LABOUR CONFLICT: STOP THE ROT AT GRASSROOTS

I wish I could have met Joe Scanlon. This fiery former prize fighter was a tough trade union leader who saved a steel company in Ohio from bankruptcy by convincing his union brothers and sisters to help save it. Such actions are not unheard of. Albert Koopman flung open the doors to participative management in South Africa at the height of labour unrest in the early 1980’s. I personally covered something similar at the Ergo Gold recovery plant near Brakpan, where the plan was developed between a local shop steward and a Human Resource manager. There are many more with varying degrees of participation and flexibility that show that we do not have to be trapped in this frightening and destructive confrontation we are witnessing in South Africa. It is proof again of the capacity for innovation and sustainable change at grassroots level despite any oppressive environment.

Where does all this anger come from? Anger that can lead to mob violence, leave patients dying in hospitals, and learners severely disadvantaged.

In his recent article Sipho Ngcobo gave us a good insight into the politicisation of the workforce. This was entrenched in the days of Nic Wiehahn when political aspirations of the disenfranchised were transferred to the workplace. Labour has always been a key ideological issue polarised powerfully against capital. While this expression has softened substantially throughout the world, South Africa seems to be going in the opposite direction. At the same time it is tearing at the very fabric of a crucial relationship where wealth is being created, in businesses and in government activities that should be supporting wealth creation. There is perhaps some solace in the fact that the most recent conflict has been between labour and government and that this may weaken if not rupture the unholy alliance between these two estates.

One of a comprehensive list of the key grievances that are bedevilling these crucial relationships is the absence of a common purpose and common fate between employers and employees. It is one that can be addressed at a micro level to buck the overall trend.

Business enterprises are the wheels that keep our entire transactional lives turning. As a collective of individuals it is one of those expressions of the human condition that make us social animals. Belonging to any collective, being a member of a pack not only gives security but also satisfies the need to be needed. It is often the most tangible expression of our preparedness to ignore immediate self-interest for the sake of a greater cause or of another person. This is most clearly seen in healthy families.

But it has an enormous downside. Too often, our own sense of right and wrong and our universal values can be clouded by the pack mentality. Membership of any group or collective should be based on one key principle alone: the fact of its being a means to unleash our true value, which lies in our capacity to make a contribution to the good of others. The group or collective is not an end in itself, but a means to that end. If the collective itself does not serve the broader other, then it will amount to little more than multiples of self-interest, enslaving us to our lower and grosser attributes. Of course, many collectives exist for the limited purpose of serving their members only. There is not much wrong with that especially if the group is set up to care for society’s neglected. But the moment such a collective sees its purpose as coercively, corruptly or fraudulently taking or “getting” from others for the group’s interest; it loses its legitimacy and allows people to hide behind banners, flags, mobs and slogans to escape individual accountability. This is not empowering for the individual. Indeed it is disempowering and debilitating.

The success of any collective depends on adherence to principles of common purpose and common fate. Common purpose should be tangible, definable, indivisible and clearly understood by all. The value of this purpose, both for individual members and the group, will be manifest in service to others outside the group. Common fate means both joint and individual accountability for the collective’s actions, as well as equitable (not equal!) sharing in the fortunes and misfortunes of the group.

If we were to hold the modern company up to this norm, we would have to concede that it fails dismally in many respects. For one thing, many people in such a collective have very little sense of belonging. This feature is automatic and spontaneous in most other collectives, whereas companies have to go to great lengths in holding social events, handing out T-shirts with logos, rah-rah occasions, and team-building exercises, to instil some sense of common belonging.

Linked to the absence of belonging, indeed probably because of it is the fact that companies seldom have a common purpose anyhow. Virtually all involved in a company have defined the purpose of their involvement primarily as a means of material self-enrichment. So a company is prejudicially defined as a place of getting. Yet for most, it is the place of expressing their contribution to others.

Establishing common purpose in a company is actually very simple. It is rooted in the natural economic law that supply exists to serve demand. The purpose of a company is to serve its customers. It is the purpose of the entire collective, including shareholders, employees, and even arguably the state through its involvement in providing infrastructure and services. The alignment of all individual behaviour to this common purpose will unleash the full potential of the company and become the ultimate empowering tool for everyone involved.

