Faithful courage in the face of a pandemic
Jordan Raynor sits down with Dr. Nido Qubein, President of High Point University, to talk about his story of emigrating to the U.S. from the Middle East, 3 things he did to cause his university to grow 5% during COVID while the average university lost 16% of its enrollment, and the two other lists he keeps handy in addition to his to-do list.
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[00:00:00] JR: Have you ever listened to an episode of the Call to Mastery and wondered how your specific vocation connects to God's work in the world? Maybe you hear our guests, “God, that's nice for them.” I get how that writer or you know, doctor or CEO, I understand how their work connects so well, but how does my work connect to God's work in the world? If that's you, then we've got an incredibly valuable free resource to share with you. My team and I have been working on this mammoth project, which is really aimed at helping anybody in any vocation, learn exactly how their specific work matters for eternity and what precisely they can do right now today to do more exceptional work for the glory of God and the good of others. If you want to learn the answers to those questions for you, you can take the free assessment we built at jordanraynor.com/learn. And now, here is today's episode.
Hey, everybody. Welcome to the Call to Mastery. I’m Jordan Raynor. This is a podcast for Christians who want to do their most exceptional work for the glory of God and the good of others. Each week, I host a conversation with a Christian who is pursuing world-class mastery of their vocation. We talk about their path to mastery, their daily habits, and how their faith influences their work.
Today's guest is Dr. Nido Qubein. He's the president of High Point University in North Carolina. He's an exceptional leader. He is the third highest paid university president in the country for good reason. During his 16 years at High Point, the university's growth has exploded and has continued to grow even throughout COVID-19.
So, Dr. Qubein and I recently sat down we talked about his story emigrating to the US from the Middle East. We talked about the three things he did, and his team did that caused High Point to grow 5% during COVID while the average university lost 16% of its enrollment. And we talked about the two lists that he keeps handy every day, in addition to his to-do list. I thought this is a really great part of the episode. I think you're really going to love this conversation with Dr. Nido Qubein.
[INTERVIEW]
[00:02:39] JR: Dr. Qubein, thank you so much for joining me.
[00:02:42] NQ: It's my pleasure being with you.
[00:02:43] JR: We were just talking before we started recording, I had one of your exceptional students at High Point, Jenna Fortier, on the podcast a few months ago, was so impressed that I offered her a job right on the spot as soon as the interview was done. You got to be pretty proud of the students you're producing there at High Point.
[00:03:01] NQ: You know what Jordan, we're blessed and highly favored. This university is a God, family, and country institution. We shout it from the mountaintop. We are proud of our students. We often say, “This is not a perfect institution, but it is an extraordinary one.” And we have grown so much and we believe that God's hand is on this work and we are on God's side. And Jenna was just one example of the enormity of positive production of human leaders, if you will, in this university.
And so, our job here, our goal here, our mission here is to plant seeds of greatness in the mind, heart and soul. And you can't just do it in the mind, you got to make sure their heart is in the right place, their soul is filled with faith and while we of course, are an inclusive University, and we welcome everyone, we make it quite clear upfront that we're a God, family, country and I say it all the open houses, if that bothers you, we understand that, we respect that, but this may not be the school for you.
[00:04:09] JR: Yeah. So, speaking of the seeds, right planted in these kids’ souls, I want to go back to the beginning of your story, and the seeds planted in your heart, your soul. So, you grew up in the Middle East, raised by a single mother after your father died when you were young. And your mother raised you in the Christian tradition, which I find so interesting, how rare was that back then growing up the Middle East?
[00:04:31] NQ: We think of the Middle East as a place that's filled with other religions, specifically Muslims and so on. But if you think about realistically, think about the Roman crusades. And of course, we can think about Jesus' journey to Damascus, and soul becoming Paul and the church beginning to grow throughout that area, in Turkey and Greece and of course, what is now Jordan and Israel and all those places. So, in many, many ways, the Christian church was born in the Middle East. And there are many, many people who of course, are and were of the Christian faith. And so, my family has always been Christians. I grew up as as an Anglican Protestant. In America, you would think of it more as Episcopalian but really, this follows the Canterbury sector. And my mother grew up as a Greek Orthodox and my wife grew up as a Greek Orthodox but became a Protestant, when we got married all the way back in 1977.
So, here's what I say, out of adversity can emerge abundance. Those who have faithful courage, can make good things come to be, right? So, none of us is an island. We all need a depth of faith, that God has a plan for my life and that God will guide that plan, and I just need to get up in the morning, believe in it, and then get in and do the work, not just stay in bed, then expect God to take care of me.
And so, my daddy died when I was six years of age. And I've often said, you know, I've never had a dad, he was sick for three or four years, never had a dad who took me to the circus, threw me a ball, read me a book, sang a song or talk with me, man to man. He died when I was six years of age.
