Editor’s note: This is the third of a four-part series on the changes that are made when an adult converts to the LDS Church. Read part 1 here and part 2 here.
As adult converts to the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, it is incumbent upon us to bring the blessings of baptism and the promises we made in our covenants to all areas of our life — both personal and professional.
In the first two articles in this series, I spoke of the impact prayer and fasting had when I applied it in my position as the officer-in-charge of an LAPD sexual assault unit covering a large portion of the city. The resulting experiences were both uplifting and testimony building.
I didn’t flaunt my search for spiritual guidance in investigations among my fellow detectives. They knew I was Mormon, but I kept my prayers and fasting private. If I didn’t, I believe it would have been counterproductive.
In some ways, however, the situation took on aspects not unlike that of the Nephites with their leaders. Obviously, not all the men under Moroni's or Alma's or Mormon's commands were trying to include the Lord in their lives. Yet, when those leaders went to war they did it with the help of the Lord. They still lost men, still lost some battles. But they obtained help, sometimes in dramatic ways. On a much lesser scale in the detective work done by my unit, we still had unsolved cases and we still lost battles in court, but like the Nephites, we also obtained dramatic help.
Bringing our spiritual gifts to the workplace does not mean we all need to make bold statements and preach of the Lord at every opportunity. Clearly, we are not all called to be prophets or full-time apostles. For the great majority of us, our responsibility lies more in the arena of quiet example and the search for common sense applications of the gospel burning within us. However, we must still be spiritual leaders within the secular arena in which we find ourselves employed.
Other Gifts
We all work in vastly different workplace situations. How I apply prayer and fasting and other spiritual gifts in police work is going to differ from the way a schoolteacher or UPS driver would apply them. Each of us has to seek out and discover how we can best serve the Lord through our chosen professions — including the profession of homemaking and child-rearing, where individuals can have tremendous influence.
While the Lord calls some to the mission field, he calls others to be accountants, business executives, engineers, clerks, and janitors. The Lord must have His people in all walks of life. Otherwise, many would never come to know Him. We are all on missions — some in exotic far-flung places, others in domestic lands, and yet far many more in the jungles of the common workplace.
Unlike the world, the Lord does not make distinctions between sacred and secular. Indeed, the Hebrew word avodah is a root word having the same meaning of work and worship. The Lord sees our work as worship, and as such we should lean on him for guidance in both arenas. In doing so, we find there are other spiritual paths and keys — beyond prayer and fasting — which we can exercise as we interact with co-workers, supervisors, and those workers over whom we have leadership.
Set Aside Personal Aggrandizement
The quest for promotion in the workplace can bring out the worst in each of us. Machiavellian back-stabbing and double-dealing are the extremes of this desire, but constant and calculated placing of our own self-interest above others is not actions worthy of the Lord. Stepping on others to get ahead can only bring us more secular power and/or more money — both of which are worthless in the eternal perspective.
By placing both our personal and professional lives into the Lord’s hands and seeking to do his will in all our efforts, he will bring promotion and reward to us as he sees expedient. If we do not get the promotions or rewards we desire or expect, we need to seek the Lord’s hand in the situation — what is it he needs us to learn or wants us to do (or even what is he protecting us from) by keeping us in our current position.
This can be very hard to do as we struggle with the disappointment of not getting what we want or expect. However, we must work to overcome these negative feelings, to humble ourselves in order to remain close to the spirit and receive His promptings.
Placing spiritual, family, and personal moral values above the priority given to career goals can appear to those with secular control over our careers as a lack of drive, ambition, or commitment to the job. It can also be perceived as threatening, because they recognize their own values being called into account.
Although not much can be done about these misconceptions, Colossians 3:23 shows those committed to the Lord are called to be diligent workers, stating, “Whatever you do, work at it with all your heart, as working for the Lord and not for man.”
Serve Those We Lead
How often in the workplace do we see individuals receive a promotion only to become ineffectual because of their suddenly inflated sense of self-importance?
