CliftonStrengths in the Church: Gateway to Human Formation

Fr. Jeff Lorig, Director of Pastoral Services at the Archdiocese of Omaha, Nebraska, was our guest on a recent Called to Coach. Fr. Jeff shared how CliftonStrengths has shed new light on the Catholic Church's emphasis on human formation and the uniqueness of every person, and how knowing your strengths helps you grow into the person God is calling you to be. He also talked about how Gallup's Q12 survey is increasing engagement among archdiocese employees and is prompting the archdiocese to ask vital questions about its purpose and its vision for the future.

Below is a full transcript of the conversation, including time stamps. Full audio and video are posted above.

What should I look for in a job/career?

Jim Collison 0:00

I am Jim Collison, and live from our virtual studios around the world, this is Gallup's Called to Coach, recorded on April 24, 2020.

Jim Collison 0:19

Called to Coach is a resource for those who want to help others discover and use their strengths. We have Gallup experts and independent strengths coaches share tactics, insights and strategies to help coaches maximize the talent of individuals, teams and organizations around the world. If you're listening live, love to have you join us in our chat room. There's a link right above me there on the live page; it'll take you to a YouTube instance. There is a chat room there, either to the right or down below the video window. Sign in. There's 3 little dots in that chat room; pop it out, so you can put it anywhere on your screen. Love to have your questions during the program. If you are listening to the recorded version of the podcast, you can send us your questions, you can still send us your questions: coaching@gallup.com. Don't forget, if you're on YouTube, to subscribe, and if you haven't started listening to this as a podcast, great way to do it as you're out walking the dog, or exercising -- I used to say, "In a car, in a train and a plane"; right now, we're not doing a lot of those things. And so, you can subscribe and get those available as a podcast. Dr. Mike McDonald is our host today. He works as a Senior Workplace Consultant here at Gallup. And Mike, always great to have you on Called to Coach. Welcome back.

Mike McDonald 1:18

Yeah, it's awesome, Jim. Yeah, I think, I think, not everybody caught this comment, but I'm just gonna be really transparent. Nate says, "Mike's excited to get started." When I jumped on with Jim and Fr. Jeff, my lead-in point was, "I am coming out of my skin. I have been quite excited and animated to have this time, and this conversation with Fr. Jeff." And Jim pointed out that we've been tracking this moment in time for a while now. So it's great to see it really come to, come to fruition, and I do have Activator No. 6. So you know, what, what do you do based on the reaction to anything, other than just light the fuse?

Mike McDonald 1:54

So, it is my privilege and pleasure, I get to introduce my friend, somebody who I admire greatly. His, his servant leadership, his passion, his transparency, and his involvement -- it's something that we should all pay attention to. He's going to be uncomfortable with the, with those, with that praise and that, those compliments. But I say in, in all sincerity, that's out of expectation that he has for doing great work, not out of his ego or any other stylistic preference in that regard. But, we have Fr. Jeff Lorig with us. Jeff is the Director of Pastoral Services here in the Omaha Archdiocese. And he has been, I would say, one of the best practice architects at assembling not just a story, but a structure around strengths with intentionality, and outcomes engagement with intentionality, and the combination of both of those two in a way that I think bears examination. That deserves some some of our attention and our study, and, and exploration so I'm really excited to get into that conversation.

Mike McDonald 2:59

You are going to hear and experience Fr. Jeff's Top 5 strengths in 3D, as we come to this conversation. So, just as we get in, a little bit of insight of what we're listening into and where he thinks, and how he succeeds. Fr. Jeff leads with Strategic, Learner, Input, Futuristic and Connectedness. I'll repeat those back again: Strategic, Learner, Input, Futuristic and Connectedness, and he markets them spectacularly with his mug right there. So, Fr. Jeff, great to have you here and can't wait to get into the conversation. If I was just to kind of help us get to know, I think it's important we start with you, specifically, and we have a favorite question we love to ask folks, just to get inside how they see their role and how they see themselves operate inside of it. If I were to ask you what you get paid to do, what would, what would your response be in reaction to that question, as we get to know you better?

Fr. Jeff Lorig 3:52

I get paid to think, and dream, and learn, and implement things. That would be a quick way to put it, but I would say -- you know, if you had to kind of wrap it all up in a couple sentences, you know I, if I believe in some some future, strategic value, and I can learn it pretty quickly, and, and I can become the local expert on a subject, and then I usually can implement it and invite others to help me to do that. So that's pretty much you know, Learner, Input, Strategic, and I got Belief there in, somewhere in the dominant, and Activator and Arranger, Ideation -- basically, I came to that realization, not because I self discovered it, but I, I, I took the assessment a while ago and -- probably 5 years ago, maybe a little bit longer than that. And there's kind of a story attached to it, but -- I don't know whether to tell you the story, or whether to just get into the whole thing, but --

Mike McDonald 4:55

Tell, tell the story. I think you'll accomplish both through the story. Yeah. Tell us.

Fr. Jeff Lorig 4:58

OK. Well, yeah, so 5, 6, 7 years ago I was you know, I'm a pastor of a Catholic Church, was a pastor, now I work in, I work in administration for the, for the chancery. But I was just really interested in church growth and church renewal. And just realizing that the church had so much more potential than, than maybe what we were experiencing. It is the gospel that, it's transformed Western culture in the last 2000 years, and I didn't see it transform in my neighborhood. And since, it, it just seemed like there was something missing, and I, I know we've got all the spiritual graces that that we need, but it didn't seem like it was really being used it in the right way.

Fr. Jeff Lorig 5:36

So, I just really started -- digging into my Learner and Input, before I knew that I had Learner and Input. It was, you know, just started reading a book, but the first book I really read was -- not the first book ever, but, but on church renewal and growth, would be by another Catholic priest, Fr. James Mallon, who I think was a guest on, on this podcast. Yeah, he wrote a book called Divine Renovation, which is really about moving your parish from, from maintenance, just kind of keeping it going, to mission, to being on mission. That really excited me. And in the book, he talks about Gallup, of course, but he also talks about another book that Gallup has written, which is, you know, Growing an Engaged Church by, by Al Winseman there. And, I read it and loved it. And I'm like, Oh, here's the answer. Right here, here, here it is. And I saw, I shared it with, with the people that I work with on a regular basis.