My mother had fourth grade education and my mother brought up five of us, I was the youngest, but three boys, two girls, and my daddy was not a successful. He left her with death and the responsibility of these five children. My mother then learned a new vocation. She became a seamstress. She made clothes for people. She worked day and night to bring some money to feed us and clothe us. But here's the deal, Jordan, she never ever made me feel that I am lesser than. I always felt that I am enough. And she believed, she had a deep faith that said that God will take care of us. She'd buy chicken on a Monday, Jordan, and that chicken would last us all week. One day, it'll be, you know, chicken. One day, she’ll put rice with it. One day, it’ll be soup, et cetera.
So, she was very, very capable. And she taught me some of the best principles and the best lessons in my life, which then I went on to write many books, as you know, and give thousands of speeches and so on. But most of it came from this woman with fourth grade, a woman of faith who believe that God will provide and she was a terrific disciple. So, yeah, that's my background. My mom bought a one-way ticket to send me to America. Because she believed you know, in the ‘60s, we had the east and the west, right? We had the Soviet Union, we had America, and she saw America as a Christian land and a place where you can pursue your opportunities.
So, she went on to be with the Lord back in ‘05, believe it or not, I became president of High Point University on January 3, 2005 and my first board meeting was January the 24th. And five o'clock that morning, my phone rang, said your mom passed away. I came and did the board meeting with a big strategic plan and then my family and I caught a plane and went over to the Middle East for her funeral and so on.
A lot of people look at my life and say, “By all accounts I could have taken the wrong turn.” But but I have not. I tell the students at High Point University that I've never smoked marijuana or cigarettes. I've never been drunk in my life. My mother used to say to me, “The circumstances in which you find yourself do not determine where you end up. They only determine where you start, not where you end up. And what you choose is what you get.” And I've always attempted to make the choices and I was in business 30 plus years. And when I became president of High Point University, I try to bring those same messages to our students every day.
[00:08:58] JR: Yeah. So, you've had a phenomenally successful career in business, now in higher education, High Point is growing like a weed. But I want to go back to an earlier chapter in your career. I read that while you were in college here in the States, you worked as a youth director for a bit of time at a church and experienced a lot of fruit in that work. I'm curious what led you to walk away from working within the four walls of a church?
[00:09:23] NQ: Oh, that's a very interesting question. Nobody's ever asked me that question before. I grew up in the church. I mean, when I grew up, I was very active in my church and my youth group and so on. That was a natural, if you will. But what happened when I came to America, I had no money, I didn't know you know, anybody. It was pretty rough. And so, in my first year, my first two years, I lived in eastern North Carolina, a small town called Mount Olive, and nicest people you'll ever meet. And of course, they've never seen a “foreigner” before you know, an accent, and especially someone who comes from the Middle East, in the holy land.
So, slowly somebody invited me to go speak at their son's school or something and then somebody else and then the president of the school would have all these meetings in Free Will Baptist churches, this school was a Free Will Baptist school, it’s a two-year school. And these were fundraising events. We’ll have dinners and these churches would hold and I guess they would pledge money towards this college.
So, they would take me with them and show me off. I mean, he kind of used me in a good way. And so, I would stand up and they could hardly understand what I said, but they thought I was cute. Later on, somebody said, “Would you come speak to our church?” The first time I spoke to a church, and I didn't know that they give you any money, but you know, they gave me $5 or $10. It was great. And then one time a guy called me up and he said, “Well, we don't pay an honorarium but we'll take a love offering.” Look, I didn't know what the words love offering mean. I thought we were all going to hug and –
[00:11:04] JR: This will go a bunch of different ways.
[00:11:04] NQ: Yeah, I thought they're going to hug me and kiss me and stuff. And I said, “I don’t know if I want to deal with all of that.” Well, needless to say, they took a love offering and Jordan, this was back in 1967, maybe ’68, and the love offering came to $220. And I thought, “Wow!” I've never forgotten that day. What a blessing that was to me, because at best, I would have $10 or $15 at a time.
Anyway, so other churches began to ask me to speak. So, I began to speak all these churches. When I transferred to High Point College in 1968 as a junior, I worked with YMCA, Christian YMCA here and a camp was called Camp Cheerio. I love that camp, because the director was Max Cooke and he was criticized why he would talk about Jesus Christ every night at Vespers. And somebody said, “Well, you shouldn't, because you might have some Jewish students and so on.” And he said, “No, this is a Christian camp.” And he stood up for his faith in such a courageous way that left an indelible impression on me. And later, I became the director of the camp.
But anyway, in the interim, I was working in a local church here as a youth director, part time, and forgive my modesty, I was very successful. The kids like me. I took the program for 15 kids, 230 kids, and I looked for creative ideas, for retreats, for Sunday night youth fellowships, and so on, and I had a hard time finding it.
