Things I’ve Learned From Howard

I usually get two questions that I can bank on being asked throughout my day.

The first one is, “What do you do at Compass?” The answer: “Depends on the day.” The second question is, “What’s it like to work with your father-in-law (Howard Dayton)?” The answer: “Depends on the day.”

I’m actually totally kidding about the answer to the second question. I have had a great time working with Howard and have gleaned some incredible leadership traits from him that I’ll be sharing today. He doesn’t know I’m doing this and will probably be incredibly embarrassed. Oh well!

1. Howard first and foremost loves the Lord. I’m not sure I know anyone who is so disciplined and consistent in spending time in God’s word. Almost everything he does—he is human—flows out of his relationship with Christ. People are usually drawn to Howard for a number of reasons, but whatever the reason is, he always points them to the Lord rather than himself.
2. Howard’s priority is people. I was sitting with Howard coming back from a flight after meeting with Dave Ramsey and his team. He had his calendar open—paper of course—and on the left side of his calendar was a section labeled “Tasks.” I would normally consider a task list as stuff to get done, but under Howard’s task list was a list of people’s names. People he was praying for, people he wanted to encourage, people to follow up with, etc. It was all about people. I don’t think I’ll ever forget that.
3. Commitment to Core Values. With Howard’s leading and encouragement, our team consistently reads through and shares our Core Values as a team. They are rich and deep and can be found on www.compass1.org in the About section. Howard lives these core values.
4. Humility. He may be the most genuinely humble person I know. If you’ve met Howard, you know this.
5. Life Transformation. Howard is all about life transformation. His desire is to see people experience the Lord in an incredibly intimate way. He would rather have one person go through a Compass study and experience radical transformation than 100 people go through it and have a “good” experience.

There are probably many more of these that I could share, but I want to make sure Howard doesn’t get a big head (would hate to have to cross humility off the list). I believe I can speak for our whole team in saying that we are blessed by Howard and his leadership qualities.

God Bless,

Kyle Hasbrouck, Chief Content Officer

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