Most people at heart prefer to behave and be viewed as contributors. Most prefer to be seen as givers rather than takers. The fact that the working environment is not fully conducive to focusing on contribution and unleashing the best in the human potential, must clearly have an eventual effect on company success and sustainable national prosperity. It’s not the premise that’s at fault, but perceptions, behaviour, language, and of course, the most powerful of all, the accounting system. All of these will be dealt with in greater detail in future writings.

The rallying points for common purpose in any company should be its mission statement, its vision and its values. Despite their being plastered on walls many employees don’t know them, understand them, believe in them or experience them as being the true and vital driving force of the company. Most mission statements today reflect a serving motive and companies have gone a long way towards fulfilling their stated intentions towards their customers or markets. What seems to be missing, however, are perceptions and reinforcing behaviour from within.

Common fate is closely linked to common purpose, for without common purpose common fate would not make sense. Broadly, it means common accountability and sharing in the fortunes or misfortunes of a company. In a specific and more tangible sense it’s reflected in rewards such as shareholder returns, employee pay, and government revenue or tax. Achieving common fate is extremely difficult when the three reward categories are seen to be in conflict with each other.

Very often rewards are out of alignment with the actual fate of the company, so an essential link in common fate is destroyed. It becomes even more incongruous when executives are awarded huge bonuses after employee lay-offs. Common fate is also destroyed if labour is seen as a “market” commodity and not as an integral contributor to common purpose. It spawns another collective in an organisation, in the form of labour unions whose existence depends on an assumption of inherent conflict between the parties involved.

The rift is fully endorsed and reinforced by the accounting focus on the bottom line or profit. Because it fallaciously expresses everything that isn’t part of shareholder rewards as a drag and a cost and a burden, it is the least common to all the contributors.

One needs a measurement that is truly and genuinely common to all. It is wealth created or value-added. Ultimately, all rewards are dependent on wealth created. There is a deeper logic to the use of this key measurement. It is absolutely essential to common fate to have common purpose in place. Achieving full common purpose and particularly common fate is undoubtedly almost impossible because there is no single generic definition of human nature. Individuals represent a myriad of different aspirations and expectations.

But without question we can move substantially beyond the current point of assuming an inherent and inevitable conflict between the different stakeholders. We can start by redefining our perceptions about companies themselves and understanding the power of giving in creating wealth and individual contentment. And we can start with one company at a time!

“Never doubt that a small group of thoughtful, committed citizens can change the world. Indeed, it is the only thing that ever has.” – Margaret Mead.

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BENEVOLENT BILLIONAIRES.

It is easy to be sceptical when someone donates half of his wealth to charity and can still buy a smallish country with the other half. So sceptics can perhaps be forgiven when they scoff at the news that Bill Gates and Warren Buffet have persuaded some 40 billionaires to donate their half share to charity, amounting to some $150bn. But it does become more difficult to scoff at Gates when he pledges all of his wealth rather than leave it to his children to avoid them being members of the “lucky sperm club”. If that is not teaching prudence to your children then I don’t know what is.

Although philanthropists exist across the world, charity is a great American tradition. The country has hundreds of foundations and institutes bearing the names of entrepreneurs such as Rockefeller, Kellogg, Ford, Carnegie, Johnson, and Packard. Indeed, “giving” makes up nearly 2% of U.S. GDP.

I find it easier than most to be jaundiced, albeit with a very shallow shade of yellow, about gifts and donations of the “corporate” kind. One could say it is easy for these institutions to “give” when the amounts involved hardly touch the corporate purse, can be written off against tax, and blur the dividing line between marketing and philanthropy. One could also ask whether this money would not be better spent if it meant some direct benefit to customers, or some social gesture involving staff in the allocation. But personal gifts of the kind we are witnessing are in a very different category.

I just find it a bit sad that many still see philanthropy as proof of the generosity of great entrepreneurs. For me it is only a relatively small reflection of their generous spirit, as laudable and as magnificent as it may be in its own right. What about all the other things most of them have done during their lifetime: provide jobs and pay company taxes - and above all, the products and services that they brought to the world that made a meaningful difference to our lives? We have somehow managed to trash the making of their fortunes as the “less attractive side”, driven by greed and profit, rather than a sincere desire to make a difference to humanity. Of course there are many who made their fortunes by being singularly focussed on financial reward. But there are just as many who were not, and perhaps have been more successful because of it.

