5/28/25 - 2096: An Unexpected Path to Leadership

Jim: [00:00:00] You've tuned into iWork4Him, the Voice of Collaboration for the Faith and Work Movement.

Martha: We are your hosts, Jim and Martha Brangenberg, and our mission is to inspire every workplace believer to recognize their workplace as their ministry place where they work with God every day. What can that look like in your workplace? Let's find out right now.

Jim: Seven years ago, we spent a week in Lubbock, Texas, at the headquarters for Betenbough Homes and the Ministry of Kingdom at Work. During that week, we interviewed people from throughout the organization. Betenbough Homes is a kingdom focused organization where employees, vendors, and customers all feel the love of God through their transactions of building first time buyer homes in the oil fields of Texas.

One of those interviews seven years ago was with Jeanna Roach. At that time, Jeanna was a vice president of sales and marketing. We follow up today with Jeanna, who's now the CEO of Betenbough Homes and five other companies. No pressure. But she's tasked with following the footsteps of the late Rick Betenbough as she guides Betenbough Homes into the fourth [00:01:00] decade of the 21st century.

Jeanna, welcome back to iWork4Him.

Jeanna Roach: Thank y'all so much for having me. I'll never forget those interviews years ago, so it's a blessing to be back.

Jim: Thank you. We're glad we didn't scare you off. At least I'm glad I didn't scare you off. (laughter)Jeanna, when we last left you seven years ago, God was moving in your life miraculously. What have you seen God do in your life personally these last seven years?

Jeanna Roach: Wow. I feel like, he was already working so much. I've worked at Betenbough Home since 2006 and that's a whole story in itself, of course, how God just met me here in the middle of the marketplace. And about seven years ago my husband, he was listening to our interview, and that was part of our story is, he said he just felt something different.

He could hear me and my friend and still teammate to this day, Cal. We've worked together now for almost 20 years, and he could just feel the love of Christ in that. And the Lord was just working on him [00:02:00] in a really big way and grabbed a hold of him. And within a month he had surrendered his life to the Lord, which was a 12 year prayer for me.

And anybody that I knew in my small group here at the office, people were praying for a long time. 'Cause I had come to faith here over those 12 years, and so now all of a sudden Andrew is, so everything and our lives changed. Everything. Our marriage was immediately better. He was a better dad. Our love for each other just grew in a way that I actually couldn't even imagine.

I already loved him so much, but seeing this new flourishing version just brought this new freedom and release to me, I feel like, and just showed me some miracles that, even though I was in the midst of it and I believe God was gonna do something 'cause he spoke to me about it through a vision, there were just still moments of doubt that would creep in.

And I would think, am I being a good witness? Today, man Lord, I messed up. I'm so sorry. And God was still working in the midst of all [00:03:00] of that. And our daughter and him were baptized together. I got baptized with them as well, and we've just seen everything flourish since then.

I feel like a contentment came over me in a way that I had been praying for years. I'm an achiever, a performer. That's how I've been my entire life, and those are good things about me when I don't have self ambition, when I have holy ambition. So I've had a rocky road though in those seven years, you should know.

I went from VP of Sales and marketing and became a director of just marketing. And that was a moment really, again, of surrender and listening to the Lord. It was a hard moment for me. It meant a large demotion. My paycheck was cut in probably half, and so there was just a lot of obedience that had to be done in that moment.

God was working on me a lot. And my humility, he was taking me to new depths with him in that moment. But it was the first time ever that Andrew and I together could [00:04:00] pray about a decision. I basically had to say, Hey, do you want us remain on the sales side of Betenbough Homes? Or do I wanna become this marketing director and serve marketing for all of the businesses that we now had?

Although that would mean a demotion for me, a title change. And, I woke up that day and I told Andrew after a Friday meeting with the whole board of directors on Saturday morning, I had all of these ideas for marketing and I said, Andrew, I think I'm supposed to take the marketing director role.

And immediately he said, man, the Lord just told me right choice. And even just that moment for us, our marriage, just the unity that we have had since has blessed everything in my life. And so I began that journey and knew that God was telling me, Jeanna, you have to walk this out and everybody's watching.

When you are in the top leadership of a company and you get a demotion, people wanna know how that's gonna go. And do you believe in me? Do you believe in these things that I'm offering you? 'Cause he told me it'll [00:05:00] look like less in the world, but it will be much more in the kingdom. And it wasn't just more, it was much more.

And I thought, what is he talking about? Okay Lord, I'm just gonna trust that. And man, I will tell you, everything became much more - my marriage, my relationship with my kids. There was so much that God wanted to do in me before I could ever have an opportunity to step into a role like this. So yeah, everything has changed.

