask yourself, 'What can I do to show my people, whether it's your family, work, whatever, don't just ask yourself what am I doing to show my people I care about them.' Ask yourself, 'What am I doing to show my people I don't care about them? What do I need to cut out? What do I need to stop doing?' Because you know, you maybe, if you think about it, you may be doing some stuff that's sending messages to your people that say you don't really want them to have, but you're just doing it. Maybe you, I don't know, full of yourself. You know, when they start talking about personal stuff, you walk off because this is work. We don't do personal here. We just work. Keep all that stuff at home. No, no, they're people. They bring all that stuff with them. Does that make sense? Servant leaders have a heart to care. Second thing is servant leaders are purposeful. You know, I just listened to Coach about a nice thing about this. So let's just, all right, let's just say I'm gonna draw on my illustration. Let's just say this represents the time I spend at work and this represents the time, hey, and look, sometimes life gets out of balance, right? And every day, and look, I spent my average work week probably nothing compared with the Coach, like that. But my hours worked were probably 60, 65 hours, and I'm gonna guess that's pretty normal around here. But every day I left my personal life and I went into the workplace and I made what I consider to be pretty decent deposits. But you know, there was something inside of me that was so magnetic that every day it drew me back out of this world because that's who I really was. Let me give you a couple verses. Everybody knows Ephesians 2:8 and 9, right? 'For by grace you've been saved through faith, and that not of yourselves; it's the gift of God, not of works, lest any man should boast.' What about verse 10? Listen, listen, listen to verse 10. 'For we are his workmanship, created in'—circle that word—'in Christ Jesus for good works.' He's got something for you to do, 'which God prepared beforehand that we should walk in them.' What 2 Corinthians 5:17 says? 'If any man be in Christ,' what is it? Romans 8:1 says, 'Therefore there's no condemnation to them who are in Christ.' Where was Noah? In Christ. He was in the ark, right? We get our purpose not from our business card. We get our purpose from being in Christ. And there's just been this love for Christ that has defined me, and it's so magnetic. It's the thing that gives me purpose. And every single servant leader I know, it's all about making a life, making a life, not just a living. Third word: courage. Write down 2 Timothy 1:7. That's a great verse of scripture today. And you know, in this culture that Jonathan talked about being so messed up, what's that verse say? 'For God doesn't give us the spirit of fear, but of power, love, and a sound mind.' So let me answer some guys. If God doesn't give us the spirit of fear, where does it come from? The enemy. Listen, listen. Some of us are so scared that if we, you know, stand up for Christ or the word Jesus in the workplace, that we're gonna get fired, sent up to HR or what. What are we scared of? Of anybody in the workplace? We ought to be the ones with courage. Why? Because we've got the power of the Living God in us. What are you scared of? Scared you're gonna lose your job? Is your God not big enough to get you another job? You know, I'll be honest. You know, people talk, you know, 'I trust God, I believe it.' Listen, some people's God, he's so small, if he was in a matchbox, there'd be room for the matches in it. He's tiny. He can't do nothing for them. They manipulate, they scheme. Why? Because I don't think their God can take care of them. Listen, we are to be people of courage. We do the right thing only because it's the right thing. And then here's the fourth thing in the heart of these servant leaders. They're principled. Caring, courageous, purposeful, and principled. Here's what I mean by that. I do a lot of work in Africa. Let me tell you something. In America, we're so blessed. We get to make choices that nobody else in the world gets to make, hardly. And let me tell you about two that you get to make that the overwhelming majority of people in the world, they just don't have a choice. They don't get to choose. You get to choose your standard of living and you get to choose your standards for living. I'm gonna talk about this one first. Standards for living. Well, what is it that defines you? What are you about? For me, our family is going to be God-centered. 'Choose you this day whom you will serve.' We, the Smith house, we are serving God. I'm gonna be a person of integrity. Like that video, 'If there ain't no work, Donnie, well, I'm gonna see you at Walmart, Donnie,' and blah, blah, blah. There's just Donnie. I'm the same day, yeah. Bless my heart, I'm the same one all the time. I'm just not smart enough to do anything different. I'm gonna be a person of integrity. I'm gonna be faithful. I've been married for 37 years. She is a remarkable woman. See, I'm gonna be generous. You cannot, Luke 6:38, I don't know if you've ever read that. You need to read that. You cannot outgive God. I don't know what you may be holding back for, but you cannot outgive God. I could stand up here all day and talk about that. But listen, those are my convictions. Those are standards for living for me. Order yours now. You also get to pick your standard of living. You get to choose, look, what kind of car you drive, what kind of clothes you wear, you know, what subdivision you're gonna live in, you know, what kind of vacations. You get to choose that. Now here's the problem. Some leaders, these type, they can forget the priorities