Calling All Leaders with Terence Chatmon
Terence Chatmon is the president and CEO of Fellowship of Companies for Christ International (FCCI), which seeks to unite Christian business leaders throughout the world. In the article below, Terence shares with TwoTen Magazine the value of collaboration versus competition...
In 1977, a small group of business leaders who shared a vision of leading companies for Christ came together in Atlanta. Their goal was to invite and encourage other business leaders to join them in accomplishing their vision. This group became the foundation for the Fellowship of Companies for Christ International, an organization that serves Christian business leaders around the world through peer-to-peer relationships, traditional and technology-based resources, local business leader groups, regional and global conferences.
About the same time and over a thousand miles away in Chicago, Terence Chatmon was graduating from high school, not knowing that God would prepare him to take the helm of this marketplace ministry.
Born the youngest of five children to a strong Christian family, Terence was a talented baseball player with an 88-mph pitching arm. His talent was notable, but just shy of the 90-mph strength needed to make it in the “big” leagues, so Terence pursued a degree in marketing at the University of Illinois instead. Over the next 20 years, Terence had a successful career in corporate, entrepreneurial and non-profit ministry leadership. It was the right preparation for the role of President and CEO of FCCI, a position he accepted in August, 2011.
A Heart for Discipleship
With his background, Terence approaches his role with the mind of a seasoned transformational leader and a heart for discipleship. “Our vision is to transform the world through Christ, one company and one leader at a time.”
When you measure FCCI’s impact, it is pretty impressive. Today, the organization has impacted thousands of business leaders in 38 states and 61 countries. However, when you look at the market penetration of marketplace ministries worldwide— and FCCI does have a global view—there is an incredibly long way to go.
Terence explains. “There are 90 million registered businesses worldwide, and if you assume 10% are owned and operated by Christians, then there are 9 million Christian businesses in the world. But only about 3/10ths of one percent of these businesses is involved in marketplace ministry; that is, using their business as a platform for discipleship. That is an enormously underserved market!”
Terence sees that the only way to address this gap is through collaboration with other organizations like his that believe indeveloping Christian-led businesses to use their platform for a greater purpose than shareholder value.
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