Fr. Jeff Lorig 6:23

I love the the whole aspect of a "good soil" church. Like, it's one thing to, you know, you sprinkle all these, you know, discipleship things, and all this catechesis you know, like, the teaching of the church, and the gospel, you can sprinkle all that stuff on, but it has to be on good soil. And if people aren't ready to receive it, it'll never grow. And so, I just love that whole concept of like, Oh, yeah, I'm gonna have to be able to help my church to be a "good soil" church. I also love the concept in that book about Belong, Believe and Behave. And I come from a tradition, a Catholic Church tradition. It's, it's, I would say, it's caricature of the Catholic Church, not the reality of the Catholic Church is that we emphasize behaviors a lot. So if you think, Oh, what does the church teach like? Well, it's anti- this, anti- this, no this, no that, and that's not really what the church is. You know, we're Christians and we believe that, you know, Jesus is the Savior of the World and the Redeemer of humanity and, and, and he loves us. He loves us so much that He sent His only Son. So, yeah, I believe that and, and oftentimes, just getting from Belong, Believe, Behave -- we've probably emphasized the behave part more than just, more than the belonging part.

Fr. Jeff Lorig 7:37

And then walking with people, which is really what evangelization is, or evangelism is, it's, it's helping people to have that sense of belonging -- that they're loved. They're cared for, more than they can imagine. And then slowly, if they're ready, they can believe certain things that Jesus teaches. And then if they really want to go crazy, they can behave in the way that Jesus is, is maybe inviting them to behave. But I just ask the question to myself always it's like, I don't behave 100% perfectly on an everyday basis. Hopefully that's not a scandal to people that a preacher's saying, Like, I'm not perfect. But at this point, I think everybody should know that we're not all that perfect. So I just ask the question, Like, why do we, why do we emphasize behavior so much? When, when really, I'm not doing it perfectly. And I actually behave better when I feel like I belong better. And that helps me believe better. And then I can, I can behave. So, so that was, that was huge for me, just reading Al's book.

Fr. Jeff Lorig 8:33

Then, I, I attended Fr. Mallon's conference in Halifax. He had a Divine Renovation Conference, and that was instrumental, in me, to really learning even more about Gallup, because, because I came back with this, just this one central idea, like, Of all the things I needed to do in my church, is I need to have a leadership team. I need to have people around me where I share my leadership, and they, they helped me accomplish the vision. That, that they're as much responsible for winning as I am. And I think there's been a mentality especially, I can't speak for other churches, but I can only speak for, for my experience here in Midwest Catholic Church Land, is there's a lot of us that are Lone Rangers. We feel like, because we're the pastor, and we kind of have a hierarchy, that, you know, everything, it really does come to our desk, and the buck stops there. And it often, it's sort of been kind of the Pastor Prince sort of mentality, like, I'm the prince of my little kingdom here. And, you know, and I delegate tasks to everybody.

Fr. Jeff Lorig 9:30

And, and, and, and this new concept of like, sharing my leadership, and sharing responsibility with other people was huge. So, I came back and I formally established a leadership team. And then, really strengths became the, the means or the, the tool to develop more cohesion on that team. Like, it's not just, Hey, let's get together, but I like that, for that team to be cohesive, to have that sense of, of knowing that we have, that we're many parts in one body, right? That's kind of a Christian thing. Like, but right here in this small group, strengths really helped pull that together. But, but I'll have to be honest, like, you know, we took the assessment. We went through them like, Oh, that's kind of interesting, but we also kind of thought, you know, I guess it led us to question like, Well, why do you do this? And why are you so good at that? But I also say, like it, it kind of sat on the shelf, as well.

Mike McDonald 10:23

Hey, Jeff, let's, let's, let's break this out into some chapters. Because first and foremost, what I, what I hope the audience, Jim -- Lindsey Spehn, I know you're out there listening, as a, as our lead partner in this relationship. I hope you all -- I don't know if jealousy is a good outcome, but do you see why I enjoy and call Fr. Jeff my friend? Who doesn't want to hang around with, with this testimony, and who he is. Again, I know he's going to be embarrassed by what I'm saying. But do you hear his strengths come out in the story he's telling? I mean, there's just a shockwave of Connectedness throughout all of this. You hear his Input, right? He's, he's consuming information, but he's converting it to application.

Mike McDonald 11:03

So I, so I love the portal that you represent and, and even is like, I was saying, I was coming out of my skin. Jeff, I'm glad you were sitting down, and maybe you're buckled in, because I think at some point in time, you might be standing up and moving around. Right? But it's, but this is the sincerity, and this is when it's right. And when we see that type of alignment and -- authentic gesture and demonstration of oneself. So it's, it's great to see how -- on this is for you. And this is why we want you telling the story, because one of the things we saw this with Lindsey, if some of you saw Lindsey with Greg Kirsch and others, the detonator to this is somebody who actually believes in it, and wears it enough to extend it on through naturally to who they are. Every single one of these profound organizational transformations has started with somebody. Right? And so Jeff, I'm really thrilled that we get to hear from you, as that somebody, and you're telling this story so well.

Mike McDonald 11:58

The other thing that I want us all to be listening into, is just how these seemingly small, innocent accumulations of experiences roll up, and become very powerful, impactful, transformational experiences. So, Fr. Jeff, because of his strengths, starts off, he reads a book. It sparks a thought. It creates a conversation. He attends a conference, etc. And then all of a sudden, it's broadened out into this, this framework of Belong, Believe and Behave. And so now how does that, how does that start to tell a story then, in a way that it operationalizes itself? Jeff, if you could, I'd like to have you take us back into a little bit more about this notion of getting, getting, I would say, getting the cart and the horse in the right order. And you did a great job of really designating those 3 touchpoints. But I want to make sure we go back and really establish those, and not move through those too quickly. Because I think there's something about discipleship in that message about belonging and if we can, if we get that -- set, almost everything is possible on the other side. Right? Everything else is almost symptomatic. And I'll overcorrect in my statement, it's a side effect, so to speak. But I think we have a chance inside this conversation, and you're doing this, of discipleship inside belonging, in a way that we could establish that maybe, dare I say even more effectively or with more intentionality, where before -- do, do you have an opinion, or a thought, as we really establish that, that footing?

Fr. Jeff Lorig 13:25

Yeah, absolutely. The, there's a process of evangelization, we would, we would talk, so basically, what is evangelization? It's the process by which disciples are made. And, and there's different thresholds of evangelization. So I, I grew up -- in the Catholic world, basically, people just kind of telling me what, what what we teach. And basically, what do I need to believe? And then how do I need to behave? But I, I, I had, I really struggled to understand like, But do I really belong? And of course that, that comes through a process of growing in relationship with other people, that, because we belong to not just organizations, but to people who who belong to organizations. So, where I feel like the Belong part fits in, is those first thresholds, thresholds of evangelization. And the first thresholds are like that, that sense of, you know, do they trust us? Do the, do other people even like us? Like, are we likable? Do they, do they have a sense that we care for them? Do they, do we -- are we clear about our expectations?

