Most decision frameworks are elaborate. Jim Hauck of JP Hauck Adventures inherited one that fits in a sentence, and he has never needed a second.
The Rule Jim Hauck Runs Everything Through
“My dad said to me many times, if there’s anything you do in life, make sure you leave the water a brighter place than you came in. And that’s what I live by. If I can’t do that, I don’t do it.”
— Jim Hauck, JP Hauck Adventures
The second sentence is the one that has teeth. Plenty of people admire a principle. Hauck describes it as a veto — if I can’t do that, I don’t do it — which converts a sentiment into a filter that occasionally costs money.
What It Filters Out Of A Business Plan
Hauck does not present this as an abstraction. He connects it directly to obligation:
“I’m a very strong believer that you give back to your community, you make your community whole, you help your community, you help your neighbors.”
— Jim Hauck
And he is pointed about where he has seen the standard go missing. He calls it “one of those crazy Christian values that the Christians seem to forget about — love your neighbor, love each other,” and he immediately widens it past his own tribe: “I love your gay neighbor, your Islam neighbor, your Hindu neighbor.”
For a business plan, the filter kills a specific category of opportunity: the one that is profitable, legal, and leaves the place slightly worse. Every founder can name one.
Community Commitments That Outlast A Quarter
Hauck’s own answer to why is not strategic. It is arithmetic about gratitude: “I’ve worked in a lot of nonprofits as a side thing to help build stuff, because I felt I was very fortunate. A lot of good things happened in my life, so I wanted to give back. Because if you get a lot, you should give a lot.”
Practitioner guidance from here on. Commitments that survive a bad quarter tend to be the ones with a named counterparty who would notice if you stopped — a standing monthly slot, a board seat, a sponsorship someone else is budgeting around. Commitments that quietly die are the ones expressed as a percentage of a number you control.
Applying The Test To Your Own Calendar (Practitioner Guidance)
Ours, not Hauck’s. Take next month’s calendar and mark each recurring commitment as: leaves it brighter, leaves it neutral, leaves it dimmer. Most weeks are dominated by neutral, which is fine — neutral is what pays for the rest.
The useful question is whether anything in the dimmer column has been sitting there for more than two quarters. Hauck’s rule does not require you to fill the calendar with good works. It requires you to stop doing the one thing you keep excusing.
More on stewardship as a posture in Are You A Steward Of A Business, Or A Prisoner Of One?.
Read more from the community on our about page and the entrepreneur blog.