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With Ros Loaker
90 Plays2 years ago
Today on PEP Talk we're all about workplace ministry. The opportunities, resources and support are extensive for Christians who want to connect with other believers in their places of employment. And stories of the creative ways employees find to share their faith at work are surprising and encouraging.
Download the Starting A Christian Workplace Group booklet from the Transform Work UK website. In Scotland, have a look at the Thrive Scotland website.
Ros Loaker is the CEO of Transform Work UK. She has been involved with workplace ministry since 2003, supporting and growing leaders of Christian Workplace Groups across the professions, industry and commerce.
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Transcript
Introduction to Pep Talk Podcast
00:00:10
Speaker
Well, hello and welcome to another exciting episode of Pep Talk, the persuasive evangelism podcast. I'm Andy Bannister from Solas. I'm joined, well, not by my usual co-host, Christy Mayer, who's often something suitably exciting and academic somewhere, but I'm joined by Gavin Matthews. Hey, Gavin, how are you doing? I'm doing well. How are you, Andy? I am pretty good. I'm pretty good. So it's the Solas boys running the podcast today. So that means we can do all kinds of fun while Christy's away, Gavin.
00:00:38
Speaker
Well, last time I studied for Christie, somebody described me as the poor man's Christie mayor, which I thought was a bit rough, but there you go. Oh, dear, we won't go there. Well, let's compensate for the fact we have the poor man's Christie mayor in the co-driving seat.
Guest Introduction: Ros Loca
00:00:50
Speaker
We are joined today by an amazing guest. We have Ros Loca from Transform Work. Ros, welcome to the madness that is petrol. Brilliant.
00:00:59
Speaker
Lovely, can't wait to fit in with the madness. Thanks for having me. So for those who don't know, what is transform work? What's all about? What do you do? Transform work is basically a network of Christians that want to support. We inspire Christians to transform their workplace in the nation. And how do we do that?
Mission of Transform Work
00:01:16
Speaker
First of all, we want to connect people together. So generally through groups, workplace groups or professional sector groups. And then we support them and we equip them. And often we get asked to come into workplaces to represent
00:01:28
Speaker
in terms of diversity quality frameworks or to talk at events. That's the sort of thing that we do. I mean, I could clarify Christian workplace groups, they're often called ERGs, employee resource groups or staff network groups, but we like to call them Christian workplace groups because we take people on a journey from being an individual to growing your group all the way through to where your organization
00:01:52
Speaker
whether that's BT, Marks and Spencers, whatever, your organisation actually celebrates you. So we have all these levels in the background. And then a professional sector group is where you stand outside your organisation. So it could be medics, nurses, vets, lawyers, and of course there's sectors,
Ros's Inspirational Journey
00:02:09
Speaker
road transport, you know, truckers, very isolated profession or sector if you like as you're going around. When you're on the roads,
00:02:16
Speaker
on the M25 or the M5 driving around pray for truckers, you know, this is their workplace in that trucks. And they do some really great stuff, the Christian truckers. Anyway, I won't go on about truckers. That's great with possibilities right there. So how did you get involved in this kind of work? Because I mean, a lot of people sort of think about Christian ministry, they instinctively think about church. But you instinctively think about the workplace and what's going on in the wider world. What drew you into this whole field of ministry in the first place? Oh, wow.
00:02:45
Speaker
That's a really long story. In a nutshell, I heard Reverend Dr Clifford Hill speak at my parents church about every Christian lived for Jesus wherever they were would have a different UK and I believe and I still believe that with all my heart
00:03:02
Speaker
And he's a fantastic guy, him and his wife, they smuggle bibles into China. And he talked about how do you hear from God? And I thought, Wow, who's this guy? And then he, at the end, I said, Can I come and work for you? I love this vision. And so he said, Yeah, so I started off a couple of days a week. And what I did is we had
00:03:21
Speaker
the UK Christian Handbook, and we found the Lawyers Christian Fellowship, the Christian Medical Fellowship hidden in there. And we brought leaders of these professional groups together in meetings in the House of Commons with Alistair Burr, MP, Andrew Saluk and Spelman, sorry, to look at how can we change the values of the nation through workplace associations?
Christian Values in the Workplace
00:03:40
Speaker
Can you share your faith and can you influence your institution with Christian values? So this is old jargon. This is going back to 2003. And the resounding answer was no.