Fr. Jeff Lorig 14:26

Or, you know, so you start to see like, some of the early, early stages of discipleship -- they don't, doesn't look like a sainthood at all. It's just like, Can I help a person feel like they're loved, and wanted, and cared for, without throwing Jesus down their throat? And, and -- because, well, that's just, that's, it's just a part of the church that, we, I don't think we've understood really well, and I think we're beginning to rediscover in this time, we, we would call in the Catholic Church, the kind of a new evangelization. Like, what is this new evangelization? Do we have to tell, do have to speak louder about how people need to behave? That's the new evangelization? I don't think so. Do, do I need to, like, just be louder about the things that we believe? No, I think we need to be -- better stewards of helping people know that they're loved. And they're wanted, and God died for them, and can't, can't help but love them -- so much that he sent his only Son.

Mike McDonald 15:22

Yeah, so, Jeff, I have Input as well. I think sometimes Input operates in terms of like bumper stickers or taglines. You just said something that I, that in my mind just illuminated, highlighted, underscored, italicized: Better stewards -- and I want to, you can, you can craft it -- Better stewards of how we love, or better stewards of love. If I walk away with one thing from this conversation, that, that's going to be a primary takeaway. That was profound. Better stewards of love. I think there's a, there's an accountability there. One of the things that, as we operationalize that then, Jeff, is, and you touched on this, I want to go back and get us established there. So entry points, then right? So, so you're caught up in this. You've read some things, you've attended some things, you believe in it. You talked about the entry point of the Leadership Council. Where did that work? Why was that part of your intentional strategy? And, and what would you want this audience to know about the assembly of that Leadership Council, based on the application of strengths and/or engagement in the Omaha Archdiocese?

Fr. Jeff Lorig 16:25

Yeah, so here locally in the Archdiocese of Omaha, it we're, basically the way it works is, the Archdiocese is a geographical area, it's northeast Nebraska, it's 23 counties, it's about 130 parishes and 70 Catholic schools, and about 250 -- 240,000 Catholics. So a quarter of a million people here in northeast Nebraska that are, that are, that are Catholic. And, so we have a vision here, that this church, about 5 years ago, kind of really, I would say inspired by Divine Renovation, Fr. Mallon's book, just really, he's just tapping into all these other great leadership books, and he just asked the question, you know, What's the vision?

Fr. Jeff Lorig 17:04

And so we asked the same question here in the Archdiocese of Omaha. Like what, in our wildest dreams, what could we hope for the church here? And that -- and then we concluded with, we dream of a place that could be one -- that would be unified. We'd be one church, that's encountering Jesus constantly, that we're equipping disciples to go do the work of ministry, and that we're living mercy. Like we're living, breathing, embodiment of mercy here on Earth, just like Jesus Christ was, that's the dream. Like, that's the vision. How could you not get excited about that?

Fr. Jeff Lorig 17:32

And, and so, but you know, having a dream is one thing -- it's sort of a kind of an Ideation sort of thing. You know, ideas are easy; execution is really hard. And that's, that's where it comes to life. But I would say this vision has really been inspiring us to move forward, as it should. So, you know, a lot of people have been through mission and visioning planning and stuff like that, and then they put it on the shelf and like, Oh, that's an, or they make the T-shirt or the poster, and nothing ever happens. This I feel like, because of our leadership of our bishop, he has not just worn the T-shirt, but he, he has not tired of talking about the dream that he has. And he really thinks it's not his dream. It's the dream of the church, which was welling up through the Holy Spirit and the hearts of people.

Fr. Jeff Lorig 18:17

So the unity part has a lot to do with the belonging. So we dream of a church that's unified and one. Well, how do you do that? You help people feel like they belong to the mission. And then the equipping part, equipping disciples, has a lot to do with leadership. So the unity part was really like, do our people feel like they belong to the mission? Are they engaged in it? It's a, every pastor will tell you that there's a small group of people in every church that's really engaged. And I think we, you just ask the question, like, What if you doubled that? What if you had 30 people? And I think it's, what is it 30% worldwide, is what you guys come up with? Yes, that's, that's 70% of your people that are not engaged. And that when we're called to be good stewards of, of the people that God has entrusted us to, and so we just ask, you know, what, if you could double the number of your engagement people, engaged people -- if you went from, and I'm not saying to double the percentage, but was just double the, you know, the number of people.

Fr. Jeff Lorig 19:11

So say if you had 30, let's go to 60. I mean, the, even the churches with 30 people that are really engaged that, that, they're all in, they are psychologically loyal, and they just love it, like it's family to them. What if, and they do amazing work, and like, and I'm not, I might, I might have sort of some -- what we call like holy discontent about the state of the church today. But, but I also believe that there's amazing things happening too, despite ourselves. We've gotten in the way a lot, and yet amazing things happen. So what if you just doubled the number of engaged people, from 30 to 60. So it's that sense of, you're not going to get everybody to be at, at, you know, Mother Teresas overnight, or even over a week.

Fr. Jeff Lorig 20:00

And, so there's a process. What's the process? Well, I gotta, I got to help people feel like they belong. And, and if they, if they have a sense that, that, that we're on this mission together, they begin to be engaged. And then I sprinkle in a little bit of "Let's go here. Let's go there. Let's do this." Then, I think you begin to see a lot of fruit. So I, I think we're mistaken when we, when we think -- whether it's a church organization or a corporate organization, you have to have good soil. You have to have a good, a good culture before you can do amazing things. And I think, you know, read every leadership book in the world, and they'll tell you that over and over again.

Mike McDonald 20:36

Yeah, no, I love that. Jeff, I, I, you had great partners. You know, you were the catalyst for this. I'm going to call out Jim Jansen. I'm going to call out Jen Moser, certainly Archbishop Lucas. You know, as, as you were able to, I think, help him understand what it is that you were introducing, and the consideration there. His leadership, I think should be acknowledged in, in, in what you've been able to do within the Omaha Archdiocese. I'm really curious, if, if we could help us identify how, from his leadership vantage point, what was it that he connected with, in partnership with you, that he saw? What were the features of strengths and or engagement that he saw having such impact in the way, that there was an endorsement and support around what that meant to the Archdiocese overall?

Fr. Jeff Lorig 21:23

Yeah. Well, before I talk about the archbishop, but I'll also mention Jim and Jen, Jim Jansen and Jen Moser, because, so I can sit here and I have these great ideas, right? And, but, but oftentimes, because of my melancholic disposition, I kind of come back and say like, Oh, this is never gonna work. But these two, they really, I didn't convince them. They convinced themselves. They believe in this as well. And they've seen the fruit of it in other work that they've done. And so to have them, they're a part of my leadership team. And so, I share leadership with them. And, and, and so winning is our responsibility, not my responsibility. So they've been integral in helping us be successful.

