Notes on Noble Business

In its most recent issue (March 23-30), Business Week offers “Game-Changing Ideas for Business” with an impressive array of examples of companies using both well-established and new ideas to improve their performance.
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With financial companies in shambles and the rest of the economy reeling, the business education community is asking themselves where they may have gone wrong in training the MBAs who headed for Wall Street, rose through the ranks, and were at the helm of many of the companies that lost their way.
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Tired of waiting for the Federal Government to stimulate the economy? One Alabama business owner took matters into his own hands, creating his own private stimulus program that provides an interesting model for other business owners to consider.

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Last week I had the privilege and pleasure of speaking to a group of 35 mid-level executives enrolled in Fordham Business School’s Accelerated Executive MBA program, which is rated in the top 30 executive MBA programs in the world by The Wall Street Journal.

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The “Noble Enterprise” business model uplifts people and profit.

As we witness the decline and implosion of major companies, with the ensuing government attempts to shore up some of these companies and the very economic system within which they operate, we wonder not only “What went wrong?” but also “There must be a better way – a better business model! The syndicated article below (which you are welcome to use and distribute, with the complete credit at the bottom) addresses this issue, urging business owners and corporate executives to take the time – especially during this seasonal time of Goodwill to consider a different business model, one that puts people at the core of the business – recognizing not only the contributions of their Minds, but also of their Hearts and Wills – and a business model that serves a larger purpose and acts with ethical values. [Read the rest of this entry »]

A few months ago, I asked several dozen business owners and executives just that question. Some reported that their companies were growing and prosperous. Others said their companies were stagnant, and a sizable number reported that their companies were declining and/or not profitable. If your business is in any of those three categories, you may be interested to learn what each group described as their biggest challenges. As you might expect, the challenge of coming up with a better business strategy and how to improve its implementation ranked high. But what I found most interesting was that there were also quite a few mentions about the challenges related to the human side of the business. You may be surprised by what specific challenges they cited.

Read the summary of the business challenge survey results.>>

That’s the question posed by the John Templeton Foundation to a group of leading lights. You can see their responses at www.templeton.org/market/. As you might expect, the answers provided a rich range of perspective. You can also weigh in and provide your own comments.

As I researched my recent book NOBLE ENTERPRISE: The Commonsense Guide for Uplifting People and Profits, I was inspired by the examples of companies and leaders who are truly noble – and actually made their companies more successful through that nobility, with passionate adherence to ethical values and a sense of higher purpose – in which these companies serve not only the material needs of customers and employees, but also their non-material (some would say “spiritual”) needs. [Read the rest of this entry »]

Can you imagine a worse scenario than business and government essentially colluding to achieve a societal goal (in this case “affordable housing”) but doing it in a way (providing high risk credit) that actually bankrupted major corporations in the process? [Read the rest of this entry »]

I often hear human resource professionals and business executives talking about the challenge of dealing with multiple generations in the workforce. How can we motivate and reward our workforce when it’s made up of people from the older generation, the boomers, the Generation X’ers, and the Generations Y’ers or Millenniums – all with different needs and desires? It’s a seemingly impossible quandary. Or is it? [Read the rest of this entry »]

In its August 25^th issue on “Trouble at the Office”, Business Week reports on how nearly 4,000 readers identified their biggest concerns about their work and provided their own answers for how to deal with those concerns. I was particularly struck by the ways people found to fight bureaucracy, deal with toxic bosses – and stay creative – not merely to make their own work lives more tolerable, but to help their companies succeed despite these problems. [Read the rest of this entry »]