President’s Message – Latest Scoop 2025 Issue 1

Sand versus rock – which makes the better foundation? The obvious answer is rock because it does not shift or change. This principle holds true for all types of building, whether literal or figurative. Building a house on rock is superior to building a house on sand, just like building leadership – and your life – on a solid foundation  is superior to building on shifting sand.

So, how do we know if we are building our leadership on rock or sand? Consider this analogy…

When constructing a building or road, a strong foundation is required to make the project last for generations. A geotechnical (aka soils) engineer will test the stability and compaction to determine if the ground is solid by gathering specific information about the soil type, design and anticipated load/weight of the structure, and make a determination about the soil density, moisture content, etc. required to hold it.

None of these important facets can be ignored. If the soils engineer were to decide to use a different method of testing – say, using a carbon monoxide detector from their house instead of a nuclear density gauge – the results could be horribly misleading. The building or roadway is at high risk of failure because they did not use the correct standard from the person who designed the process to ensure the structure would hold up to the tests of time, storms, and wear. There are tried and true ways to determine the necessary information to build a safe, lasting structure. Striking out to reinvent the wheel or to use your own subjective truth does not work.

Truth is the firm foundation needed for all areas of life, not just the standards for construction like this analogy exemplifies. This is true when it comes to leadership as well. We need to understand:

• Who we are
• Why we are here
• What matters after we are gone.

If we only look within ourselves to answer these questions, we will be no more effective than a soils technician who attempts to use their own method to determine soil compaction with a CO detector! To the extent we think deeply about our responses to these important questions, we will have a foundation upon which to build effective leadership of ourselves, others, and the projects on which we work.

I cannot answer those three questions for you; however, I can tell you what I share with every new team member that joins Brubacher:

God created you with a unique purpose in life. It is our responsibility to ensure we don’t cut short your opportunity to discover and live out that purpose because we took a shortcut on safety and tried to save a dollar here or a minute there!

There’s a parable in the Bible about a wise man building his house on the rock and a foolish man building his house on the sand that illustrates this same principle. Truth matters, whether you are building a house, a bridge, a career, a leadership strategy, or your life.