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"You can either sit with a hood over your head and pretend things won't change or you can get ready for it." —Jeffrey Immelt, GE Chairman, CEO
 Patricia Aburdene is one of the world’s leaders on the 21st century transformation of socially conscious business. In her book, Megatrends 2010: The Rise of Conscious Capitalism published in 2005 by Hampton Roads, Patricia predicts the rise of spirituality in the world of profit. In post financial crisis 2010, her book is more important than ever. In the following months, GoodB will be excerpting portions of it to inspire readers.
Success and Consciousness: The Missing Link
“Spirituality” in business sounds lofty. How practical is it?
The answer is “very.” There’s a fundamental way in which Spirit and consciousness contribute to worldly success—and it has long been ignored.
As experts, authors and gurus often note, the game of business is to influence the external world. But here’s the point: How can you control your environment if you can’t even manage your own thoughts and emotions? In other words, how do you rule the world without first mastering yourself?
The cornerstone of effective leadership is self-mastery.
But that’s exactly what’s missing in business today. Lack of self-mastery is why so many business heroes wind up in court—if not the jailhouse.
The fallen heroes of free enterprise who parade across our TV screens illustrate the irrational, self-destructive choices we make without the grounding, illuminating power of self-mastery.
And the surest route to self-mastery is spiritual practice. Time spent in peaceful reflection or mindful meditation clarifies thought, sharpens intuition and curbs unhealthy instincts. Spirituality, it turns out, is a lot more practical than most of us ever thought.
Am I saying a dedicated meditation practice would have helped people like former Tyco CEO Dennis Koslowski, former AIG chairman Hank Greenburg and many others?
Yes. I certainly am.
Worldly power without self-mastery is the downfall of leadership.
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 “The Era is Over”
Several months ago, the G-20 Nations promised that the, “Era of banking secrecy is over.” Also pledged in the G20 Summits and in economic discussions throughout the world economies this year is that the era of US “cowboy” economic supremacy is over as well. The world’s nations are adopting a more cautious approach to finance using the painful lessons learned over the past decade.
New Initiatives in the Global Top 20 Economies in 2009
Policy Changes at the International Monetary Fund
G20 New Initiatives: Pittsburgh Summit
 G-20 London Summit – Spring of 2009
An angry and determined G20 met this Spring in London to discuss the ending of an era of American-style "anything goes" capitalism. The death-knell came for US financial as the follow-the-leader crowd of G20 countries followed the American bulls right off the cliff to insolvency. To resolve the crisis, huge banking bailouts were drafted by Germany, France, the UK, and the US as well as emergency measures throughout the European Union and G-20 nations. The crisis has ushered in a new era of global fiscal responsibility. The G20 has created a template for global regulatory change.
“President Obama, feeling the mood of the Spring G-20 Summit earlier this year, “signed on to a communiqué that Nobel Laureate Joseph Stiglitz said repudiated the previous U.S.-led push to free capitalism from the constraints of governments.
“This is a major step forward and a reversal of the ideology of the 1990s, and at a very official level, a rejection of the ideas pushed by the U.S. and others,” said Stiglitz, an economics professor at Columbia University. “It’s a historic moment when the world came together and said we were wrong to push deregulation.”
In bowing to that view, the leaders conceded in a statement that “major failures” in regulation had been “fundamental causes” of the market turmoil they are trying to tackle. To make amends and to try to avoid a repeat of the crisis, they pledged to impose stronger restraints on hedge funds, credit rating companies, risk-taking and executive pay.
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 Policy Changes at the International Monetary Fund (IMF)
The IMF, one of the top strategists of the G20 Summit in London, agreed to increase resources for troubled economies to $750bn. The G20 will also contribute $250bn to boost trade. UK Prime Minister Gordon Brown said the G20 will “crackdown on tax havens” and draft “stricter controls of bankers’ pay and bonuses.”
The following are the G20 goals for the coming months:
1) To create a new Financial Stability Board to work with the IMF to ensure co-operation across borders and provide early warnings for global economic instability.
2) Greater regulation of hedge funds and credit ratings agencies
3) A common approach to cleaning up banks' toxic assets.
4) The world's poorest countries will receive $100bn extra aid.
G20 countries are already implementing the biggest economic stimulus "the world has ever seen" - an injection of $5tn by the end of next year.
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 G20 New Initiatives: Pittsburgh Summit
The major outcome of the Pittsburgh Summit (September 2009) is that the G-20 will permanently replace the G8. The financial crisis has revealed how interconnected the 20 nations are in the 21st century global economy. The new G20 policy will include developing countries like China, India, Brazil, and Indonesia. The G20 now encompasses 90% of the worlds “economic output.”