He's, we now, my husband and I, teach on how to hear from the Holy Spirit, how to hear from God. These are dreams. Every time he talks, I just cry and weep because of the goodness and favor of God, and so I don't have to ever question if God is good or if he speaks to his people, and if he is good on his promises, because I get to see it every day in Andrew.

Martha: There's so much there to unpack and I love that you shared very vulnerably that doesn't mean that the blessings are always measured in the world's [00:06:00] eyes as being more whatever that is, that we all seem to be striving for, but rather in the kingdom. So Jeanna, I'm gonna just tell our listeners right now that I'm gonna put the links to our past interviews with you so they can hear some of the progression because we actually did an interview with your husband after he got saved.

You guys went on a mission trip. There's so much there that God has done, but I love to hear that your long, what felt like long prayers, God answered even though there's been hard in the midst of it. So let's talk about your work journey then, as a result. You've, like you, you already alluded to, there were some changes, some shifts that probably did not make sense to a lot of people in the midst of it. But where is it that you find yourself today and what has God done through all of that?

Jeanna Roach: I feel a little bit like, I'm like Joseph, where I came in pretty prideful. [00:07:00] And it's like God had to, he just was constantly teaching me things. I had a 9 1 1 conversation here with Rick Betenbough maybe that was about 2012. And for us, in our culture, a 9 1 1 means this is an emergency. And you've been acting this way. A behavior's been happening this way, or your work is going this way and tomorrow it has to 180 change.

Martha: Oh, wow.

Jeanna Roach: And that really began this journey for me of really being introspective and reflecting on what parts did I own and learning to take responsibility. The first part of the Bible is all about taking responsibility. And so I had to learn those things. And I think through the work journey, it's just such an opportunity to hear from God, to learn things about him and how he created you and what he's calling you to.

And I think, there were moments like even before my demotion, I said out loud to all of our leaders, which at the time I think was about 50 leaders on our management team, and I said, Hey, [00:08:00]look. Your value is not connected to your title or your pay. God sees you as valuable no matter what. Every job is important. And so then guess what I got to do? I got to ask myself, did I believe that? Because I said that before I got the demotion. And I did believe it. And okay, now I have to walk through that and walk that out.

And so God was teaching us so many things along the way, and then the minute I would really lean into him, listen to him, and walk in things and just walk out stuff, becoming the marketing director meant that I had people coming from all these different teams, and we were creating this one centralized team. So it wasn't even just the people that had been under my authority in marketing, it was now new people that I was having to bring this group of about 15 individuals together now to become united and serve every business.

And that is a challenge on its own. If you've ever built a team and then you didn't choose most of them. I [00:09:00] didn't. So now I have to go and I have to bring this group together in a new way. And those were new challenges. I had been here so long that every team, I had somehow been involved in the hiring and development of that group, and my goodness, the things that God taught me during that were so powerful, how to love people really well.

Felt like I was good at that before, but again, I had hand selected those people. So these were new people. I was bringing them together. I was having to rely on the Holy Spirit in a way I'd never had really before. I just hadn't done that in that kind of way, and brought this kind of powerhouse group of people together.

And in the midst of that is when Rick really started calling me into other things. He said, Hey, I want you to come and lead our title company. We had started a title company in 2020. And that was part of my idea was, man, we're closing over a thousand homes. This is something that most of our buyers, they're not even in tune with.

So is this maybe a new business that we could add in [00:10:00] to where we are actually making an impact for the kingdom? Could we add them? And so new people in our organization get to try something different. They get a new challenge, and we get to expand the territory of the kingdom. And that had been an idea for many years, but now that we were at a thousand closings, let's do this.

We had, we knew nothing about title outside of that people had them. We knew what Home Builders know about title, right? Which is not the in and outs. And so we began that and that was had a bit of a challenge. That team needed some new Leadership. And so Rick asked me to take that on and I had just gotten so peaceful with where I was at.

I was experiencing that much more. So then I'm like, do I do this? I don't know if I'm supposed to do this. And prayed about it. Felt like, okay, just try it. And so that's what we did. So I started leading the title company, and I gotta be honest, it was one of the most toxic situations I had ever experienced. So just because we have a purpose, a kingdom purpose, doesn't mean that everything here is rainbows and unicorns.

Jim: I don't [00:11:00] wanna run outta time without you telling the rest of the story. You became a director. Then you became CEO of a title company and now you're CEO of all of the Betenbough companies.