And finally, I found a company based in San Diego, and they had these programs, but they seemed a little bit – I’ll just use the word liberal. That wasn't exactly what we were trying to do in our church, in High Point. And so, when I went to grad school and graduated, and I had a choice, I could go work in a bank or something like that. Or I could start a company that can fill a need that I experienced when I was a youth director. And that's what I did. I started a company called Adventures with Youth.
[00:13:20] JR: Yeah, hugely successful.
[00:13:22] NQ: Yes. mean, I started with a little newsletter, but the newsletter grew and eventually, had 68,000 customers in 32 countries. These were churches and camps, and so on. And it was interdenominational. Then, of course, I hired all kinds of youth ministers and ministers to write a lot of the material that went into it. My very first book, I'm looking at it now in my office was called, What Works and What Doesn't Work in Youth Ministry.
So, I did that for a number of years and then here's something you don't know, maybe I was not within the four walls of a church because I was not an ordained minister as such. But what I did is, I had a couple of Christian music groups, one band was called The Bridge. And we, because of the subscribers to the newsletter, and of course, I developed many, many other products that they could use. Remember, this was pre computers and so on. So, if a church published a newsletter or a bulletin, and they needed art, they would buy the art from me and stick it on their mimeograph or whatever, however way they printed it.
And so, these churches start inviting us to speak and so I was speaking as many as 50 weekends a year in churches around the country. Then I would take the musical groups with me. One was a duet and one was an actual band. I would lead youth leadership programs. I would preach on Sunday morning in the church, and we would begin on Friday night. And we were very, very popular and we would just go all over the country. And out of that came my corporate work where somebody in the church when we speak and say, “Would you come speak to my company?” One thing led to another.
But that's a long story to say. I love those years. And that's why, Jordan, in an amazing kind of way, God's hand works in ways that you and I sometimes simply cannot predict. So, after success in business, isn't that amazing that then I had the opportunity, the invitation to come back to lead my alma mater as its president, when my alma mater was really broken. It was $100 million in deferred maintenance, only 1,400 students, very few people ever heard of it, and so on. And I came back and I realized that, you I thought, I'll do it for a couple years, to be honest. And here I am. I'm completing my 16th year this month.
And we've been spectacularly successful. And then I realized, I love it because it is with young people again. And I love it because I am free to talk about my faith. And I am free to say, we are a God, family, country school. And I am delighted to be in a place where we have a chapel with a cross, inside and outside. And yet we are an inclusive society. We welcome and love all of God's creatures.
I don't know, God has a plan for us, my friend and God gives me energy every day, and hopefully a little bit of wisdom to make some tough decisions like this fall. We opened up even with this pandemic, and it went very, very well to the amazement of parents and so on.
[00:16:41] JR: I'm so glad you brought that up because I want to ask you about this. So, you’ve proven clearly, you've mastered the art of leadership in a couple of different domains, right? In the church, in business, now, in higher education, you've had this spectacular 16-year run at High Point. And the reason why I invited you on the show was Jenna Fortier, who we mentioned before, who now works on my team. We were talking one day, and she’s in grad school at High Point, she mentioned how extraordinary your leadership has been through COVID-19. And I was going to ask what that looked like, specifically, but I said, “Don't tell me, I want to have Dr. Qubein on and I want to ask directly.”
So, you guys opened up in the fall, what were some of the decisions you made throughout this crisis that you think would cause a student like Jenna to admire your leadership throughout the pandemic?
[00:17:32] NQ: Well, clearly, Jenna is very generous, and that I appreciate that very much. First of all, Jordan, I believe in the power of prayer. And I talk to God every day. If I'm at the beach, and I like to walk when there's nobody else on the beach. So, I can talk out loud, and my chats with God and 99% of thankfulness monologues, thanking God for strength, for wisdom, for surrounding me with angels who are willing to help and for giving us the opportunity to survive and thrive even in the midst of crises or challenges. I cannot overestimate what the power of prayer carries forth in my life. If we got up in the morning and we thought, “Hey, we got the answers. We can go do it.” I think we fail. That's called overconfidence. And I don't ever want to be overconfident.
As far as the pandemic is concerned, we told the parents and the students last May that we will open up. As you can imagine, it was a lot of pressure on us not to open up. A lot of our sister schools didn't open up and the media, of course, you know, talk ill of those kinds of missions. But I believe that God wants us to open up, we'll open up and we'll work our hearts out and we'll make it happen. So, the first thing that I did is I appointed a task force of very learned people on my team and people in charge of all the major areas. And we met every single day, sometimes twice a day and we were very thoroughly prepared. We started last March.
