Ron Johnson (CEO of Enjoy)

Today's episode will begin in three minutes. But first I want to tell you about something crazy I'm doing for my new book, five Mere Christians. I've never seen an author do this before, but I'm giving a money back guarantee on this book. I'm so confident you're gonna love this book that if I'm wrong, if you pre order the book, you don't love it, I'm gonna send you a $20Amazon gift card as a money back guarantee. Why? Two reasons. One, this is a different book for me, right. I know this is a very different biography. What is Jordan Rayner doing? And I know it's risky, so I'm going to de risk it for you. Because listen, in my other books, Redeeming youg Time, the Sacredness of Secular Work, Master of One, etc, etc, I am telling you and me how we can glorify God in our work, but in five Mere Christians, I'm doing something very different. I'm showing you what that looks like practically through these unforgettable life stories of five Mere Christians from history. These are the top men and women that I would love to have on this podcast today if, you know, they weren't dead, right? So that's the first reason this is a risk and I'm gonna de risk this book for you. Here's the second reason. I'm just confident you're gonna love this book. My friend Mark Batterson said, quote, five Mere Christians proves that biographies can be extremely entertaining, profoundly helpful, and mercifully short. If you're looking for a book that combines the punch of a great sermon with the pace of a great thriller, this is it. Highly recommended. End quote. But here's the thing. In order to qualify for this money back guarantee, you got to do two things. Step one, pre order five Mere Christians in any format, hardback, ebook, audiobook, whatever. And then step two, go to 5merechristians.com and fill out the form on that page and that's it. But you got to do it by midnight Eastern Time on May 9. By filling out that form, you'll also get all of the pre order bonuses listed on 5 mereChristians. Calm and be entered to win this crazy, epic trip for two to Europe. So visit 5meerchristians.com right now to sign up. Now, please enjoy today's episode. Hey everybody. Welcome to the Mere Christians podcast.

Hi, I'm Jordan Raynor.

How does the Gospel influence the work of mere Christians? Not those of us who are pastors or religious professionals, but those of us who Work as civil engineers and janitors and teachers. That's the question we explore every week. And today I'm posing it to Ron Johnson, the man who Steve Jobs called.

Up and asked to create the Apple Store.

Ron served as VP of Retail Reporting to Jobs from 2000 to 2011. Before that, he was responsible for turning Target into Target.

And today he's running a great company called Enjoy.

This innovative retail concept that brings the store through your front door and into your living room. Ron and I had a terrific conversation about how he and the team at Apple quote, made love visual through the Apple Store. We talked about his final conversation with Steve Jobs while Jobs was on his deathbed talking about eternity and faith. And we talked about why Ron chose to start at the bottom of the career ladder when as a Harvard graduate he had every opportunity to not to. I think you guys are going to.

Love this terrific conversation with Ron Johnson. Ron Johnson, welcome to the podcast.

Jordan, thanks for inviting me. It's nice to be with you today.

Yeah. So you started your career at Target back in 1985, transformed this brand into this, into Target, right? This more luxury experience, which by the way, where in the world did this Target thing come up?

I did not transform Target into Target. There were a lot of people, I just, I had a small impact on it, but I was there during the time people kind of affectionately called Target Tarjay. It's kind of when we go Back to the 70s and 80s, discount stores were kind of these moderate environments. Think of a Walmart store today, they all look the same. Yeah, they weren't really beautiful place to shop, but there are a lot of well to do people who would go to the department store, but they wanted to shop at a discount store to save money, especially kids. And as Target started to elevate its in store presentation, its merchandise, a lot of people found it really Pride kind of was fun to say I got this at Target.

I remember my mom. This is the deal growing up, right? We went to Target like right down the road from where we lived.

Yeah, it was a wink, wink, it's okay to shop here. But that really helped. If you look today, you know, Target's got a clearly cut up position as the upscale discount store. And Walmart is the store for most other folks. Not it's not downscale, it's just, you know, you always want to carve a niche. And Target's got a beautiful position in the market, as does Walmart, but that's kind of where it came from. It really came from customers.

