Diana Romero, founder and CEO of Integrated Purpose Management, begins this month’s discussion on integrating faith and work by sharing why the word “integration” is such a major part of her life and career, and why she believes it should be as important for you, too.

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You can listen to this conversation with Diana on our podcast, Work, Love, Pray! Listen below or click here to find your preferred listening platform.

The word “integrate” seems to really resonate with you. What draws you to this concept?

In my career in corporate America, I kept looking for the elusive work/life balance. It felt like everybody was talking about finding work/life balance, but the thing is, I never found it. I was in corporate for 30 years and I never found a balance. One day, I was listening to someone speak at a work gathering with another organization. In their presentation, they said that they had replaced the term ‘work/life balance’ with ‘integrated life’ within their workplace, and I just thought, ‘What a perfect way to say it because I really do want to have an integration instead of a balance of my faith, my family and my work.’ It just stuck with me and I knew that it would be a part of whatever I did whenever I left corporate America.

Why is integrating faith and work so important?

We should be able to take our full selves anywhere we go. A lot of people are actually nervous, even fearful, to talk about their faith at work. Our constitution actually protects us and tells us we can, but some people don’t realize that! For me, I can’t imagine living my life without my faith going with me. I wasn’t a Bible thumper at work, but if you came in my office, you saw something about God in my office, and I always offered to pray. For many professionals, their faith is important to them and they want to have it with them and feel comfortable sharing it and talking about it at work.

Have you ever tried to integrate your faith at work and it didn’t really go according to plan?

Honestly, I really haven’t ever not been able to bring my faith to my workplace. Everything that I have ever done at work was faith-forward. I tried to use wisdom on when and how I talked about my faith. The key for me being able to be authentic in my faith journey is that I allowed people of other faiths to share about their faith with me. I had a really good friend who was Hindu and we had some amazing conversations because I was open to hearing about her faith. You have to get really comfortable and strong in your own faith and be willing to let other people share theirs.

We’ve had some discussion in the past about work/life/faith balance and how a more realistic goal is to have work/life/faith integration. What is your opinion on that?

I completely agree. What work/life integration means for me is not being afraid to talk about my faith at work, and setting up patterns in my life to keep certain things integrated. It would be no different than if you were working and trying to get a degree at the same time. You must have a pattern of having time with the Lord in the morning, or at lunch, or in the evening, whatever your pattern needs to be. For me, part of this process of work/life/faith integration involved giving myself permission. I had to tell myself, ‘You know what? You can bring God wherever you go. Don’t leave Him at the door.’

Diana Romero is founder and Chief Executive Officer of Integrated Purpose Management (IPM) LLC, a family owned and operated company. IPM enables you to realize your integrated purpose by providing business management expertise to grow your business, professional coaching to elevate you to your full potential and understanding in communication intelligences to cultivate your professional and personal relationships. Diana hosts a podcast called The Integrated Life where she encourages her listeners to have a life where they integrate their faith, family, and work so they can become whole again. She has a Bachelor of Science degree in Biology with a minor in Chemistry from the University of North Texas and an Executive MBA from Texas A&M, Mays Business School.

Prior to founding Integrated Purpose Management, Diana has over thirty years of experience in the healthcare industry, most recently working for Abbott. She has served in the areas of project/program management, research and development, global quality assurance, regulatory affairs/compliance and executive management. Diana is a certified Communication IQ* consultant for Life Languages International*. Diana is married and has a grown daughter.