Once Jesus rebuked His disciples by telling them, “You know that those who are supposed to rule over the Gentiles lord it over them, and their great men exercise authority over them. But it shall not be so among you; but whoever would be great among you must be your servant, and whoever would be first among you must be slave of all.”
To know and do the Lord’s will, we must recognize as leaders our first responsibility is to serve those we lead — not demanding that those we lead serve us. To be effective in the workplace, we must remain humble to be sure we are keeping our grip on the iron rod and our feet on the narrow path.
This servant leadership is essential for those in our workplace stewardship to in turn want to serve each other.
Recognize Free Agency in the Workplace
I’ve been very lucky over the years on my job to have supervisors who always kept me on a very loose leash. As long as I produced high end results, I’ve been allowed the discretion to accomplish given tasks and manage personnel using my own approach and style. It is something I have truly valued.
Having free agency gives us the blessing of making correct choices and learning through experience. It is important in our professional environment to provide those in our stewardship with as much free agency as the workplace allows.
When detectives come to me for direction with an assigned investigation, the first thing I ask is what do they want to do. If the answer is not illegal, immoral, or unethical, I encourage them to proceed. If they actually don’t know what to do with the case, I try to give them a series of (a), (b), or (c) options to choose from. If they inquire further regarding what I would do in the case, I tell them the option I would pursue and why, but still leave the other options open as choices.
My goal is to allow individuals to grow into the most effective detectives they can, not to force them into doing things my way. By nature, my interrogation technique is very low key. Another of my detectives is a major hard-liner in interrogations. Both of us are highly successful at obtaining legal confessions.
I could not, however, interrogate suspects in his style, nor could he in mine. Our personalities and strengths are different; therefore our approach to interrogation is necessarily different. Having the free agency to choose how we approach our work — always understanding the final result is successful completion of tasks — increases both harmony and loyalty in workplace by empowering individuals through acknowledging their strengths as individuals.
Bringing our spiritual commitments to the workplace means recognizing the self-effacing task of helping others to discern their gifts, creating an environment for their use, supporting their efforts, and drawing those in your stewardship together with a sense of unity and direction.
Allow/Encourage
Here’s one I had trouble with. In general, police culture fosters both cynicism and gallows humor. Sex crimes investigations, in particular, engender these traits as ways of relieving stress and dealing with the constant barrage of the adversary’s worst efforts.
Within the confines of our sex crime unit’s squad room, I originally allowed this interaction to occur unchecked. It did no particular damage within the squad room itself, but by allowing it to continue without comment or restraint, I was giving tacit encouragement to the behavior. The result was the cynical comments and gallows humor began to expand beyond the squad room into the interaction between the unit’s detectives and outside entities. This, of course, necessitated a tightening of the reins to keep the situation within acceptable boundaries and taste.
Remember, what you allow as a manager, you encourage. Set reasonable guidelines and keep vigilance over their effectiveness.
Implement Discipline Compassionately
It is unfortunate, but sometimes necessary to implement discipline to those in our professional stewardship. This is never a pleasant situation, but it can be made far worse by the way we handle our role. To belittle or deal overly harshly with an employee, or to react in anger or with vengeance in mind, will only destroy. Discipline, even firing, should be handled in as compassionate a manner as possible.
How will we want the Lord to deal with us when we appear for judgment? How would he expect us to respond in secular situations in this dispensation? Again, to do his will in these circumstances, one only has to ask in humble prayer for his guidance and it will be given.
Radiate Compassion
Commitment to people as well as the task at hand is key. Compassion needs to go beyond the area of discipline. A genuine, heart-felt concern for the needs, feelings, and aspirations of those within your stewardship will build loyal and effective employees. Caring as much about those you serve as much as you care about workplace goals will designate you as an effective leader.
Stephen Covey, in detailing The Seven Habits of Highly Effective People, states, “No amount of technical administrative skill in laboring for the masses can make up for a lack of nobility of personal character in developing relationships. It is at a very essential, one-on-one level, that we live the primary laws of love and life.”