Yeah. Yeah, which is the best place for it to come from. So you spent 15 years at Target and then you got the call to join Steve Jobs at Apple in 1999. What was the essence of that pitch? For you to come to Apple?

Yeah, Steve had concluded. Remember Steve founded Apple with Woz, left the company and Apple went through a rough patch in the 90s. He came back in 97, I believe the board finally brought him back and Apple had 30 days of cash and they created the imac which became this wonderful product. But it had like any consumer electronics product a couple year run and then that's sort of fading. And he looked at Apple and he said, you know, we're kind of a cult brand and one of our weaknesses is how we go to market. At that time, Best Buy wouldn't carry Apple products because they weren't popular enough. So Apple was the biggest store to buy Apple. It was Sears or CompUSA. So Steve wanted to open his own stores. So somehow he called me to say, would you like to come think about opening stores for Apple? And we began that conversation. And for me it was a point in my career where I'd done pretty well, grown a lot. I'd been in retail for 15 years, but I was locked into one function at Target, which was merchandising. And I loved being a merchant. I was okay at it actually. Pretty good at it, I guess. And. But I always wanted to do the whole store because the story we haven't talked about. When I came out of Harvard Business School, I went to unload trucks at a company owned by Target Corporation, which was called Mervyn's on the West Coast. And that had the biggest, that year probably had the biggest impact on my career, if anything. And my faith, by the way, parked.

There for a minute. What happened in that year?

Well, what happened is I had been at Harvard Business School, one of these elite environments. I had Stanford, Harvard, the typical. I was a middle class kid from Edina, Minnesota, went to public high school, got into Stanford, met all these pretty well to do people, got into Harvard Business School, did that. But then I made the decision not to go to Wall Street. I had this offer in Goldman's M and A group. But I said, you know, I'm making a decision for a lifetime. I love people, I love leading, I love, for some reason, I love retailing. And I said, now I'm going to pick a career I could do for a lifetime. So I said, if I'm making a lifetime decision, it's kind of like an eternal decision. Not quite as long, but at that time it felt like it start at the bottom. So I left Harvard Business School and I went to Hispanic store in Glendale, California. Largely Hispanic employee population in unloaded trucks. And I did that for the first probably three months. And then they promoted me to the sales for I got to straighten merchandise and eventually I got to check people out, get to use the cash register. But I'm a Harvard Business School student working with minimum wage employees. I wasn't paid, so I was paid a little more, but not a lot more. Just learning retail. But what I mean by transformative is the people I met in that job, they became my family. And I played on softball teams with them, went to the park on the weekends, dressed up for Halloween, celebrated all the birthdays with their family. Because it turns out that people that aren't trying to so focused on making a living, they're living a life. And that's what I found. I found such joy in the people I worked with in that retail store that you realize kind of what life is about. A lot of people there were people of faith. And, you know, so then I thought, wow, you know, what I see in this is love. I see love through these employees. And then throughout my career, what I've tried to do is make love visual through work. And that's the thread that kind of probably ties my career together more than anything. But that to me is when I think of the Bible, if there's one word to describe it, it's love. Right? Yeah. So how do you do that?

Through work?

And so that was kind of the impact from that first job out of Harvard Business School, if that's all right.

So this is fascinating. Did you grow up in the church or was this your first encounter with Christianity?

No, no, no. I grew up in a. Remember back in the. I grew up. I was born in 58.

Yeah.

Grew up in the 60s. Most people back then, yeah. Went to church or would say they go to church, you know. And we went to a big Lutheran church in Minneapolis. It had 17,000 members at that time, was huge. But they had the seven minute sermon and the great youth programs and a big camp. So it was very popular because you didn't have to make a big commitment.

Right.