In my workshops I would ask those present to put names to the following quotes:

“I will build a car for the great multitude.”

“I will make the computer accessible to the masses.”

“I will protect the consumer against exploitation.”

“I will stay in prison until my people are free.”

They were easily identified as Henry Ford, Bill Gates, Raymond Ackerman and Nelson Mandela. The group would also readily agree that they were all statements of giving rather than getting, reflecting generosity rather than selfishness in what drove them. Then I would set off a heated debate by asking whether the statements were sincere or not. Apart from Mandela, most questioned the sincerity of the others.

Do we know these people intimately? Do we know them so well that we can accuse them of lying? We make assumptions so easily, most of them baseless and forgetting that assumptions lie at the root of all conflict. But, as I would tell my groups: They said it! They did it! How much more successful would they have been if they were indeed sincere!

But they were sincere. And I would argue that without that sincerity, without that passion and without a desire to add value to people’s lives they would most probably have failed. What do these people have that other’s lack? It does seem to have a mystical quality about which Time magazine once wrote: “like a code writer and his code (they) stand outside the system to which they are so crucial.” Volumes have been written about the key ingredient for success of these people and others…from Covey’s “Seven Habits” to a whole plethora of self help and motivational multi-media paraphernalia. Indeed, the pursuit of happiness and success has become a huge industry in its own right.

Perhaps it is less elusive than we think. Even if we dispute the benevolent intent of some of the great entrepreneurs, we can simply select our own role model or person that we admire and question why we hold them in such high regard. Invariably, most of us grant them hero status on the basis of what they have “given” in life; not what they have “received” or own, or what their bank balance looks like. The capacity to care, to have an outward view exists in most of us. It is a basic natural instinct that existed in prehistoric times. Yet, over a number of years, we seem to have conditioned ourselves into applying a litmus test that destroys every opportunity for greatness. I call it the “WIIFM test” – one that insists that we do not act before answering the question “what’s in it for me?” We all have valid reasons for withholding acts of unconditional giving. At the very least, we should become aware of its self-destructive capacity.

I must emphasise that the definition of “giving” in this case is not about money or handouts. It’s about giving the best of yourself, your time and effort, in all circumstances that present the opportunity. It is about enabling others; not about making them dependent on you. Ultimate empowerment is to enable other’s to add value to people’s lives.

So it is to be hoped that while many will always be dependent on others and have no capacity for self-help, our charitable billionaires will at least try and ensure that their donations are enabling the recipients according to Abraham Lincoln’s tenet: “You cannot help men permanently by doing for them what they should be doing for themselves”.

There is a simple illustration that makes the point.

We seldom, if ever know with certainty what we are going to “get” out of any situation. We know with greater certainty what we are capable of giving or contributing to that situation. If we always restrict our giving to the extent that we know what we are going to get, we automatically restrict our giving to that limit. We most likely end up with less than we expected. So the next time we give less, and the next time less again, until we end up as non-contributing balls of metabolising tissue always dependent on others. The difference between the willingness to give and the certainty of a reward is called “risk”. Risk is the essential ingredient of all acts of entrepreneurship. Risk is the source of surpluses and prosperity.

“Only those who risk going too far can possibly find out how far they can go.” — T S Eliot.

In this context, and not denying the crucial role of profits and reluctant to beat my favourite drum again, I have never understood the obsession with the profit motive as the best engine for prosperity. It epitomises the WIIFM approach, especially when taken to extremes like the “reverse income statement.” I will never oppose people or companies their right to chase profits. I ask simply: “Is this the best of you?” Is the real essence of a company and its contribution to mankind captured by the income statement and because of it? Surely there must be more! Perhaps Henry Ford said it best: “The man who will use his skill and constructive imagination to see how much he can give for a dollar, instead of how much he can get for a dollar, is bound to succeed.”

As we saw in the give/get circle, the size of risk and entrepreneurship is a function of the size of giving. But this is about behaviour, not a state of being. An “entrepreneur” is not a particular kind of human being, but rather one who acts in a particular way. When someone is given the title “entrepreneur” it may not be entirely appropriate. We are all capable of entrepreneurial behaviour and can respond to life in an entrepreneurial way. Then, and only then, will we become entrepreneurs, whether in our personal lives, jobs, or own businesses.