Second, I committed resources. I said, “If we expect those students to come back and be in our midst, that means their parents entrust us with their children. That means we have to make sure that they're safe. And so, no resources are to be held back, whether they're financial or human resources or facility resources, whatever it might be.” I made that very, very clear. I also communicated with everybody in ad nauseam. I mean, I communicated every day. I would do a video or I would send an audio message or an email and I mean every day, to parents, to students, to faculty, to staff, and one of them to know that the leader of the institution has faithful courage. And that while we don't have all the answers, we certainly are prepared to do whatever it takes to make sure everybody's safe. And I communicated all the things that we've done, everything from distancing to masks. I provided masks free, and so on. I made it very, very easy for people to follow the rules.
And the rules should be followed out of respect for other people here. We are a community and we must look after each other. Jesus said, “If you have done it unto one of the least of thee, your brothers and sisters, you've done it unto me.” And I said, “Even in these difficult times, we will not dilute our efforts for service learning”, meaning reaching out in the community, feeding the hungry, clothing those who need it, providing for the homeless, et cetera.
Looking back over it, I think that worked with people. People want to be led. They want to be believers. They want to believe that this leadership message works. That the system will work. But then you have to prove it, obviously with execution and action. And so, when we got into a situation of COVID-19, and of course, we weren't they. We knew we're going to have some of that system work. I had already booked eight hotels, to put our students in them. We already booked additional volunteers to deliver food. We had all that under control. And the parents were amazed and they kept writing beautiful things about us on social media and so on.
And so, once people get the feeling like the school has got its act together, I think they relaxed a little bit. The fear factor, which as you know, prohibits us from doing anything. Fear is quite often the absence of faith. I mean, you have to have faith and you have to be committed to getting the work done.
[00:21:47] JR: Yeah, but it's not blind faith. You're not saying, “This isn't dumb courage.” Where it's like, you know, pandemic or not, we're opening up. You guys were methodical. It sounds like, and planning out every scenario, planning for the worst-case scenario, kids getting sick, booking hotels, staffing up on resources. So, you had courage but you also were responsible in planning for the worst case, so that you instill confidence in the parents, right?
[00:22:18] NQ: That's exactly right. That's why I call it faithful courage. That’s exactly right. For example, the clinic we tripled the size and 50% of our clinic, was just for COVID-19. So, that the student who has a cold does not have to enter the same clinic as their student who might have symptoms for COVID-19.
We also were very concerned about the quality of life on campus. In other words, when you distance and so on, you can go to ball games, you can’t do this, you can’t do that. How do I maintain here, the mental and emotional state of these students as well? So, we did things like we would close a couple of streets in the middle of campus. Every day, in the afternoon, we'd bring in food trucks and a band and we would just create sort of a celebratory environment, again, distance and with masks, but nevertheless, free food, free everything.
So, we did so much of that, coming back, the students come back in January, we're building an ice rink for them, for example, doing this all over again, opening up. We have 16 restaurants on campus. Some of them open lunch and dinner, now we're opening up the more favorite ones, lunch and dinner and so on. So, our students could see and feel and sense that we cared deeply.
And guess what happened, Jordan, because we communicate all that post March, with all the parents and students. As you know, these are actual number, the national figure for total enrollment in colleges this fall was minus 16%. A lot of schools really, really suffered. We have some in our neighborhood here, almost shutting down.
For freshmen, the number in private schools, we’re a private school, was down 4.6%. What happened at High Point University? Well, we grew our total enrollment by 5.6%. So, that's like 22% data we’re talking about. And even though we spent all our money and even though we put all these resources, we didn't furlough anybody. We knew that we have to deliver and we had to make sure things work.
And so, things were so good that again, at Thanksgiving, I announced a bonus for everybody. So, everybody got a nice bonus up to $1,000. We give all of our employees $600 a year to eat on campus free. We give them gifts in August when school starts. We give them gifts again, Christmas. So, for example, this Christmas was the third year we give one of these nutcrackers, lots of nutcrackers that they can put in their home and they're themed like faith, faith is one, love is one, joy is one.
We have a large nativity scene on campus. We're very bold. They wanted me to say Happy Holidays, I said, I'm glad to say Happy Holidays. But we're going to say Merry Christmas, and happy holidays.
[00:25:17] JR: Everyone's talking about loss at this moment. But there's also a lot of opportunity. You mentioned 5% increase in growth. I'm curious, now that we're past, hopefully, the worst of the craziness, how you've been encouraging your staff to spot unique and innovative opportunities that this pandemic has brought about?