But it was a great church, my Olivet Lutheran Church. My mom was the nurse. She'd volunteer at camp, we'd go to camp. So I grew up in a very, very strong Christian family with just a loving environment. So I've always had a faith. I was present in my confirmation class I got to give my first speech, you know, to the whole confirmation class in church at age like 13. So yeah, so I've always had a faith. But in my 20s I don't think I walked in the church in Boston when I was at Harvard Business School. When I got back to California, I started to go to church. But it's pretty infrequent. Once a month I felt like I should go to church. But my faith wasn't a huge part of my life at that time. I always deep in my bones would say I'm a Christian but I was not practicing it any way, shape or form at that time. But it was such a knowing I had that deep inside of me. Being at the Mervyn store with these people, you saw love in action. And so I connected that to my faith even though I wasn't super active at that time. And I can tell you later when I got deep in my faith. But you can go whenever I'm talking too long. So go ahead. This is fascinating. Just keep talking.

I do want to go back. You touched on this term that I love and I've heard you say it in other interviews before, but this idea of making love visual and it sounds like that was part of the draw to leave Target and go to Apple. By the way, that wasn't an obvious choice.

I would imagine people thought I was absolutely crazy because Apple, this is 1999.

They had what, 5% of the computer market?

Maybe that was an exaggeration. It was probably closer to three. Yeah, yeah. Now. But on the other hand, if you take the auto industry, you know, BMW at the time had 5% share, you know, so you can make a nice business with low share. But that wasn't the now. People thought it was crazy because Target was just booming. The stock had gone up 12 times in the last decade. Really good position. But even more importantly, if I was going to leave Target, people goes the dot com revolution's happening. Why aren't you going to one of these?

Yeah, yeah.

Interesting, right? Why are you going to a money losing computer maker? Yeah, but so love visual, what does that mean? I think love is the essence of being a great Krishna. If you can practice love every day, I think you're honoring your faith. Very simple.

Yeah.

And I see love in so many things. I see love in beauty like nature.

Yeah.

You know, God created this beautiful world. We all know that. Most people on the call here I know are Christians. I see love in beautiful things. That's a visual experience. When I think of an Apple store, when I used to see the genius and the employee getting the customer getting help, and they're interacting, their heads close to each other across that bar and smiling. Aha. I understand. That's loving made visual. Right. A beautiful store is a creation. Right. That's love made visual. I look at the world as everything we do, everything that you see started in someone's imagination.

The first creation. Right, the first creation. Second creation. Stephen Covey framework.

Yeah, probably. So everything started in someone's imagination. I believe our imaginations are a gift from God. I believe I'm prompted most of the ideas I have. You always wonder, where did that come from? And so I view it that way. So I just view. Part of my job is to make love visual. That's through people, through customer experiences, through store environments, through everything I do. But that's the product of that very simple thought. How do you make love visual through a retail experience?

Yeah. I may be misremembering this, so correct me if I'm wrong, but I thought I heard you say that part of the strategy for the Apple Store. This is a pretty radical design concept. At the time, there were no big displays blocking your line of sight. It's a pretty open concept. And I think I remember you saying that was intentional. It's part of cultivating human connection.

Very simple. So we forget how quickly retail changes. But back in 2000, we opened the Apple Store. Target didn't even use corporate email. I didn't have an email account. Steve said, can I send you an email? I said, I don't have one.

This is amazing.

In the year 2000, no. Wi Fi wasn't named yet. The world was different. And there were PCs and Macs and the Internet was just kind of coming out. Amazon was a tiny company losing money. Yeah, yeah, yeah. I remember sitting down with Steve and I said, well, if we're going to do retail stores, the first big decision you have to make is where would you locate them and how big should they be? Right. And he said, okay, so how do we think about that? I said, well, do you want to advertise the stores? He said, no, no, I don't want to advertise. I want to advertise products. I said, great. Then we got to locate our stores in the middle of where people live their lives. The most popular place in town. And I said, because someone's not going to drive 10 miles to an Apple store, but they might walk 10ft in. He goes, okay, I buy that. I hate shopping malls, but I buy that. And so now we're going to put a computer store in a shopping mall which is really expensive and nobody did that back then for things that were bought once every three years. Think of an auto dealership. You're out at some remote parking lot where it's inexpensive because you'll go there when you need to buy a car, but you don't stop by every day. But the second thing, how big? And Steven joined the Gap board to learn about retail, which was kind of interesting. And I said, is the Apple brand as big as the Gap? He said, bigger. I said, well then why don't we build a store the same size as the Gap? He said, that sounds logical because if your store is too tiny, they'll think you don't have your tiny brand. People are very visual and emotional. So we agreed to do that. Well, a Gap store at the time was 6,000 square feet.