00:03:49
Speaker
apart from two organisations, which was the Christian Medical Fellowship that had a course called Confident Christianity. So instead of saying, come on colleagues, come to my Alpha course, come out of your workplace to my church. No, no, Christian Medical Fellowship want to train up medics, doctors, nurses, whatever, to be confident into answering apologetic questions in
00:04:10
Speaker
the place where they work hallelujah and then they had something else called saline solution how do you connect with patients not just your colleagues you know there's a logical rational way of doing that for like wow and so that's the professional side taken over professional sex groups and then we found um CTAC it was called Christians in the audit commission way back in 2003 and they were the first christian workplace group that we had
00:04:34
Speaker
found that had received formal recognition by their employer, which was the Order Commission at the time, to have a formally recognised Christian staff group that had time to run the group, paid money,
00:04:49
Speaker
and to meet together and to have conferences. Actually, Geoff said he was the chairman of that Christian workplace group at the time. He would twice a year make an appointment to go and see Stephen Blundred down at Millbank in London, who wasn't a Christian, and he would go in with his Bible and say,
00:05:09
Speaker
I'm here to pray with you. I'm praying for you because we're for the audit commission. And he got to read Bible passages and pray over the two foot deck of the audit commission, which is amazing. So when we found this out,
Overcoming Fear in Workplaces
00:05:22
Speaker
you know, what do we do? We're like, right. We want you to share your testimony. Why? Because the Bible says, how do you overcome by the blood of them and your testimony of your work? And so that's how Chancellor Meekhein have got going. So when we found another individual, let's share other people's stories and see where we go.
00:05:37
Speaker
And then you'll have to jump in. I'm going to jump in, Roscoe. Like me, you're so enthusiastic. I love it. But let's talk for a moment about Christians perhaps at work in more general. I know one of the things I often come across, and in fact, I was like this when I was in the workplace. A lot of Christians, they are quite nervous about being at work. They're a bit fearful about sticking the head of other parapet. You talk about Jesus.
00:05:59
Speaker
you're getting trouble from HR, or the first thing you get is your colleagues go, Oh, you're a Christian. So are you, you know, homophobic and transphobic and all this stuff. And so that causes Christians, I think, to kind of shut down and say nothing. How do we overcome that? What are some of the ways that you've seen helping kind of sort that I'm guessing one answer is community, right? Which is what you guys are into. But talk a bit about that, perhaps. But if there are other sort of advice or strategies that you've come across to help Christians listening to this thing, I'd love to be more out there as a Christian at work. But I'm just
00:06:28
Speaker
I'm just proper terrified. So good. Well, we're in it for the long game, you know, first of all. And the second thing is I love our God. He's three and one. He's a group already, Father, Son and Holy Spirit.
Forming Christian Groups for Support
00:06:39
Speaker
And He created us to be in families. We work in communities. You know, we were born into, we're in the nations, right? So He's all about groups anyway. And so, and even when He came, you know, Jesus had a disciples, you know, 12 of them, and then three of them often came together, didn't it? Peter, James and John.
00:06:56
Speaker
So at Transport UK, we are about loving individuals and connecting them to others to have a group. Because when together you can do more, you know, when you read Matthew 5, you don't put, you know, a bowl, you put a light on a lamp so that it can shine in the whole room. And the more light that you have, the greater you can shine.
00:07:15
Speaker
So basically, that's what we do. So if you work for Procter & Gamble, for example, one of our latest Christian groups that we've discovered, we want to connect you together so that you can have a greater influence. If you're an individual and like a business owner and you work on your own, we'd put you into what we would call a Christian workplace ministry. So there's Faith in Business, there's ICCC, if you go to a website, there's like 90 different
00:07:41
Speaker
like business type or chaplain type, entrepreneur type groups that you can connect with in your area, your region. So that's what we do. So the first thing is to connect Christians together so that you feel confident in your organization. And then the second thing we do is get you to start praying.
00:08:03
Speaker
because we're two and three are gathered together praying Jesus in your midst and it's Jesus and the power of the Holy Spirit that gives you confidence to be fully who He's created you to be in that workplace and then what we would say is
00:08:17
Speaker
you know, there's a logical, rational way for you to share your faith.
Starting Christian Groups: Practical Tips
00:08:21
Speaker
And that would be to receive formal recognition from your employer to be a staff network group. So you are able to come into your workplace and bring your whole self to work, which means you can be a Christian at work.
