Authored by Janice Giannini.

When the stay at home orders came out last year, many of my friends and I were lamenting the:

• Need to Zoom into every activity
• Disruption to our lives, work, home life, social life, and fun activities
• Lack of human contact
• Uncertainty about the length of time we had to wait it out.

Hand in hand with thinking this is the worst thing that has happened to us was the question what do we do now? Suddenly there was more time on our hands to fill, use or invest in something. Clearly, we were not doing school at home with children. So what was that something to be?

Recently, I realized that I had received the gift of extra uncommitted time (lack of driving, traveling, etc.). I read. I invested in several online courses. I devoured almost 40 additional books last year because I had the time and attention to read.

What did I read?

In the past, I never found the time to understand the rational case for the Christian faith. I had read that the Bible is the world’s best-selling and most widely distributed book. Recent estimates suggest that as many as 5 billion copies have been purchased during the last 100 years.

So I went on a journey to understand why the Bible? And to develop a limited understanding of the comparison of Christianity to other religions.

The author, Charles Martin, wrote a book about the Bible titled, What If It’s True? That started me thinking.

As I look at the troubled times in which we live, the challenges we face in business, leadership, and society in general, the following thought occurred to me. If, indeed, there is a reason there are 5 billion+ copies of the Bible out there–what IF?

What if we applied the simplest tenets to business and leadership? What might be the difference in how we operate and the results we achieve?

What if–

• Our default position was to try to understand others’ points of view first, before judging or trying to convince them our way is the right way?
• We committed ourselves to be the first person to say I’m sorry we got off on the wrong foot. Let’s try this again?

Could it be easier to envision and realize the following?

• Implement greater Diversity and Inclusivity
• Demonstrate greater respect for all people
• Develop greater trust among executives, employees, clients, and shareholders
• Build sustainable solutions for the business versus focusing too much on short-term goals and Wall Street pressures

So, what do you think?

Is it worth some of your time to ponder as well?