Recently I was on Dawn Sadler’s excellent Christian business podcast Your Purpose is Calling, where we talked about How to Get Unstuck.
Dawn is a writer, speaker and coach who helps people walk in their God-given calling with more clarity and confidence. She is doing great work, and I recommend checking out her podcast and subscribing!
Here are four big ideas from his book that go to the heart of the biblical and Reformation understanding of faith and work. If you reflect on these ideas, you begin to see how truly transformative they are.
One crucial aspect of productivity is getting into the context where you can be the most productive—which means getting the right job. When it comes to the job hunt, resumes are still an essential tool.
So here are six resume dos and don’ts from Brian Brenberg, chair of the program in business and finance at The King’s College. The six tips are:
If you haven’t seen it on social media, I have an update: Last year I started as director of career development at The King’s College in New York City. In my role I help students launch meaningful careers that will impact the culture through remarkable excellence, professionalism, and service.
I am thrilled to be at King’s and it is a great place. One reason it is such a good fit is that I believe that Christians are called to influence culture, and that is exactly the mission of King’s:
Through its commitment to the truths of Christianity and a biblical worldview, The King’s College seeks to transform society by preparing students for careers in which they help to shape and eventually to lead strategic public and private institutions, and by supporting faculty members as they directly engage culture through writing and speaking publicly on critical issues.
King’s has a fantastic philosophy of education that focuses on seeing the connections across disciplines, and is one of the best Christian colleges in the nation. The opportunity to obtain a rigorous Christian education in the heart of NYC is something that you cannot find anywhere else, and I believe that through this King’s is making a crucial contribution to the call of the gospel to engage the culture winsomely. You can learn more about my role here.
What does this mean for WBN? We are expanding! As we mentioned the other day, Daniel Kaufman, who has many years experience doing training for Chick-fil-A, just joined our team as our newest coach. I highly recommend reaching out to set up a series of coaching sessions with him. I am also available for our 2-Hour DARE coaching package.
My plan is to resume posting regularly and continue creating new products. We have a new book coming in the months ahead, which we will be sharing more about soon. And in December a new study guide and video curriculum for What’s Best Next launches from Zondervan.
In sum, Lord willing, great things are ahead!
At What’s Best Next, we pick our coaches carefully. We can’t just be thinking about productivity in the abstract, we need to know how to understand someone else’s challenges and help them make meaningful change.
That’s why we’re excited to introduce you to our newest coach, Daniel Kaufman. Daniel hails from the southern U.S., where he spent over a decade at Chick-fil-A helping train restaurant leaders and operators. He brings to our team a passion for organizational health, building successful teams, and gospel-driven change.
Here’s a brief interview we did with Daniel.
Please tell us a little about where you’re from.
I’m a Georgia native, born and raised, and I’ve lived in the same 45-mile radius my whole life. I graduated from a two-stoplight town to another two-stoplight town called Senoia, GA. I grew up in a Christian home, but didn’t become a Christian until my early 20s—a common Bible-belt story. I have 3 siblings and some nieces and nephews that I adore.
What do you like to do for fun?
When I have spare time, I like to practice humility by playing disc golf at one of the local courses. I don’t always make it through all 18 holes, but that’s fine because I stop trying to keep track of my poor score around hole 12. If you walked into my house, you’d notice some musical instruments as well as board games. Both are go-tos when I or my roommates have the time.
How did you begin working with What’s Best Next?
Well, it started with me growing in my walk with the Lord from reading the book What’s Best Next. I had been interested in reading productivity and consulting books through the lens of Scripture. I would write notes in the margins about how something did or didn’t align with the Bible. Matt’s book was the first one I read where the author had already done that work, and I really fell in love with the truths and principles he was teaching.
Jump forward a few years—I was using What’s Best Next and The Advantage (I’m also a huge Patrick Lencioni fan) to build my teams, but I hit a slump. Somewhere along the way, I learned that What’s Best Next provided productivity coaching. I signed up and started working with Matt. Those times were a huge encouragement to me, but an unexpected side effect was how much I developed a desire to work more with What’s Best Next one day and help others in the way I was helped. What’s Best Next was starting to expand coaching, but the time wasn’t quite right. That was a few years ago. This spring, the timing worked out and I’ve now been coaching officially with What’s Best Next for a few months.
You’ve done a lot of reading about work strategy and tactics. Any favorite tactics or tools you’ve found over the years?
I really like a lot of Patrick Lencioni’s models and checklists. They have helped me significantly. I’m a fan of What’s Best Next’s DARE framework and asking myself the question, “what’s best next?” in a prayerful way. I also use the 5 Whys technique for help in cause and effect problem-solving. A final favorite is the idea that simpler is generally better. We talk a lot at What’s Best Next about sticking to our core mission and centering our work around the right principles. I suppose you could say a favorite “tactic” is pruning to keep things from becoming too complicated.
What’s one of the toughest productivity challenges you’ve faced?
There was a point in my career where my team and I all felt stuck and I was exhausted. We were doing too much and it wasn’t super clear how to make changes within the current system. But we pushed forward and experimented and kept working. I was able to grow in more effective delegation and allowing others on the team to step up and grow. Eventually we got unstuck and after two years we even saw some of the changes we made in our team implemented across the organization, but at the time it felt like we would never make progress.
Do you have a favorite part of working as a What’s Best Next coach?
I’ve really enjoyed the role so far. The team is great to work with, and each person we serve has a unique story that we get to enter into. It’s a privilege to come alongside fellow Christians to support them. Growing up, I always wanted to be involved in so many different things around the world, and coaching has afforded me that opportunity as I work with people from Texas to Thailand.
Curveball. Do you have any hidden talents?
I don’t know about hidden, but I enjoy playing music every so often. Most people have never seen me play much guitar or piano. I studied theory early on, and can somewhat pick up and play any stringed instrument at this point—as long as it doesn’t require a bow!
Any parting advice if someone reading this is thinking about coaching others?
Pray for a genuine interest in the lives and good of others. Stay curious. People are fascinating, and there are always more layers and new insights to be learned for serving them better. You may know someone for years and then something comes up that helps you understand them in a fresh way. So stay curious!
Want to work with Daniel or another What’s Best Next coaches on the productivity challenges you’re facing? Learn more about our coaching options.