That's a flipping your world right side up if I've ever seen it. But in the middle of that, Rick Betenbough, a great man of God, went to be with the Lord. There was, he was diagnosed, he's gonna die right away with pancreatic cancer and ends up living two years because he gave up ribeyes.

That's what Jeanna is convinced of. I don't know if that's really true (laughter) but Rick Betenbough, an incredible mentor. Rick and Holly Betenbough two incredible people. You now run the companies that you started working for 20 years ago.

Jeanna Roach: Yeah. What a journey. And again, I think it's just that daily submission and just getting really comfortable with who I am and the gifts that God gave me. So he let me take over the title company and help lead that. Along with leadership, everything we do here is teams. So this has never been just me, not ever. It's really about surrounding yourself with people [00:12:00] that fill in those gaps that you had. And that's been everything that Rick has done.

He saw this 20 years ago. He started building and developing leaders, and that's just what we spend our time doing. Full time. So after the title company we were watching, we have a cafe and we have an event center also, and those were in the red, pretty heavily in the red. And so Rick came to me one day - actually, I called him because I felt like the Holy Spirit was ta talking to me through scripture, like he does, telling me that Rick was wanting to ask me to do some things, but he was worried about me.

He didn't wanna ask me to do too much. And the Lord was just telling me to be willing to do whatever he's asking you. And so I called him and he said, okay, let's meet tomorrow. And so he said, Hey, I want you to take over the cafe and the event center, but you're gonna have to give up something. And I'd like for you to give up the marketing team. I'd led marketing for 15 years here at that point. And so he knew that had been [00:13:00] originally my passion.

Like God does, he gives you these new passions, is what he's done for me, and leading business operations and healthy teams has just been, I have been a culture defender and fighter from the beginning. I knew this place was special and I am willing to fight to keep it that way. And I did that. I remember we had a team member and they were like, okay, we're gonna lose less money in 2023. And Rick goes, how about we start making money in December and this was October? And I'm like, yeah, what Rick said.

I grew up with him, he's the one who taught me everything that I knew, him and Ron, his dad. And so that's what we did. And by December, actually, the cafe was in the positive. And it's got like outrageous revenue right now, for our coffee shop.

Jim: That's fantastic.

Jeanna Roach: Everything has turned around. So here I am, the Lord just, he constantly told me I was in training, I'm like Joshua. Joshua was there, Moses was with God, and Joshua was right there next to Moses. And I've been like [00:14:00] that with the Betenbough family, just listening and learning. And when Rick called me on November 13th, he called me of 2023. He said, Jean, he would always call me Jeanna Sue. He said, Jeanna Sue, you got a little bit of dad.

You got a little bit of me and you got a little bit of Holly, and this is why you know God is calling you. He's added these things to you to bring in this next season. And that was the biggest. I cry more about that statement than anything.

Jim: It's amazing. Yeah. You talk about flipping your world upside down. God has done such a amazing work and since we know some of the backstory and to be a even a little piece of that story with you and Andrew, what I love is when God surprises us.

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All right, Jeanna, in this last eight minutes of us talking, and I know we could talk forever, but you're a CEO and you're busy. It's the kingdom culture. If there's one thing we've talked about across the country, it's the kingdom culture of Betenbough Homes, which is now Betenbough Company, these six companies. It's the kingdom culture. I remember the first day we were there and we were sitting waiting for some of these meetings to kick on, and Holly Betenbough walks into the room.

I watched the Holy Spirit (makes a sound) just in this room. There's no better way to explain it, but I saw love in a corporate environment I've never seen before. I saw people loving [00:16:00] on each other that I've never seen before. It was one of those things when Rick and Holly first brought us in there in 18, I said, fine.

You say you guys got this kingdom culture thing down. We wanna interview people from the top to the bottom, and I wanna see if it's real. And they said, okay, whoever you want. And we did, we interviewed people. I don't even remember the names of all the people we interviewed.

Martha: No, but we'll put the show links in there because here's a little backstory, like there was no prepping. It wasn't like, okay, make sure you answer the questions to make us look good or, make sure that, whatever we put some employees on the spot and had an opportunity to say what is it really like here as far as the culture? And you said, you are a culture defender since the beginning, and rightfully so because the culture, in my opinion, is a lot of what has probably brought the success of all of the companies, even through the dips in the valleys and the economy, all the different things.

The bottom line is that, number one, for people that don't [00:17:00] know, your companies are an esop, so the employees have an interest in the company. And so to have a culture that lifts them up and encourages them and lets them know how valued they are, more so than the home they're building, or more so than the sandwich that they're making or whatever the, the product is that they're bringing to the table. That culture has been such a big part of it.