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EXPECTATIONS: THE DEADLY ECONOMIC VIRUS

I was born in a shack on a plot in Rhynfield, Benoni, hours before dawn on Saturday, the 22^nd of January 1944. The shack was built by my father on the plot that he owned but then lost for not paying land tax. I learned much later from my intensely rivalling three siblings trying to put me in my place as the youngest and inferior, that I was a “mistake” from an intense moment of passion between a “Sapper” on leave from the war, and a spouse deprived of adult company for a number of years. Still grieving about the still birth of her first child and exhausted from the confinement of four in rapid succession, she saw no benefit in bringing another into a world of rations, no running water, no electricity, an outside long drop, and the prospect of being a war widow and Nazi slave. Catholic dogma and a stern lecture from the local priest saved me from being consigned to a paper bag as a foetal blob.

My father’s parents owned a school at Musselkanaal in Northern Holland. That was all they owned, apart from the respect and adulation of a rural community. So when the depression came, my father with the self-help disposition common in those days, decided to emigrate south. He at least had the title deed to a heavily indebted piece of land left by an uncle, and a recollection of whispers in Musselkanaal that this very same departed uncle was a confidante of Paul Kruger and knew where the missing gold was. I don’t know whether he expected to find a clue, if not the gold itself, in the long drop. My mother, also to escape the austerity of a small Amsterdam family bakery, responded to an advert in a lonely hearts column and joined my father after meeting him for the first time at Cape Town harbour. But his dreams were interrupted by a war that he claimed he could not stay out of because the “rot mowwe” had invaded his motherland. My mother probably felt that he would rather run the risk of being killed by a bullet than to face up to his duty to the fruits of his fertility. On his return, dispossessed of the land, and after futile attempts to find an occupation in his first love, farming, he joined the gold mining scramble. So began years of nomadic trekking with his family in tow and with varying degrees of leads and lags, separations, convents, and foster care.

I reflect on those times with no celebration or lamentation; no acclamation or condemnation. It left me simply with a deep appreciation of the value of prudence, and an aversion to elitism. I witnessed how acts of kindness are as likely, if not more so, between people of modest means as in others. I also came to understand that poverty is as much a state of mind as it is a state of wallet. The circumstances were perhaps less relevant than the time itself. It was a generation that was to bridge an age of deprivation and austerity for most with an age of progress and abundance for many. It has become known as the “baby boomer” generation. If I compare my parents with my children, then it is as if they are a different species, not in a physical sense, but certainly in their expectations and aspirations.

My parent’s generation, and those before them, had a certain faith in the concept of progress. They expected that over a lifetime at least, they could experience some improvement in their lot and that of their families. It was perhaps not of the same buoyant kind that was prevalent in America at that time, but it was a sense that drove them with some contentment through their daily efforts. What was clearly understood by that generation was that personal progress was only possible with personal effort. There was an intuitive understanding of the inseparable link between expectations and aspirations: what you could expect out of life, and what you aspired to put into it. This was particularly true of America, which by then was already the engine of the global economy and was domestically driven by a strong tradition of individualism with government intervention only peripheral.

Then someone threw a switch: one that was to turn that balance on its head. Former Central banker, Arthur Burns, has identified that switch as being “the cataclysmic events of the 1930s and 1940’s”. In less than twenty years, with the concept of self help shattered, governments were made accountable for national prosperity and elections were won or lost on promises of better times. It has, according to Burns, built in an “inflationary bias” in all economies, one that will continue to grow as long as populist politics force governments to act contra-cyclically.

There is little point in being drawn into a debate on “systems” again. We are in an age where a rolling back of government is arguably a quixotic cause. Likewise, calling for greater government intervention brings with it incredible dangers of affordability, mounting public debt, stifling of initiative, and authoritarianism which everyone should fear. In any case, governments are increasingly finding themselves at the mercy of global events, and international rules and regulations often blunt the tools of domestic measures.

Nowhere more than in individual expectations do we see the futility of systems, policies and regulations that are not supported by individual behaviour. Classic economics, including John Muth’s theory on rational expectations and a variety of highly authoritative work on inflationary expectations, do not come to grips with the volatility and susceptibility of individual expectations. They certainly cannot quantify their multiple causes and combined impact.