of these. So it's the end of the quarter, end of the month, end of the year, sales contests, and you have just got a verbal commitment on a huge 30 million pound order that is going to mean you're gonna be in the circles of sales excellence and you're gonna get to go on the great trip and you're gonna get the extra bonus and your wife's gonna get to go and you're gonna get to hang out with all the executives and man, that is awesome. Problem is, it's gonna take about two weeks to get the paperwork done and your customer's already told you that next year they're gonna not single-source, they're gonna go to two suppliers. So there's no way you're gonna get that order again. Very little chance you're gonna be able to make the sales trip. But you've got a verbal commitment this year. So what do you do? You can't end this year's numbers and you get it on this year's trip. And you start that slippery slope because you prioritized your standard of living above your standards for living. Fellas, don't ever do that. You serve an awesome God. So you prioritize your standards for living. You let God, 'Seek ye first the kingdom of God and all these things.' Got it? Always prioritize. Servant leaders are purposeful and principled. Now let's crack open the head of a servant leader. What do they think about? I think there's one thing that manifests itself in a few different ways. I think it's with a servant leader, it's all about teamwork. Listen, what is the job of that peach tree? There's peaches, right? That's all the servant leader thinks about. It's what is my role in helping my team win games? I read a book years and years and years ago called 'High Five.' It's a Ken Blanchard book. Oh, it's probably the smallest, it's a small book. It's probably done more to shape my leadership than any other thing I've read other than the Word of God. And it's a story. This guy who gets fired, but he doesn't get fired because he's not competent. He gets fired because he's not a team player. So he doesn't have a job. So he coaches his kid's fifth-grade hockey team. He knows nothing about hockey. So he gets the help of this ancient girls' basketball coach, Mrs. Weatherby. And she teaches him four principles of teamwork that are absolutely critical. First, and by the way, it spells out PUCK because it's a hockey game and Blanchard can't help himself. He's got to use all those allegories or acronyms or whatever you call that word. So it's P-U-C-K. P stands for purpose, mission, and values. Every winning team knows exactly what their purpose is, exactly what the mission is, and exactly what the guidelines and guardrails are that they're not going to violate to accomplish the mission. They know their purpose, they know their mission, and they know their values. Every winning team. A second thing they know. U means unleashing skills through training and development. That's why you're here. I'll tell you what, my cup is full. God has spoke to me through Jonathan and James. I tell you what, I bought last night, I was reading scripture on my phone. I was so embarrassed, I brought my Bible today. And hey, I knew he was leaving. I was just afraid he left spies back. So, but here's the point. It's not about you just getting smarter, although you need to get smarter. It's about you being a more effective leader. And the way you do that is you unleash the skills you get in an event like this. So this is about going back home and starting that family devotional. This is about going back home and, like Jonathan was talking about, there's stuff we need to go away from and there's some out there in the new unknown we need to go to, right? But that don't happen if you just sit here and soak it in, get smarter, take good notes, put them in your Bible and find them a month later. No, you got to go unleash those skills into the workplace. You got to lead differently. You got to think differently. You gotta have different habits. Make sense? C stands for creating team power. Mrs. Weatherby uses this phrase in the book called 'None of us are as smart as all of us.' And it's all about, even though we play different positions at work, it's all about how do we create what you could call synergy or harmony. That's why you got an orchestra. I used to play in a huge orchestra. That's why all the instruments are different, because they come together in harmony and make awesome music, right? That's what teamwork's all about. There's only one quarterback. There's just one. But that one quarterback can't do it all by themselves. He needs ten other folks out on the field with him, right? And it's about how do you create team power by working together. Hey, these folks, they have a hard time doing that because all they're worried about is themselves. And then K. K means keep it positive with regular recognition and reward. Let me take a quick story. So not long after I became CEO, and I've come up through the company, done just about everything. So I was up in Rogers at one of our distribution centers, and I was talking to Phil Garrison. And he took me through the building. And after we looked through the operations, and it didn't take me long to look at a freezer that's 40 below, I'm telling you. So we went back in his office and we were talking about stuff. And sometime during, of course, the conversation, Phil said, 'Don, let me show you something.' He pulled open his desk drawer and he pulled out a little birthday card. And on that birthday card was written, 'Hey Phil, just wanted you to know, so glad I get to work with you. Happy birthday, Donnie.' I gave Phil back when I first took over the distribution group, about 3,500 people, about 300 and some managers, and I sent every one of my managers a birthday