Everything in business flows from what you believe: what you believe about yourself, your calling, and God's place in your life and your company. Building a clear authentic brand starts with story, looking at what you have lived through and finding the patterns and giftings that have been developing all along. The same lens applies to hiring. Every candidate has a story that has shaped who they are. Your job is not just to evaluate fit. It's to look for the patterns that point to their gifting and their potential, and to call that out, even if they don't get the offer.
The hiring series has been about process. But process is never the point. Process exists because of people and purpose. And people and purpose only make sense when you understand the story underneath them. Yours. Theirs. The one your company is writing.
This episode steps back from the tactical and into the foundational: why story matters in hiring and in brand building, how identity and calling connect to the decisions you make as a leader, and what it looks like to build from a place of clarity and peace rather than comparison and insecurity. The journey traced here goes from military-kid to misaligned roles to the Alaska calling that no one saw coming, to show how the gifts have been there all along.
- All the process work, the hiring process, the brand identity work, the onboarding, it only matters because of its connection to people and purpose. The process is not the point. The people are.
- Who we are today is based on what we've lived through. That's true for candidates in an interview, and it's true for you as a business owner building your brand. The story is not separate from the strategy.
- Your brand identity as a business is deeply connected to your personal identity. What you value in the company is connected to what you value as a person. That's why every business feels different, even when they do the same thing.
- Clarity comes before authenticity. First you have to see what has been true about you all along. Then you have to believe it's enough. Then you can start to act from it.
- Comparison breeds insecurity and insecurity breeds pivoting away from what is actually true about you. The remedy is not more information from outside. It's silence, reflection, and choosing to go deep into your own story.
- Structure your hiring process so that every candidate walks away feeling like a company called out greatness in them. Even the ones who don't get the offer. That is the kind of seed you want to plant.
- At the end of the day, it is love God, love people. Everything else in the business, the process, the hiring, the brand, is in service of that.
Why does all this process work matter at the level of people and purpose?
Because process without people and purpose is just activity. The hiring process, the brand clarity work, the onboarding, none of it matters if it's disconnected from the actual human beings it's supposed to serve and the calling it's supposed to support.
We are all just people. Leaders, entrepreneurs, employees, stay-at-home moms, people stepping out in faith and taking a risk. We are all given time on earth and specific gifts and abilities, and we're trying to live lives that are worthy of our calling. That's what everything comes back to for me: wanting people to be in roles that align with their gifting, to work for companies that align with their values, to feel purpose and intent and alignment in what they do every day.
The reason I care about asking the right interview questions isn't process for the sake of process. It's because the decisions we make in this intersection between a business and a candidate are going to affect that person's life and family and identity and calling and ability to develop their gifting. That's the weight of what hiring actually is.
The process we build, how we build it, why it even matters, it only matters because of its connection to people and purpose. We are all just people, given so much time here on earth and specific gifts and abilities.
Amy Dardis, Episode 44How does your own story shape how you show up as a leader and a business owner?
More than I used to think it did. I was a military kid, always the new kid, always thrust into situations where I had to build new relationships and adapt and read social dynamics. Standing in front of a mirror as a kid giving pretend, passionate, persuasive speeches to an imaginary audience. That wasn't something I thought was significant. But apparently it was pointing toward a specific calling.
When I entered the job world and found myself in roles that didn't align with my gifting, I didn't even know what my gifting was yet. I just knew whatever I was doing was not what I was made for. That bothered me enough to keep moving, from misaligned roles into entrepreneurial work, into asking better questions and discovering patterns in other people's stories.
And then the Alaska calling I never saw coming. One moment, one shift, one thought, and my trajectory completely changed. Our brand identity as a business is deeply connected to our personal identity. What you value in the business is connected to what you value as a person. That's why every company feels different from every other company that does the exact same thing.
When I was called to move to Alaska and start this business, that wasn't even a thought. It wasn't even a seed in my mind. And then this one moment, this one shift, this one thought completely changed my trajectory.
Amy Dardis, Episode 44How do you move from comparison and insecurity to clarity and confidence in what you bring?
Three things: reflection, silence, and choosing to believe it's enough.
Reflection first. I spent a lot of time looking back over the last 10 to 15 years, going back into childhood, asking what makes me uniquely me. The patterns were there all along. I just had to slow down enough to see them. Writing things out, journaling, working through them: that's how they became real.
Then silence. I limited social media, podcasts, books, outside influences. If I'm being fully honest, I am very easily distracted by what other people are doing. So I got off social media, took those apps off my phone. At first it was really quiet, and that was weird. But then little by little I started hearing more of God's voice, more of the promptings and leadings. And then ideas started coming that were fully organic, just between me and God.
And then the believing part. Where I'm at right now, the gifting I have, what I've experienced, that's enough. Today, it's enough. Comparison breeds insecurity and insecurity breeds pivoting away from what is actually true about you. Peace came when I stopped asking whether I was doing it right and started asking whether I was being who I was made to be.