[00:25:41] NQ: Well, again, a terrific question. You're very insightful, because I do think that if you take risk out of life, you take opportunity out of life. And I also think that risk management is quite different than risk avoidance. And sometimes you can avoid risk. We couldn't avoid the risk of this pandemic. But we can somehow attempt to manage it. And while you are managing it, you tend to learn new skills, therein of course, lie a lot of opportunities. You learned the skill of awareness, that you become more aware about your strengths, more aware about your tenacity and your resilience. You also become more aware of your faith or lack thereof. And so, the opportunities are many on the personal level.
But opportunities also many on the relational level, how we get along with other people, how we respond to other people and with other people in moments of need, in moments of pain, or to use your words and moments of loss. And fortunately for us, none of our students or staff had to go to the hospital. So, we've been very blessed in that regard.
I think another opportunity is institutional, that we have proven to ourselves that yet one more time, back in ‘07, ‘08, ‘09, we had the great recession, and we chose not to participate in during the great recession. We actually grew tremendously at High Points So, here we go, again, we proved to ourselves that institutionally, we can be strong, we can have grit, and we can be resilient. So, I think the opportunities are many.
And finally, familialy, that, moments of pressure and tension and fear and loss, you have an opportunity to model behaviors for those whom you love, your children, your spouse, your immediate family and others, to model behaviors that demonstrate your faith and, therefore, the capacity that God bestows upon you and creates within you. We are going to open up on time. We are ready for it and we believe we can deal with what may come.
But more importantly, we feel, it's like we have a new life at High Point University saying that we have a major responsibility with the students. We have 5,600 students here, four times what the number was, when I originally came. We have nine academic schools, we only have three, when I came. We had BA and BS degrees only. Now, we have many Masters, many Doctorate degrees and so on. And we're number one in US News and World Report, among best colleges in the south. Number one overall, number one most innovative. You’d have to see our campaign to really understand what we have here.
But anyway, yeah, I mean, opportunities are many. But you know, Jordan, many, many, many people on the face of this earth have opportunities. So, the question is not whether you have opportunities. The question is whether you appreciate them, whether you employ them for the good, and some people have opportunities, and they employ them for selfish reasons and for methodologies that do not create a better world around us. And some people use opportunities to really, truly carry forth the teachings of Jesus, to help others, to model the faith, to ensure that we are indeed disciples and with that blessing come a requirement to do his work and to prepare for his coming and to ensure that when people look at us, they see they see Jesus within us.
[00:29:47] JR: Yeah, and part of that is just a plain old discipline. Disciplining ourselves to be able to take advantage of the opportunities with the time that God's given us on this earth. We talked a little bit on this podcast about how masterful leaders like yourself do that practically day to day. So, I'm curious what a typical day in your life looks like, Dr. Qubein.
[00:30:11] NQ: Yeah, so I am early to bed, as in 9 pm. And I am early to rise, as in 3:30, maximum when I'm really lazy, 4 am. And I'll tell you why, I treasure the precious time of the morning. It is a peaceful time. It is a quiet time. It's a time of prayer and reflection, and introspection, and study. And so, I make coffee for me, and coffee for my wife. We drink, she likes a little more sugar in hers, so we make Turkish coffee and she wakes up at 6:30 or so. But I do about two and a half hours of study every morning. And then usually at six o'clock, I will go for a walk for an hour with a neighbor of mine. And then I'm at work, you know, 7:30, 7:45.
When I come here, I have two lists that I live by. One, of course is the to-do list, which is very transactional. It's do this, do that, write this, look at these minutes, et cetera. The stuff you have to do running a university. And then I have my to-be list. That's my strategic list. That is what are we doing to make this university stronger? What are we doing to ensure that our students are getting an extraordinary education? What are we doing to withstand the competitiveness of the marketplace and to shine even through it? Those kinds of things. And then, hidden in the back part of my brain is a third list called the stop doing list. Because you cannot become without stopping some things, right? You start some things, but you got to stop some things.
So, if you're going to lose weight, you're going to have to stop eating two Snickers bars a day, and so on. So, I take care of my to-do list and some of my to-be list, first thing in the morning, working through others. My job is to create capacity in others who work on my team. So, the first hour in the morning, I am talking to my team or writing my team or meeting with my team about significant issues that will move their areas forward. Hence, I know that the day is going in the right direction. And I know that now I've got a bunch of people working on this important stuff.
And then of course, I have meetings, lots of meetings. Lately, we've been doing a lot of these Zoom meetings, as you know, and WebEx and so on. And then of course, I have all kinds of board events and whatever, giving speeches, et cetera, lots of faculty meetings, lots of things like that.
And then, I go home about six o'clock in the evening. At six o'clock in the evening, I sit down with my wife and we commune together for about an hour, sometimes we'll watch 30 minutes to an hour of some news cast of some sort. And then at eight o'clock, I'm getting ready for the next morning. I am the kind of guy who will prepare my clothes for the next day. Right down to cufflinks in my shirt and stains in my collars.
