J. N. N. Ng’ang’a – Meditations for the week of 15th – 21st October 2011 - Corporate Ethical Commitments – Part Three

J. N. N. Ng’ang’a – Meditations for the week of 15th – 21st October 2011 Corporate Ethical Commitments – Part Three Day 1 Deuteronomy 24:15 Pay him his wages each day before sunset, because he is poor and is counting on it. Otherwise he may cry to the LORD against you, and you will be guilty of sin. Paying reasonable wages Continuing with the issue of ethical organization paying reasonable wages, we agreed minimum wages covers even un-skilled labour. There doesn’t seem to be a clear definition of skilled and un-skilled employees. I assume if anybody is trained, then that person is described as skilled. So when an Ayah is a form four graduate, and she has never been trained, (except looking after her own younger brother, she has never looked after anybody else’s child), is she skilled or not skilled? If one is trained, in what type of school, what type of certification? Was the place they were trained recognized by Department of Industrial Training (DIT)? If somebody has worked for you for six months, does that make them trained? If skilled there is a salary for city, and there is salary for rural. The Kenyan newspaper simply told us the new minimum wage is eight thousand shillings. However we clearly know the fact that the minimum wage does not include house allowance. So you can’t start deducing from it all the food she ate, or the housing. The salary is for somebody you are employing for the first time. If somebody has done a year in your place, there must be an increment, isn’t it? So that one should not be paying just the minimum because minimum means the person is now beginning to work. It is my prayer and hope that even as you think about the people you employ you will seek to treat them with integrity however unskilled they are. When it comes to minimum, then it is easy….the figure has been given by the Government. But most employees are above this. When you employ a graduate from the University of Nairobi, what is the minimum that a person of integrity, an employer of integrity should pay? I recently was talking about careers in petroleum industry, to one person who left the university recently and wants to join the oil industry. He asked me …. What is the reasonable beginning salary for somebody working for a petroleum company? Knowing that I have worked in oil industry for many years, he thought I could answer. I told him I had no answer at all. Now there are about fifty seven oil companies in Kenya, most of the oil companies do not even have one percent market share. The top 3 take something like sixty percent of the whole market. All the other fifty five are sharing the difference. Some of them have zero point zero one % of the markets. They cannot exist on their own, if it were not for government’s involvement, because the government is the one that has facilitated them to be there, to encourage competition. So what that means is you can be called distribution manager whose market share is zero point zero two, and the other one is called distribution manager of a company with 30% market share. Can your salaries compare? In fact even the CEO of this small one cannot earn the salary of even a sales rep of the bigger one. So there is no such a thing as an oil industry salary. You cannot say I am being paid little. What are the standards? My recommendation is check which industry you belong to because you are competing for manpower in that industry. Then within that competition, what’s a reasonable salary for what size of market share? If you don’t pay a reasonable salary and people have similar skills, they will leave you for the competitor, isn’t it? So if really you are a good employer you must ensure you pay at the industry rate. You do what is called salary survey within the industry and so you can talk about reasonable salary across board, within industry. And of course we used Government as the minimum payer hence the private sector had better pay higher. But now the Government salaries have gone so high that many people are now leaving private sector to join Government. So you no longer can say because you work for private sector you necessarily earn more than government. So reasonable salary levels is not a very a easy subject to deal with any more. What I also have discovered is that everybody believes they are badly paid. I have never met someone, who admitted he was well paid. That’s why, in order to be ethical, you need to check, what the going rate within your industry is, then make sure you are not below it. Day 2 Malachi 3:5 “So I will come near to you for judgment. I will be quick to testify against sorcerers, adulterers and perjurers, against those who defraud laborers of their wages, who oppress the widows and the fatherless, and deprive aliens of justice, but do not fear me,” When I became distribution manager at the beginning of 1990s, one of fresh graduates from Christian unions which I frequented said, ‘I am desperate for a job. I feel terrible that I still have to get pocket money from my parents’. I said, ‘there isn’t a vacancy for a graduate but I do know that in our Nairobi depot, we are requiring somebody to help us with filing. But given that you are a graduate, that’s not really a job for you. He responded, ‘no, no, Brother Ng’ang’a please help me. Anything that can stop me relying on other people’s pocket money, I am willing to do. I asked, ‘are you sure? Do you know the filing job; even a form four is too educated? The tasks are to take invoices, you put them in a file, and you lock it. It is something simple. You don’t have to have been to high school’. His argument was ‘the money we are going to pay me as a casual was bigger than the salary the government was paying some teachers’. So he went to the depot and started working. He is a Christian, he is a graduate, even the depot manager is happy that he is doing a good job. But you know what? As soon as he arrived he found somebody from his university who had now gotten a job earlier to fill a vacancy as a marketing rep. And sales people are given cars because you can’t work in the job without a car. For them the car is called a tool of trade. So as soon as you are employed the company gives you a car on loan and of course you use your mileage to pay back. And then the salary is of course not double, but triple or four times what this guy is earning. And you were in the same class. They are now working together. Remember he is in the office filing. This sales rep comes saying, there is a customer who has missed a document, can you get it for me? The clerk wonders, how do I get orders from my former classmate. And remember this person, may not be cleverer than him. One day, the young man doing clerical duties rings me and tells me, “Mr. Ng’ang’a how are you? People here are telling me that they can’t believe that Ng’ang’a, a Christian, could have employed me, a graduate in the type of job that I am doing’. So I said, ‘and what are you telling them?’ He is not saying I am underpaid, he is saying, people are saying he is under paid. How can a manager who is born again surely put you in such a job. His reply, “You know to be honest, this type of job is not for graduate By the way this job was not the problem, it was the salary, it is so little, the money I am earning is so little, I can understand what they are saying’ . I asked him, ‘young man, what do you think is the appropriate value of that job? Employers don’t pay qualifications of people, they pay for tasks done. In other words you don’t look at a person and say, you worth twenty thousand, but you are only worth two thousand. The normal procedure for this is called job evaluation.HR will study the task and its complexity in order to agree the type of manpower you require and its competencies. There is a system in HR to do job evaluation so that you arrive at a certain value and given that value, that’s how you set the salary level. Salaries are gauged on complexities of the job. So you don’t pay a person, you pay the job he is doing. So that even if you have a PhD, if you do messenger work, what you get there is a salary for messenger. You will not get the salary of a professor when you are doing the job of the messenger because it is not a person paid; it is a job that he is doing that is paid. So I asked the boy, do you want a donation from your employer? If you are doing a job whose value is x, do you want the company to donate to you additional money? Are you begging? Be honest. What exactly do you want? It is true the sales rep is earning a lot of money but then his job is meeting senior people and negotiating with them. The complexity of the job deserves what he is getting. Do you remember what we agreed when you came to my office? I told you this is not a job for you. And you told me you still wanted to do it. I gave you the job but also allowed you to resign without notice as soon as you found a better job. That the day you will have a better job, please don’t report to the depot…I will explain to the depot manager myself. So why are you now complaining? If you found a better alternative, why would you be there?’ I allowed him to choose whether to leave or stay Day 3 Matthew 20:8-10 8 “When evening came, the owner of the vineyard said to his foreman, ‘Call the workers and pay them their wages, beginning with the last ones hired and going on to the first.’9 “The workers who were hired about the eleventh hour came and each received a denarius. 10 So when those came who were hired first, they expected to receive more. But each one of them also received a denarius I initially thought the issue of employing over qualified staff on low job was a small matter. Another time we were in a management meeting and one of the others managers brought up the issue. I think the matter had gone up the grape vine… that Ng’ang’a was employing graduates to do very junior jobs. Actually all I had employed were casuals since permanent staff was employed by the HR for the various departments, so the issue came up in management about why it is bad to give a job to somebody overqualified. I told them. “I am very clear in my mind. This is a person who needs pocket money. He is literally idle at home totally unable to secure any job. Do I refuse him this casual job just because he is over qualified? How can you punish somebody for being educated? The man can do the job in question to the employer’s satisfaction, and he will not be paid any more than the less educated competitor for the job. I am not giving him a long term job; it is just a contract for his pocket money as he continues job hunting. So why should I refuse him the job just because he is overqualified?’ Some people however felt that it may be seen as exploiting the youth and any way they may even fail to perform well because they are not motivated by the same money that would motivate another less qualified. We debated the matter until finally a decision was taken… let’s not take people in jobs where they are over qualified. In my heart I didn’t quite agree with it but that’s what finally was agreed and I followed it thereafter. The fear people have is that if you give a job requiring a form four, to a graduate, he will come and do it, but within 2 months will be dissatisfied, he may even end up stealing from you. So please leave it for the form four. You can see it is a complicated debate, isn’t it? But it comes from that misunderstanding of thinking that you are being paid a salary for your qualification. It is the job you do being paid. So it is the task you do that determines your salary. So even if you are very qualified, and the vacancy available at that time is this lower one, and you willingly apply, you are interviewed and you are even found overqualified but you are given the job, do you think they will give you more money because of your qualifications? Secondly, note that your first class honors degree will not lead to faster promotions. Certificates help you to enter, what happens after that depends on performance. You just keep saying, ‘you know I have an MBA. I am the only person in this department with an MBA’. Your MBA is totally irrelevant after joining the organization. It only did its job of helping you enter. Remember there were a B.com and an MBA in the interview. You entered because you had an MBA and the other one had only got a B. Com. Once you are inside, it is performance that counts. That’s one of the things I found very interesting as a manager. I evaluated the people who came to work in my division. I know this guy has first class honours, he had a pass but did very well in the interview. Both of them were employed. Within no time we note the guy with first class honours cannot produce results as shown by his score card. There are things clearly that are measured by a score card. So in the first year the pass degree holder is on gets twenty percent salary increase, the other one gets only what we call cost of living increase. e.g. 5%. So already within the first year, the salaries are different by fifteen percent. And he had a pass and you hade first class honours. Except HR who has the file, even your boss might not know how well you did in school. They might never need to see the certificates, so they look at the way you perform, not aware you had an MBA when you entered. Thus you need to know that at entry the certificate is important, what happens after that is depends on how you perform. … I am saying all this to communicate that I understand the commitment to pay reasonable wages is important but complicated. But we were saying that an ethical employer will not pay employees less than he should. Day 4 Ecclesiastes 4:9 Two are better than one, because they have a good return for their work: An organization that is ethical will seek synergies to impact the broader society We next want to say that an employer, an organization, that is ethical will seek synergies to impact the broader society. You may not influence the whole nation not to operate unethically but you can at least aim to impact your competitors, in your industry? In other words, it is not enough for you to be an organization of integrity; you must be committed to use available opportunities to influence the rest of your type of industry to be ethical, responsible citizens of the country. So you should look for synergy, ways of working with others in your industry, to impact the whole industry. There are areas you must compete, but there are other areas where if you work with others in a similar area, you are likely to help industry. We are saying, work with rather than against others in your sector to benefit society. For example, we currently have fifty seven oil companies in Kenya, who really have cut throat competition, really outdoing each other but there are areas they have agreed to work together. That’s why they have Petroleum Institute of East Africa, where they have agreed to come together for common good to themselves and society. Like the time when there was the Sachangwan petroleum tanker fire that killed over 100, they all contributed money into a kitty to put adverts on the T V to educate “wananchi” about oil tanker accidents. And that way they were working together to help the country without necessarily gaining as for business. We are saying that if you have integrity, you will be that type of a person who is going to help organize them to do well. If you are in a neighborhood and they are trying to create a security system so that everybody can benefit, you will not be that person who refuses to pay your contributions because you are looking for ways of working together with others in the neighborhood, together with others in the society to create benefit for society. Similarly, if you find an organization where the industry is working together in order to benefit society and it says, “me I don’t have that kind of money, I am not going to be involved.” It will not be regarded as an organization of integrity. Day 5 James 5:4 Look! The wages you failed to pay the workmen who mowed your fields are crying out against you. The cries of the harvesters have reached the ears of the Lord Almighty Develop employees and grow their competence Next, an organization with integrity develops employees and grows their competence. In other words employer regards employees as stakeholders who must fully benefit from the business. So you think in terms of giving them not just a salary, but also that because they work in the organization, each is left a better person than the way they came in. I left campus in the seventies. East Africa Industries, which is currently called Unilever had a commitment, to develop marketing professional for the East Africa market. They used to come to university to identify possible employees. I was told they would employ more than required employees, with the assumption that after two years, they would have gone through a training program, and could leave and work for other companies who did not have a training program. This was an impressive CSR project from the biggest consumer goods company. They offered me the 1st job interview after campus. When we went for the interview they told us, we will take about twenty of you, but only five of you will be remain here after two years. That means after we give you training, some of you should look for a job somewhere else. I don’t know how many organizations do that kind of thing, where you are totally committed to developing people and you measure your success as an organization by how well you have helped people. After ten years with you they are much more competent to do bigger jobs or to start bigger organizations .The country will be the richer because of an increase in experienced business professionals. If you have integrity, you will not want somebody to go out of your employment after five years to do the same job they could have done when they entered. Just as a point