When Your Faith is Central to Your Identity, How Much of Yourself Can You Bring Into the Office?

Adrian Bracy was chief financial officer for the Arizona Cardinals, an NFL team now worth five and a half billion dollars. Today she is a full-time advisor to one of the wealthier families in the country, helping guide their business and philanthropic operations. Billionaires listen closely when Adrian speaks, but her first and deepest loyalty is to someone with even more clout: God.

Adrian has structured her exceedingly impressive career around conducting business and pursuing her religious convictions at the same time. Each reinforces the other.

As you will hear, she knows the danger of putting that aspect of her identity front and center but decided long ago that it was worth the risk. Actually, given the strength of her convictions, I’m not sure she felt there was any choice in the matter.

Episode Guide

1:30 The first thing she wanted to do with her money was give it to the church

10:21 Her job is to help a wealthy Christian family perform good works with their money

13:58 Relatively few wealthy Black families have their own family office to organize their financial affairs

18:37 You might own an NFL franchise, but that doesn't mean you can pay all of your bills

24:35 The dangers of discussing faith in the workplace

30:07 People keep coming to her with their problems, and she likes that

33:15 She takes her own advice when it comes to budgeting and estate-planning