00:08:34
Speaker
and then you can engage with lots of things that the organisation is getting up to. So just even last night I was on a call, Water Industry Christian Network, one of our new sector groups that we've helped set up, so Thames Water, Welsh Water, Southern, in fact Southern haven't got a group yet, but there's a guy on last night who was super excited to see all these other companies that have these Christian groups within them. He's like, oh, tell me, let me set one up.
00:09:03
Speaker
And I always remember talking to Ian, who leads the group in Anglian water, and he won't mind me telling you, quite a shy guy. You know, there was a tiny little group of people that used to come out of the organisation to the local pub to pray together.
00:09:19
Speaker
didn't really witness or anything like that, and we helped them grow their Christian group, get formal recognition. And now they've got two groups in Anglinwater, one in Huntington, one in Peterborough, and they have run Christianity Explored through the company. And he sent me a message. He said, Roz, he texted me, I'm pinching myself right now. I was like, oh, why are you doing that? He said, because I'm sat with the comms director.
00:09:41
Speaker
And we're looking at the Christianity Explored website because she wants to get the logo so that we can invite everybody will start from the company to attend this course. I mean, if you want to talk about sharing your faith, I love the fact that the organisation is advertising and you're allowing that to happen.
00:10:00
Speaker
So I do believe in like the ministry
Success Stories of Workplace Groups
00:10:02
Speaker
of one, of course, you know, and it was exciting the Bible, you know, always be prepared to have an answer. And we've got loads of testimonies. Even this weekend, we went away to Foudy Brennan taking leaders of professional sector groups and one of the leaders of our another new group, the Local Authorities Christian Network, a guy called Paul, he just felt God say he had a word for one of his colleagues, you know, and and so sat down with her at lunchtime and said,
00:10:29
Speaker
I said, does this mean anything to you, this particular word? You should get him on it. She's a great guy. And she said, how did you know that? You could possibly have known this particular word of knowledge and then literally in the canteen led this girl to Jesus. So, you know, there's a number of ways you can do evangelism, of course. And, you know, partnering with the Holy Spirit is one. Engaging with the organization is another.
00:10:57
Speaker
but just being you, lovely you, who Jesus created. You know, my personality is one that's a little bit loud and out there and I like to have fun. So when I first started in a scientific PR company a number of years ago, on my first day, they asked me what I had been doing and I'd actually been to a 50th birthday party at Ridley Hall, which is a thicker factory. So I just went, ah!
00:11:23
Speaker
I had a leopard dress on and I was just like, I went to a vicar factory and wore my leopard dress and they were like, what? Because it was so out of there thinking that I was a Christian wearing a leopard skin dress at a vicar factory in Cambridge at Ridley Hall.
00:11:39
Speaker
And it just broke down barriers straight away. So I would just say, be who you are in the workplace and love, love, love people and where the opportunities come you can share. LICC, London Institute for Contemporary Christianity has some brilliant resources. And I see that you've had a number of people on and, you know, we'd always plug their six ends.
Initiating Workplace Christian Groups
00:12:02
Speaker
If you don't know about them, look them up, the six ends of LICC. But yeah. Yeah.
00:12:07
Speaker
Can I jump in there and ask you a question? I'm picturing where I used to work at a call centre and I was aware that there was one bloke at the other end of the call centre who was a Christian. I heard there might be somebody on the third floor and it was maybe one of the managers, but I wouldn't have had a clue of where to start bringing people together and setting up a Christian group. If someone listening is in that kind of situation and I think this is on my heart, this is what I want to do, I know I can grow my witness, but I need to do it in fellowship.
00:12:32
Speaker
What's like, where do you begin? What's the first step? How do you get a Christian group in a secular workplace off the ground? And how do you then go on to the other things you've talked about such as getting recognition and starting to build something? Where do you start and what input can transform work give to help someone on that journey?
00:12:49
Speaker
Great, well, great question. Set it up well. I would just go straight to our website and go to our resources, www.transmoreatuk.org slash CWDbooklet. Get our booklet, download our booklet. It takes you step by step. There's even little blank boxes in there. I know it's a little bit childish, but actually we want you to stop and pause at every step of the way. First question, you know, why is God put you in your workplace? You know, your workplace, he loves your workplace.
00:13:17
Speaker
Another question is, do you know any other Christians write their name down? Who's your HR manager? Write their name down, stop, pray for them.