card on their birthday. Phil Garrison, by the way, this is a six-digit job. It's a big job with a lot of responsibility. And he's been promoted now since then. I mean, this is an accomplished business person. He kept a birthday card for eight years. Wow. Because it was important to him to be recognized. He was no longer employee 0007727. He was Phil Garrison that had a birthday and his boss knew about it and thanked him for working with him every day. Let me ask you something. What are you doing to keep the environment around you positive? Listen, people need encouragement. Thank God there's Barnabas's in the world. Barnabas's nickname was encouragement. I want to work for that guy. Because you got a lot of people, listen, they will just suck you dry. You know what I'm talking about, right? You can't ever do anything good enough. They'll walk into a room, there could be sixty thousand things right, they will find the two things wrong and blame them both on you. You know what I'm talking about? Yeah. Listen, don't be that person. Find something good in everybody. And maybe you just came today. Wait, and some of our plants, honestly, we have our leadership stand at the door and shake people's hands as they come to work that day. 'Thanks for coming in.' Just, 'Hey, thanks for showing up.' And you know what? I appreciate you being here. We'll have a great day and we'll keep you safe. It's all gonna be good. See, it's five. What are you doing to keep your environment, your family? Listen, what have you done to praise your kids lately? I don't care how old they are. What have you done to praise that 32-year-old son that you just about wanted to strangle when he was 22? What have you done to praise him? Surely he's done something good in the last 12 years. Where we had guys keep it positive with regular. Now let's talk about the habits of a servant leader. I find six in every servant leader I know. First one's this: they are intentional. And we talked about being purposeful and principled. I'm talking about being intentional. How many of you have a to-do list? That's good. How many of you have a to-don't list? There's one or two smart people in here. Don't kid. You need a to-don't list. Let me tell you a story. So in the spring of 2009, we almost went bankrupt. You never know that, but it was really close. And I remember I had Prepared Foods at the time, and I just got the margin report. It came out every Thursday about 10 o'clock, 11 o'clock in the morning. I just got my margin report that week. My business had lost 25 million that week. My business had lost 25 million. I get a phone call from a guy and he says, 'Hey, you need to get on old Scott so-and-so. You need to get on him.' Listen, what? Well, he's ordering the wrong company calendar. Well, the little backstory was, in one of our more unimaginative times two or three years earlier, we did this cost-cutting thing and this cat came up with an idea to change the company calendar and save 40 grand a year. Super. But the customers hated it. And so, you know, we would have an account and we would go in and there would be a Sanderson or a Pilgrim calendar in the buyer's cube. So we're sitting there trying to have a conversation about chicken and they're looking at the competition. Why? Because they liked your calendar better. Sales guy said, 'Pretty good.' So he said, 'Look, let's just get enough calendars for our customers that they like, that they'll actually look at our stuff, especially when we have the account.' I thought that. Now I got that backstory later when I had time to think about it. But anyway, this guy calls me and says, 'You know, look, I just lost 25 million dollars this week. I don't care about the company calendar.' 'Well, you gotta care.' 'No, I don't.' And I don't care. 'Donnie, what do you think about the carpet?' 'I don't care.' 'What about those ceiling tiles?' 'I don't care.' 'Well, I think after you...' 'I don't care. Go to Chick-fil-A. I don't care.' There's just a lot of stuff that people want me to care about that I ain't gonna care about. Why? Because if I waste time caring about that, I can't be intentional about the half-a-dozen things that really matter to running a successful business. So you know what I'm gonna do? I'm gonna be largely unsuccessful at a ton of stuff. You want to beat somebody playing golf? Invite me. I probably say no. But let's go fishing. Something. But there's just stuff that I'm gonna say no to because there's more important stuff to say yes to. Fellas, we need to get really intentional. Now, I've screwed up a lot of stuff, but I've done it on purpose. I really thought I was doing the right thing. I was just wrong. You know what I'm saying? We got to be intentional. We got to intentionally get up every morning, get in God's Word, and get on our knees before him in prayer and ask him to guide us through this day and let us not miss the chances he has for us to make an impact on other people's lives. You know something else, guys, that I found is, and this is sort of like saying two different sides on the same coin, there's accountability and responsibility. Let's talk about accountability first. Every servant leader I know has a habit of being accountable. I had a lady, Brenda Kendrick, my admin, worked right, I left my doors open and she worked right outside of my door. And Brenda, great, great godly Christian woman, she was on the hook that if she ever heard anything come out of my office that wasn't befitting of the office of the CEO, she was to come in there and call me on it. And she never had to, frankly. I was scared of her. But she never had to. But she had done it. You need people in your life that will hold you accountable. But you know