Appearance on The Catholic CEO YouTube Channel
Plus Additional Reflections on Being a Catholic Founder and How to be the Best
In Today’s Issue
The core principle of being a Catholic Founder
On Doing our Best
Welcome back to Catholic Founders, The #1 Publication For Catholic Founders & Business Owners. We’re on a mission to support and educate Catholic Business Owners worldwide so that together, we can intentionally influence the world toward God.
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The Catholic CEO
Recently, I had the chance to join Henry Kutarna on his YouTube Channel, The Catholic CEO.
The interview went live last week so I wanted to share it with all of you to promote his work. You can check it out here 👇
Show notes: The interview is 25 minutes, and we cover…
My background and story and how growing up working for my dad influenced me into business
What Catholic Founders is, and a little bit of the origin of the idea
Why we can’t take credit for our success and why we don’t deserve all of the rewards for ourselves
How would a Catholic business look like in the world
A rigorous prayer schedule is essential to know when is the time to start your business
The importance of finding a mentor & finding your calling
#1 thing to succeed as a Catholic Business owner — Become a Paintbrush (God is the Painter)
A Little Elaboration
In the interview, Henry asked me a question towards the end that I hadn’t prepared for but after listening back to it, I feel quite happy with the answer I gave. But I’d still like to elaborate a bit on this.
The Question: what is the number one thing you need to succeed as a Catholic Business owner?
The Answer: understand that you are the paintbrush and God is the Artist.
If you’ve ever reflected on your existence, you quickly realize that you are literally nothing on your own. We would not exist were it not for God. None of the things we have are from us. We owe Him everything.
It’s an obvious fact.
So why do we forget that the second we become entrepreneurs? ‘I’m so great.’ ‘I know what I’m doing.’ ‘This business is going to make me a million dollars.’ ‘I’m going to be a billionaire.’
The list of things we say is long.
But we didn’t do this ‘on our own.’ Everything we have comes from God; we simply participate with Him. When we can understand this, we will have a great deal of peace.
If we work hard and genuinely do our best, God will take care of the rest. We may not hit it big. Heck—we may end up failing—but that’s also what God wants of us if we are doing our best. We are set free when we stop clinging to the shore, and start rowing down the river of life that God has set out for us.
Notice how I set free, not ‘we get smooth sailing.’ A river often has rapids, twists, and turns, and even waterfalls. It’s a wild ride but it’s the ride God chooses for us if we cooperate.
This is the core of genuinely being a Catholic Founder or Business Owner: Recognize your responsibility to be a co-creator with God rather than as and independent actor.
On Doing Our Best
Earlier, I said, “If we work hard and genuinely do our best, God will take care of the rest.”
Let’s talk about that.
There is a fundamental issue a lot of Catholic-run businesses have. They are not highly sophisticated. They often have good intentions but when it comes to running a business, they don’t even know the basics.
Folks—it’s the age of the internet. The amount of free business knowledge available is insane. There is no excuse for not knowing most of the best practices for running a business—it’s just laziness.
I’ll write about this more in the future, but I am begging you — pleading with you, resolve to become a master of your craft AND to learn the basics of doing business well.
You have the skills, energy, and tenacity to start a business — skills that God gave you — now learn how to best deploy those skills.
Resource
One really valuable resource to start with is The Personal MBA by Josh Kaufman.
In addition to the book, he has a TON of resources on his website.
While reading this is only going to make you better at business in theory, it will most definitely help you.
Well, that’s all for today. Be sure to leave your feedback on the interview with Henry, follow his channel, and share this with others who can benefit from it.
See you next time! 👋
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