of digression, recently I have given a series on men. One Sunday I was talking to them about man as a husband and the next I was talking to them about man as a leader. I was telling them that one of the critical things about man old enough to marry, is the fact that he is given a girl to marry who is at the age of may be twenty five, so that by the time the girl is thirty five, ten years later, he must ask himself, what major has he made to that girl? Okay the shape may have changed with the birth of children from a figure eight, to near drum shape, but that is not the progression I am talking about. I was telling them, if you truly are a responsible man, that woman in ten years must be a better woman. There are things she can do she could not before. So the commitment of a man is to develop that girl until even her mother cannot recognize her because of the better person she has progressed to be. If she came to you and she could not cook ugali properly, you could even take her for a course. When she visits her mother’s home, she makes ugali, and mother says, what happened? When you were in my house, your ugali, used to be like soil. What happened? What have you done to develop the person who reports to you from what they were to what they are? Many, many marriages, Believe in PHD— “Pull Her Down”….as soon as you marry you start going down. One woman came to speak to me afterwards, and asked, so what do you do with a husband who is a blocker, not allowing you to move upwards. In Kenya because of men being blockers, most women who become anything big, are not married. Am I right? You just go to who is who in Kenya, you might not hear of a husband. They used to have but they have dumped them. Because it sounds like for a Kenyan man, for a woman to progress, they must dump the man. There is no other way they will ever go forward. This is not a biblical world view. God created a man to help the woman to rise. Similarly God makes you an entrepreneur so that you benefit those who work for you. So what we are saying is, even for an organization, there must be a commitment to develop staff, the salary is not enough. I still remember somebody about twenty years ago who came to me for advice. He had a job with a small organization which was paying more money, there was also opportunity in Kenya Power & Lighting and it was paying less. Where should he go? I told him I wouldn’t have any difficulty knowing where to go. You go to Kenya Power & Lighting because the have a manpower development program. For the first two years, they have a training programme for engineers. If you go to this small one, you will be a manager from day one. That’s why they are paying you more money to cover your supervision tasks. But in the process there will be no development, you have reached your end. Can you imagine what you will be after two years of training, moving from department to department? If I were you I would go to Kenya Power & Lighting. Twenty years later, he is one of the senior managers in Kenya Power & Lighting. Kenya Power & Lighting is committed to developing its own manpower. So what we are saying is, an organization with integrity, may not do it as Kenya Power & Lighting, but there must be something they do to develop staff. It may include but not limited to paying school fees for MBA. It may be you create a programme where somebody begins this job, then does it for two years, then they are moved elsewhere for two years, and then moved to another place for two years. Even if they are not getting any promotion, their skills and CV is getting richer, isn’t it? So that’s what we are saying. I keep encouraging young men, every three years ask for opportunities for growth transfer even if no promotion chances are available. Look for opportunity to do something that is more difficult, because having done something for three years; you know how to do it. If you go to the other one, although the salary is exactly the same, it will develop your muscle. So by the time you actually move upward, you are very skilled. So I am not talking about necessarily being taken for a course. I am talking about creating opportunity for staff to gain competences, not just degrees, not certificates but competences so that at the end one can say, I can do this, I can do that. Developing employees and growing their competence should be a commitment of any man of integrity. Why? The better they are the better the organization will be. A few of them may still leave you but those who remain will be the richer. Number two, a few of them will leave but you will not miss them because even the ones below were already developed. This is the dividing line between an organization that has integrity and an organization without integrity, which just exploits staff. Day 6 Exodus 20 12 “Honor your father and your mother, so that you may live long in the land the Lord your God is giving you. Respect the dignity of the individual and the right of employees to freedom of association. Any organization that feels because they have employed you they can make personal life decisions for you has no integrity. The supervisors says, I saw you interested in that girl, can’t you see that’s not your type?’ Remember, you are just my employer, you don’t decide whom I marry. That is what cults do. So you must give staff independence. Any organization that becomes cultic is not an organization of integrity because God created every man with capacity to decide for him/her self. So as a supervisor, when I talk to you, I should not talk like I can order you because I am the boss. I can make a suggestion but I must give you the freedom to refuse it, especially when it is an area outside work. When it comes to your job description, you must certainly work as agreed with your boss. Other matters, an organization must be very careful about them. That’s why for example you cannot have activities every weekend. That way making sure your female staff cannot get a boyfriend outside the organization. You need to be allowed time here and time out so that you have the freedom, as to who you associate with. But of course there is a bigger issue of whether we are talking about preventing employees from joining trade unions. But more importantly an organization of integrity does not control the mind of its employees. But the truth is, if you are in a good organization, chances are if you have an issue that is disturbing you, you are likely to ask your boss, or you will ask somebody older within the organization for advice. But it is your choice, not a command. In the nineteen seventies there was something called the pyramid practiced by very radical Christian's. The pyramid is meant as a discipleship process in the Christian circles. It meant that every born again person must have what was called a cover. God does not deal with you directly. You know Catholicism can come in many forms, and this sounds like it but among Pentecostals. You could not do anything without your cover giving you permission. The way it became a pyramid is because at a lower level you have more people. You start in a fellowship with their leader as their cover. The fellowship leaders also have a cover, and their covers also have covers …., until you have a ‘pope’. That’s why it is a pyramid shape. Some groups agreed to sell tier houses and live a community at Karen in Nairobi. Finally the thing could not work and they lost their money. They had to begin again from scratch financially. Any organization, even a church, where the leader is determining your thoughts is not one with integrity. Since even the leader is fallen creature why does he think others cannot be right to correct him from wrong. It is a very risky thing. That’s one of the greatest marks of a cult, a leader in control. I normally tell young people, when you go to church and you hear a pastor keep saying, ‘my church, my church’, ask yourself, what am I doing in his church? Because the only church you should join is the church of Jesus Christ. So if it is his church, he is not wrong in controlling you. It is you who is wrong in joining him. Why did you go to someone with personal property? You saw on TV how even a big church like the crystal Cathedral; can go down under a family leadership, with others seeming unable to help. The famous reformed church seems to have been bought by a Catholic Church. A Muslim could have bought it since the bank just needed money. Bankrupt megachurch Crystal Cathedral in Garden Grove, Calif. is changing faith traditions. The Roman Catholic Dioceses of Orange is purchasing the church’s 40-acre property with its towering glass building for $57.5 million in a deal approved by a bankruptcy court judge Thursday. The megachurch, founded by television evangelist Robert H. Schuller in 1955, filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy in October last year to restructure its staggering debt. The founder’s son, Robert A. Schuller, took over the church until he was forced out, in part, by family