Fr. Jeff Lorig 22:04

And I know you, I always think you think we're more successful than I think we're successful. But you have a different vantage point than I have. I'm like in the thick of it. And I think, there, we are so far from the top of Mount Everest, but they're really important, like, we would have never moved forward without without those two. So I would say like that, like, if there's Catholics listening here, and are like, Well, I want to do what Fr. Lorig's doing, and I gotta get, I gotta convince my bishop, like, Well, good luck. I wouldn't start there. Like, I would start with a couple people that are, that have influence, that, but primarily, that they believe in it, and they, I would say everybody has influence so, so find those those people in your life, they're already there. You have influence with them and they have influence with others, but those people who believe in it with you, and let it grow from, from there, and don't give up on it.

Fr. Jeff Lorig 22:52

But as far as our bishop goes, so it's good to know what his his Top 5 are, and I'll just get his Top 3 are Context, Belief and Connectedness. So he's one of the few people that have Connect -- I think he's the only one here in the chancery that has Context as his No. 1. And so he constantly begins with, he always tells you the story of how we got there, and where, how we got where we are today. But he, because of his Belief, he believes in the vision. I am utterly amazed. So this is where he doesn't talk about his Belief, you know, when we do like Sharing Your Strengths, kind of exercises and meetings and whatnot, but he rarely will ever talk about Belief. And I don't think he fully understands it. He really understands his Context, but the Belief part, that's probably what I see coming out more and more. He, he loves Jesus. He loves the church, and he believes in the vision that the Lord has given us. And so because of that, he fits it into the context of our past of where we've been, and and how the vision is so needed for our present time.

Fr. Jeff Lorig 23:56

And then you go from there, his Connectedness connects all that together -- and, that he sees that God has provided, right? There's a reason for everything. And, and because of this, he'll, he'll buy into any tool that's going to help the vision move forward. Now he's not going to be the front person, you'll never see him at a bishops conference like pushing the strengths and engagement. But he'll say something like, "The vision is so important, whatever it takes to get there, let's do it." And so, so the endorsement is, it isn't always front and center, but it, but it's there. His job is to be the cheerleader of the vision. But then he allows us to use the tools that we can find to help help move it forward.

Fr. Jeff Lorig 24:37

And, and these are the tools that Jim, Jen, and other teammates, our Superintendent of Catholic Schools, and Family Life Director and our Stewardship Director, Shannon Brommer. They're, they're, they are also beginning to see the fruits in their own teams. So they're doing it in their own teams and they're like, Oh my gosh, what if -- what if parishes started doing this? So, it, my Strategic, while I would love to get to Z really quick, I know there's a lot of B, C, D, E, F, G, all these little steps, and so the steps that I, which I think really is a grace that I've received by talking to you today, Mike, is, is it helps me to see that we are making progress. That I, I don't think, you know, I could get discouraged because we're not at Z yet. But if I step back and say, you know what, we're at, like D, and I don't think -- we'll never get to Z unless we get to D, and we're, we're at D, we're somewhere, we're somewhere around there. But in that, what is D? D means I have a little circle of people, that, and we, we believe in the vision as well. And we're seeing the fruits of it in our own teams. And, and whether it's engagement or strengths, both of those things, we use a lot here in my my team, and in the offices that I'm responsible for. And, and I think you're just going to see it being pushed out a little bit more, a little bit more, because it's, it's becoming such a fabric of our daily life here, that we're, it's not even like we, it's just, it's become part of the lexicon.

Mike McDonald 26:02

Yeah. Yeah. Jeff, let me, so a couple, I always like to take notes, right, mentally -- what are the, what are the, what are the key touchpoints that I think we ought to be listening in to? So a couple things I would call out specifically is, and we're seeing this in the chat, but it's, it's those points of entry can be really intuitive and agile. But what we know is, who's naturally contagious? Who's naturally bought into -- we don't have to win everybody over, all in one fell swoop. Right? And I think it's fine and healthy, that there's a range of processing to this. I don't think we should, you know, there's a fine line between being fearless and reckless, you know, in our attempts. And so I love the fact that we have some people in our constituency who ask more questions, and there's, there's different processes of not just resistance, but just consideration, right, as we operationalize, there's a mindfulness about that.

Mike McDonald 26:53

There are others who provide that catalytic kind of contribution to what all this represents. And so I love the fact that we can enter into those who have, with authentic credibility, a catalytic contribution, like I mentioned, and then we start to, with performance and evidence, start to show up and involve ourselves in other areas, and to be able to win other people over by the fruit of what's been accomplished prior. So I love the fact that you, you know, as you speak so, so well about, you know, Jim, with this notion of stewardship, and Jen with the notion of mentoring, as it rolls up, and gives you even speaking points to Archbishop Lucas, that there's, there's, there's just, there's promises that have already been made and kept, right? And there's an evidence, outcomes orientation to that. And that's consistent with strengths and engagement.

Mike McDonald 27:40

We get pretty graphic and overcorrected sometimes, but we know the trap door we can fall into is -- and you mentioned this early in your testimony there, that the trick is, "Hey, we took StrengthsFinder. That was fun for about a day. And it was wildly interesting," and then it goes in the top left-hand drawer in my desk and we never talk about it or do anything with it again. "Hey, these 12 Items of Engagement -- aren't they interesting, and novel and unique? And let's measure and use them one time, and now, engagement is stale. You know? We did it once and now I wonder what we're going to do next."

Mike McDonald 28:08

And what you did, though, right, and I love the story that you told me about Archbishop Lucas, is these are tools, these are leading indicators, and they should always serve the purposes of our outcomes, serve the purposes of our priorities. And I love the way with his leadership perspective, he very clearly, and what we would say in a nonthematic reference point, talks about the outcomes. And then we can use all sorts of things with meaningfulness and relevance. And so we have that, I always say, we have the cart and the horse in the right order. Otherwise, these are a trick. They're a deception. And they're a trap. And that's absolutely not the way they should, they should work. So I love the fact that your story has all of those things. So sequentially in order -- the right things, for the right reasons, serving as leading indicators. Otherwise, I think it, I think there can be a disconnect and I think we should be cautious about Hey, this is you know, this is a waste of time and resources, and we don't have the capacity. Our mission is too important for us to wander. I think and guess about too many of these things too often.

Mike McDonald 29:09

So, Jeff, I want us to get in more specifically, on the other side of the architecture that you're building. Right? So you come in through this Leadership Council, you assemble that -- and, and we would say in our chapters, right, we're thinking about introduction, right? How did you introduce the concepts of strengths and engagement in, and I think that's a really natural entry point that we have to somehow -- extend this on through leaders who buy in, believe, and can start to extend, and create outcomes on the other side. Where did you start on the other side of introduction? Tell us a little bit about implementation, either formal structural implementation or to your point, as you talk about it, changing the fabric of the archdiocese, maybe of the curiae. Where did you see evidence that it was starting to infiltrate and, and to become comfortable in how people were speaking to it and using it?

