E. F. SCHUMACHER LECTURES OCTOBER 2004, STOCKBRIDGE, MA EDITED BY HILDEGARDE HANNUM Judy Wicks is one of my heroes. She is a single woman who built and runs a financially successful business, which at the same time is socially responsible and ecologically accountable. The White Dog Cafe not only serves regionally grown organic food but actively supports the network of farmers who grow that food. Staff share in profits and decision-making. The White Dog Cafe hosts community discussions around global issues of peace, renewable energy, rights of workers in countries around the world, hab... posted on Apr 17 2018 (8,108 reads)

Gioia (pronounced Joy-a) claims to be the only person in history who went to business school to be a poet. Having earned a degree from Stanford's graduate school of business, he worked 15 years in corporate life, eventually becoming vice president of General Foods. In 1991, Gioia wrote an influential collection of essays titled, "Can Poetry Matter?" in which he explored, among other themes, the nexus between business and poetry. Since 2002, he has been chairman of the National Endowment of the Arts where he has overseen programs aimed at making Shakespeare and poetry recitation more popular in the U.S. Gioia, who is a speaker at the Wharton Leadership Conference in Philade... posted on Jan 28 2013 (15,239 reads)

way you can make a living.” I say that’s absolutely the wrong idea. We have to go back to our entrepreneurship [roots]. We are all entrepreneurs. The whole problem of unemployment came because of the concept of employment. If we didn’t have the concept of employment, you don’t have the problem of unemployment because everybody can be an entrepreneur. That’s what we do in Bangladesh. We address all the young people from Grameen families. We say, come up with a business idea and we’ll invest in your business. We are a social business investment fund so that you can come with any business idea. We invest in you, and you be successful and return the mone... posted on May 5 2018 (10,399 reads)

we can see from the brushing example), and we can forget about coming anywhere close with metrics to the deeply meaningful intrinsic value of life itself that cannot even be enumerated. As I slowly started to accept the truth of this assertion on counting, I found myself questioning the prevalent worldviews on profit and impact. What follows are two conversations that explore both profit and impact as metrics that are only useful if they drive productive action. “The purpose of our business is really to make money.” My friend, who I will call Scott, said this to me with a deadpan expression. I knew that Scott loved his work. He was intellectually inclined, passionate ab... posted on Oct 17 2017 (15,020 reads)

for they themselves. As if everyone is born with the dollar sign in their eyes! So they’re pursuing the dollars. I said, that’s where it’s wrong, this interpretation of humanity. Human beings are not born with dollar signs in their eyes. Our education system has put those dollar signs in their eyes. And our economic system put those dollar signs in their eyes. The real human being is selfish and selfless at the same time. Selfishness has been expressed with a selfish business by the capitalist theory but they didn’t accommodate the selfless part of human being. Human being is both. If we include the selfless part of the human being into economic theory, then... posted on Jul 24 2018 (7,664 reads)

interested in engaging classic literature, Wikipedia has a list of "The 100 Best Books of All Time,"and Modern Library has picks for novels and nonfiction. Those interested in leadership might consult the syllabus for David Gergen's leadership course (PDF) at Harvard's Kennedy School of Government or the syllabus his colleague Ron Heifetz uses for his course on adaptive leadership (PDF). But if I had to focus on a short list for young business leaders, I'd choose the 11 below. I've only included books I've actually read, and I tried to compile a list that includes history, literature, psychology, and how-to. Variety is ... posted on Dec 19 2012 (55,916 reads)

or the art form called Improv, may call to mind comedy shows but it is now also a serious business tool. Organizations are using it to foster team work, collaboration, positive engagement and mindfulness, says Bob Kulhan, founder and CEO of Business Improv, who is also a part-time comedian and an adjunct professor at Duke University and Columbia Business School. Kulhan describes his strategies in his new book, “Yes And: The Art of Business Improv", which he co-authored with Chuck Crisafulli. He recently discussed them on the Knowledge@Wharton show, part of Wharton Business Radio on SiriusXM channel 111. Click here to play audio. ... posted on Oct 27 2017 (7,560 reads)

Online September 22, 2020 How does one witness to businesspeople about climate change? Climate change is a problem for the collective and the long term, whereas business often requires a ruthless focus on the individual and the quarter. Climate change is an ethical catastrophe whose solution almost certainly requires a profoundly moral response, but talk of morality in the boardroom is often regarded with profound suspicion. Reconciling these tensions has forced me to navigate between worlds in an ongoing attempt to persuade businesspeople that solving climate change is both an economic and a moral necessity, and that the purpose of business is not only to make money but also to su... posted on Oct 27 2020 (5,575 reads)

week I meet with a group of Los Angeles business owners and entrepreneurs - men and women from very different fields who share a common vision of being self-supporting through self-employment. Among the group are doctors, accountants, attorneys, real estate agents, writers, architects, artists, actors, PR agents, personal trainers, professional speakers, headhunters, musicians, construction contractors, literary agents, photographers, landscapers, and more. The topic for this week's meeting was: "What are you doing to keep your business going in these crazy-making economic times?" Several people said they have upped the number of cold calls they're making; other... posted on Mar 19 2012 (41,521 reads)

leaders can find lessons even from unlikely sources such as mountain guides, who follow principles that apply in business settings, says Christopher I. Maxwell. He is a senior fellow at the Wharton Center for Leadership and Change Management and an adjunct professor at the school. Maxwell, an avid mountain climber, found that guides display six leadership traits — such as social intelligence and adaptability — that empower other climbers. He distilled these lessons in a new book, Lead Like a Guide: How World-Class Mountain Guides Inspire Us to Be Better Leaders. He discussed the main takeaways of his book on the Knowledge@Wharton show on Wharton Business Radio ... posted on May 5 2017 (13,046 reads)