Yeah.

So then I said, well, Steve, how brings the product line? And we're literally sitting in a little conference room. He goes, well there it is on the wall, those four computers. And I looked and I said, so we can fix those on a 328 by 432 foot square table. Now our store is 3. 3 times 10 is 30. It's 300 times bigger than we need. What are we going to do? But that was actually the best decision because it allowed us to create a store that wasn't about the products, it was about the customer. So how do you create a place that people will want to belong, that they'll discover the brand, they'll launch a relationship with Apple through buying a product. They'll deepen a relationship through coming back. And we created all these experiences. Genius bars and theaters and kids tables and set of products like around what you're going to do with them like photography and movies and music. Because we had the luxury of space. Right. And so then when it came back to your question on design, why was it so uncluttered? Part we didn't have to clutter with all these products. There weren't many products, but the more big idea. I said, so the purpose of the store is to make love visual. To do that you've got to engage people. I want everyone walks in an Apple store to get their hands on a Mac and spend some time on a Mac. And I want them to connect with a human being, one of our great people. And I said the only way to do it, if you walk in, there's nothing else to do. Get your hands on a product or talk to a person. There's no place to hide. Right, yeah. And so you walk in the Apple Store, everyone was on computers. And what was unforeseen, but one of the big blessings is we had about typical store, 45 computers in the front of the store. Well, this was now the beginning of when people were getting into the Internet and buying computers. And so the Apple Store became a big free Internet cafe. If you go back to 2000 to 2005, there's no iPhone. So you're going to meet someone at the mall, you'd say, let's just meet at the Apple Store. I'll just get on the computer and check my email. Like you would do an Internet cafe for free and just come whenever you want. Because I couldn't text them on my phone or look at their location. There was no way to communicate that. People didn't carry cell phones back.

Right.

I mean, people did, but not Steve didn't carry a cell phone.

Interesting.

He runs Apple. He invented the iPhone. He never had a cell phone.

He never had a BlackBerry.

No. No BlackBerry? No. That's such a terrible interface. You know, I'm just kidding. But no. When we launched the iPhone, Steve. I have a meeting with Steve and his assistants. They won't make sure you have your phone ready. Steve might get a call.

Yeah.

You know, he did not think the products were good enough. And. But that's the world we're in. But so. But the Apple Store became this gathering place. It's an outcome of a fundamental faith based foundation in a person or people that designed the store. And that's this thing for your listeners.

Yeah.

We might think of bringing our faith to work as being an evangelist. I don't see it that way. I think it's practicing your faith through your vocation, through your interactions. How do you apply that to every decision you make? Yes, the outcome will be you've made the world a little better place. A place of love, of human connection, where people get help. You know, it's not. It's agape love, if you will. And that's how I look at it.

Yeah. So much of this faith at work conversation focuses solely or at least primarily on the instrumental value of our work.

Right.

I go to work in corporate America so that I could share the gospel of Jesus Christ. But what you're talking about is what I love so much. It's the intrinsic value. Right? No, the work in and of itself matters because it's a way to make love visual. So, Ron, for our listeners who don't design retail stores, who are carpenters or entrepreneurs building a software Product. How do they make love visual.

Oh, they do it. I can. I wish I could show you this video, Jordan. We built the Apple Store on fifth Avenue. That was a real. That. That is a architectural icon, you know. Yeah. In a city like New York, it's really hard for anything to stand out. The Statue of Liberty stands out. The Empire State Building used to stand out. The Apple Store stands out. And we did it in 32. A glass cube. 32ft high. A piece of glass. Right. That is the power of architecture. But that had to be constructed. Right. And I remember building that store. I would fly to New York at that time, probably once a month. It was easy to go in overnight, check on the store, fly back. I was there once a month with the teams and we had people from all over the world. And I remember there's this gentleman named Otto who assembled the glass stair in that store. And I remember we took a video. He just walked down. He was so proud that he had created that beautiful object of art which is really what a stairways in an Apple Store.