Fr. Jeff Lorig 30:01

Yeah, so, we knew that we, so the way the church works, is that we're all independent. Each church, each parish is independent. And while the archbishop has ultimate authority, he doesn't use it that way. He doesn't lord it over people. So the way he, our primary way of change is through influence. And so we, we knew we, if we're going to influence the rest of the diocese, we knew we were going to have to eat our own pudding or whatever. We're going to have to eat what we're making here. And, so we decided to go all in. I mean, praise God. Again, the archbishop, you know, he, he didn't study it, like I studied it, like that's because, that's, those are my strengths. But he said, OK, let's do it. So here in the chancery, we have about, between 70, 70 employees basically working in this one building. And we said, Well, let's go all in. Let's, let's do strengths, and let's do the, the Q12 Engagement Survey. I, the surveys are one thing, but it's, that's not, that's not what it's about. The Q12 is a, it's a framework for engagement. It's a, it's a way in which we manage people and be good stewards of the people that the Lord has entrusted us to. So we, what we did was we just, I think right now, we're pretty close -- everybody's gone through, received strengths and of course, their assessment, but we also have several Strengths Coaches here in the chancery. And so internally, we've been using those, those people who have been, been trained to be Strengths Coaches, to train other folks here.

Fr. Jeff Lorig 31:40

But then we, of course, were starting to do the the engagement part, the Q12. And what -- so what happened was, so we've been doing, I think we've done, we've been in it for 2 years now. So we've, our second time around, after our second year, we took it, and so I'm like, I'm gonna do it right this time. So I'm like, I'm like training the managers here. So, I don't have an MBA, but I have Learner and Input, so that qualifies me for pretty much anything. If I'm, if I'm really passionate about it. If I believe in it, I might as well have an MBA in a tiny little niche thing of business. But so I'm, I'm, I, we started doing manager roundtables, manager training. And, but then, once we took our Q12, we looked at our results. So what's, what's great? What's not working? What, where can we, we see it that it's improving? But even before that, so if you do, if you follow the, the instructions that you guys give for the State of the Team, so when you sit down with your team, you look at all your results. And you say, What are we going to do about it? Right? So measuring is, only matters if you're going to do something. Otherwise, you're just measuring for the sake of measuring.

Fr. Jeff Lorig 32:51

So we want to do something with it. But we when we sat down, the first question is, What's your goal here in the chancery? So it's 70 employees. We're like, we're like the headquarters of a franchise. And, and we have never asked the question, What's our goal? What are we, what are we trying to accomplish? So when we asked the question about engagement, so what do we want to work on engagement for? We just asked, Engaged in what? Like, what are we trying -- so we don't make widgets. We don't, we don't, we're not a for-profit. We're not trying to increase profit and revenue. What do we do? And so that, what, so I'll say the evidence, while it's not data, it's data -- anecdotes are data, qualitative data -- is that for the first time ever, we started asking the question, What do we want to accomplish for the Lord? What does the Lord want to accomplish through us? And so we, we actually because of this question, we asked them, What are we engaged in? And it was like, it is just birds, like it was crickets, like just nothing. I don't know. What, what are we supposed to be doing? Like, we kind of do what we're supposed to do, but are we accomplishing that? So it was really hard to track and be accountable for results.

Fr. Jeff Lorig 34:08

So, what we actually just went through is, or we're in the process of actually really close to completing it is, a 10-year goal for the, for the Archdiocese of Omaha. It's one thing to have a vision. But then the vision has to have sort of like, Well, what's your plan for accomplishing that? What's the, how are we going to, what are the the milestones and markers? And so, this, this is the fruit of what happened when we took the Q12. Is that we asked the question, What do we want to accomplish? And now, now we have a 10-year goal. And I'm not going to reveal it, because it's not time to reveal it, but, but this 10-year goal has the potential to impact the next generation of the Catholic Church in northeast Nebraska, because we can honestly say here in this chancery, we are going to be responsible for making our church different in 10 years, or less.

Fr. Jeff Lorig 34:54

And so what are we engaged in? Making missional churches. Right? Churches that are on mission to transform the world for the, for the kingdom to expand His kingdom. And we've never had that before. And now we actually have a tool that helped us ask the question, but now we have a tool to say like, Are we in it or not? Like, are we, like, it's one thing to have a mission, right? But am I engaged in it? Am I, am I a good manager to be able to help my employees just not come to work, but come on, come on mission? Right?

Mike McDonald 35:23

Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. You know, Jeff, when you talk about this, and I, and I love this frame of reference. You know, we, you know, we get a little bit, you know, we, we reference positive psychology, in the midst of all this, and I'll let that, you know, you're much more adept in terms of how that actually contributes, or if it actually does when we think about theology and in our own faith. But the point there, I think that you're describing, it's really interesting, the State of the Team, and as you, as you described how you had a 10-year vision around it, I love this reference point when we talk about hope. Right? And when we break hope down there's two parts to it. There's, there's what we would say sometimes, is the willpower, and then there's the "waypower." And I, and I love how beautifully you just, and so succinctly, quite frankly, sometimes we can look at the State of the Team, and we think that it's almost like an operator manual to how I program, my Blu-ray, you know, or it, or it's like how, you know, how do I put together my lawnmower? And it's so much more than that, and you just nailed the center of it. It's, it's helping us first to identify our willpower. Why do we even want to do this? How do we get our arms around it?

Mike McDonald 36:27

But not just that we have this engine of desire and motivation to go somewhere, to do something, we actually have what we would say is a "waypower." We actually have a strategy and an intelligence about how we can get there. Right? So now this 10-year plan isn't some daunting, intimidating thing that we, we don't know if we could ever be big enough to ever arrive at. We know we can because we can cast the vision and then reverse engineer it through our intentional involvement, and the structure of just a simple, straightforward conversation that causes us to commit ourselves collectively and individually to something that now can become a reality. And, and, and again, it's just the way you unfold the story is terrific inside all of that. And even just the fact now that -- we have a 10-year plan. Right? That there was, there was a call to action inside that conversation for us to create something that didn't exist. So, again, a lot of a lot of power and influence, I think, in terms of what you're sharing with us.

Mike McDonald 37:22

Jeff, one of the things, so we're talking, and we're talking about a lot of things that have gone right. Right? A lot of things that, that did work out. And I think there's a reality though to it, that, that's really useful to our audience, in terms of perseverance, resiliency, where there was a slower reception to maybe strengths or engagement. Where, where was, where did that show up? We'll qualify it as part of the process, right? That some people ask different questions and maybe need more evidence to substantiate their buy-in and belief. Where did that show up, and what did you think was effective about the angle and positioning of strengths and engagement to where people considered it, where they hadn't initially? And some of the push for that you saw happen there?