00:13:24
Speaker
you know, are there any other diversity groups, LGBTQI, disability, gender, ethnicity groups, do you know the leaders of their group, stop, write their names down, start praying for them, God loves them, you know, and then so this, this booklet takes you through that journey. But one of the things since the pandemic, one of the beauties that we've seen is, I mean, people say how many groups have you got, I always say around 500 is completely fluctuated because
00:13:49
Speaker
where there's been one company had many groups, they've all joined together to have one. So it's like, or do they still have 10? Or is it one, you know, so anyway, but everything's online. And so you could do a little shout out on Yammer, any other Christians around? Why not? And when you find them, I'd encourage you to set up a WhatsApp group.
00:14:07
Speaker
And then on that WhatsApp group, you know, for your organization and what Christian group, you can video yourself just a one or two minute testimony. This is how it became a Christian or
Engaging in Workplace Events
00:14:18
Speaker
a voicemail. Give your test. Get to know each other. You can build relations relation in WhatsApp.
00:14:25
Speaker
straight away so that you get to know the other Christians. If you're not, like most people aren't coming into the workplace now, so the landscape has changed. But if you are in the same building, then you know, if you can take your lunch break together, do it. If you can meet before work, do it. I know somebody that works in government got challenged apparently when I went in and said, listen, if you're not praying for your workplace, who is?
00:14:49
Speaker
And so they get up at six o'clock in the morning. They pray in the spirit language for 20 minutes in the last 10 minutes. They pray for their line managers, their line managers, line manager, all the way up to the seniors and they all pray. And they've been going for two years and many of those ladies in that group
00:15:07
Speaker
have received cremations actually which is just exciting to hear as well. But so the first thing is yeah all the information is up but look but yeah start praying, God open my eyes, show me where the other Christians are and then when you find them I would encourage you to get a WhatsApp group going and get to know them.
00:15:24
Speaker
That's really great practical advice. Will you put a link to that booklet directly into the show notes then, so that people can link directly across to that landing? Absolutely. We'll put a link to all of the resources and transfer work and whatnot there on the show notes, so encourage people to look at that. So, Ros, let's take it a step further. People have got a group up and running. They've met with other Christians. They've started praying and stuff. How then is a group
00:15:47
Speaker
some of the ways that you've seen then groups beginning to think about reaching out so you've got together you're encouraging one of your praying what are some of the sort of success stories or stories that encourage you that you've seen when groups then go okay now how do we reach out to our wider workplace so i know you're full of stories so
00:16:02
Speaker
So give us an example or two of how you've seen groups doing that well. There's so many different things. What we would say, you know, it's so hard for Christians because they think, I've got a Christian group. I'm going to do church in the workplace. So that means reading the Bible. Nothing wrong with that. We love that book. It's powerful. And it means praying. Do you know what I mean? Or it might be putting on an alpha course or something like that. And we're just like, you're a Christian workplace group. Keep those three things in mind. And so what we would encourage people to do, especially when people are time poor,
00:16:32
Speaker
When you meet together, say you've got 30 minutes, first of all, sorry, I'll come around to your question. What are you celebrating in your workplace? What are the struggles in your workplace?
00:16:44
Speaker
for 10 minutes, 10 minutes, the last 10 minutes, you've got your praise and prayer points there, your intercession points. So that's how you can easily lead a workplace group. If anyone's thinking, how would I even do it? There you go, 30 minutes, bang. You don't have to spend hours preparing. But coming back to your question, see what I'm like, terrible. So what we say to people is what is already happening in your workplace that you can get involved in?
00:17:05
Speaker
Is your workplace or your organisation putting on a diversity and inclusion event? Are they putting on a wellbeing event? Are they putting on a mental health awareness week? Like, Christians have a lot to say in this area. So we'd say, jump in, get involved, bring a Christ perspective, a heavenly perspective,
00:17:23
Speaker
into those events and be present, be present. And that's a different shift from like doing church. You've got the opportunity to make a difference in what the organization's
Introducing Christian Meditation at Work
00:17:37
Speaker
already doing. And people find that kind of hard because we want to put on Easter events and Christmas events. And I'm not saying don't do those because they are quick wins, but there are other things that you can do that won't take up a lot of time that you can join in with.