Yeah.

He's a construction assembler of specialist and glass fabric, not fabrication. It's assembly. But yeah. And we did this video and here I surprised part. Hi, I'm Otto from Munich, Germany, and I'm assembling the stair for the Apple Store. He was so proud. Right. And then the next one. I'm Mark from Staten island and I'm doing this. And there was such pride in their work. And that store became a place that everyone had to bring their families and friends to show them what they did through their work. Right. And you know, so I think we all bring our faith to work. And it's not just people like doctors who are saving lives. Most of your faith is through the little interactions every day.

Yeah.

With the people that come in your path. And.

Yeah.

And if you focus on every little interaction, the sum of the parts will be a good outcome. But it comes from just every little choice you make.

Yeah. We're so. In the west, we're so utilitarian minded. We're so. We're so purpose obsessed.

Right.

And thus we elevate the callings of doctors and attorneys, fighting sex trafficking and evangelists and all those are good things. It's all fixing the world. We got to remember that our God creates with both utility and totally purposeless beauty.

Right.

Like and that's enough. Ron, tell us about the company you co founded and are leading now. I've been a huge fan of Enjoy since near the beginning. For our listeners who don't know what is Enjoy.

Yeah. So we're, we're, it's very simple. I, I just like doing what I call the next thing, you know, hard things. You know, I love Target, helped make it Target Apple. How do you make Apple go from a cult to a club to a community to world's beloved brand? That was not an easy thing. I tried to turn on JCPenney. That's the long story. But that was a hard thing. And starting a company is a hard thing. But what we're trying to do is basically in the world that's going to the home, going online. You know, more and more people buying online, people working mobile. How do you bring the entire store through the door of someone's home? Because if you're a premium brand, you want engagement. And so in a world where people are just buying online, that's very transactional. Could you deliver the retail experience in the home? So Enjoy does that. We operate stores for Apple at&t in the United States, we're in the UK, Canada, and we're trying to figure out how to deliver a mobile retail experience. It's like everything I've done, it's really hard. We're in the middle of a rough patch. We're very short on cash. We're working through that and my faith has really helped me through it. That's what we're trying to do.

Yeah. And so give a little bit more concrete detail to the listener if you can, about how this works. So I'm sitting at home. By the way, Enjoy is a dream come true for parents with young kids. Right. So I'm sitting at home, I need a new iPhone instead of going to the Apple Store. How does Enjoy help me buy and start using that product at home?

Yeah, So a lot of people go online and maybe 30% of people today will just go online. They research, they buy online. Historically, they've had a choice. Ship it to me. Do I want it shipped fast and I might pay more for it to ship slow and it drops off. You hit that brown box at the door and you open up and you're on your own. Now with Omni Channel, I can pick it up in the store. I can pick it up in the store and get help. That's kind of nice. Well, wouldn't it be nice if I could choose in the cart? I want it delivered to me and have that help at my kitchen table. Yeah, that's what Enjoy lets you do. So when you're in the shopping cart, you'll pick an at home experience. It's free. And you'll pick the two hour time frame you want that in. And we'll have one of our trained full time experts who is going to make love visual at your kitchen table. But they will come through and provide a great experience for you. And we can do everything you can do in a store. You can buy additional products if you need accessories, we can activate your device, we can connected to your life, we can, you know, everything you do in a store, we do in the home. So it's a choice in the shopping cart if you're buying from AT&T or Apple. And it's becoming very popular.

Andy Crouch just published a really good book called the Life We're Looking for about how technology is making everything less personalized in the world and taking out the human interaction. You're a great example of fighting against that. And I got to imagine your faith shifting shapes the perspective of this a little bit. In this age of depersonalization, you're fostering human interaction throughout that retail experience. Are those two things connected for you? Your faith.

The way I look at it, and I didn't go to Apple because of this.

Yeah, sure.