Fr. Jeff Lorig 38:10

Yeah. So I would say, usually, the initial response is skepticism. What is this corporate business tool? Why is this? What does this have to do with the church? And, so there's lots of counterarguments to that. You know, like, Well, yeah, we use tools all the time. I'm using a computer. I'm using a Logitech camera right now. So it's, it's helping me to get the job done that I need to get done. And, you know, while the, the church never had any of that, you know, in the early church, and I said, like, You know, the church wouldn't be anything, the early church, Christianity wouldn't be anything unless the Romans built the roads. So, those are really useful tools that we use a lot. So there's there's a lot of skepticism about, about that.

Fr. Jeff Lorig 38:51

And, and I think it's, it's important to understand that the church is not an entrepreneurial organization. Right? That's we were not built out of a garage in the '90s during the tech boom. Like, we're not Google. So we're not, we're not always looking for like, new and good and like, that is not how we operate. And I think it's, it's important for, you know, if you're, if you're working in the, in the church, if you have a 2000-year tradition that you're, you have to sort of be aware of, you're gonna have to make a case for how does this new thing, and I wouldn't even say it's new, it's just it's very human, the stuff that Don Clifton and, and Gallup was, they were able to articulate, it's really just human stuff. That it's, it's a, you were able to research human behavior, and say, and then put it and quantify it and ... do all that, do all the sciency stuff, right? So, so my job has been to be able to kind of make the case that, you know, to be strengths-based is to be faith-based, like there's no contradiction in that at all.

Fr. Jeff Lorig 39:52

And so I, so I had a chance to speak with our Priests' Council, it's about 15 priests throughout the diocese that are were chosen by their peers to be leaders in the diocese, to really be the council and advisory board for, for the archbishop. So they gave me the opportunity to do some strengths with them. And they liked it enough that they wanted to do it for the whole diocese -- for all of our priests. Which is about -- what is it? I think it's like 130 guys or something like that. I lose track here and there, but then you, you helped out with that, right? You know, sort of, you did a great job, but I don't know if it, it won everybody over. I know I walked away really kind of struggling like, Oh, gosh. I was just like, Maybe that was too fast for these guys. But, but we are seeing fruit of it.

Fr. Jeff Lorig 40:39

So but I would say, one of the things I've had to do is, just make a case. So I, like I created a Top 8. I probably have a Top 10. I could probably squeeze some out, but you know, I think -- you can use some of the, the sources of Christianity, especially the Catholic Church, to, to make a case for how strengths, the strengths philosophy fits into this. So, so particularly in the strengths area, engagement is maybe a different, I haven't made my Top 10 list for that yet. But, there's a, there's a thing in the Catholic Church where we talk about human formation is foundational. Before you can get into the spiritual formation, you have to know who you are as a human being. So when we when we train our priests, they go through seminary, usually between 6 and 8 years. A big pillar, 1 of the 4 pillars of their formation is human formation. And I think strengths is a great means to, to grow as a human being. Understand who you are, what makes you tick, why you're wired, why you do this way.

Fr. Jeff Lorig 41:40

And I actually just did a strengths seminar workshop for the seminarians over Christmas break. And so one guy came back and he just said, Oh my gosh, now, now I understand why I'm so different than my other RAs. So he's, you know, all the other resident advisors like, because there's other guys in his, his group that are slackers, in his, his viewpoint, because you know what? But he had, his Top 5 are all Executing. All Executing. They were all the purple ones. And they were like, Yeah, no wonder you get crap done. Right? But everybody else is sort of like managing, massaging relationships, and he was just getting crap done. So, it was huge for his human formation, and in his ability to get along with other people like, Oh, like I'm just like, I'm, I'm wired differently than everybody else, and I need to respect the gifts and talents that the other people have that I work with. So that's human formation.

Fr. Jeff Lorig 42:32

Self-knowledge, we would say is a, is a gateway to all discernment. So discernment is a, it's a very -- I wouldn't say it's, I mean, I do attend some evangelical churches every once a while, but, so I don't know that, the lexicon there, but in the Catholic Church, spiritual discernment, especially in the, in the tradition of St. Ignatius, the Jesuit sort of spirituality. This spiritual discernment is a big part of, of prayer and understanding, how God is speaking to you. And I think oftentimes, we confuse God's voice with just kind of our human voice, like, we're just not living out of our strengths, so it feels wrong if like, Oh, maybe the Lord doesn't want me to do this. But actually, if you begin to understand, have some self-knowledge of, of your, who you are as a human being, how you're wired, then you can begin to discern, well, that's just, that's just my strengths. That's just my, kind of on the emotional level of my heart.

Fr. Jeff Lorig 43:28

But then there's this other level, like the deeper level, the spiritual level of how God is speaking. I also think, you know, like, strengths is not just a personality assessment. It's a, it's about growth. And that's, that's, I think, what makes strengths so different from all the other assessments out there, because it's, it's understanding that you can actually grow in this, and that's what, that's the desire that we have, that the Lord has for us, that we become the the people he's calling us to be -- that we grow in that. I think, learning, loving and living our strengths, honors God. St. Francis de Sales has this great quote, it's, "Be who you are and be that, well." "Be who you are and be that, well." Don't try to be anybody else. Just be who you are and be that, well, so it's about really just honoring God, by, by being the person that he's calling us to be. It's good for humility. Humility is not just accepting our weaknesses. Humility is a recognition of that which is true. And so if I can really hold on to that, if I understand my Top 5 or my dominant strengths, my dominant themes. I understand what is true about myself -- what I'm good at. Again, humility is not just like, "Oh, I'm no good at this. And I should just kind of cower, like" -- No, it's, it's living in truth. So I think strengths help us to live in humility.

Mike McDonald 44:44

Hey, Jeff. You're, you're, you're striking -- the, the chat is absolutely losing its mind right now, in all sorts of great ways. You're provoking a lot of thought. I want to come back and and just give you a little bit of a breather here and just just help you kind of absorb what it is you're causing people to think about differently, as to reinforce what you're sharing with us. First off, you missed out on the copyright, because we're going to market this like crazy. And Bree is right out of the gate -- I caught it too -- but I want to make sure that, that you really appreciate what you just said. To be strengths-based is to be faith-based. And I love the way you paired those two together, where they don't compete, they don't collide. That we can have a complement of what that exactly means. So again, as we think about the sound bites, unbelievable teaching inside of that for, I think for all of us to take away.