What does it look like to build a hiring process that speaks life into people?
It means asking: what kind of impression do we want to leave on every person we interact with, including candidates who don't get the offer?
If you structured your hiring process so that every single candidate walked away feeling like a company called out greatness in them, do you know what kind of seeds you'd be planting? Into the candidates themselves. Into your employees. Into your reputation in the community. A company that says: I see this gifting in you, I see this potential, and here's the direction I think you should go. That is a company that speaks life.
That kind of clarity, believing that that's how you operate, changes everything. What you believe, what you think, what you say, how you act, your processes, your conviction to follow through. This is what it means to be clear and authentic. It starts with knowing who you are as an individual and what God is calling you to. And then stepping into that with faith. At the end of the day, it's love God, love people. How did I do that in my business? That's the question I'm always coming back to.
If you structured your hiring process so that the big takeaway was that anyone who ever went through a process with you, you spoke life into, do you know what kind of seeds that you would be planting into the people that come into contact with your business?
Amy Dardis, Episode 44Resources mentioned
- Ep 43 — Why Hypothetical Interview Questions Don't Work — The episode referenced on story and why we ask about what has happened, not what would happen
- Ep 1 — Why This Podcast Exists — The origin story and the conviction behind the Clear Authentic Brands framework
- Ep 38 — How to Build a Hiring Process That Verifies Role Fit and Character Alignment — The full hiring process from start to finish
Full transcript
I spend a lot of time talking about process. Process when it comes to hiring people, onboarding, being clear on your brand identity. But really, process all comes back to people and purpose. That's the core of everything. The process we build, why it even matters, it only matters because of its connection to people and purpose. At the end of the day, we are all just people. Whether we are leaders or entrepreneurs or employees, whether we are stay-at-home moms or entrepreneurs stepping out in faith and taking a risk. We are all given so much time here on earth, given specific gifts and abilities, and we're trying to live a life that is worthy of our calling, aligned with how God wants us to live and lead. That's what it all comes back to for me.
I've been thinking a lot about this idea of story. Our story. The importance of story. I talked about this in the last episode, about why we should not ask hypothetical questions, because they ask about a version of someone that doesn't exist. When we're interviewing people, we're focused on their story, on what has shaped them, the person right in front of us today. The version of who we are today is based on what we've lived through and experienced and believed up until this point. And we don't know what's going to happen tomorrow that might shift what we believe or how we act.
When I was called to move to Alaska and called to start this business, that wasn't even a thought. It wasn't even a seed in my mind. I was going along thinking my life was going down one path, and then this one moment, this one shift, this one thought completely changed my trajectory. I never saw it coming. And going through that, uprooting my life and my family and moving to a brand new place, it brought on all kinds of challenges that helped me grow and shook some old mindsets and old beliefs. Who we are as a brand, as a business, is just what we have experienced and lived and specialized in up until that point. Our brand identity as a business is actually intertwined and deeply connected to our personal identity. What you value in the business is connected to what you value as a person. That's why every business has a different set of values, different environments, different work styles. It's directly related to the people that work there, to the people who make the decisions.
How we run our business, the choices we make, that's dependent on what we believe. What we believe about ourselves, about our worth, about our value, about our calling, about God's place in our life. Everything we do is based on what we think, which is based on what we believe about life, about business, about people, about purpose, about process. For me, this brand, Clear Authentic Brands, has been a journey of going through that process myself as I look at my story, as I look at what I believe and how that's going to change how I show up every day. And then it's been the process of learning how to pull out these brand stories from businesses and from other leaders and entrepreneurs. And then that is actually where we pull out a hiring process from. It always has to start with this clarity piece. Clarity really is the foundation. And then authenticity is stepping into that and acting on it.
When I sit down with anyone, whether it's a friend over coffee or another entrepreneur or a candidate in an interview, all I'm focused on is their story. What's brought them to this point in time. What has shaped them. And I'm looking for patterns and evidence in their story that point to what they believe, what they value, what their behaviors are, what their skill sets are, what their unique differentiators are. It doesn't matter if it's a business or a person or a friend or a candidate. The approach is the same: what are the things about this identity that make them unique? What have they been through that developed those giftings? And what does that tell me about what they believe about themselves and their calling?
When I say we need space to dive into our story, it starts with taking a step back. For me, I've spent a lot of time reflecting on the last 10 to 15 years of my life, going back into high school and childhood. Looking at what makes me uniquely me. What giftings I have that I've seen develop over time. And what I found were patterns that started subconsciously, habits I was doing that I was never aware of when I was younger. This idea of asking questions, being intensely curious about people's stories. That has been there since I was a kid. And the desire to communicate, to speak, to write. That was a deep-seated theme throughout English class, throughout high school, standing in front of a mirror giving these pretend, passionate, persuasive speeches to an imaginary audience. Yes, I absolutely did that. And apparently that was just directing me toward a specific calling.