And I do not want anything in the morning to disrupt my positiveness. I want to wake up in the morning and say, “Thank you, God for another day.” And I'm not going to let the fact that the shirt I wanted to wear is not ready or some silly thing like that, to interrupt my day. Because Jordan, I believe that there are two things we have to manage in life. Clearly, we have to manage our time, because we all have 24 hours in the day and we're going to manage it for the good. But more important than managing your time is managing your energy.
[00:34:07] JR: Just going to say this. I'm so glad you went there.
[00:34:10] NQ: Because look, you cannot manage your energy without managing your attitude about life. In other words, you have to have a growth mindset. You have to say, and there are certain people that you have to get rid of in your life because they are sucking your energy. They're negative. Most people when I say, “Garbage in”, finish the sentence and say, “Garbage out”, and I go, “No, that's not true. Garbage in, garbage stays and multiplies.”
So, don't allow garbage in your brain in the first place. Reading garbage, being with people speak garbage, attending things that just bring garbage, garbage being those negative things that disrupt your life are just going to mess you up. And they're going to usurp your energy. So, I'm happy to tell you how I manage my energy. There are special techniques that I have taught over the years many executives. But at the end of it, it's all about investing, just like we invest our money. We think that's the most important thing. That's actually not the most important thing. The most important thing is your energy and your health and your faith. Because when you have those, you can always make money. But money comes in money goes.
So, that's really where my focus is, every day. I have a full day every day. I am one of those people who dedicate myself to what I'm doing wholeheartedly. But I don't do just High Point University. I serve a bunch of corporate boards, large boards. I serve in my community, in my church. I chaired a major $100 million campaign to revitalize our downtown at High Point, North Carolina. I'm highly engaged and also economic, economic ventures of all kinds that create jobs and improve people's lives.
[00:35:54] JR: You're a busy guy. You got a lot going on.
[00:35:58] NQ: I'm not so much busy as I am substantively engaged.
[00:36:05] JR: Yes. And you're not hurried, right? There's a big difference between busy and hurried. So, yeah, I'm curious, you're clearly an ambitious guy. Can you draw a line from your faith to your ambition for your work? Are those two things connected for you?
[00:36:20] NQ: My faith is a source of everything. So, if God didn't want me to be ambitious, he wouldn't have given me the kind of DNA, I guess, and it wouldn't have given me the energy I have. And it wouldn't have opened up the doors for me, and he wouldn’t have lit the pathways, and he wouldn't have placed me in circles of influence that have been quite useful and supportive, right? So, I believe that I am a very ambitious guy. I am ambitious about anything I do. So, ambition doesn't mean more personal achievements. It doesn't mean more money or more awards. I could be a volunteer in some organization in town and I'd be very ambitious about getting the job done and job done well.
The way my faith is connected to that, is that I'm created in God's image, period, paragraph turn the page. I don't have to explain anymore. So, I joke about this at open houses here, I say, I look at all the students who are considering coming to High Point University, usually a thousand of them sitting there with their parents. And I say, “Don't come to High Point University, if you don't want to be extraordinary. Don't come here and mess up our school. Go somewhere else. But if you come here, I want you to have a life filled with success and a life that is framed with significance.” And I'll say, “Because that's what we believe. We're a God, family, country school.” And I say, “Look, God didn't sit in heaven one day and say, I’ll tell you want I want to do. On Monday, Wednesday, and Friday, I'm going to create some extraordinary people. On Tuesday, Thursday, and Saturday, I'm going to create me some fingerlings. So, I can make this world balanced. And then I'm going to rest on Sunday.” And then I jokingly say, “Now, which day were you born on?”
And then I say, “The truth is, we're all extraordinary. How do I know that? Because God breathed on my nostrils and gave me life. Because God created me in his own image. If we were created in God's image, who do you think you are? You're an extraordinary person.”
Now, extraordinary could be defined in many ways. By extraordinary, I don't mean necessarily, so like successful, what success mean. For Albert Einstein success meant unraveling the secrets of the universe. For Mother Teresa, it meant feeding the hungry. For Ted Turner, it meant building a media empire.
[00:38:39] JR: For your mother, I meant getting you to the US, right? Your mother was an extraordinary person.
[00:38:46] NQ: Yes, thank you for saying that. Though, my mother, it was not just going to move to the US, but for my mother was, first of all, see me from childhood to adulthood, and making sure that I had the right foundation so that I'll make the right choices in life. And then blessing me daily with her prayers and good wishes to do the right thing. My mom was a very, very sacrificial soul. It took me years to really, maybe all of us, it takes us years to fully unfold and uncover the beauty and the enormous sacrifices that our parents make in our lives. Only when we're parents and we begin to travel that journey do we really acknowledge and comprehend all of that. So, you're exactly right.
