Have you ever worked with that person who doesn’t pull their weight? The person who neither does right by themselves nor the organization because they are unwilling to do what others want? They are proud, stubborn, and in other words, they are stiff-necked. In this edition of By Your Life, we discuss what to do and how we are called to correct, not condemn.
Mass Readings Audio
http://ccc.usccb.org/cccradio/NABPodcasts/2020/20_06_07.mp3
Solemnity of the Most Holy Trinity – June 7, 2020
Welcome to the one hundred and fifteenth episode of By Your Life. I’m Lisa Huetteman and I know that you have a hundred different things you could be doing right now, so I thank you for choosing By Your Life.
My goal is to inspire, empower, support, challenge, and encourage you to connect Sunday, with Monday-Friday, in a secular business world. It’s my desire to help you live our Catholic faith in the marketplace. I hope to offer you practical ways to go forth and glorify the Lord by your life.
In this edition, we’ll reflect on the readings for the Solemnity of the Most Holy Trinity. The Trinity is one of the great mysteries of our faith. It is the one God, three persons we profess to believe in when we recite the creed. Reflecting on the dogma of the Holy Trinity is above my pay grade, so I’ll leave you to the Catechism of the Catholic Church.
I do want to pick up on one aspect of Church teaching in relation to the Trinity, that is the “family is a communion of persons, a sign and image of the communication of the Father and the Son in the Holy Spirit.” (CCC 2205) The Catechism extends the relation of family into the greater community, saying, “Human communities are made up of persons. Governing them well is not limited to guaranteeing rights and fulfilling duties such as honoring contracts. Right relations between employers and employees, between those who govern and citizens, presuppose a natural goodwill in keeping with the dignity of human persons concerned for justice and fraternity.” (CCC 2213) With this as a background, let’s reflect on the readings for the Holy Trinity Sunday and the implications for us in our work lives.
I do a lot of work with companies who want to create values-centered cultures. As a part of this work, my clients go through a process of identifying and defining their shared core values. There have been several of these organizations that identified “family” as a core value. But what did that mean? As with all core values, words have different meanings to different people, so it is essential to define the value in terms of behaviors.
For one of my clients, the core value “family” means genuinely caring about each member of the team to help them get where they want to go as individuals while perpetuating the business goals. For another client, “family” reflects the belief that they are better at work as a team when they have balance in their personal and professional lives. So, they committed to nurturing healthy, trustworthy relationships inside and outside of work, encouraging and supporting each other in achieving objectives, and recognizing and honoring personal and professional life balance. In both cases, they recognized and respected the needs of the individual while at the same time, the individual respected the needs of the team.
Treating people with dignity and fostering an environment where their wants and needs are met does not mean the needs of the business are neglected. To the contrary, it is essential to do both/and, as Tom Vande Guchte, the CEO of Storr Office Environments, Inc., told me when I interviewed him for my book, The Value of Core Values.
Tom said, “We had a manager whose performance was not where it needed to be. In a meeting with him, when we were talking about the lack of results in a certain area, he spent a lot of time telling us about all of the ways he’d been caring for his people.” So, Tom said to him, “I want to make one thing very clear to you. How we treat employees is very important. That’s one of our core values. But that’s not a substitute for performance. We expect you to get the job done.”
A lot of people equate Christianity with a warm, fuzzy environment. That is not what is needed. Instead, what is needed is to equip people, to give them a chance and to help them grow. If someone is not succeeding it’s bad for them and bad for the organization. They don’t get the rewards of success, the job doesn’t get done, and the rest of the team has to pick up the slack.
Not everyone will choose to do right by themselves and the organization. They are proud, stubborn, and unwilling to do what other people want. In other words, they are what Moses referred to in our first reading as “stiff-necked people”. (Ex 34:9) It is easy to lose your temper with such people as Moses did. While that may feel good in the moment, it is usually not very effective when coaching someone whose behavior is unacceptable or whose productivity is not meeting expectations. I’ve found that having this type of discussion is uncomfortable for most leaders I’ve coached, but it shouldn’t be, not if you both share the goal and responsibility for the individual’s success. It is when your focus moves to how their lack of performance is impacting you, the conversation becomes self-serving and falls apart.
Which brings me back to our readings for Holy Trinity Sunday. Just as “God did not send his Son into the world to condemn the world, but that the world might be saved through him.” (Jn 3:17), your objective is not to condemn but to correct. When an employee isn’t meeting expectations, there are usually four possible reasons. First, they don’t know what to do, so tell them. Second, they don’t know how to do it, so teach them. Third, they don’t believe they can, so encourage them. Or, fourth, they don’t agree that it is the right thing to do, so listen to them. Either they are correct and there is another better approach, or at least you’ll understand the obstacle so you can address it.
The Greek root of the word condemn used in John’s Gospel means both judgment and condemnation. Jesus’ purpose is to save, but his coming provokes judgment and some condemn themselves by turning from the light. As a leader and a coach, your role does involve judgment and some employees will turn away in pride and stiff-neckedness. When you’ve done your part to equip your employees for success, it is up to them. Tom Vande Guchte said, “I believe God designed work as an opportunity to experience rewards and fulfillment. If that isn’t happening, we need to help the person move on to a job that’s a better fit.”
Remember, our God, is a God of second chances, a merciful and gracious God, slow to anger and rich in kindness and fidelity (Ex 34:6)? Our God is a God who “so loved the world that he gave his only Son, so that everyone who believes in him might not perish but might have eternal life. (Jn 3:16) We, his creation, are made in his image and likeness and so is every other human person. We are called on this Holy Trinity Sunday to look at ourselves and our relationships with others and ask, “Am I merciful, gracious, slow to anger, rich in kindness? Do I love others and are my relationships based on wanting what is good for them? How is my selfishness, stubbornness, and pride getting in my way and turning me from the light?
Our world needs more love. As St. Paul wrote to the Corinthians, “Mend your ways, encourage one another, agree with one another, live in peace.” (2 Cor 13:11) If only it were that easy, we would not be experiencing the effects of racism and violence on the streets of our cities. We may not be able to change the world, but we can mend our ways, encourage one another, and listening to each other so we find where we agree. And then maybe, just maybe, we can begin to change our worlds – our homes, neighborhoods, and places of work – and live in peace.
Let’s give thanks to the Lord for his merciful love and ask the Holy Trinity, God the Father who loved us into being, God the Son who died for our salvation, and God the Holy Spirit, who breathes life into us each day to conform us into their love so that we may in turn share that love with one another.
“The grace of the Lord Jesus Christ and the love of God and the fellowship of the Holy Spirit be with all of you.” (2 Cor 13:13), and may God bless you abundantly with his love so you can go forth and glorify the Lord by your life.
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