FAQs

A C12 Chair (or “Chair”) is a spiritually mature Christ-follower called by God to encourage Christian CEOs and Business Owners to build Great Businesses and to have them utilize their businesses as a platform to advance God’s Greater Purpose. The Chair, who is a leader in our peer advisory group, is responsible for recruiting the members (business development), facilitating a monthly business forum (operational delivery), and meeting each member for a focused one-on-one session each month (business and spiritual coaching).

C12 Members pay monthly fees that allow a successful practice to generate a professional income. As the Great Detroit team grows, we will have the opportunity to launch multiple business forums to help us further develop this territory and have a Kingdom impact. Because C12 is a turnkey franchise model, you can build a valuable, sustainable asset with substantial monthly recurring revenue. The systems, processes, models, and curriculum are already in place.

Here is how it works after you have been trained and joined our team.

We help you launch your practice through events, coaching, networking, marketing, and lead generation activities.

Once you have a nucleus of new Members, you begin a C12 Business Forum under your leadership.

Each month, Member fees are collected; you receive a portion of the gross collections.

As your group grows and you build your practice, you will add more business forums. The maximum load for most C12 Chairs is 4 full forums (approximately 48 Members).

Most successful C12 Chairs have six-figure annual incomes.

Yes! In Greater Detroit (Wayne, Washtenaw and Livingston Counties), a new Chair joins an existing team that works together. We offer onboarding, best practices, role-playing, coaching, event support, lead generation, marketing programs, and weekly check-ins to ensure that a new Chair has adequate support. You will also find that experienced C12 Chairs around the country are also willing and available to help whenever there is a need.

In addition, every Chair that is selected must complete a paid training program with our C12 Headquarters team. The training covers the history, the fundamentals of being a Chair, a set of effective practices and good approaches to presenting the C12 value proposition (i.e., sales training) to help prospective members make an informed decision about becoming a C12 member.

A Chair finds prospects anywhere in the franchise territory through relational connections, referrals, Social Media marketing, SEO and LinkedIn Lead Generation tools using Sales Navigator. The Greater Detroit Chair’s counties include: Wayne, Washtenaw and Livingston. This is a huge territory with approximately 6200 business with approximately 8-10% being Christian CEOs. Owners, Founders and Presidents.

Finding prospects requires the development of a system to make calls, encourage personal meetings, and includes networking (in person and via social media), territory marketing, and workshops. Like any other industry, referrals from satisfied members are the best source of prospective leads.

A “Principal Chair” is the person who purchased the local franchise rights from C12 Headquarters to build and facilitate groups in their territory. C12 Headquarters holds this person responsible for brand compliance and business development. For many territories, including Greater Detroit, potential members cannot be served by one chair. C12 Headquarters created the “Chair” concept to add capacity to the Principal Chair to better steward the franchise territory.

A Chair does not own the franchise. However, the Principal Chair and Chair work in unity and alignment to steward the territory and serve members through a territory operating agreement between the Principal Chair and the Chair. The territory operating agreement defines the responsibilities, deliverables, and financial arrangements, in addition to other matters.

Members and prospects treat Principal Chairs and Chairs alike. There are no outside-facing responsibilities that are different.

One C12 Chair impacts:

A fully developed practice has up to 4 business forums of 12 Members, or 48 Members

An average C12 company has 40 employees, or 1,920 employees

Each employee has an average circle of influence of 100 people, or 192,400 customers, vendors and/or family members.

192,400 people > 10% of a metro market

What would it mean to influence that many people? We think that the eternal impact potential is huge. And it starts with the hearts of the leaders that a C12 Chair mentors, encourages, and inspires.

C12 Greater Detroit accepts members from Wayne, Washtenaw and Livingston counties. We facilitate groups all over Detroit area. The opportunity and challenge are large.

A significant part of a C12 Member’s expanded vision comes through their relationship with the Chair, the structured business curriculum, and their business forum interaction with fellow non-competing peers. C12 Chairs not only facilitate monthly business forums but also meet monthly with members one-on-one, reviewing real-time challenges and opportunities. The Chair helps them think through building teams, refining processes, vetting opportunities, and solving problems. The results are often astounding, usually through steady incremental growth across multiple business measures. Men and women who persevered admirably before joining C12 find traction through concepts and insights that simply were not part of their management thinking and vocabulary. They stay because they get real business help and sharpen their eternal perspectives.

Some Christian CEOs and business owners come to C12 with deeply held faith convictions and a clear connection between Sunday and the workweek. For others, seeing their business as a platform for ministry is a completely new perspective.

We regularly see Members with a mild interest in displaying their faith at work evolve into confident Christians engaged in workplace ministry. For C12, ministry means helping our Members see how they can care for people’s physical, emotional, and spiritual needs both inside and outside the organization. Members realize that as they grow their profits, they have the capacity to invest in their people, their community, and their world.

One of the core values of C12 is “Results Matter.” We think that making a difference is a worthy calling. In fact, Jesus’ final directive to his disciples was a command to go achieve results—to make disciples of all nations. Until now, we have largely left this charge up to the institution of the local church to fulfill.