But ultimately, as a Christian, you have to understand technology is going to be a part of the world.

Yes.

So we have to learn how do we use technology for good, how to use technology to help us become who God intended us to be. Right. And so I think if you're in the middle of that, you have a chance to have some impact on that. Right. So if we're in the home, we can do, you know, settings for parents. A lot of parents care about how much time their kids spend on technology, what websites they go to. Well, we can help with that. We can just teach them how to set the phone so the kids can't do the wrong stuff. You know, there's all kinds of things you do, but it is technology is here forever. We got to make sure it's a force for good. And right now it's got super big challenges. We all know that in so many ways. But I believe that over time good wins. So we all know there's evil in the world and there's love in the world and right now there's a lot of evil have an impact in technology. And we see that on websites, we see that in Twitter feeds, we see it in all kinds of ways. But I just believe love wins.

And as Christians we ought to be engaging in those dark places as a means of making light more visible. You mentioned Enjoy is currently in a tough cash Position. Hard season for the business. What's God teaching you in this season?

Well, it's amazing. So much. So much. You know, I read a lot, but one of the other things I do. Jordan, maybe everyone does this, but a lot of us have favorite passages in the Bible, and. Yeah, I've always loved the 23rd Psalm, for example.

Yeah.

But on my little you version app on the Bible, I get 38 versions of it.

Yeah.

So I like to read different versions because every translation has different words. But I was reading the 23rd Psalm, you know, lately, and that's become a couple of times a day. The Lord is my shepherd. I have everything I need. I like that so much better than I shall not want. But then it says, he gives me new strength. It doesn't say he restores my soul. Now, that's the translation. If I was reading he restores my soul, I'd kind of look at that. Well, I'm at peace. No, this translation, he gives me strength. Well, when you're in a rough patch and you're leading a team at work, you need resilience. Yeah. You got to get back up and figure out another way to win. So the 23rd Psalm. Reading a different version gives me strengths. Then it says, he guides me in the right paths as he has promised. All right, so I need a path here to navigate. And I told you before, it's serendipity. Where do ideas come from? I believe they come in part influenced by my faith. Now I'm getting guided in the right paths. Even if I go through the deepest darkness, that's what I'm going through at work. I will not be afraid, Lord, for you are with me. Right. And then finally, you prepare a banquet for me where all my enemies can see me. So it's not saying a banquet at a table somewhere. The idea is, you know, I've been a pretty visible guy. My pennies thing, that was a banquet. Everyone could see me, a lot of enemies, but you welcome me as an honor guest. So I'm now struggling, but I'm an honored guest in front of my enemies and fill my cup to the brain. Because goodness and love will be with me all my life and your house, my home, as long as I live. Well, look at how those words through that translation apply precisely to what I'm going through. Isn't that fascinating, too? I mean, to me, it's kind of fascinating. So beautiful. I just find when you. How does faith at work? It's. It's reading the Bible, it's using different translations. Whatever works for you. But I just find such obvious direct connection, guidance from my faith through everything I do. And I'm not just making that up. I mean, it's kind of. That's why I read that for you.

Yeah.

I hope you don't mind. No, this is terrific.

That was the best case study.

Yeah, yeah. It's like a case study. Just saying faith is real. It works.

Yeah.

And that's my sense.

I was talking with Mark Batterson about this. He has started reading a different version of the Bible cover to cover every year. So is it not to get wrote and switch it up? But I love what you're talking about. Same passage, lots of different versions at the same time to draw out the nuances of it. I really love that. It's a great example.

And, you know, I do that. You know, when it. What if I read a book? I'm always looking for one thought. Yeah, yeah. I learned this from Steve. Steve Jobs was such a great mentor and boss and friend and all that. And I remember he told me once, he says, ron, if you think about a problem hard enough, you'll be able to get to its essence in four words or less. You could understand any complex problem in four words or less. And so when we launched the iPad, it was a thousand songs in your pocket. Yeah, the phone. We're going to reinvent the phone, you know, because you got to get things down to their essence. Well, that's what a thought does. It's like the 23rd Psalm. I have all that I need. That thought I should carry with me every day of my life because I have been blessed. Right. But you're looking for little thoughts. And I think when you read a different version of the same thing, you're going to pick up a different thought. And that's really what I think influences us more than anything is these life changing thoughts.