what? You need to live life where that's not a hard job. And that's where this responsibility thing comes in. Now I have people today, even to this day, that hold me accountable. Let me say something. I am responsible for me. My life is my fault. And listen, we all have different kinds of pasts. Some of you had a great past. You were, you know, a quarterback or whatever on the football team and you have had a great past and there's a man there still talking about you back home. And some of you have had a horrible past. You've been abused, you've been lied to, on and on and on. Your life is your fault. I was 31 years old before I ever heard my dad say, 'I'm proud of you.' He never told me he loved me. My dad was a good guy. I loved him to death. Christian man. He grew up in depression days, just a hard man, right? And I could use stuff like that and other stuff as excuses, but listen, my life is my fault. Every morning I get up and I get to choose how I'm gonna approach that day. And here's the thing, when you sow tomorrow, tomorrow, when you come to church, you're gonna have a phenomenal illustration about how you ought to look at life. Your rearview mirror is about that big. Your windshield is about like that. Now I'm sorry, guys, some of y'all are still looking back at your rearview mirror to find your purpose and meaning. No, no, no. It's okay to glance up there and learn from your past, but you need to live your life looking out your windshield. That's where the opportunity is. God will fix the past. He'll cover it in his blood. He can fix anything. He will save anyone. The opportunity is out there. Go get it. Listen, I don't know about you, but when my life on earth is done and you know, I'm coming down to my final minutes here, here's the picture I want to see. I want to, you know, those cars in the demolition derbies. I want to see that thing doing all it can do, wide open, smoke pouring out the back, just slamming into the end of the days of gold going, 'Well, what a ride!' Go get it. Don't be controlled by your past. Your life is your fault. You choose every day what kind of attitude you're gonna have. Two other things real quick. Servant leaders lead from the middle of the pack. I'm very comfortable in the cafeteria processing plant. I'm probably more comfortable in a cafeteria processing plant than I am the boardroom. I love to go in, sit down, and it doesn't matter. Let's talk about your kids. Let's talk about where you live. Let's talk about where you're from. Let's start and just get in a conversation. I'll get up and leave. They go, 'Who was that?' 'That's the CEO.' 'No, yeah, yeah, he's just a regular guy, man. He's eat up with normal.' It certainly is. Listen, if you don't get anything else, that's the leader, get this: shepherds smell like sheep. Now, most of us, we're trying really hard to smell like Giorgio Armani, but no, no, no. Shepherds smell like sheep. How comfortable are you with your sheep? Do you relate to the people you lead? Here's another one. I learned this from Dan Cathy. Leaders pick up trash. So I was with Dan Cathy and there's his guys, two of his guys, and we were going to see his stores because he was kind of telling me about, you know, what makes them great and what makes them different and how they try to honor God with the way they lead. So we drive up to the store and all four doors open and then they just scattered. And I'm going, 'Yeah.' Well, what they did is they went all through the parking lot of that store picking up, you know, the lid off the drink or that squished ketchup thing or just a little piece of the straw paper, right? But they all found something in the parking lot and they went up into the store and they put it in the receptacle. They disinfected their hands and then they did the store visit. And what did that say to everybody in that restaurant? They don't think they're better than me. And there's nothing they would ask me to do that they wouldn't be willing to do themselves. Fellas, pick up trash. So don't ever make your people think you think you're better than them. And don't ever let your people think you're gonna ask them to do something you wouldn't be willing to do. And then here's the last one, guys, and then we'll close. Servant leaders have a habit of surrounding themselves with great people. You cannot win races without thoroughbreds. You need to have great people around you in a trusting environment that will challenge you and challenge the way you think and that will make your team better. And you know what? If they blossom, they're gonna push you up. Don't suppress them. If you're gonna win races with Derby, I'm not much of a racehorse guy, but I do know this: you gotta feed them, you gotta water them, and you gotta let them run. Don't you micromanage them. You give them responsibility. You make sure they know what they're supposed to do and you let them do it their way, even if it freaks you out a little bit. They will amaze you at what they can do if they know you got their back. Guys, listen, how we lead our families, how we lead our teams, how we lead, you know, the people around us, it matters. The workforce today in America is probably 140 million plus. We go into this massive mission field every day. And if we will lead them the way that book says lead them, not only will God be honored, their lives will be impacted forever. Think about this. Think about how much time you spend at work. I did the math. I spent, during my working years, I spent roughly a third of my life at work. So as a leader, you are responsible for the environment in which a people spend a third of their life. That is an awesome responsibility. Don't take that lightly. Serve them well in Jesus' name.