[00:39:36] JR: This podcast, a lot of it is about helping us all see how the image of God influences our ambition. I'm not sure that's the right word, for excellence, our commitment to excellence. We are God's children. We are to go out in the world and be his representatives and look around creation. Excellent is too trite of a word. He's the perfect. He's a holy God and we are his sub creators called the image into the world around us. That's the source of ambition and commitment to mastery, whatever our vocation is.
So, speaking of, I read an interview of yours. And you said, something I found pretty profound. You talked before about at High Point, you guys have students of a bunch of different faith backgrounds. So, you're clearly a Christian leader, but you guys have a lot of different faith backgrounds represented. You said in this article, “We’re not standing up and screaming, like somebody on the corner of the street with a Bible, what we're doing is living and acting and modeling the teachings of Christ in ways that are sustainable, and meaningful.” So, I think those words are interesting, sustainable and meaningful. What do you mean by that? Can you explain that?
[00:40:56] NQ: What I mean by that is that when my time comes, and I leave this earth, there are two English words that are really going to matter. One is, did I influence anyone? It could be an individual, organization, or community, whatever, a church, whatever. And was that influence in any way impactful? So, at the end of it all, it's about impact. It's about what is it that you have done in your life that truly helped someone, nurtured someone. And by the way, that applies, perhaps, that could be neutral in its application to any faith, right? Anybody could say what I just said. And then you have to key it, you have to order it in your own faith, what it is that you believe. I believe Jesus Christ, my Lord and Savior. So, therefore, it's clear to me, what impact that I seek in life.
So, what I say is that young people specifically, and I work mostly with young people. So, young people specifically are not looking for crusades aimed at them. They're looking for partnerships with them. And you can't just scream at them and tell them, “Don't do this and don't do that.” Much, much more influencing would be, what I say is that we live, they watch, they learn. So, a value modeled is twice as good as a value preached.
And that's why in society, we get so disappointed. When we hear about somebody famous in politics, or even sometimes in the pulpit, who go astray and do something, we're shocked by that, because we have expected from them and accepted from them, a modality of modeling of behavior. And when you go outside that, that track was shocked. And therefore, the shock is very, very negatively impactful on us.
That's what we try to do here. We try to tell faculty, you could be anything you want to be. You could be a Democrat, Republican, Libertarian, whatever you choose. Then it does not give you the right to try to impress about students your leanings, in one way or the other. What does matter is when they watch you, what do they see?
And I often use this example, what three words which people use to describe you to others? That's a really powerful question. What three words would people use to describe you to others? You'd be shocked what people say to that. Some people's words are all very, very – describe the dailiness of life. Some people's words describe their soul, they don't describe just their actions and so on. And so, you learn a lot about people.
But at the end of the day, I do think that ambition is one word for it. Execution is another word for it. Desire to give it your all is another word for it. But Jesus gave his life on the cross so that you and I could live and whatever you and I give, Jordan, is minuscule and minute.
One reason I love to walk on the beach, we have a home on the beach on an island very few people live so it's a private island, so you could walk on that beach five or six miles and not see anybody. And one reason I so appreciate that is because I'll stop occasionally. And then look at the humongous ocean before me and the substantial amount of sand beneath me and around me, and I realized what a spec I am, just about the time you think you're really hot stuff because you got a title or because some people think that you have more power than they do. We all have to take a recess to reassess.
Who are we really, why are we here? What is the purpose of my life? And how can I bring value through whatever God has given me to others. That's why I tell to all my students, every day, remember to thank God for the one thing that's being given free to you, it's called oxygen. Just start with that. Just thank God for oxygen, without which you can’t breathe and you can’t survive. When was the last time you thank God for oxygen? I gave everybody a little clicker. I call it the no whining clicker.
I say, “When you catch yourself whining about food, or weather, or somebody who said something to hurt you. We’re so now, so taken by all this ‘micro aggressions’ and all that.” I said, “Grow up already. You know who you are, and deal with it and be strong.” And so, when you whine, we're going to click you. And here's why: Whining is the opposite of thanksgiving.
So, in my view, you cannot have a depth of faith and be a whiner. That just doesn't work. Because thanksgiving is what faith gives you, is what allows you to understand how small you are, and yet how God has allowed you to do some big things. And for that, and for all the love you receive, and all the people who love you, and even the people who sometimes just put up with you. We have to be very, very thankful. We preach here what thanksgiving is about. It's got nothing to do with turkey and dressing. It has everything to do with pilgrims, who get on their knees, and thank God Almighty for the first harvest.
And so, what is your harvest? What is your turning point? What are the turning points in your life that gave you harvest? How thankful are you for them? How are you multiplying those in the lives of others? What are you doing in your church and in your community? And so on.