When public expectations exceed reality, (Diagram 1) we create public discord, anxiety and discontent. On the other hand, when public expectations are lower than what they experience in life, we create peace and contentment. Nowhere has this been illustrated better than in Denmark which, according to Leicester University has the most contented people in the world. This has at least in part been ascribed to their low level of expectations.

South Africa is a prime example of the effects of rampant expectations. Apart from promoting a general feeling discontent, expectations inevitably become “entitlements” and entitlements become demands. We can see its effect on labour unrest such as the recent and ongoing strikes, service delivery protests, and burgeoning allocations to welfare to the point that it has economists such as Mike Schussler concerned about the size of the “welfare state” and the fact that more people are dependent on tax payers than there are taxpayers to care for them. A little cameo close to home that illustrates this is the case of our part-time housekeeper. From being quite content, she became fairly belligerent shortly before the last elections. She then promptly quit, informing us that she no longer needed the work because she was promised a free house by an electioneering politician visiting her township.

There is no easy answer to containing expectations. Not even the reality of a world recession, it seems, can contain them. They are multi-sourced, elusive and volatile, and you certainly can’t effectively contain them through legislation. It is perhaps one of the faults of democracy which while arguably the best system we know, is dependent on an election process which inflate expectations beyond what is affordable.

It probably starts with the Constitution itself, which enshrines many “rights” but in reality guarantees little more than the “right of redress to court”. The most basic of all, that of the right to life, if flaunted by a murderer, has only about a 20% chance of some form of court outcome. But there are many more: such as comparisons, parenting, schooling, advertising and excessive pay discrepancies. There are also many expectations that are often in conflict, such as shareholder and labour expectations.

Any solution to excessive expectations requires at the very least that it becomes a much more visible scourge, perhaps equal to our awareness of HIV-AIDS. We all intuitively know when we have been subjected to it and when we promote it. Prudence and the value of moderate expectations should be consistently and aggressively taught in homes and schools. Politicians and union leaders simply have to learn to appeal to the nobler qualities of the electorate and their members and not make promises they know cannot be fulfilled. Leadership has to set an example, and certainly not flaunt unseemly wealth in the face of a deprived electorate. The thorny issue of executive pay and excessive bonuses has to be actively addressed beyond media criticism. Business has to become more transparent and consistent in sharing information with staff, and promote concepts such as fortune sharing. You probably have more valid ideas. But they are all non-starters if we do not recognise expectations as a terrible and fatal economic virus in our midst.

The recent soccer world cup gave South Africans an excellent example of how a nation can be uplifted by high aspirations. Aspirations are things we hope to achieve with effort and not handouts. When they exceed our expectations, (diagram 2) they reflect maturity and promote contentment. The opposite is true when expectations exceed our aspirations. As a nation we have to more clearly define aspirations as against legitimate expectations.

Ultimately it should not be such a difficult message to sell. The reward for low expectations at an individual level is greater peace and contentment; for high aspirations achievement and success. At the very least, a better balance between the two will give us the resilience to cope with whatever lies ahead.

With apologies to John Kennedy: “Ask not what you can expect out of life. Ask rather what life can expect out of you.”

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RESTORING TRUST IN BUSINESS

“We will die if we can not trust each other”. With these words, human activist writer, Ariel Dorfman, touched on one of the critical issues facing society today.

We have all experienced some breach of trust in a relationship. Few are not aware of how it tears at the threads of whatever binds us as people, in individual or societal relationships. Trust is not easy in a modern world where technology has enabled greater interaction but less direct contact and where transaction has become more aloof and mechanical. Indeed, with remote forms of communication it has become easier to mistrust and to sow the seeds of distrust by enabling puerile pranksters to throw venomous stones from behind the walls of anonymity.

Trust lies at the very heart of our freedom as individuals. Given the importance of this issue in our time we simply have to make an effort at fostering trust, and most certainly have to combat as a scourge those instances where it is broken down through competitiveness, petty jealousies, prejudices, rumour-mongering, innuendo and baseless assumptions.

As Dorfman pointed out, South Africa has a particular challenge in bridging the trust gap of the past and in fostering more open dialogue between cultures and classes and between distrusting collectives such as government with electorate, farmers with government, business with society, and employer with employee amongst many others.