members who reportedly disagreed with Schuller’s leadership. The younger Schuller, now chairman of FamilyNet media company, had the highest salary at the church when it went bankrupt at $196,478, the Orange County Register reported. The current congregants of Crystal Cathedral will have to find a new place of worship though dozens attended the six-hour hearing pleading to call off a sale of the property[1] Can you imagine that is the work of sixty years of the old man who founded it and is still alive? He was great blessing to millions around the world. What do you think went wrong? I guess it is the organizational structure and philosophy, not the message they sent out. You need to understand that when we are talking about an organization where one man is so revered he can control individuals, chances of withstanding challenges are reduced. We are saying that the organization must respect the dignity of the individual. That’s why there needs to be a contract that clearly states what is it the organization expects from the staff , and what the staff expect of the employer. Outside that, you must give people freedom to be themselves. They have a right to decide who to associate with outside the organization. An employee is not a slave but a willing stakeholder. He came willingly and can also leave willingly. He is not your son. Even for family structure, a son needs freedom to think if he is mature. I was telling fathers in the church, any father with a grown up son that he continues to control, he is a father outside God’s way because God does not expect grown up children to be controlled by their parents. Nowhere does the scripture say that a grown up son should obey his father. Yes the bible says even grown up children honour their fathers, but children are told to obey. By the time you become an employee, you are an adult, because according to the laws of this country, children are not allowed to be employees. So neither as a father nor as a boss are you allowed to control an adult. You must allow him to be independent. I used to work in Kisumu, and my wife was teaching in a high school, A-level economics. One of the other teachers said he knew me. She said, how? I said he was in the leadership of the CU at college in Nairobi where I was speaker frequently. But now he was not a Christian as far my wife could see. He explained that, after graduation, when he arrived home, he discovered the parents had already organized whom he was to marry, and the parents were not Christians. Remember he was a serious brother in the C.U (Christian Union) . So he told my wife, what could I do? This girl is not a Christian but is the one that my mother has told me to marry, so I obeyed. But the girl does not even want to go to church, so we no longer go to church. Now he started blaming it all on obeying the parents. This is really lack of biblical teaching, isn’t it? He was following tribal traditions, not Christianity. Like my mother died in her eighties, I am about sixty, in the African traditions; I am still supposed to obey her. But that’s not the bible. The bible teaches after, the age of twenty, a child is held accountable for all his decisions. Below the age of twenty, a child is not held accountable. How do I know? When people crossed the Red Sea and saw the mighty works of God, and then in the wilderness, some of them disobeyed, God held children innocent. Remember all of them disobeyed, but only the ones who were above twenty were held accountable. How could God do such miracles for them and they disobey? As a punishment none of the adults would reach Canaan except Joshua and Caleb. But anybody who was nineteen and a half or below when they crossed the Red Sea was allowed to go to Canaan. As long as you are a child, below twenty, you are supposed to obey your parents. So when your parents tell you to disobey, they are held accountable. But when you are above twenty, if your parents tell you to disobey, and you follow them, God ignores them and punishes you. You made up your own mind after listening to them. What my adult daughter does, she takes responsibility. I am just a consultant to her. At times she follows my advice, but sometimes she does the opposite thing. I accept it because I know I am not supposed to have power over her after she has become a grown up. But many fathers don’t accept it because we were born by parents who never allowed us to become adults. So we are parents who are not allowing others to mature. We want to think for them. But please check the scriptures. When the New Testament talks about parents being obeyed, it addresses it to children. If it had removed the word children and say, people obey your parents, then even at 60 you must only do what your parents tell you. However, even at the age of sixties and my mother in the eighties, I am not allowed to dishonour her because at whatever age, however old your parents are, you must never dishonour them. So sometimes they will tell you something and you disagree with them. The way you disagree will determine whether you are honouring them. You don’t tell them, ‘that’s nonsense mum’. How can you say that? That is not the way to talk to somebody you honour, isn’t it? You might have, like Nathan talking to king David, have to approach the issue from far. But you say it in such an honourable manner that the parents are happy with you although you said no. That’s what we are talking about. We are not suggesting that you should not listen to your boss but he should give you the freedom to disagree with him honorably. Allow individuals to be individuals. Also an employer must not take over the management of employees outside the job description or the work policy manual. And the manual itself must not say things it should not be saying. Respect the individual dignity of each employee. That means that if he wants to join a trade union you should not stop him. However if you are treating him well and he trusts you he might choose not to belong to one. Day 7 James 5:4 Look! The wages you failed to pay the workmen who mowed your fields are crying out against you. The cries of the harvesters have reached the ears of the Lord Almighty Partner and outsource services from organizations that uphold the same ethical values and practices as the corporate The first time I heard the word outsourcing corruption, it was from Christian CEO. He said many big corporate organizations cannot be caught with any corruption because they never do it. All the activities that require any corruption are outsourced. For example clearing and forwarding, you don’t do it because you cannot get anything from the port without corruption. You employ a guy whom you know will do whatever is necessary to clear your imports. When you are asked, are you corrupt? No, never, check my accounts. But you know that the quotation of the clearing and forwarding agent included money to bribe. That’s why you did not give the lowest bid; you gave somebody you know can do the job properly. How do you do the job properly? -By paying bribes. That is called outsourcing corruption. Because although you are not the one giving the bribe, you are the one paying the briber, isn’t it? This is a very difficult issue. You must not only be a person of integrity but you must also not work with a person who has no integrity. If he is openly corrupt, and you contract him, then you also corrupt. He even comes and tells you, “Mombasa I have no difficulties clearing goods . If you are ever caught by the police, just talk to me. I deal with the very top’. How does he deal with the top? What does he actually do to deal with the top? He must be using something to influence them. And that’s the guy you are giving work? That is called outsourcing corruption. In other words you are the one who is corrupt, it is only you have given the job to another person to be corrupt on your own behalf. You cannot call yourself a person of integrity when you know very well the people you are paying are using your money to do corrupt things. However, after saying that, there are people that you are dealing with who may be corrupt, and you are not aware. Not even that, it is possible your own employee is corrupt. That’s why we must also talk about personal integrity rather than, organizational integrity. It is possible you can have organizational integrity without individual integrity. So it is possible for an organization to do its best to have integrity yet some employees or agents don’t have integrity. Although in a court of law the organization is held guilty, it is being held responsible for things the employees are doing that they have no means of finding out. But we are saying, you must investigate your staff and agents to discourage corruption. Like being in charge of operations I had a lot of contractors. So we actually created clauses where if you entered into a contract with us, you gave permission to audit you, so that I can find out how you run your own things. We go and check your books, check how you do your own things in order to be sure what you do will not make us responsible for evil things. So it is an issue that one needs to think about. You go to Gikomba low price market and you find an item which in town it is costing twenty thousand shillings, but costing only one thousand in Gikomba. You don’t ask yourself, how come you can buy the same item at one thousand shillings? Might he have stolen so that he can sell it at a thousand shillings? But my brother instead you buy and you come back saying, the Lord blessed me. It is true, you have bought it cheaply, but you need to ask yourself, might there be a possibility that things are being stolen in town, being sold in Gikomba and you are enjoying the cheap price. You are buying something from somebody who is not paying tax. You cannot claim to have integrity without paying a true cost of your supplies. It will reduce your profits but according to God’s word, when you live a life of integrity, you are assured of his blessings. And so the choice is, do you want to get money at any cost or do you want the blessings of God? So we must do due diligence of business partners to ensure they do not become corrupt on our behalf. Associate with people who have similar values even if it will cost your business more. Past meditations: www.johnnganga.org