Mike McDonald 45:32

A lot of reaction to the, to the reference of human formation. Right? And there's a, I think, an open-hand, nonprescriptive attitude, and air, that we allow the person to kind of grow and breathe on their own. Right? And to uniquely be who they are. And I personally wanted, one of the things I've always appreciated about our relationship, and you've helped me understand -- that if God created us with this intentionality and this design, right? We all know how rare and unique we are. We all have fun with the math around, you know, what's the you know, the, the likelihood that you and I will share the same Top 5, in the same order? And that's, that's fun and recreational when we think about 33 million.

Mike McDonald 46:09

But what you really helped me understand, and I think, as we think about the invitation, specifically about the belonging piece, is that if God created us with that intentionality and that design, which goes far beyond even strengths, right? Don't you think that there's probably an intentionality, and that's where, where and how he designed us to experience him? Right? So that, so that, Jeff, when you think about your Top 5 strengths, your Strategic, your Learner, your Input, your Futuristic -- how does God reveal himself to you, so that you have that personalized encounter with him through the activity of those strengths? How does he reveal himself to me, to that personalized encounter and activity that I have through my own, and it's so unique and so specific, and that's where the relational connection comes through in such a profound way. And again, strengths doesn't even qualify almost as even a part of that. And yet it starts to give us some insight, I think today in terms of how we encounter him, and then also then how we can extend that to encounter and invite others.

Mike McDonald 47:05

The other thing that I thought you brought out too, that I really want the audience to lean into, is, is this, this equipping and this shift, as we think about priests as leaders, and bringing some of that business acumen in about how we build teams, how we arrive at outcomes. And I don't know if that always happens. I think you're very transparent about that there's more that can be added to it. I think a lot of times, I think of you almost like the Chief Operating Officer, to a large degree, for the Omaha Archdiocese. I don't know if you, if you, you know, adopt that role, but when you think about outcomes, and then establishing a culture that drives those outcomes, there is an intentionality around that. And I think that's been a big part of our contribution, as we move into that.

Mike McDonald 47:46

So Jeff, I'd, I'd like to have, you know, as we think about evidence, you know, as you pull back the lens for all of us, we bring our conversation to, to a conclusion, I think what we would all love to hear, and this is qualitative, quantitative -- where has your introduction, your implementation, where has it actually landed with impact? Where can you step back and say, We're doing things differently and better than we were before? And help us understand, and get excited about that.

Fr. Jeff Lorig 48:18

Yeah, it's a, again, I've given a few of those examples. And I -- think there's a lot more honesty happening. I think that's what the, engagement, the engagement conversations allow us to do. When we first took the Q12 here in the chancery, we had a pretty high score, and then actually it's growing, which is great. So there's some, if you need some data, not, I'm not a huge data person, but, but what I was actually impressed with was some of the the teams and offices that had high scores, the first time around, actually had lower scores the second time around. And it's not like we changed personnel. It's not like they changed their objectives or anything like that. What I think what happened was, because there was permission to talk about how they were doing, and, you know, just using those 12 questions of engagement, I think it gave permission for people to be a lot more honest.

Fr. Jeff Lorig 49:09

And I think we, in the church and in church world, we have a penchant for -- sometimes being too nice to each other, and, and then kind of taking on sort of a passive aggressive attitude. Like, you kind of let somebody talk in a meeting and like, OK, that's really -- and then we don't, we don't feel that permission to be honest with them, because I don't, we don't know where they're coming from, or it's like, They just think, we think they're crazy. So then after the meeting, we talk about them. And then, we just have this penchant for like, just trying to not hurt anybody's feelings, and, and I think what the engagement conversations allows us to do is -- be a little bit more honest, and not be afraid to get some feedback as a manager or a boss or a pastor, to understand that there's, we all want to accomplish the same thing, and and then be able to like, give the feedback that's necessary for people to be more engaged. And so we just know that the more people get to chime in, the more that, the more they're going to end up buying in to all the things that we're trying to do. So the engagement allows for those conversations to happen.

Fr. Jeff Lorig 50:11

So, again, I don't have, I can give you stories. But I could, I could also show you like, some of our best teams. Like our, I think our Stewardship Office is one of our most most engaged teams here in the archdiocese. Their score went down, because I think they got more honest. And because of that, who cares about the score? What's happening is they're being more honest, and they're going to get more crap done.

Mike McDonald 50:36

So, so a couple things, and then Jim, I want you to jump in here. So for the record, Fr. Jeff said "crap" twice now. I'm keeping track. So we actually got him to kind of flirt with a little bit of, almost getting so enthusiastic that he uttered a, what was dangerously close to an obscenity. So that's a, that's a cue that we want to listen in to. But Jim, I know you've had a chance to process through the, the chat and, and what people are thinking about. What's, what's, what's, what's on your mind right now as we converge to a conclusion here?

Jim Collison 51:04

Yeah, Fr. Jeff, I think you're right on, actually, on the scores going down. Like, I think that's a great index sometimes, well, there's some safety in that too. Right? They know, like, I can now be honest and transparent, and I'm not going to be punished. And so that's a great indicator. I think that you've, you've gathered trust in that area. And, and maybe a continued strengths emphasis builds that trust. Right? Maybe that working in that space, knowing who I am. By the way, that "human formation" term, I am totally going to steal -- like that, that's gold right there. But Richard asked this question out there, he says, Is there a concept with the strengths-based approach that has provided you with a fresh perspective for your faith and relationship with God? So as you think about that, your Top 5 and how that relates to that, what, how would you answer that?

Fr. Jeff Lorig 51:51

Yeah, so the story I didn't tell the at the beginning, but I shared with, in our prep meeting, was, when I got into my new job here -- so I was a pastor for 5 years, I think somewhat successful pastor. Loved it. Loved my people. Was in a tiny parish in rural Nebraska. And it was hard to leave, for sure. So then I came here, and think, I'm going to do these great things in the chancery and, you know, I'm going to work with the archbishop, and I hated it. I, and it still rubs me the wrong way, a little bit. But it's, it's, I just I didn't know how I fit in, where, like, we were creating a new position, there was no job description. And I, I started to really think well, maybe I wasn't supposed to come here. So I started doing spiritual discernment. And like, well, maybe the Lord isn't calling me to this. I made a mistake. The archbishop made a mistake. I should just get out of this as quickly as possible.

Fr. Jeff Lorig 52:41

And then when I went to, to Gallup for a meeting about the, the Growing Engaged Church Survey, the ME25 that they use. I think it was a -- it was Lindsey or I think it might have been Elena. I don't know. It was one of the blond girls at Gallup. We were just doing introductions and we did Top 5s, and she, she just said to me, Oh, you get paid to think. And I thought, "Oh!" And then I started connecting it to all the successes I've had in the past. And I was like, Yeah, because I read, and I, and I dream, and then I implement. Right? I input and I output, and then I invite other people to help me. And the, and then, next thing you know, we've created something amazing.