But anyway, so we interviewed these employees and that really set the tone for us to validate and say, yeah, this is real. Listen to what's going on and learn from it. And we've been big cheerleaders of you guys ever since.

Jim: So how are you gonna maintain this culture? You're not Rick Betenbough. You're not Holly Betenbough. And you're not Ron Betenbough, but you've been trained by all three of them, and you've lived in that culture now working 19 years. As a CEO, how are you gonna keep it? How are you gonna perpetuate it? And how are you gonna take it to the next level?

Jeanna Roach: I think for us first is, we just talk about it all the time. We have a kingdom [00:18:00]purpose. Our purpose is a kingdom purpose, to reveal God and his kingdom through our work in the marketplace. So that guides every decision right there. I think a kingdom culture is when there's a flourishing for all. That shalom, that idea of shalom. But it's really, it's, we're in right relationship with God, with one another, with our community, creation.

And so we're constantly running it through those filters. It's not that it's always the best for our people. That's actually not a flourishing for all. It's not that it's always best for the customer. That's also not a flourishing, and so we're trying to look at it from every single area.

Everybody that's in our authority. What does this look like in our community? And so I think by always putting our purpose at the forefront and making decisions with that first filter, that's the way that we do that. And in our culture, any leader, we're gonna ask them to adopt that purpose as their purpose.

Because really, let's be honest, our team, there's five of us total on our board, [00:19:00] including Holly Betenbough. She's an advisory member of our board of directors. For anybody else that would be their C-Suite. That's our group. And together, combined, I don't even know how many years of service we have, probably 60 to 70 years of service here.

And so it's about a team bringing this culture together. We know who we are. We definitely have our kingdom related core values that we talk about incessantly. Anytime we're together, that's what we spend our time talking about. It's very rare that you hear us talk about numbers. Now we wanna talk about numbers 'cause we think stewardship is critical.

And so we're always asking ourselves what does stewardship look like in this moment? How do we balance generosity and stewardship? But for us, generous stewardship is a core value because we think it's a kingdom thing. And so we're living those and talking about 'em and walking them out. And I'll tell you, our team is very accountable to one another.

And I think that is so important. There is nothing that is withheld on our [00:20:00] board. And so sometimes that's a shock to people because we are just honest with one another. And now we honor one another too. I heard one time from Leif Petland, he's an author and speaker, amazing author and speaker, and he said, love looks like honor.

And that is true and we have a culture of honoring one another, but being honest. And so if one of us steps outside of the line of that culture, trust me, your teammate's gonna tell you. And we're just trying to build that into every team. And that's why we're talking about 'em. I'm talking this week.

I don't always get asked to speak to our leaders anymore. 'Cause we have a team, right? We have a hundred managers in our culture that are tasked with adopting this purpose and living it out and loving their people in a really relational way. And so I don't always speak, but I get to this week on Unity. That is, that's a core value of ours.

And so we go and talk to our leaders we say, Hey, what does that look like here? And we're just constantly talking and [00:21:00] teaching, which is what Jesus did, and then empowering them and asking them to take that to the next level.

Martha: I love that you said, we continue to talk about it because God continues to teach us new things all the time, so it can never be old because he is gonna open up another way of looking at some of your core values and things like that.

There are a lot of companies that struggle because they don't have a culture like that, but they may want one and a lot of people, when they're trying to grow their business, use a local chamber of commerce in order to engage and grow their business. Imagine upping that game and becoming a member of the US Christian Chamber of Commerce.

The US Christian Chamber of Commerce likes to say business isn't just business, it is a kingdom calling. And so at the US Christian Chamber of Commerce, they unite Christian business leaders to build with excellence, lead with integrity, and advance God's kingdom in the marketplace. This is how We Chamber. Are you in?

You can check 'em out at [00:22:00] uschristianchamber.com.

Jim: And I believe there's a Christian chamber coming to Texas. The Texas Christian Chamber. I know they're working on one in Dallas as well. So check it out online, US christian chamber.com. Jeanna, you're the daughter of the king. A wife. A mom, a CEO of a very large Texas company. 'Cause everything in Texas is big,. How do you keep it all in perspective and properly quote unquote balanced?

Jeanna Roach: Yeah. When I first took this role, because look, I haven't done this well always, honestly, and I feel like a lot of people do this when you are leading and you believe that you are doing ministry work, and this is God's thing. I believe this is God's thing, and I have for many years. Sometimes that becomes the main thing in your life. But he never wants my work to be my priority. And so over the years, he has really helped me to make sure that I'm seeking first the kingdom, which means kingdom priorities.

