nouwen & business management
hahaa... i thought i'd go back to something more "mainstream" before venturing out in faith again. business management & spirituality is something that my dad talks and writes about often, so what is intriguing for business leaders at these talks might not necessarily be all that new to me. in fact, i was chatting with this older business guy after the workshop today, and he thought i was a business major! hahahaa...
so anyways, i thought i'd type up a few thoughts from my very last workshop of the conference (for my dad or whoever else interested). it was a CEO/consultant who travelled from germany to give that talk, since he found nouwen's spirituality to be hugely significant in his own business management model.
there's the question about the identity of the company. does the company exist to puff up itself, or does it seek to serve others? the example given was the change to Hewlett-Packard's mission statement. before it was, "we want to be the best company in the world" to now, "we want to be the best company FOR the world".
he talked about setting up the company in a way that could help their employees find their own journey to life, and finding different strategies to be successful (different from the "worldly" ways). an interesting point in this regard is that i guess germans, like the japanese, were used to "life-long employment" from the same company. so while acknowledging the difficulty in having to let go of employees within the new paradigm, he actually sees dismissal as an opportunity for helping the person find their own journey in life.
hmm... i want to write more on leadership, but i also want to sleep. maybe i'd just leave two sites if you're interested for more:
Robert Greenleaf: Servant Leadership
Peter Drucker: Leader to Leader Institute
so anyways, i thought i'd type up a few thoughts from my very last workshop of the conference (for my dad or whoever else interested). it was a CEO/consultant who travelled from germany to give that talk, since he found nouwen's spirituality to be hugely significant in his own business management model.
there's the question about the identity of the company. does the company exist to puff up itself, or does it seek to serve others? the example given was the change to Hewlett-Packard's mission statement. before it was, "we want to be the best company in the world" to now, "we want to be the best company FOR the world".
he talked about setting up the company in a way that could help their employees find their own journey to life, and finding different strategies to be successful (different from the "worldly" ways). an interesting point in this regard is that i guess germans, like the japanese, were used to "life-long employment" from the same company. so while acknowledging the difficulty in having to let go of employees within the new paradigm, he actually sees dismissal as an opportunity for helping the person find their own journey in life.
hmm... i want to write more on leadership, but i also want to sleep. maybe i'd just leave two sites if you're interested for more:
Robert Greenleaf: Servant Leadership
Peter Drucker: Leader to Leader Institute
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