J. N. N. Ng’ang’a – Meditations for the week of 8th - 14th October 2012 - Corporate Ethical Commitments – Part Two

J. N. N. Ng’ang’a – Meditations for the week of 8th - 14th October 2012 Corporate Ethical Commitments – Part Two Day 1 2 Thessalonians 2:13 [Stand Firm] But we ought always to thank God for you, brothers loved by the Lord, because from the beginning God chose you to be saved through the sanctifying work of the Spirit and through belief in the truth I hope, as we go on with this discussion, it is helping your worldview to change because the very purpose is not just to show you the issues we are discussing, but for you to start reviewing: why do I believe what I believe? Remember right at the beginning we said, behaviour is determined by attitude and attitude is determined by belief .We said when you see somebody behaving in a certain way, check the reason behind this in his attitude. When you have identified what attitude he has, find out what the belief behind the attitude is likely to be. The real thing that causes you to do what you do is beliefs. That if you think that people wearing white are covering up their sins, every time you see somebody in white, at the back of your mind you want to start investigating the sin they have done. It becomes part of your personality. And so my prayer and hope is actually as we discuss this, you learn to go beyond behaviour of for example accepting bribes and things like that, what makes you bribe or accept bribes. Thus I would really want to deal with belief system rather than just behaviour. Remember we are going through fifteen statements that an organization commits to follow before it can be described as an organization of integrity. We said such an organization will not only refuse to elicit for bribes, it will also not accept them and it will not even pay for them. Day 2 Matt 22 17 Tell us then, what is your opinion? Is it right to pay taxes to Caesar or not?”18 But Jesus, knowing their evil intent, said, “You hypocrites, why are you trying to trap me? 19 Show me the coin used for paying the tax.” They brought him a denarius, 20 and he asked them, “Whose portrait is this? And whose inscription?”21 “Caesar’s,” they replied. Then he said to them, “Give to Caesar what is Caesar’s, and to God what is God’s.”22 When they heard this, they were amazed. So they left him and went away. Commits to pay all taxes We now begin with the statement that an organization with integrity pays taxes. If you are a Christian, Jesus already said, give to Caesar what is Caesar’s. Unfortunately it is not you to determine what Caesar needs from you. Remember Caesar or your government is the one who determines, what tax the citizens or residents are to pay. Thus it means that if you really want to influence taxes, you must elect in the next elections parliamentarians who are not going to just keep increasing their salaries rather than development projects that increase national wealth, and therefore you have to keep paying higher taxes. Government, you know, can’t charge tax unless parliament approves. So all taxes that we are having, our own representatives are the ones who determined them. So you as a citizen can only influence it at that level. Get representatives in parliament who cannot approve bad taxes. Once the taxes are decided, then you have no alternative than to pay. My consultancy is young and new, and recently when doing my initial tax returns for Taruma Consultancy ltd, my tax advisor said, I can’t see VAT in your accounts. But I argued it is too small to be paying VAT. But he told me, that’s not the law. The law says, every consultancy firm must pay VAT. Why? There is not supposed to be any reason, the law just says it. You have no basis to argue for non-payment. So I have since then been paying. Many of us look for ways of justifying non-payment of some. So when you find an organization that is trying to justify not paying taxes, that organization must be seen as an organization that has no integrity. But I am going a little further than that. I am saying if you really are a person of integrity, owning a company of integrity, you will be willing to contribute to societal cost. You have driven on a tarmac road. You never built it. Somebody somewhere paid a tax that financed the road. So why should I want to enjoy being on that road and I am not contributing to its construction? You know that when security becomes a big issue, most neighbors organize their neighborhood security at their own cost. Do you know there are people there in that community who refuse to pay and yet enjoy the improved security? But what embarrasses me is when even religious leaders avoid contributing to community costs. The other day a bishop in the community refused to pay, and I heard them finding out what to do with him. Somebody is guarding you every night, and others are contributing and you are not contributing. You are societal parasite. That’s what you are. A societal parasite. The same thing with an organization, where others pay tax but you enjoy whatever the community has and you don’t want to contribute. So I wanted to emphasize that you cannot call yourself an organization of integrity, even if for example you are giving to the poor, and yet you are not paying taxes. In o0ne country in Africa when the presidency change and a hence new commissioner was appointed to take over the Revenue Authority, taxes moved from about two hundred billion, to over seven hundred billion within a few years. The GDP had grown at an average of only five percent. So GDP has grown by thirty percent, but taxes had grown by more than three hundred percent. What does that tell you? The taxes increase was not from the GDP increase, but taxes recovery from people who were not paying taxes before. Are you getting my logic? That if it is increase tax from growth in income, then the growth in taxes should grow at the same rate with the growth in income. The fact that you can see multiplying total tax many times tells you even with the small GDP before; they were not collecting taxes adequately. This means it is also possible that when we change the government, the taxes will come down, if the government has no integrity. The basic thing where they are getting the increased taxes is that when a businessman refuses to pay tax, earlier he had a place to appeal but with a new president he will be returned back to the Revenue authority. So the next time you realize there is nowhere to appeal, what do you do? You pay your tax. Of course they have also introduced ETR machines so that every sale has a tax receipt and hence the revenue authority does not rely on the business to tell the truth. If it was in earlier government, the ETR would never have taken off. Instead of saying it is the ETR we don’t want; you start saying it is the supply procurement system that you do not agree with. But the problem is not the supplier; it is that we don’t want ETR to stop us cheating on taxes. Government must create a system that forces us to honor paying of taxes. Day 3 Romans 13:6 This is also why you pay taxes, for the authorities are God’s servants, who give their full time to governing However the best thing is if people have integrity and chose to pay taxes. Even after taxes have grown, there are still people who have ways of avoiding taxes. Such an organization cannot claim to have integrity. The RA will never employ enough people to catch everybody. I believe they use probability. When everybody has made their returns, if they suspect you they do a thorough investigation. I don’t think the number of files they have they can go through all files. If you are not caught in that