As part of what a friend calls my post-corporate-life rehabilitation, I’ve been exploring the concept of business with purpose. Its raison d’être, or reason for existing, as expressed eloquently by Francophones. And I’ve come across a phrase that seems to pop up more and more frequently:
Business as a force for good.
There’s a lot to unpack in those six words. But let’s start with… good. What does good mean? Good for whom? By whose compass?
I remember telling my sister anxiously when we were growing up that I must be the bad one. There’s one in every family and it had to be me. Compared to the rest of my family, I felt overly self-centred, judgmental, possessive, condescending and uncompassionate.
Reflecting on this recently, I was intrigued that my instinctive sense as a child of what it meant to be good or bad was based essentially on character traits. Studying the works of great thinkers through the ages wasn’t part of my formal education. Discovering Aristotle’s Ethics as an adult, I was fascinated by his conclusion that possessing virtues is what being a good person is all about. And that exercising those virtues is what makes a life worth living.
I’ve barely scratched the surface of the questions I asked. What I can say at this point is that the common thread in everything I do is to become a better person, and to use that to more effectively make the world a better place. It is – I am – a work-in-progress.
What does it mean for you to be a good person?