While the formal church has a large role in spreading the gospel, the reality is that there are many more people at work who need to hear the Gospel than there are at church. In fact, up to 70% of Americans in the workforce have no regular contact with a pastor, priest, or minister.

This is our mission field. Could it be yours?

It is not easy to be an effective C12 Chair. We are looking for a select few that meet the following requirements:

Mature Christ Follower: Member must be a hearer and doer of God’s Word, with an unwavering biblical worldview.

Entrepreneurial Attitude: Members must have a “can do, never give up” mindset, with the willingness and ability to be in business with us and committed to being a full-time “owner” of your practice. We think that grit is essential.

Trustworthy Advisor to Peers: Members must have the “gravitas” to garner the respect of business peers who will seek your advice and counsel.

Business Leadership Principles: Members must have strong business leadership acumen and understand how the Bible applies to business.

Ability to Invest Financially: Members must also have the financial reserves to live on for 12–24 months, depending on your monthly needs.

C12 Chairs view the workplace as their mission field, serving full-time in their local market. The roles of a C12 Chair can be summarized with the words build, lead, and impact.

BUILD
The Chair builds business forums for Christian CEOs and business owners (Members). This process includes networking, marketing, and business development. You do not need a sales background, but you do need to be willing to follow a proven, results-oriented process and have the passion, patience, and persistence (i.e., grit) to grow your practice over time.

LEAD
After you build a forum, you will facilitate monthly peer advisory meetings and engage in one-on-one coaching, consulting, and mentoring sessions with the forum’s members. The topics covered range from business to spiritual to personal (the member controls the agenda of the one-on-one session). You will focus on best-in-class practices that have both a near-term and an eternal impact.

IMPACT
The impact on your Members, their families, and their companies and communities will be amazing. From healthy, growing businesses, better work-life balance, and stronger relationships to an eternal impact around salvation, service, and giving, the C12 Chair is uniquely positioned to influence, observe, and celebrate great progress.

One of the great joys (and challenges) of being a C12 Chair are the various roles you play for your members. It is a privilege to participate with members in the most important areas of their lives and to be trusted to contribute solutions. Here is a sampling of what is required. While this may sound daunting, remember that you will grow with your members into these roles:

Advisor
Peer
Pastor
Facilitator
Coach
Curator
Mentor
Confidant

When you are a C12 Chair, you never forget that you are running a business (just like your members). That responsibility keeps the everyday issues that your members face fresh in your mind. It also helps you to demonstrate how to apply the many concepts that we cover each month in our business forms. All of the improvements we recommend to members, you get to model. Does that sound exciting?

Sales
Marketing
CFO
Coordinator
Operations
Account Manager
Thought Leader
Community Liaison

Perhaps you are intrigued by the prospect of using God-given business talents to help Christian CEOs and owners move to the next level, but there is the very practical issue of making a living. Can you feed your family, take care of obligations, and plan for the future as a C12 Chair?

This is where the C12 model is distinct from many alternatives. All our Chairs view their role as owner-operators and are engaged full-time in their practices. They do not split time between consulting engagements, side businesses, or fundraising. They are fully focused on building their groups and serving their members.

C12 Members pay monthly fees that allow a successful practice to generate a professional income. As the New Jersey team grows, we will have the opportunity to launch multiple business forums to help us further develop this territory and have a Kingdom impact. Because C12 is a turnkey franchise model, you can build a valuable, sustainable asset with substantial monthly recurring revenue. The systems, processes, models, and curriculum are already in place.

Here is how it works after you have been trained and joined our team.

We help you launch your practice through events, coaching, networking, marketing, and lead generation activities.

Once you have a nucleus of new Members, you begin a C12 Business Forum under your leadership.

Each month, Member fees are collected; you receive a portion of the gross collections.

As your group grows and you build your practice, you will add more business forums. The maximum load for most C12 Chairs is 4 full forums (approximately 48 Members).

Most successful C12 Chairs have six-figure annual incomes.

We invite you to begin the exploration process. All your information and our conversations are confidential. Please provide the following information to get our conversation started:

A current resume.

Responses to the following:
Using what you have learned about the C12 Group from our website, this Opportunity Profile, and any other research you chose to conduct, describe how your life and career have prepared you to serve as a Chair?

Why is this the right time for you to serve in this role?

What is your business background?
Contact Tom Rivers: Tom.Rivers@C12forums.com or 248.933.1179 to begin the process.

If you would prefer, leave your contact information, and we will get in touch with you.

There are three threads in the approval process. A “yes” is required in all three to permit someone to become a C12 Chair. (We are very careful about this process.)

1. The C12 Greater Detroit Principle Chair will coordinate interviews with other local C12 Chairs, perform additional assessments, arrange for visits to one or more C12 monthly business forums, and determine the team fit with the applicant.

2. C12 Headquarters will interview each candidate to determine if they feel a candidate is a good fit for C12. The interview process will include discussions with the development director and executive staff, financial vetting, and the completion of multiple assessments.

3. And you will perform your assessment to determine whether or not C12 is a good fit for you.