probability system, you can still continue cheating without anybody knowing. What I am saying is if you are of integrity, it is you that will volunteer the tax and not wait to be caught. You will declare the right tax voluntarily. I think you do this for three reasons. Number one, because you believe you don’t want to be a societal parasite, so you don’t want to enjoy things you are not paying for. Number two; because you know in many things government is helping the less fortunate from the taxes of the rich. The only way they can do that is for those with money to give so that the money can be used to help those without money. You are committed to a society that has distribution of wealth. So that when you pay tax, you are actually participating in your own way in helping to raise the wealth. Thirdly, you have a commitment to helping to improve society. Are you aware that if people have money, they don’t steal meager things? If you are assured you have food, then you might not steal bananas, although you might steal bigger things. So when you have improved the economy by paying taxes and of course also assume parliament will help in the distribution of wealth, and so the levels of income improve, people still steal but they don’t do petty crimes. You don’t put you underwear outside your house and fear somebody is gong to disappear with it. They go for big things, not small things like that. So in your paying of taxes is helping to make your neighborhood secure. The most dangerous thing you can have is to be rich in a community of poor people. Do you know what I am talking about? There is no way you will enjoy your food. So as you pay your tax, it is a way of ensuring you give yourself protection. As a point of digression, one of the things I am committed to is evangelism. I know that if and I do not invest in evangelism and if my neighbor doesn’t get saved, he will soon be the person who is harassing me. If he gets saved, that ceases. The same thing with the taxes. In as long as you are paying the tax and the tax is well distributed, you can start enjoying your remaining wealth. When you go buying a plot in an open place because normally they are the cheapest, you take a risk. If you go buy ten acres and then cut them into quarter acres. At that point if you go to buy it, it will go for twelve thousand or thirteen thousand. This is attractive because the next place which is already occupied, the thing is going for half a million. Here it is going twelve thousand. So you run and buy. You have no idea who will be your neighbor. if the wrong people start coming, you are better off selling the plot. So who is in the neighborhood matters? You must work to help your neighbors to be equally well to do. ……. So paying taxes is a way of distributing wealth. And it is not just for the benefit of the poor, it is also for the benefit of the rich. Of course I am being careful with my words because I know you can pay your tax but it ends up paying MPs salaries. That’s not the kind of thing I am talking about. I am talking about MPs who care. Most people really feel pain paying taxes and so to me this is one of the important measures of integrity. They look for every means possible not to pay tax. Haven’t you ever seen when it reaches the deadline for tax returns everybody will be going because all of us want to pay the last minute? You need to come and ask yourself, is tax a bad thing? And I am saying no. we have seen first of all it is biblical… you are told to pay. But also we have seen, it is a good thing. So I would rather that you have the attitude: I am proud to pay taxes. I am willing. In fact the words I am using here is, I am willing to contribute to societal costs. When I realized paying tax is not a bad thing, it really relieved me because I now have no problem with the issue of paying taxes. When it is just your salary it is deducted before you get your salary anyway. When you start investing in this and that, you have to decide whether to declare or not to declare your extra income… that’s when the temptation not to pay starts. My attitude is that, when God gives me twenty thousand, part of this money must help society. Then you do not think you own twenty thousand, you say you have two thirds of it. That’s a concept you need to have in your mind because if you have that concept, paying taxes will never bother you. The same thing with a company. If a company makes a profit of a million, you don’t start saying, I made a million. You must always think about your money as net profit after tax. And if that enters into your mind, paying TAXES will never bother you. If I get the letter informing me they employer has increased my salary of one thousand shillings, I feel very proud. Only to discover in my bank six hundred shillings only had put there... Initially you feel, this is theft. How can I get an increase of a thousand and the government takes four hundred? What kind of people are they? I am giving my personal testimony when I started working. I felt like it is terrible …. I am even planning what to be doing with one thousand. Just to discover, salary has just increased with six hundred per month. Until I realized, it is for my benefit as part of Kenya, it is in obedience to the scriptures. I should never think of my income as mine alone. It is our income together with society. I think if an organization leadership is thinking at that level, they will never be expecting more than profit net of tax. It will be net profit after tax. And of course income tax is not the only tax. There is VAT, and all kind of taxes that the government wants you to pay. I think one needs to be sure they are all paid. Day 4 Malachi 3:5 “So I will come near to you for judgment. I will be quick to testify against sorcerers, adulterers and perjurers, against those who defraud laborers of their wages, who oppress the widows and the fatherless, and deprive aliens of justice, but do not fear me,” says the LORD Almighty. Pay reasonable salaries and wages The next requirement if you are a company that has integrity, is that you pay reasonable salary and wages to all who work for the organization. This is dynamite. What do you mean? If you are an employer and are an employee, are we likely to agree on this one? No. It is impossible to agree what is reasonable. The word is not paying high taxes; the word is pay reasonable taxes. If you have a house assistant, a reasonable tax has already been determined by the government as minimum salary. It is not you to determine what is reasonable. It means if you are paying your house assistant less, you are a thief. For obvious reasons you are not the one who was left to determine it. That’s why I told you this is one of the toughest topics. Remember, if your salary is only twelve thousand and you are paying her eight thousand….tell me what sense that makes. It doesn’t look sensible, isn’t it? But then the point is, the key word is reasonable, reasonable is not as determined by employer and reasonable is not as determined by employee. Reasonable means reasonable to an independent man on the street. Are we together? I am in several Christian boards; I keep saying this is an impossible topic to them. I don’t recommend we as the board determine what is reasonable. I always say we must do a salary survey. What do organizations that are similar to ours, actually pay? For example if you are working for Barclays, they can’t pay far less compared to Standard without being said to be unreasonable…Because they are in the same industry. So they must do a survey among banks of a similar level on what is being paid. By the way every bank is trying to pay as little as possible, so already the method already has a problem. But they are also competing for the best talent, which is the theory behind salary survey. You are competing for labour in that area. So what are you willing to pay to get the best labour? That’s what helps you know what is reasonable. My recommendation is, do a salary survey, done not by a biased person, but an independent person who will get the facts as they are. A pension was looking at level of pension. Because the employer was contributing quite a bit in the pension scheme, he was really thinking that the pensions were too good. He kept saying, surely how can you get it this good? , I am also asking them about the kind of pensions they have in their countries. There is absolutely no comparison between the kind of pensions we pay in Africa and the kind of pensions they pay in Europe. In Europe you retire and you become a philanthropist because your pension is so good, you can also afford to travel all over the world. In Africa, even after you have a pension, you are still seeking to be an employee somewhere else. So the best thing is to do a survey. What I am trying to get you to see is, it is such a sensitive matter that almost any organization will have a problem. Day 5 Proverbs 11:17-19 17 A kind man benefits himself, but a cruel man brings trouble on himself.18 The