Read More
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Europe Leads The Way
 
Thanks to a surprising upswing in economic growth for France and Germany, Europe is reportedly on its way out of recession. All reports this week indicate stronger employment, consumer spending, and banking stabilization. Previous economic turnarounds were normally led by the U.S. However, the current European and Asian recovery, according to the Wall Street Journal, “appears to hinge more on spending by governments and the region's households and businesses.” This could benefit the U.S. economy in the long run “by lifting American companies' exports while U.S. consumers rebuild their battered finances.”
Only two months ago in June 2009, economic indicators forecast the U.S. emerging from recession quickly while Germany and France struggled to keep afloat. What happened between then and now that turned things around?
Firstly, the German and French governments created strong banking initiatives that replaced risky practices with more conservative money management. (See Germany Lays Down Banking Laws). Secondly, unlike the U.S., both countries made supporting workers and saving jobs a priority with pro-active stimulus programs and strings-attached bailouts (see Vive La France). In the U.S., while President Obama is supportive of worker and job initiatives, it is hard to get anything done to that end.
The European leaders France’s Sarkozy and Germany’s Merkel made job preservation conditional when bailing out car makers, banks, and large employers. Europe’s pro-worker sensibilities support these initiatives. In the U.S., however, workers are unprotected in the wake of high finance destruction. For example, TARP taking banks like Bank of America laid off tens of thousands of workers as they absorbed billions in unconditional taxpayer support.
Germany and France have important job saving programs that the U.S. government does not have public support for or authority to enforce. Congress talks loudly and frequently about “saving jobs” yet has done little to support that. Ironically, President Obama’s controversial plan to remake General Motors and Chrysler and in the process save as many jobs and retirement pensions as possible has been called “unAmerican” and “unDemocratic” by opponents in the banking and credit sectors. This would never “fly” in Europe as jobs and public welfare come before private banking interests. Consequently, the U.S. economy lags behind Europe’s rebound as the American worker and small business struggle for life-support.
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A Catholic Call for the Common Good
Pope Benedict XVI calls for Ethics in Business
Bet you didn’t think the Pope would be interested in the ways and means of the world of money. Nor would you think the Pope was a concerned business man. Well, think again. The Vatican has issued a Papal proclamation on ethical capitalism called, “Charity In Truth.”
According to the UK Guardian, “The pope today called for a ‘profoundly new way’ of organizing global finance and business, calling for a new social and ethical dimension to capitalism and arguing the case for a new world political authority to help champion the common good.”
The Catholic Leader encouraged the financial industry to "rediscover the genuinely ethical foundation of their activity.”
Catholic tradition with its long history of moral social examination calls upon its congregants to reflect on profit practices. Many of the “guilty” in the current crisis may not be Catholic and may indeed turn the other cheek as well as the other ear to the words of the Pope. Yet the Papal Leader’s call for business ethics is hopeful cry for moral transformation for practicing Catholics at least.
Whether or not you are Catholic, the call for thoughtful and just adherence to “the Common Good” is a welcome policy from an important Global Spiritual Leader. The Holy Father joins the Dalai Lama in his quest to inspire the world to “moral money.”
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Consciously Conscious Capitalist: John Mackey
Whole Foods magnate, John Mackey started his healthy foods supermarket chain in his Austin garage.
His business success and passionate views on “free market capitalism” have inspired Mackey to create a movement for Conscious Capitalism, a phrase coined by “Megatrends 2010: The Rise of Conscious Capitalism” author and business philosopher, Patricia Aburdene.
Mackey doesn’t like unions:"The union is like having herpes. It doesn't kill you, but it's unpleasant and inconvenient, and it stops a lot of people from becoming your lover.”
Mackey believed that unions are unnecessary if employers create positive working environments and partner with employees for fair wages and benefits. "Unions as they evolved in the United States became very adversarial, untrusting, and opposed to the success and prosperity of the business. This is my major objection to unions today — they harm the flourishing of the business for all the stakeholders.”
Instead Mackey encourages cooperation between employees and employers for a less adversarial more mutually beneficial “win-win” partnership. Whole Foods workers are deemed “team members.”
From WholeFoods.com:
Empowering Work Environments: Our success is dependent upon the collective energy and intelligence of all of our Team Members. We strive to create a work environment where motivated Team Members can flourish and succeed to their highest potential. We appreciate effort and reward results.