It's good. You mentioned Steve was a great mentor. You left Apple the same month he died. What was the last conversation you guys had?

Yeah, it was in his. He lives. Well, his wife lives in the same house now, Lorraine. But I was over visiting him probably two weekends before he passed away. It wasn't like the last, last days. Yeah. But I was in his bedroom and we were having this wonderful conversation. I remember crawling into bed with him to give him a hug because he was pretty frail. And we just had this lovely conversation. You know, we talked about faith many times. You know, it was the most interesting thing. It was. Steve was a very. My guess is he was a super spiritual person. Right. And we know that there's the time when he was young, he went to India and spent a lot of time there and was exploring different types of things. And one time he was in Hawaii. He had discovered he had cancer. He was over there. While we were on the phone, he said, ron, you teach Sunday school, right? I said, yeah. He goes, tell me about your faith. And I kind of told him about it. He says, yeah. He goes, there probably is a God. He goes, I just haven't spent a lot of time. And I remember saying, well, for someone as smart as you are, Steve, who goes deep on everything, I would think you'd start thinking about eternal things. That's all I said. And he said, no, no, I, I don't disagree with that. And he didn't want to say much. Well, I get to the office the next day and I got this video he had sent me. He said, this is my favorite movie. And it was Brother Sun, Sister Moon. Have you ever heard of that?

No.

It's about Francis Assisi.

Yeah.

Now, isn't that kind of interesting? So Steve, super, out of the blue, sends me this movie that he had watched probably 30 years before about Francis Assisi. So you realize we're all on a spiritual journey and we're getting nudges. I'm sure Steve's nudge, part of it was in India, part of it was watching that movie. Part of it was this moment when he's got a health crisis. Right?

Yes.

He's one of those exceptionally rare founders. Obviously goes without saying whose work is going to outlive him for a very long time, it appears. I'm curious how his example of mentorship coupled with what you believe about eternity as a Christian, how does that shape how you think about the legacy of your work after you're gone?

Ron, Honestly, I don't think about legacy. I. I've become quite humble. I think I went through a real challenge with pride when I was young. When you go to Harvard Business School, we all want to be successful. You get confidence from being successful. And I had top of the world experiences leading the Apple Store as Apple executive team, but I went to Penney's and had a really hard time. And I realized in the world, if you're looking at how the world's going to look at you, you're gonna have ups and downs, and we all do. Right. But if you look at eternity, none of that matters. Right. So I, I just, I. I don't honestly think at all about legacy. I just think about every day. How can I be the best person I can be and who am I becoming? One of the blessings I have. I'm a good friend of John Ortberg's. You probably know John.

Yeah, yeah, sure.

And John's got a great new podcast. I'm on a board with Pat Gelsinger.

Yeah.

That night are on his board. But John went through a rough patch and he's now got a ministry. It's called Become Me New. No, Become New Me. He does a daily 12 minute little talk that now there's 5,100 followers and amazingly 2,000 watch it every day. That's pretty good attention.

Yeah.

It's like going to church every day and I do that every morning. But the reason I bring it up is all I care about is doing the little things every day to make life better. And oh yeah, I know I might because. Because of become. It's all about become new. Who are you becoming? You know, that's to me, sanctification. It's.

Yeah.

We're always trying to become a little better person and that's going to prepare us. So when we get to heaven, it's a place we really belong and we want to be.

Yeah.

Because you wouldn't want to be in heaven if you didn't want to be in a place like heaven is supposed to be. Right. So you got to kind of get ready for it. And so I honestly, Legacy, that's legacy's history. Right. I don't look back. We look forward. Right. It's always about next to the legacy. In the next life, it's the legacy. The next life. Honestly, legacy is not a deal for me.

Yeah, I love it. Ron, three questions we wrap up every conversation with. Number one, which books do you find yourself recommending or gifting most frequently to others? I know you mentioned the Churchill one. Never give in.