wicked man earns deceptive wages, but he who sows righteousness reaps a sure reward.19 The truly righteous man attains life, but he who pursues evil goes to his death Please understand three things on wages. Number one, if you are paying unreasonably low wages, you have your employees for a short while because they are not likely to last for a long while... The minute they get an opportunity somewhere else, are they going to stay with you? No. So you have no stability with your employees when you don’t pay reasonable salaries. Number two, when you pay unreasonable salaries, you tempt your employees to steal. Because if people sit there thinking that their employer is a thief, you encourage them also to become thieves. I am not suggesting you should be paying high salaries, I am only saying you should be paying reasonable salaries. So that even if you move elsewhere to a similar organization, you are unlikely to earn much more than an additional ten percent, for example. Not double your salary for the similar job, in similar sector. If you feel reasonably well paid and you still steal,) because some such people still steal), you feel guilty. But when you feel like you are being underpaid, you feel tempted to steal. But thirdly, when you don’t pay reasonable salaries, you attract incompetent staff and in the process you don’t get high level of productivity. When you see people so happy to stay with you and they can’t go elsewhere and you are paying them so little, chances are even if they try to get a job elsewhere, they can’t get it. So you are happy your employees don’t run away from you, but the reason they stay with you is because they themselves are incompetent. So your productivity is affected. So it is not in your interest not to pay reasonable salaries. … Fourthly the reason why you must pay reasonable salaries is because integrity requires you to. You cannot be a person of integrity and then you still don’t pay reasonable salaries. So do not pay below government suggested wages. That’s one of the ways of measuring if salary is reasonable .When the minimum wage was set, was it inclusive of benefits? It is minimum, and you still must give housing. In other words, you have the alternative of either going to rent a house for the house assistant or giving her or him a room in our own house. So giving her a room in your place is not a benefit to be charged to her. Opinions on this are many. If wrong you will still be prosecuted in court despite your opinion. And number two, however unfair it is to you as an employer, you will still be prosecuted. So what does the law say? The word minimum, does it mean you subtract from the minimum any food she eats? Follow the law not the opinion. The other thing I want to emphasize is that salary law is not necessarily fair. Because if you started being fair, you have to compare her circumstance with employer circumstance and the other employee’s circumstance. Since parliament does not do that, it just makes one fair to the majority but it is might not be fair to some people. It tries to be but it isn’t necessarily fair to everyone. Anyway, all I am saying is, do not pay below government wages, and be within your sector salary levels. In other words you don’t call yourself unreasonable when banks are paying a certain salary you can’t afford if your organization is not in the banking sector. So salaries differ from sector to sector. So when we talk about reasonable it must be within a certain sector. For example you can imagine a house where we have no children…. compared with when my three children were young, it is a world of difference. We all go in the morning, the whole day the house assistant has nothing to do. Should you then pay her less? From the time our children became grown ups, whenever we take someone, we sponsor them to a school to do a course during the idle time. So should we be paying her less? After all, the fact that she can go to a full day school tells you she is not working. You must pay above minimum wages. Surely, when profit gets less, isn’t it reasonable that we start paying less than the minimum salary because clearly money is not coming in. So you must deal with the matter both as employees and employers. You can be calling yourself, as having no corruption, you don’t accept bribes, yet you are underpaying your staff. You are not a person of integrity. Even if you never take bribes, as long as you are not paying reasonable wages, you are not an organization of integrity. Day 6 Romans 13 Submission to the Authorities 13 Everyone must submit himself to the governing authorities, for there is no authority except that which God has established. The authorities that exist have been established by God. Obey government, authorities In another way, follow the law. You cannot be a person of integrity if there is a law which you are not obeying. Sometimes I consult as a petroleum expert. And recently we were in School of Monetary Studies where we were studying what changes the government wants to make to the Petroleum Act and the petroleum rules. And some of the rules they are coming up with are going to be pretty tough on the operators in the oil industry. But once passed you can’t decide you will not follow them. For example they are saying, nobody will become a transport contractor unless he has gone through a process to be pre- qualified. Oil companies might not want to do that. They go for the contractor who charges you cheapest. But the government argues no. With all petroleum fires we have had on the road, we want transporters who can manage transport safely, who must have certain amount of training. Thus it will be very easy to put the rules; to enforce it will be very difficult. They are also saying that no driver will drive a petroleum tanker unless he has driven other types of vehicles for ten years, previously, after he has gone through training on how to handle petroleum products... Easy to say that, enforcing will be very difficult. However unreasonable the government authorities are, you do not error at the side of disobedience. As long as the law is not interfering with your spiritual beliefs, with your worship of God, (obviously that’s not an area they are supposed to legislate), you obey. If everybody starts becoming the one who determines what is right and what is wrong, what is right to you may not be right to me, and we will end up in confusion. Also an organization of integrity will never need to fear being audited externally, being checked by the government. There is nothing they are doing knowingly that is breaking any government law or other government authority’s requirements. Of course you can be breaking it without realizing. Like my thinking that if your consultancy is just a small one, you don’t pay VAT...Yes, there are issues that may happen but not knowingly. That is why it is important that an organization seeks legal advice to ensure the way they are operating in whichever country, they are obeying the laws of that country. An organization of integrity goes out of its way to study the laws so that they know exactly what they are required to do. The same way I went to an tax expert who advised me. Day 7 Leviticus 25:35 “‘If one of your countrymen becomes poor and is unable to support himself among you, help him as you would an alien or a temporary resident, so he can continue to live among you Give back to society by remembering the less fortunate You need to select areas in society where you feel you would like to help. This way you are involved voluntarily in giving beyond the taxes. This is called CSR. But one of the problems I have had with CSR is the fact that they give for the cameras, isn’t it? I am even told after they have given that large cheque, some of them the cheque never is never cashed. The same thing is repeated every often because what they are after is the camera. It sounds really criminal. They do it so that the community can see them as a responsible member of society. If you are a person of integrity, you will not do it just for the camera. There is nothing wrong with the camera, but you will do it because you sincerely want to be a part of society that is disadvantaged. You need to see some changes within them. So how do you recognize an organization with integrity? It will want to be a good member of society by remembering the less fortunate. But it is again a difficult subject to deal with because unlike the minimum wage, there is no minimum figure. All we are talking about is, you are part of this society, and how are you helping the people in the society. In the bible the rich were to harvest leaving some for the poor neighbors. Similarly every organization is a corporate citizen with poor around them. Seek synergies to impact the broader society Then you must seek synergies to impact the broader society. What we are saying here is, work with rather than against others in your sector to benefit society. If you are talking about an organization that has integrity, it