I think, people who believe that and who live that are joyful and joyous people. They're not perturbed too much by a pandemic, or by a recession, or even by an election that you may or may not like. They just rise above it because they have joy in their heart. Years ago, in the youth group, I used to say, “Joy stands for Jesus, others, yourself.” So, you put Jesus first, you’ll have joy in your life. And so, those are such simple lessons, these are. And that's really, that's what the Christian faith is. It’s a very simple faith. It's not very complicated. That's where you can come to Christ with a very simple prayer of just accepting our Lord and Savior.
[00:47:49] JR: But takes years to unpack it, right?
[00:47:49] NQ: Yeah, it doesn't. You don't have to have a lot of theology to be a Christian.
[00:47:54] JR: So, three final questions that we wrap up every interview with, real quick. Number one, I'm curious which books you tend to recommend or gift most frequently to others, and you can't say your own books. You got to come up with somebody else's.
[00:48:08] NQ: Well, I would never say my own book. And of course, the Bible would be number one, but I assume that that is the most common answer you get.
[00:48:18] JR: Yeah, probably.
[00:48:18] NQ: I give people a lot of books, and part, because a lot of authors are friends of mine, and they send me books. And I read the book and I pass it on unless it's autographed for me, then I keep it, put in our library at High Point University. I like books on leadership. So, I like John Maxwell, for example. A good buddy of mine. Zig Ziglar was a very good buddy of mine. These are Christian men and I trust the writings. When you recommend a book, you have to be very careful. Either you read the book very thoughtfully yourself, or you have to at least trust the person who wrote the book. Otherwise, you could be without meaning to a false prophet, without realizing that you are misleading somebody. So, I give books on leadership. I give books on communication. I give books on excellence and I give, of course, Christian books.
[00:49:14] JR: Hey, who would you most like to hear talk about their faith intersecting with their work maybe on this podcast?
[00:49:21] NQ: Because my background was mostly in business. I love to hear business leaders talk about their faith. So, anybody who's a CEO, I'll give you an example of someone you may not know. Kelly King is the Chairman CEO of a company called Truist. Truist is the merger of equals of two companies, one was called BB&T. One was called SunTrust. So, Truist got 60,000 employees. It's a $450 billion in assets company/ I happen to serve on the Board of Truist and have served for the last 30 years. Kelly King is a born-again Christian. He is a fascinating person. He is very, very successful in business. He is very, very significant in his testimony. And so, I love hearing Kelly speak about his faith. And so, that would certainly be one that would be terrific to think about.
[00:50:35] JR: I love that answer. So, one final piece of advice you want to give this audience, this audience of Christ followers who just want to do great work for God's glory and the good of others? What do you want to leave them with?
[00:50:45] NQ: Well, I would say that always remember, that focus is more important than intelligence. So, you tend to get out of life what you put into life, and you tend to put into life that which we're focused on. So, one must have a degree of clarity about their focus.
So, faith alone, is a great source of strength, but it may not be enough. You have to activate your faith. You have to actualize your faith. You can't be a Sunday morning, Christian. You've got to be a 24/7, Christian. I would say one should take time to evaluate and sometimes even negotiate what one's focus is. The reason I say this, because knowledge does not equal understanding. So, you could read the Bible 10 times, and you could be a scholar. That does not necessarily follow that you understand what’s Christianity is all about. And it takes a lot of feeding of the Spirit for someone to truly begin to understand. I'm still a student of understanding.
You can read all the all the books you want, and you can listen to all the sermons you want, but understanding implies that you execute on that in your life. And it is tough to execute on your faith daily when life beats you up sometimes with something pretty big, like your spouse having cancer or you losing a child or something like that. That's when the real test of understanding comes forth.
So, that's why I say focus, hopefully can lead to understanding not just through knowledge about your faith or about your life or about your relationships or about your business or any of those things.
[00:52:38] JR: That's good. Dr. Qubein, I just want to commend you for the exceptional work you're doing. Thank you for creating a university culture that serves students really well. And thank you for joining us here today.
Hey, if you want to learn more about Dr. Qubein, you can find him easily at nidoqubein.com. That link will be right here in the show notes. Dr. Qubein, thanks again for joining us.
[00:53:01] NQ: You’re very welcome. And High Point University, all you got to do is just put highpoint.edu.
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[00:53:13] JR: I hope you guys enjoyed that episode. By the way, if you haven't heard the episode with Jenna Fortier, the High Point student who built an incredibly successful nonprofit while she was in high school and college and now works with me, go check it out. Go find that episode from Jenna Fortier. Hey, if you enjoyed this episode, make sure you subscribe to the Call to Mastery so you never miss an episode in the future. If you're already subscribed, take a second and go review the podcast. Thank you guys so much for listening this week. I'll see you next time.
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