So what exactly is Conscious Capitalism as Mackey sees it? 1) Creating profit while providing the highest quality products for your customers. 2) Caring for the environment with a commitment to sustainable business practices. 3) Common initiatives that give back to the community. 4) Empowering workers through a team oriented work environment. 5) Business finding solutions to world social problems.
Given that Whole Foods solved the problem of making healthy non-processed foods easily available in non-agriculturally developed areas in the U.S., he seems to have fulfilled his own prophecy.
Seems to us at GoodB, Mackey’s view of Socially Responsible “Free Market” Economics might be a good template for the financial industry and the business community in general. Sounds like a win-win for all.
From Freakonomics: Is There a Market for “Conscious Capitalists”?
The iconic libertarian Milton Friedman once said “The great advances of civilization, whether in architecture or painting, in science or literature, in industry or agriculture, have never come from centralized government.”
Michael Strong, founder of innovative charter schools, and John Mackey, C.E.O. of Whole Foods, agree with Friedman, and have their own libertarian vision. They believe that entrepreneurs and “conscious capitalists,” not government, can solve the world’s problems, and they’ve founded an organization called Flow, Inc., to advance that vision.
In his new book Be the Solution, Strong describes the Flow vision and explains how liberated entrepreneurs in a free-market society can tackle such colossal problems as protecting the environment, eradicating poverty, and fixing the U.S. education system. By Dwyer Gunn
Read more:
http://freakonomics.blogs.nytimes.com/2009/05/07/is-there-a-market-for-conscious-capitalists/
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 A Leader of a Different Kind:
Moral Money
“What the world needs now is love sweet love. It’s the only thing there is too little of” –at least in the savage world of money and business that is. Enter, His High Holiness Himself – The Dalai Lama.
For many followers of Tibetan Buddhism and admirers around the globe, the Dalai Lama is a universal living example of compassion and selflessness. A feat worthy of Buddha Himself.
*Interviewed by Steve Hamm for Business Week, here are a few pearls of Buddhist wisdom that could change the world in a heartbeat. Perhaps in our current state of economic challenge, we are finally listening...
On How to incorporate RIGHT ACTION:
Dalai Lama: “This global economic crisis was caused by too much greed, speculation, and hypocrisy--not being transparent. These are the moral and ethical issues. So be transparent and honest right from the beginning.”
Putting money in perspective:
DL: “Money is important. Without money you can’t survive. However, it is not the only measure of value…This global economic crisis reminds us you should find some other values. Money value alone is not very certain. It’s a limitation.”
Understanding the Big Picture:
DL: “These things happen due to their own causes and conditions…All the causes and conditions were fully ripe. No force could stop it. It’s the natural law. So you accept it.”
How to Cope Going Forward:
DL: “Instead of more frustration and anger, now think about other alternatives. Make an effort. That’s better. There’s a Tibetan saying: Nine times failure, nine times effort, without discouraging oneself.”
GoodB: What the World needs now is Hope, sweet Hope. It’s one of the things like love there is too little of. Thank you Dalai Lama for putting things in perspective and offering us Hope for a better future.
(*From May 5, 2009, Business Week: The Dalai Lama on the Global Economic Meltdown by Steve Hamm.)
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Compassionate Capitalism
WHEN THE WORLD'S most successful entrepreneur gives up control of the Fortune 100 company he founded to devote his prodigious skills for innovation to resolving global poverty, the world takes notice. When the world’s most successful capitalist joins forces with him, the business community stands at attention. Bill Gates and Warren Buffett shocked the Adam Smith world as they earmarked billions for world-wide social entrepreneurship. Making money and making a difference wasn’t just for "fringe zealots" anymore, their actions brought a Good Business mandate to mainstream capitalism. Gates called for “capitalism for the 21st century.” At the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland, Bill Gates challenged modern business leaders to pursue his brand of “creative” capitalism by using “the power of the marketplace” to help the poor.
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He's the Boss
GE CEO Jeffrey Immelt |
PERHAPS REMARKABLY, Jeffrey Immelt ranks his number one priority as General Electric’s Chief Executive Officer as “personal responsibility” according to Fast Company magazine. Immelt stated, "Enron and 9/11 marked the end of an era of individual freedom and the beginning of personal responsibility. You lead today by building teams and placing others first. It's not about you." That view is a refreshing about-face from predecessor, Jack Welch and his 1980’s style "profit first, people last" capitalism. Immelt's perspective represents the remarkable change that has occured in business in the new millenium. His clear mandate of personal responsibility is evident in GE's environmentally concerned efforts such as the innovative ecofriendly product initiative: Ecomagination. (see Profits and Purpose)
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