Fr. Jeff Lorig 53:25

That -- I was thinking it was a spiritual problem. And what, what, that little comment did, was made me realize that it was, it was a human problem. Like, I was not living out of my strengths or embracing my strengths. Now I spend hours reading every day, and thinking, and I, and I give myself permission to just stare at the wall for a little bit, and go for walks. I think it's hard to track my hours that I work because I work when I'm in the shower, I work when I'm, you know, walking around. So, I would say that's the fresh insight is it's helped me discern the spirits. You know, sometimes it's the spirit of, that my human nature, that it's, that's it's my, it's rubbing the wrong way with the way that God has intended me to live it out. So that's, that's been huge for me. So when, I'm a Spiritual Director as well, so people come and they ask, you know, ask me to help them guide them. I don't tell them what God is saying to them. I just help them to listen. And one of the things I'm listening to is, is, is this really the Lord? Or is this just because they're trying to be someone who they're not supposed to be -- that God has never intended? So are they living out of their strengths?

Jim Collison 54:30

One more quick question. As we wrap this, Bree asked, How are you integrating strengths into your Stewardship and Development Office?

Fr. Jeff Lorig 54:38

Well, that is a great question because --

Jim Collison 54:40

Maybe a whole podcast, but let's see if we can do it in a minute or two.

Fr. Jeff Lorig 54:44

Yeah, yeah. And, and so we've -- so internally yes, they are all in on the strengths. They're probably one of our biggest champions for internally, the strengths and engagement. They do all the exercises. Shannon, our director there, has Discipline in her Top 5, so you know she's going to do it. Right? So she's gonna, she's gonna have a rhythm to it, so it's just gonna be a part of her life.

Fr. Jeff Lorig 55:07

We're beginning to ask the question, externally, How do we serve our parishes? And, and, because I think at the very heart of stewardship is, if I, if I put myself in the pastor's seat, like, and I'm supposed to help people to be good stewards of the gifts, I also -- the, the main thing I want to be responsible for, or I should be responsible for -- or how to say that -- I'm going around in circles here. The biggest gift that the Lord has entrusted me to as a pastor, and as a parish, church leader, is the people sitting in those pews. And to be a good steward of their gifts means I have to be able to find a way to engage them. And it's not just about keeping them busy and giving them activities. It is a -- engagement we know is so different than busyness. And I think there's an opportunity for our Stewardship Office to build the, to cast that vision for our schools and our parishes, and their leaders, to think about that the people in those pews and in those seats, are, that's the most important gift. It's not the money in their wallets. That's a part of who they are. Money is a part of who we are, but it's -- so I think, we have not had much traction in putting or using the ME25, the Membership Engagement Survey in our parishes. But I think we're going to do everything we can to use the framework as a way in which we teach stewardship in our parishes.

Jim Collison 56:38

Yeah, I think that no, I think that's good. As we, as we, as we bump up against the end here, Mike, why don't, why don't we do some thanks, and wrap this.

Mike McDonald 56:46

Yeah, without a doubt. So, you know, I, I led this off -- I led this off with an introduction with Fr. Jeff, and I was being somewhat selfish about who he is, as my friend. And I think based on what the chat's reactions, I think he's our friend by the conclusion of this. And, and you could see why, from all of, you can see why I love to spend time with Fr. Jeff. Like, he changes the way you think. He changes the way you feel. He changes the way you behave, for all the right reasons. And I think better, and I love it, and you have a, you have a fan club, Fr. Jeff. It got bigger, let's just say that. I don't think it was an either/or. It got bigger. There was so much merit in what you shared.

Mike McDonald 57:27

And so I love your, again, your authenticity is raw. It's, it's searing. And we heard that. We heard your heart. We heard your leadership, but the convergence of that as you extend this invitation for someone like Jim, Jen, myself, Elena, Lindsey, others to be part of this, is so captivating. And I think that's really the spirit of everything that you've said, even from start to finish is, we can and should extend a bigger, broader invitation for everybody to be part of what we're doing for the right reasons, unique and relative to their design. And it can be a grand picture and vision when we all do this together. And to me, if there was a singular word that comes out of the theme of what you described, is that we can, and we should be inviting people better than we are right now to be part of something that's bigger and better than they are right now. And so I thought it was spectacular. Thanks so much for your time, and who you are as a leader. It's been an absolute pleasure and privilege to spend this this quick hour with you. Jim, back to you.

Jim Collison 58:28

You bet. And Fr. Jeff, thanks. For me, as well, it's always great. You may be the most quoted guest we've had on Called to Coach in a while. We'll, if you, when you get a chance, go back -- when you watch this again, go back through the chat room. It's pretty great. So thanks for coming on.

Jim Collison 58:43

With that, we want to remind everyone to take full advantages of all the resources we do have available now, on Gallup Access, and you can access that easily through our site at gallup.com/cliftonstrengths, actually take you right to your your CliftonStrengths report available for you. Don't forget, you can catch us on YouTube as well. And, if you just head out to youtube.com and search "CliftonStrengths," you'll see everything that we do there. You can follow us as a podcast on any podcast player. You can search "Gallup Webcasts" and find us. Subscribe to us there. Do what the cool kids are doing and listen to podcasts as you're walking the dog, and some of those things around the neighbor -- more dog walking going on these days than I've ever seen, ever. Don't forget, when you're on, when you're on our site, subscribe to our CliftonStrengths Community Newsletter. You can do that there at the bottom of the page. If you have any questions at all, you can send us an email: coaching@gallup.com. Don't forget to follow us on Eventbrite: gallup.eventbrite.com, that will give you some notifications every time we do something new, so you can kind of stay up to date with all the things that are happening. Speaking of staying up to date, the 2020 Gallup at Work Summit has changed to 100% virtual, and we'd love to have you join us there. June 2, it's happening. In fact, Abbie is coming on a little bit later this afternoon to talk about that here on Called to Coach, but you can get all the details right now: gallupatwork.com. We'd love to see you there. Price is is, is at a price point that I think will work for a lot of people. So we'd love to see you at our virtual summit, June 2. Join us in our Facebook Group: facebook.com/groups/calledtocoach, and then on LinkedIn, just search: Gallup Trained -- I'm sorry, "CliftonStrengths Trained Coaches," and we'll get you in that group as well. Want to thank you for joining us today. If you're listening live, stay around for a smidgen of a postshow. With that, we'll say, Goodbye, everybody.

Fr. Jeff Lorig's Top 5 CliftonStrengths are Strategic, Learner, Input, Futuristic and Connectedness.