Following the example of our elder brother, Jesus Christ, the best leaders care about people in a manner that they are encouraged in heart and united in love.
Walk the Walk
Although this is a cliché, it is none the less true. Your character consists of who you are when everyone is looking and when no one is looking. Your example flows naturally out of your character.
The scriptures make this quite clear. Jesus rebuked those who preached one thing and did another calling them hypocrites and white-washed sepulchers — tombs that were immaculate on the outside but full of rot on the inside. Saint Peter advised his subjects in 1 Peter 5:3, “Never be a dictator over any group that is put in your charge, but be an example.”
Too often there is a gap between the talk and the walk in the workplace. Mission statements and codes of ethics are intended for others to follow, not for the leaders who established them. Those in our workplace stewardships are quick to perceive deviations when our behavior is different to the behavior expected of them. When this happens, productivity, innovation, and morale all suffer.
Respond to Logical Requests for Change
When our detective unit was first organized, one of the mandates we were given was to increase the number of arrests made by detectives (as opposed to patrol officers). In an effort to motivate my detectives I established a checklist on a whiteboard with a running log of how many arrests each individual detective made.
Do we ever outgrow the need for gold stars on a checklist? Apparently we do. After a couple of weeks I was approached by the detective who had the most arrest checks next to his name. He told me he didn’t feel comfortable taking sole recognition for the arrests credited to him. While he may have been the detective assigned to the case, he had received help from a number or other detectives from the unit during the investigations. I checked and found the other detectives on the board felt the same way.
Rather than stick my heels in because the system was my idea, I asked the detectives what they suggested. They suggested a monthly running log on the whiteboard of all arrests made by the unit as a whole — the goal being to meet or exceed the total the following month. This was a great idea. By responding to this logical request for change, the last week of every month was filled with detectives busting their tails on cases to get arrests and exceed the previous month’s total.
Will Rogers was reported to have said, “We are all ignorant, only on different subjects.” Recognizing others may know more than you, have better ideas, or the ability and experience to deal with a problem in a more concise manner, breeds innovation, collaboration, and success.
Being open to the needs and ideas of those under our stewardship, and not insisting on having our own way or blindly pushing our own ideas, leads to harmony and success in the workplace. It is not always possible, however, to implement the ideas or changes requested. If that is the case, an open discussion of why and an appeal for cooperation can go a long way toward fostering a positive work environment.
Guard against Burnout
After thirty years of police work, I am daily aware of faith’s ability to bring comfort in dealing with professional burnout. Experience in sex crimes has shown me again and again that faith, gained through prayerful petitioning to follow Father’s desires, will keep you clean as you walk through the sewer created by the adversary.
A specific example of this would be the unwanted, but necessary, exposure in my job to objectionable images. When a mass of this material has to be viewed for investigative and prosecution purposes, praying before viewing has a powerful effect. In most cases I’ve been able to find the needed explicit evidence almost immediately. Furthermore, the Holy Spirit has constantly acted as a mental filter, keeping the images distorted and vague once viewing and testimony are completed. For this comfort, I am truly grateful and testify again that I could not do my job without the Lord’s protection and guidance.
Look Toward the Horizon
With the gifts given to us through baptism and conversion also come responsibilities. Leadership, as exemplified by the life of Jesus Christ, should become the basis for our actions in the workplace. Those individuals who are most successful in doing this keep their eye on the horizon instead of the bottom line. They challenge the status quo, not meekly accept it. They don’t settle for doing things right, they do the right things. They innovate, develop, and inspire.
Paul wrote to the Philippians, “Keep putting into practice all you learned from me and heard from me and saw me doing, and the God of peace will be with you.” Can we do less than follow the advice in the scriptures if we are to be true to our adult rebirth in Christ?
In the first thee parts of this series, I’ve written about using the spiritual gifts gained through baptism and conversion into our professional lives within traditionally structured workplaces. In Part IV of Ripples of Adult Conversion, I want to bring this same perspective to the creative arena.