Simon is the founder and CEO of Sounds True, a multimedia publishing company that Tami founded in 1985 at the age of 22 with the mission of disseminating spiritual wisdom. Today, still faithful to its original mission, Sounds True has grown to have nearly 110 employees and a library of close to 2000 titles featuring some of the leading teachers and visionaries of our time.  Sounds True is a pioneer in the conscious business movement, and Tami leads in a way that values their multiple bottom lines, which include relationship and mission as well as profit.  Tami also hosts Insights at the Edge, a popular weekly podcast where she has interviewed many of today’s... posted on Nov 24 2018 (6,549 reads)

my books, my paintings and really leaping onto the sublime with the full sense of passion and purpose. My heart and my soul were pulling me stronger than anything that was stopping me. So that is exactly what happened. And here we are, 15 years later. I still at the moment own nothing in the world apart from one suitcase.   Along the way I had the incredible honor to meet the most influential and powerful humanitarians, those volunteers that join me, and celebrities and the well known business leaders that I have met in the front lines. All great humanitarians. Audrey: Learning about your work, it really is about brokering relationships between all these different people. Betwee... posted on Aug 3 2018 (4,685 reads)

Laloux is a business analyst and author whose book Reinventing Organizations: A Guide to Creating Organizations Inspired by the Next Stage of Human Consciousness is considered one of the most important management guides of the past decade. In this episode of Insights at the Edge, Tami Simon talks to Frederic about what it takes to become a "next-level organization" that meets the challenges and opportunities of expanding human consciousness. Frederic explains that the next stage of human development will be to move beyond ego, elaborating on how this will look in the business world. Tami and Frederic discuss the difficult balance between fulfilling financial... posted on May 13 2019 (7,831 reads)

we were a French company. And I'd write them back, and I'd say, "What a minute. We're not French. We're an American company. We're based in San Francisco." And I'd get a terse response: "Oh, that's worse." (Laughter) So one particular day when I was feeling a little depressed and not a lot of joie de vivre, I ended up in the local bookstore around the corner from our offices. And I initially ended up in the business section of the bookstore looking for a business solution. But given my befuddled state of mind, I ended up in the self-help section very quickly. That's where I got re... posted on Sep 2 2016 (27,347 reads)

were off the hook for resolving a difficult situation, he was exacerbating the problems the company faced. We gave him our frank assessment of the damage he had been doing. Joe, obviously taken aback, was thoughtful and silent as he contemplated our feedback. We’ll get back to Joe’s story, but first let’s look at why we paid such close attention to the conversations he was having with the newspaper’s employees. Conversations Create Culture James A. Autry, businessman, author, and poet, says, “We do make things true by what we say.… Things and people are what we call them, because in the simplest terms, we are what we say, and others are wh... posted on Oct 22 2017 (12,292 reads)

is the transcript of an Awakin Call with Mayuka Yamazaki, moderated by Pavi Mehta and hosted by Cynthia Li. Pavi Mehta: It is my pleasure now to introduce our guest. In many ways Mayuka Yamazaki's life is a study in contrast: Her credentials in the business world are impressive: She sits on the board of three public companies, has worked as a management consultant with McKinsey and Company, and is backed by a decade of experience working as an executive with Harvard Business School at their Japan Research Center. During her time with them, she co-authored 30 Harvard Business School case studies about Japanese companies, business leaders, and societal issues. Mayuka is also... posted on May 3 2023 (2,561 reads)

was one of America's greatest poets. The author of "The Emperor of Ice-Cream"and "The Idea of Order at Key West" was awarded the Pulitzer Prize for Poetry in 1955 and offered a prestigious faculty position at Harvard University. Stevens turned it down. He didn't want to give up his position as Vice President of the Hartford Accident and Indemnity Company. This lyrically inclined insurance executive was far from alone in occupying the intersect of business and poetry. Dana Gioia, a poet, Stanford Business School grad, and former General Foods executive, notes that T.S. Eliot spent a decade at Lloyd's Bank of London; and many other... posted on Dec 19 2012 (33,326 reads)

is about inspiring and influencing people to action. The servant part—it’s not about being a slave. Being a servant leader is not about doing what people want. It’s about doing what people need, and there is a huge difference. It’s not about being a slave, it’s about being a servant. What my children want [laughs] sometimes is not exactly what they need. What my employees want may not be necessarily what they need. So what servant leaders are about [is] the business of identifying and meeting people’s legitimate needs, seeking their greatest good so that they can grow. So the test of servant leadership is, do people leave you better than they found... posted on Aug 7 2014 (30,648 reads)

8, 2015 Underlying the collaborative economy are a handful of very strong and general trends that are challenging the conventional business models in just about every sector of the economy—not just in the types of transactions that we usually think of as the sharing economy. Focus is shifting from selling stand-alone, physical products to creating services that enable users to make the most of the resources around them. The cost of coordinating even very small and non-standard resources to fit individual user’s needs is falling. Everyone is increasingly empowered to participate and contribute to the value creation. Everything is getting connected; ... posted on Sep 1 2015 (12,875 reads)

first era of sustainability, call it sustainability 1.0, focused on cleaning up the planet’s growing environmental mess. Federal legislation restricted air and water pollution, as well as hazardous waste, and businesses adapted to the new regulations. Sustainability 2.0 took a broader perspective, reducing not just toxic waste, but waste of all kinds. The business community realized that less waste meant less cost and pitched in, often increasing efficiency and boosting profits in the process. But throughout this era of growing environmentalism, the linear business model, which has dominated the modern world since the industrial revolution, remained fundamentally unchanged. &ldq... posted on Jul 18 2017 (7,064 reads)