And which doesn't means Betenbough Companies cannot come before my family. It cannot come before my spouse, and it [00:23:00] cannot become an idol even ahead of him. And so I have set boundaries up pretty early now, especially in a lot of speaking engagements or my travel. I have boundaries around that, how often I will travel, which is once a month.

I won't be gone more than three nights from my kids and my family. We are blessed. My husband has a flexible schedule, and so we have a bit, of a non-traditional, kind of family where he's taking the kids and picking them up. But we're both built that way. God made us that way. So for us it feels very natural.

But we've had to set up some boundaries. I always leave here before 5:30 PM. I am not on my phone. That's not always been the case. And even my kids, they understand that. They go, mom loses her phone all the time, and I actually take that as a badge of honor. That just means I'm not on that thing, and they don't see me on that thing.

And I just had to put those things in order to make sure that I'm spending time with the Lord, that I'm hearing from him, that I'm being still enough, because that's the biggest problem. The [00:24:00] devil is in the distractions. He wants to keep us busy. And moms working. Moms, not even leaders, but working moms.

There's a lot of things that are coming, trying to gather our attention. The minute you get home, your kids need something from you. Your spouse needs something from you, and you can just run at a pace that is not healthy and is not holy. And so I have had to learn to put those things in order, which I think really is seeking the kingdom first in all things. And then God has, gosh, given us every blessing when we've done that. 'Cause sometimes you get it wrong and you have to repent and then put it right back into order. So it's been sweet.

Jim: We're almost out of time. Martha's got one last question for you, but I wanna know when we do the next interview, - I hope it's not seven years. What's it looking like to take the vision you've been given by Rick and Holly and Ron Betenbough and take it to the next level? What does that look like spiritually, vision-wise for the company?

But we don't have time for that today, but I want you to be thinking about that one for the next time, unless of course you have a [00:25:00] short, succinct answer before Martha asks our last question.

Jeanna Roach: I think for that it's just we're gen two. We're generation two. And you know what Rick and Ron did? They just took the next right step. They asked the Lord what that was. They never had these big visions. Actually, God did, but He always gave them the next right thing. And so that's exactly what I'm doing right now.

Martha: That's so good because I think a lot of us think, okay, it's gotta be this three page document with all these bullet points, but taking the next right step - a good word for everybody right now, Jeanna.

There are a lot of Christian working women that are listening. What can you say to them today that the Lord maybe has put on your heart that you can speak into the Christian working woman?

Jeanna Roach: I've thought about this a lot, of course, 'cause I get questions like this all of the time. And I think, what I have learned is to just be authentically - to ask the Lord, who am I? Those two big questions. Who am I and why am I here? Identity and purpose. And so understanding that [00:26:00]women bring something so unique to a culture that is needed. God made us nurturers. And look, that looks different based on your personality, that looks different. That doesn't mean that you have to be really huggy and lovey-dovey, but that gift is in you.

Women have the gift of intuition, and they bring those things, and I'll tell you that Rick and Ron, they pulled those things outta me. They would always say, Hey Jeanna, we just need Jeanna. Don't beat Cal, don't be Carrie. Don't be whoever. We just want you. And I think that is the main message of the day, is to do that.

But like oftentimes, the world's trying to tell us to be more like our male counterparts and teammates. And if that's how you, that's how you win, that's how you get to the next level. But that's not what God says, he gave us specific giftings and for us to have whole and healthy cultures.

We need to bring those gifts that he gave us. And so for me it's, I always tell people I [00:27:00] joke, but it's like I'm gonna be in heels all the time. That's just who I am. I'm gonna wear hot pink. I'm not gonna look like your typical CEO for a home building company. And that's just because God made me uniquely this way.

These are the, this is who I am. And so I'm gonna bring all of me, all these gifts he has given me. I'm gonna recognize that other people around me are gonna bring other things. But honoring your male teammates I think is so critical. I see a lot of competition in women and the kingdom is about collaboration. It's about seeing not just those gifts in me, but those gifts in them, and that together we just make a powerhouse team.

Jim: Praise God. Jeanna Roach, thank you so much for coming back on, for sharing your life with the iWork4Him audience a few times over the last decade and we're just so excited to see what God's doing. Can't wait. Hope it's not seven years, but we can't wait to see what God does next. But Jeanna Roach, thanks for being back on iWork4Him today.

Jeanna Roach: Thank y'all so much. Bless y'all.

Jim: You've been listening [00:28:00] to iWork4Him with your hosts, Jim and Martha Brangenberg. We're Christ followers. Our workplace, it's our mission field, but ultimately iWork4Him.