The Saintly CEO: A Mental Model For How to View Our Employees
Plus! How This Billionaire Is Donating All His Fortune and More
Happy Tuesday! I decided not to send out on Memorial Day, as most people are hanging out with family.
A reminder that this coming Thursday is the feast of the Ascension, a Holy Day of Obligation. Make your plan to attend Mass.
Welcome back to The Saintly CEO. We’re back with another tactical way to run your business like a saint. We’ve also got 5 more heavenly hustlers we think you should know.
In Today’s Email:
CF Role Model: This Billionaire Gave Away His Money, For God
+ 5 more Catholic entrepreneurs (Heavenly Hustlers)
A Mental Model For How to View Our Employees
Miscellaneous Resources
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Heavenly Hustlers
Looking to find more Catholics who share your ambition? Each week, we curate a short list to do just that.
ICYMI, last week we announced that we’re now partnering with Catholic Owned to aid in this curation experience. Catholic Owned runs a huge database (and more to come) of Catholic business owners, so we can support each other by buying from each other.
Some of those listed each week were discovered through Catholic Owned.
We encourage you to get listed in Catholic Owned today if you’re not already.
CF Role Model:
🍕 Tom Monaghan founded Domino’s Pizza. Then used his financial success to give back to God. He did this by founding Ave Maria University (and building the city around it in FL).
He also created Legatus. A network of highly influential professionals who take the implementation of their faith into their work very seriously.
You should really check out his life’s story. But his generosity, tenacity, fortitude, and hard work are something all founders, especially Catholic Founders can look up to.
Other Heavenly Hustlers:
💼 Natasha Lovely is building Aspen & Olivia — a personal branding agency. She’s also supporting YCP.
🎙️ John Heinen is the currently the co-host of The Catholic Gentleman podcast (a must listen) and he also works with Jeff Schiefelbein (past pod guest) at Undivided Life.
📚 Trevor Rothaus is the CEO of Catholic Stories for Children — helping teach children about the faith through cartoons.
📈 John Christian Kuehnert runs Ascendancy. Helping tech companies scale. He’s a founer 6 times now. Talk about persistence.
👕 Daniela Mondragon runs a bi-lingual Catholic clothing brand, Sacred Styles Designs Co. She’s also working with EWTN.
🙋♂️ Nominate a Heavenly Hustler (including yourself) - It takes 1 min.
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A Mental Model For How to View Our Employees
Last weekend I was trying to convince a bunch of my Catholic friends to become entrepreneurs. Someone raised the question: “What are you going to do if your employees quit to start businesses? Who’s going to do the work?”
On this topic, like most, I do have thoughts. Of course, I’m no authority on the matter, so take it for what it is; just my opinion. However, if you also have thoughts, I’d love to hear them in the comments to flesh out this idea as a community.
I told my friends, God gave you skills. Therefore you should start a business (use your skills). This holds true for all men. We must use our skills. As employers, we should encourage our employees to develop and use their skills to the best of their abilities. Even if that means leaving our company.
Here’s my framework.
Recognize their Imago Dei
Recognize they are created by God, in His image and likeness. Meaning, regardless of what their skills are, they deserve respect, and they possess a creative soul (co-creators). Keeping this front and center will ensure you treat them with respect—at all times. You wouldn’t want to disrespect God.
Be a Scout
The same way scouts unearth sports talent, help employees discover their own talent. They might already have strong self belief, but you can really bolster that. Recognize what they are capable of and push them towards that.
Sometimes, we find a rare talent, and we’re called to go the extra mile. Consider furthering their education in some way. Maybe conferences, networks, or schooling.
This also might mean having a willingness to bet on someone. Often, they don’t have the background for the job. However, if they have the basic skills you need and the potential, don’t be afraid to give people a shot. Jesus gives us all a shot, why shouldn’t we imitate Him in that way?
Bare Your Soul
Sorry. That was a little dramatic. What I mean is—tell them the role you plan to play, and the objective you have. You’re there to help them along the way—like a coach, and you’re going to push them so they can grow.
If you don’t state this, many won’t notice what’s happening. Most employers don’t do this. But knowing your intent enables them to be a better mentee. They’re also more likely to bring their thoughts and challenges to you.
It’s also important they know what you’re up to so they don’t start questioning your interest in their career. It can be intimidating to share your big goals with your employer because most wouldn’t react well if you’re planning to start your own thing.
Foster Daily Dialogue
Doesn’t to be daily, but that has a good ring to it. The point is—you need to develop an open dialogue. Not a scheduled quarterly review. When either of us have something on our minds, we should bring it up. That nudge could be the Holy Spirit at work.
At first you’ll likely have to open the conversation. Over time it’ll become more natural to both parties.
Doing this also helps you develop deeper relationships—meaning more trust. A side benefit of this is that you’ll probably know when someone is about to leave for a bigger role (or hopefully to start their own firm). This makes backfilling their role easier.
Teach Portable Skills
A lot of people don’t develop portable skills. This leads to a lack of upward mobility. Help them develop skills that have value anywhere. Yes, sure, it might increase the chances. However, if you’re doing your job, most will stay because they can count on continual development.
Helping them turn their basic learnings into genuine skills they can take anywhere—is one of the most empowering things you can do. Especially consider this, maybe there is a more established company that can give them a huge pay raise. Maybe they really need that for their family. Or maybe, they like working with you so much they decide to stay.
Either way, do the right thing.
Pay a Living Wage
Just because you can pay them less doesn’t mean you should. In fact, we are called to pay our employees a just wage. Not just what the market says but what’s just for them in their current family situation.
There is no magic formula to implement this. My method is to ask my employees what their family’s monthly needs are. For full-time hires, I pay them that. This in itself forces a dialogue and develops trust.
Not saying you shouldn’t pay them more, but you should not lowball people to save yourself a buck.
As their skills develop, usually so does their responsibility. Be sure to give equitable pay raises. We’ve shared how John Johnson, co-founder of Patmos (among other things) gives his employees a pay raise every time they have a baby.
Beyond this, I’d encourage implementing performance-based bonus. This helps them recognize their own value, expressed in a dollar value.
I could go on, but I’m running out of words so I’ll end here.
My hope is that—through this mental model, entrepreneurs will never lose sight of the humanity of their employees. And that, through this we’ll make better decisions for the business. Decisions that look at the employee’s humanity first—before considering how to maximize shareholder value.
God Bless & Happy Building
~Silas Mähner
Misc. Resources:
Groups:
Events:
Sign up for the SENT Summit (Sep 8-11, 2025, in Notre Dame, Indiana)
A summer course for Catholic high schoolers to learn entrepreneurship (actually launch a business) taught by the Catholic University of America
Content:
Nick Huber recently put out this amazing newsletter on buying a biz vs. selling one.
Want to hear how Bach (yes the organist / composer) took over the world with his music? Check out the most recent episode of How to Take Over The World Podcast from Ben Wilson.
Services:
Hire a Catholic Virtual Assistant through ParacleteVA (email us: dearcfpod@gmail.com)
Hire the best guidance when buying, selling, or passing down a business from our very own Zach Scardino at Scardino Strategic Partnerrs. He came on the pod — Episode #7
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