Joe Greene

Joe Greene, visionary and founder/ chairman of CEO Fellowship, has spent his life in the corporate world modeling Christian leadership. His passion for encouraging other leaders to live as Christ and manage their companies as a picture of Christ overflows in his seminars, consultations, presentations, and now in his first book. The primary goal of the CEO/Business Owner is to lead in a way that motivates others to follow Christ and His teachings. Born and raised in Nashville, Tennessee, Joe accepted Christ at age 12. After serving in the Air Force, Joe graduated from Bowling Green College of Commerce in Bowling Green, Kentucky with a B.S. in Business Administration and Finance and held management positions in hospitals in Jackson, Tennessee, Mobile, Alabama, and Atlanta, Georgia. He then spent ten years with Humana, Inc. (the largest for-profit hospital company in world at that time) as President of Hospital Operations. After that, his life really got interesting. “When I left Humana,” Joe explains, “God made it plain that I was to operate a company on Christian principles. After postponing taking action on this instruction from God for two years and ending up in the emergency room of one of our hospitals with extremely high blood pressure, I finally accepted God’s vision for me and opened Health Management Associates—without having the financing, marketing, or staff knowledge but with a steadfast commitment to operate a hospital company based on Christian principles. Almost immediately, funding came my way, key staff accepted positions, and hospital management opportunities cropped up seemingly out of nowhere. God was faithful in every way as I began to learn from Bible study and input from Fellowship of Companies for Christ what Christian principles I should be following.” When HMA finally grew to the point of “going public” and trading on the NYSE, Joe resigned and returned to Nashville from the company’s Naples, Florida headquarters. There, he raised two daughters following the death of his wife and turned his focus to helping other Christian CEOs find the same path to success and satisfaction that he discovered in Scripture. To Joe, a company is its owner’s or CEO’s mission field. For HMA, he put together a Ministry Plan, including detailed ways the company would serve to its employees, customers, and vendors. For instance, Joe turned the concept of a Christmas party into an opportunity for evangelism. One Christmas, Joe invited Bruce Wilkinson (Founder of Walk through the Bible and author of The Prayer of Jabez) to speak to the 400 employees and their spouses at the festivities. After Bruce shared his testimony, twelve people accepted Christ as their Lord and Savior at the company Christmas party! Dare to Succeed is laced with story after story-many of them humorous and all of them firsthand experiences from Joe-that demonstrate biblical principles in action, in business.