Commit to Improve Your Industry

Hope comes from believing that you can be part of making something better, and that is probably why Ebby Halliday is energetic and beautiful even in her 90s! She never gives up hope, and after decades of growing a business, she gave it to her employees and put a succession plan in place. Her Dallas-based creation, Ebby Halliday REALTORS, is one of the largest privately owned residential real-estate firms in the US.

TRANSCRIPT

HATTIE: (In the Studio) Hi. I'm Hattie Bryant. If you want to understand how businesses are built and how they grow, stay with us for the next 30 minutes. You'll learn about businesses and the people who build them. Every week here, you meet a new American hero, the founder of a growing business, the brains and brawn behind work and wealth creation.
This week is unusual because Ebby Halliday is not only a hero, she is a legend who has helped define her industry. Breaking the gender barrier before there was a feminist movement, she has run her real-estate business since 1946. If you need a hero, Ebby can be that for you. Heroes are people who bravely confront adversity while doing for others. What the real-estate business is today is partly because Ebby was there to establish the standards and pave the way for others. Now she is a legend, the new American hero, Ebby Halliday.

HATTIE: What is it? I mean, she's like this—she's got this magic.

PETEY PARKER (Heads Relocation Department): Yeah, she does.

HATTIE: What is it?

PETEY: It's that magic.

LEONORE BERGERT (Accounting Department Supervisor): She's the world's greatest salesperson.

ROBERT DOYNA (Halliday employee): She's a legend in her own time.

HATTIE: (Voiceover) Who is she? She's Ebby Halliday, but everyone in Dallas already knows that.

This video appears in "Conclusions to Ecclesiastes" in Ecclesiastes and Work at www.theologyofwork.org.