will not be so competitive against its competitors that it cannot discuss how as organizations they can work together to help their community. For example in petroleum industry, they formed something called petroleum institute, where all the oil companies come together to ask, what is it we are doing, as an industry, that is harming the environment, harming society? What can we do to stop it? So that some of the rules that are being changed currently under the new Petroleum Act are from discussions from oil companies. I know we are employing bad drivers; we need to find a way out of it. Of course one company cannot order the other, but we can discuss and ask government to enforce. Most industries now have what we call self regulation, where the group that is working in that particular sector come together to say, what should be our minimum standards? What standard is it we should not operate below? And if you are agreed, you help people. In other words you may compete on customers, but don’t compete by going below these standards. Let there be a minimum standard of operating in your industry so that the community benefits or is not hurt. But if you refuse to participate in such meetings, even if you are not in corruption, you still are not a person of integrity. The idea of organizations coming together to improve the offer to customers or to their clients by increasing the minimum standards is something you should be interested in. Thus you we are seeking synergies to impact the broader society. And synergy is what is the extra product of two people working together rather than working separately. Are you sure that competitive … real competitive people do not talk to each other? We are not suggesting you stop being competitive, but we are saying, outside competition, are there things that you can do together as an industry that helps to improve the industry. Develop employees and grow their competence In other words, a person of integrity in addition to paying reasonable salaries is interested in developing the staff. They are not just interested in the profits; they are interested in staff as stakeholders. If that house girl works with you, after three years, does she go back to be still a house girl? That’s what we are talking about. One of the things I can speak proudly about as a manager was my commitment, all my life as a manager, to see that whoever works under me, by the time I am no longer his manager, I would like to see him a better person. If you are not doing courses I say, why haven’t you thought about this? What are you doing so that you are not in this particular job forever? Whether I contribute in money, or just mentoring, when I see the person has done better, I feel that was the reward of being his manager. Develop employees and grow their competence. Regard employees as your stakeholders who must fully benefit from your business. Obviously that is true. If somebody’s competence improves, guess who is the first beneficiary? The employer. When you send him for a course and he discovers, a better way of doing something his productivity will improve. This is somebody who has worked for five years doing something in a wrong way. As a trainer, I know the employer paid my flight to Mombasa, paid my cost, if they start running their stock management the way they learnt it, who will benefit? The employer. But not just the employer, the individual employees. If they attend an interview in a bigger oil company, they will pass. So that by the employer paying me to train his staff, they develop the staff to be more marketable .which of course may look negative to the employer. But number two, it helps the person to start doing better in the organization immediately so that the company does not lose stock and any stock they will not lose, it will now be sold and bring an income to the company. Thus the employer also benefits. If you think training your staff is expensive, try ignorance. Of the two, find out which is more expensive to your organization. You must develop your employees and grow their competence because you will both benefit them and benefit you. It is our prayer that as we discuss these things, both as employees and employers, that we will know, what integrity requires and do it. What is it that God would want us to do in order to be a good organization and to act in a way that honors Him? We need wisdom and commitment to do it… Past meditations: www.johnnganga.org

MINISTERING AS A COUPLE

JOHN N.N. NG’ANG’A TEXT: ACTS 18:18-26 1. Why marry? · Companionship - no loneliness Gen 2:18 - no secrets · Give spiritual help - Ziporah / Moses Exodus 4:25 · Fulfil God’s call - Malachi 2:15 Mission statement for couple = sum total of the individuals Example - A Pastor who sees himself as called and his wife is not called. 2. Prerequisites · Christian couple · Mission statement - Sense of God’s call What is your mission in life? 3. Examples: · Adam & Eve - Genesis 1:28 Multiply and fill the earth One cannot and should not do it alone · Abraham & Sarah - Genesis 12:4-5 - Go to Canaan but not alone Leave wife and ministry affected = time lost enroute · Priscilla & Aquila - Acts 18: 24-26 Use home to teach (Appolos) 4. Benefits of ministering as a family · Biological Church growth · Avoid sin (dealing with opposite sex) · Synergy = higher output · Can reach all ages and sex · Counselling of youth · Home based - Neighbourhood Bible study + Bible club + Literature(Library), etc. QUESTIONS FOR DISCUSSION 1. Difficulties that make ministering together a burden 2. Solutions to the difficulties 3. Example of beneficiaries from this type of ministry 4. Is the wife’s role only praying for the ministering husband? 5. What is the place of children in a ministering family? Reff website:http://johnnganga.org

Why THANKSGIVING TIME is important

Why THANKSGIVING TIME is important 1 Thess 5:16 Be joyful always; 17 pray continually; 18 give thanks in all circumstances, for this is God's will for you in Christ Jesus.niv Ps 136 136:1 Give thanks to the LORD, for he is good. His love endures for ever. 2 Give thanks to the God of gods. His love endures for ever. 3 Give thanks to the Lord of lords: His love endures for ever. 4 to him who alone does great wonders, His love endures for ever. 5 who by his understanding made the heavens, His love endures for ever. 6 who spread out the earth upon the waters, His love endures for ever. 7 who made the great lights-- His love endures for ever. 8 the sun to govern the day, His love endures for ever. 9 the moon and stars to govern the night; His love endures for ever. 10 to him who struck down the firstborn of Egypt His love endures for ever. 11 and brought Israel out from among them His love endures for ever. 12 with a mighty hand and outstretched arm; His love endures for ever. 13 to him who divided the Red Sea asunder His love endures for ever. 14 and brought Israel through the midst of it, His love endures for ever. 15 but swept Pharaoh and his army into the Red Sea; His love endures for ever. 16 to him who led his people through the desert, His love endures for ever. 17 who struck down great kings, His love endures for ever. 18 and killed mighty kings-- His love endures for ever. 19 Sihon king of the Amorites His love endures for ever. 20 and Og king of Bashan-- His love endures for ever. 21 and gave their land as an inheritance, His love endures for ever. 22 an inheritance to his servant Israel; His love endures for ever. 23 to the One who remembered us in our low estate His love endures for ever. 24 and freed us from our enemies, His love endures for ever. 25 and who gives food to every creature. His love endures for ever. 26 Give thanks to the God of heaven. His love endures for ever. Thanks means · Gratitude · Recognition · Credit · Merit · Appreciation Benefits of thankfulness · Basis of friendship. o any relationship(deteriorate if one taken for granted) · Will attract business, shareholders, suppliers, motivated staff, government support · Thankfulness when things are bad forces you to see something good in the bad and have hope to work harder o may be …5 complements should prepare for 1 negative criticism o count your blessings not curses and it will surprise you… Appreciation bounces back to you You normally GET WHAT YOU LOOK FOR ..LOOK FOR THE GOOD AND YOU WILL GET IT · Thanks yield repeat performance ..Subordinates do what is appreciated · Thanks even for negative criticism will yield honest feed back that can help you improve your self · Helps you have positive attitude..that saves you doctors bills fake thanks backfires Basis for thankfulness · Appreciate the true you o –strength and weaknesses o -your need of others why some people are not thankful · World revolves round you/pride/seniority · When served –just usual since you expect/deserve it God · Thanks to God is basis of thanks to God since cannot doubt he deserves it story of sick banker who did not see where God comes JOHN N N NG’ANG’A Ref webiste: http://johnnganga.org