Yeah, I only read books that are. Have some spiritual connect. When I find myself reading just a novel, I feel like my soul's not being filled. Like I'm watching a TV show. But I think any book by Dallas Willard I'll give.

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Divine Conspiracy, Allure of Greatness, Renovation of the Heart. Those are awesome.

Yeah, well, as a Norberg fan, I expect that answer.

Yeah, but it is. But those books I read, I read Renovation of Heart like I read the Bible. I mean, yeah, I know which chapters I've got to read over. I probably read some of those chapters 50 times.

Yeah. Did I notice you say a couple seconds ago, TV feeds your soul? Because I've uttered those. Exactly.

No, no, No, I said the opposite. No. Okay. If I read a novel, you know, it's kind of. Sometimes it's just dark and you're reading it, it's like entertainment. You go to bed. When I read a book, like Churchill's book or Dallas's book, it's filling my soul, and it goes, you come alive. Yeah. Like if I watch a movie or a TV show, typically those things aren't feeding your soul.

Yeah.

They're entertainment. There's a good purpose for them. But I. I find myself. I want to go to bed. For me, my day starts the night before I go to bed early, but it's really. My day ends when I go to bed, is what I look at it. But.

Yeah.

So that's what I do for books. Next question.

I love it. Who do you want to hear in this podcast talking about how the gospel shapes the work they do in the world?

I think Tim. You're thinking of talking about Apple. Tim Cook would be kind of interesting.

Yeah.

I don't know where Tim is on that, but I think it'd be. I think we all want to hear from people that we recognize. That's where I'm not as good a guest as others you'll have, but someone you're familiar with, who you want to kind of understand what. How they think about that.

Yeah.

So someone like Tim. Pat Geltzinger would be great. If you haven't had Pat on.

Yeah, we have. I have a couple connections to Pat. I haven't reached out, but I need to reach out.

I'll introduce you. Pat and I are acquainted. We live nearby. And he's got a big job now.

Yeah, he's got. He's doing a great job at Intel. All right, Ron, last question. You're talking to an audience of Christians across a very diverse variety of vocations. What they share is a commitment to Christ and doing great work that reveals his glory. What do you want to leave them with before we sign off?

It's all about every moment. Right. Every moment is a chance to impact your faith for good, and you got to find a way to be prepared for that. You know, we can't control what's happening in the future. We can't change the past. We can live in the moment and have an extraordinary impact. It's all the time. I stopped by a convenience store today. I'm. And the gentleman behind the counter just looked at me and said, you haven't been here for a while? I said, no. I said, how have you been? This was like four in the morning, by the way.

Yeah.

And he said, I'm okay. I said, you don't sound great. He said, no, I'm a little tired. My 6 year old, I pick her up at school every day after school. I work overnight. I pick her up at 2:30 and summer's coming in three days and a lot of her friends are doing these summer camps but because of my job I can't take her and I'm feeling really bad. And I said, oh, that's, that's really tough. He goes, yeah, but we'll figure it out somehow. And we had this lovely conversation and you know, this is four in the morning with some person checking me out at a store. Yeah. But I know we had this great connection and I was able to express empathy for what he's going through. I couldn't do anything about it, but I could at least express empathy. Right. But that made me recognize back to the 23rd Psalm. I have everything I need. Right. And I see that every moment. So therefore, live in the moments. That's where you impact the world. And that's my advice.

That's great. Ron, I want to commend you for the exceptional kingdom work you do every day, for creating incredible retail experiences that focus on love and bringing people together and just serving teams and customers and shareholders through the ministry of excellence. Guys, if you want to learn more about Ron and enjoy, you could do so@enjoy.com Ron, thanks again for joining me.

My pleasure. Have a great day, man.

I hope you guys enjoyed that episode as much as I did. Hey, if you've got somebody who you think could be a great guest for the Mere Christians podcast, I want to know. Go to jordanraynor.com contact fill out the form right there and we'd love to hear about who you have in mind. Guys, thank you so much for tuning in to today's episode. I'll see you next week.

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