00:17:51
Speaker
So one acute story about that would be in CBRE there was a young lady there who they had just received form and reckon mission as the Christian group and there was a well-being day and this lady decided to do Christian meditation. Now the Christian group were organising it so she didn't have to really go this is the Christian meditation, it's meditation and so the group bought in bean bags and cushions, low lighting and she put a background music on
00:18:19
Speaker
And then she read scripture after scripture after scripture over her colleagues. And one person found it so refreshing. He fell asleep because he was so stressed out. But what I love about this is that she did say, you know, this is from the Bible and I'm going to lead you to the foot of the cross. I mean, the testimony is on our website.
00:18:39
Speaker
But if you don't believe in Jesus, you can think of somebody else that you want to go to. So she did make it applicable to other colleagues. But what I love about this is that the feedback that she got from running this event was so good that HR asked her if she would run it again.
00:18:58
Speaker
And I just think that's just valuable, you know, because you're partnering with the organisation, you're bringing scripture in and the Bible says that my word doesn't return void. So this stuff is going over your colleagues. And so they have feedback. A number of years this lady had left and I got in touch with Nigel down at CBRE and I was doing lockdown actually and said, how you going?
00:19:20
Speaker
He said, I'm thinking, you know, some groups shriveled up, some groups really thrived June, and docked down. And he said, so excited. So you wouldn't believe it. I was like, what's happened?
Role of Workplace Groups as Church Expressions
00:19:30
Speaker
He said, we've engaged with management. We're running alpha courses. It's like, wow, okay, brilliant. And so people are becoming Christians.
00:19:39
Speaker
and being discipled and then witnessing to other Christians. But he said to me, we've got a problem. And I said, well, how is that a problem? He said, well, the people that are becoming Christians don't see the need to go to church. I said, oh, because they're getting all their support from their Christian workplace group. And so now we've got a lovely problem in teaching newborn Christians in the workplace that actually is probably a good thing if you connect to a local church.
00:20:05
Speaker
because you can get made redundant, you could get promoted or move to a different organization where there isn't a group yet and so then where does your community, where does your connection come from. So workplace groups are an expression of church but they are not church in the workplace and I think it's really good to mention that.
00:20:27
Speaker
Yeah. One very, very quick question, because I think time is almost
Connecting Lone Workers to Networks
00:20:31
Speaker
gone. We need to ask if somebody is listening to this and they're thinking, but I work on my own, is there anything that transform work does for folks who are loan workers?
00:20:40
Speaker
Yeah, so I would say, you know, what industry are you working in? Like, are you a website designer, that type of thing? And then I'd say, or where is your region? And then I would connect you into that Christian workplace ministry. So in Cambridge here, there's something called Faith in Business. And they would welcome you in because they're basically business owners that come together to support each other. And there's loads of these groups across the nation.
00:21:06
Speaker
In Scotland, Andy and I, of course, thrive. So if you're an individual and you're a Christian, you're a business owner, you work on your own from home, I'd say get in touch with Fry, they will support you. And they have a lot of business, breakfast, prayer groups across the nation. So we are an umbrella of networks. We've got like these 40, was it 52 now, professional sector groups, around 500 workplace groups, and as I say, 90 Christian workplace ministries. So we will connect. That's the main thing, Christians to be connected with others.
00:21:37
Speaker
Fantastic. Well, Roz, you shared so much stories and advice and the enthusiasm and passion came through so strong. It's been a fantastic conversation. The 20 minutes has flown by. So we are going to wrap
Episode Wrap-up and Future Outlook
00:21:53
Speaker
things up. But I guess last question, if people want to find out more about Trans from Work UK, where do they go? Is the website the main place to find out about you guys? It would be the website. Brilliant.
00:22:02
Speaker
Excellent. We'll put a link to the website into the show notes. It's really easy to do click through. And we'll also put a link to Thrive that you mentioned there. I know Thrive gang up in Scotland, fantastic bunch of folks. But yeah, I hope this has encouraged you. And yeah, if you're in the workplace, and you haven't got a workplace going, a workplace group going, you now know who to talk to track down track down roles. If there's one going already, join it, get along there. And the other thing is what I guess if you're a pastor or a church leader, you know, encourage Christians, right in your
00:22:32
Speaker
in your church, in your community to get involved in these kind of things, because what an amazing opportunity to just be a blessing to the workplace and see God at work, eh? Well, Roz, it's been a pleasure. Thank you for taking the time. Thanks for the time. And we'll be back in two weeks' time with another episode and another guest, whether we'll have the real Christie mayor or the substitute Christie mayor in the form of Gavin, remains to be seen. Bye for now.