I was a military kid, so I moved around all the time, every couple of years, new places. I was a new kid constantly, thrust into situations where I had to build new relationships over and over again. I had to adapt, be flexible, pick up on social dynamics and people. I didn't realize what was going on at the time, but those experiences were developing the gifts inside of me. And then as I entered the job world, being in roles that didn't align with my gifting, even though at the time I didn't know what my gifting was, I just knew that whatever I was doing was not what I wanted to be doing. I didn't want to live my life wasting my time. I didn't want to go to a job that didn't challenge me, that I wasn't passionate about.
This idea of time and gifting became more and more prominent. Moving from misaligned roles into entrepreneurial work, starting a marketing and web design business, having to build new connections and ask questions and listen for people's stories. And then that same pattern came into hiring, looking at people applying for the same job and being fascinated by how two candidates could give very different responses to the same question because they were motivated by very different things. And having to navigate: what specifically am I looking for? What are the motivations in an individual that make the most sense for this company, this role?
And this 20/80: really 20% of the questions I ask are going to give me 80% of what I'm looking for. The idea of essentialism and minimalism. How do I cut out the noise, clear the clutter, get rid of the distracting signals, and bring it down into something that truly matters and will truly indicate the path somebody needs to walk down? And making the connection that it wasn't a one-sided conversation. The decision we made as a business was just as important as this being the right decision for this individual. How this intersection at this point in time was going to affect their life and their family and their relationships and their identity and their calling and their ability to develop their gifting.
Two: I have to embrace that. I have to recognize that what I have experienced up until this point, the gifting that I have inside of me, where I'm at right now in my life, that that's enough. Today, it's enough. I have all that I need for this season. And changing my thoughts and my patterns to embrace that fully. Looking around at other entrepreneurs and other businesses and seeing how they do it, that can breed insecurity. It can make you question what you bring to the table. And because of that, you pivot and you re-strategize and you try to come up with something different to match what you think somebody else is doing better, when it wasn't authentic or in line with what you were trying to bring to the table.
That was rooted in insecurity and in a lack of clarity about what I was good at, about my unique differentiators, about what I brought to the table. Taking the time to really go through that and look at it is step one. Then step two is coming into acceptance and confidence and boldness to say: this is who I am, this is what I bring to the table, and it is different than these other people and these other entities. And I'm okay with that. What I'm doing and how I'm doing it is enough for right now, knowing that we're on a journey that doesn't ever end. We are continuing to be refined, continuing to grow, continuing to be molded. It's learning to be at peace with where we're at in the process right now.
I think peace has been something I have been desperate for in my life and in my business for years. And it was only in the last year that I felt like I finally came to this shift of being like, okay, I can have peace about this right now. Regardless of what it looks like, regardless of where I'm at in this process. I don't need to be anxious about it. I don't need to compare myself to what everybody else is doing. I need to focus on what makes me who I am, what makes my business what it needs to be. And then that leads us into this authenticity piece of being able to act on it. First we recognize the clarity in our own story. Second, we start to believe it, believe that it's enough, believe that how we're wired and the gifts we've had and the experiences we have are for a purpose. And because of what we believe, we start to act differently. We start to build differently, to interact with people differently.
I actually had to limit social media, books, podcasts, outside influences during this season of going through this process. Seeking the silence. Seeking a level of kind of isolation so I could really grow deep roots into this without being distracted. I am very easily distracted and very easily influenced by what other people are doing. I would like to think that I'm not, but if I'm being fully honest with myself, I am. So I got off social media. I took those apps off my phone. I got off YouTube. I canceled out all of these outside noises. And since doing that, the ideas, the focus, the creativity, the work, the output, the revelation, it has just been coming at me. It didn't start that way immediately. It was really quiet at first. Really quiet. And that was weird. But then little by little I started hearing more of God's voice. I started paying attention to more of the promptings, more of the leadings. And then I started having ideas come to the surface that weren't things I was learning from other people. And I needed that space to know this was fully organic, just between me and God.
And so when you take this time, whether you're a business owner going through a brand identity or strategy session or just someone reflecting on how you got started and what brought you here and what's driven you and why, and then choosing to hire people who thrive in your organization, you eventually get clear on who you are as a company, as a leader, as an individual. And then you can start to build around it. And then you get to the point of asking: what kind of impression do we want to leave on every person we interact with, including candidates? Even if they don't get the job, what do I want them to feel when they walk away? And I think if you structured your hiring process so that every candidate walked away feeling like a company called out greatness in them, do you know what kind of seeds you'd be planting? Into the candidates themselves, into your employees, into your reputation in the community.
That kind of clarity, believing that that's how you operate, that's going to change everything. What you believe, what you think, what you say, how you act, your processes, your conviction to follow through on them. Because this is what it means to be clear and authentic. It starts with knowing who you are as an individual, what God is calling you to, and what that purpose is. And stepping into that with faith and conviction. At the end of the day, it's love God, love people. How did I do that in my business? How did I honor him, obey him, surrender to him, and then love and serve people through that process? That is all I have for today.