For business internationally, trust has become the most pressing strategic issue of all. Until a few decades ago, business was largely structured hierarchically. It enjoyed a cosy relationship with shareholders, had customers with fewer choices and less information, and a greater autocratic control over employees. It pandered marginally to government, but had greater lobbying sway with the powers that be who in turn ruled over an arguably more naïve electorate. Of course, these were not relationships built on trust, but on expediency.

This has all changed… dramatically!

Within the space of a few years, the tide started to turn. From about a decade or so ago, we have seen a wave of public pressure shake old business paradigms to the core. Topics such as sustainability, governance, transparency, Mervyn King reports, triple bottom lines, balanced scorecards, ethics and values have become common in board room discussions.

Employee trust has always been a key concern for business and a variety of instruments and approaches have been implemented for a number of years now. They all basically come down to the same thing: employees will give or withhold their trust on the simple assessment of whether management has their interest at heart. The criteria used are whether employees feel cared for and are given the opportunities to develop. Holding leadership seriously accountable for these two criteria in regard to their immediate subordinates establishes a lasting process for enhancing trust. Of course, these efforts can be bedevilled by large pay discrepancies and a belligerent trade union, but these too tend to wane in the face of sound servant leadership.

For decades, public trust in business has been dismal to say the least, with less than 20% of people explicitly trusting business, according to Gallup. The public uses the same assessment as employees do: is the company perceived to have the public interest at heart. But the criteria are very different, covering very thorny issues such as governance and transparency, quality of product or service, customer relations, involvement in communities and environmental care.

The financial crisis has given further impetus to this scrutiny, reviving the Warren Buffet classic line: “only when the tide goes out do you see who is naked”. Like a veld fire clearing out strangling underbrush, the crash has already taken out quite a few rogues. So it is perhaps not surprising that according to the 2010 Edelman Trust Barometer released earlier this year, trust in business globally has risen compared with last year. The survey covered the world’s 10 biggest economies by GDP, and the improvement in trust was led by Western economies. The Edelman barometer should not be compared with the Gallup survey, but while percentages in all polls should be treated cautiously, changes in these percentages are more dependable.

The exposure of kings with no King attire has not been the only thing that has improved trust in business. A growing business trend to listen to and engage all stakeholders, treat employees well, and to be involved in solving social problems have been listed as playing a perhaps more important role in fostering trust. The improvement in trust is also tentative and conditional. According to Edelman, 70% of those polled said business would “get up to the same tricks” when conditions returned to normal.

Some other interesting features of the Barometer are:

• While public trust in governments to do the right thing has also improved, it is still below that of public trust in business.
• The banking sector is the least trusted and trust in the sector has declined further.
• Both China and India have substantially higher levels of trust in both business and government than the Western economies have.
• Conventional media are seen as the least trustworthy regarding business coverage.
• CEO’s generally are not highly trusted as a source of information, and
• Financial performance has fallen from being third ranked to being lowest ranked out of ten criteria fostering trust in business.

So what does engender trust? In U.S. companies, the top three are: transparent and honest practices, a trustworthy brand name and high quality products and services. From a public point of view (see graphic), when the CEO and the board make a strategic decision, specific shareholder considerations have to be among the least in their minds. At the very least they have to take a comprehensive stakeholder view.

Trust in business in South Africa is far more complex, clouded by race, class and ideological issues, as well as a combative labour collective. King III places much emphasis on ethics as part of governance and many companies have included ethics management as part of their business models. But according to the latest Ethics Institute of South Africa’s research, employee awareness of ethics policies is low, and their effectiveness only moderate.

That ethics have to be “processed” and “managed” at all, speaks volumes as to their sincerity. We have seen how easily this mask can slip with the BP and Toyota incidents. Unless ethics are underpinned by sound values, they will lack authenticity. Ethics are what you wear, values are what you are. Values are never a means to an end, but and end in themselves.

There are many concepts that address “benevolent” intent. I prefer “universal values” to the many others such as virtues, principles, and morals. By “values” I do not mean the rather narrow “things that we value”. Nor do I mean “cultural” or “religious values” such as polygamy or prayer. I also do not mean existential states such as liberty, rule of law, peace and contentment. They are all valid concepts and can be argued from a “values” perspective, but they tend to clutter the debate and often cannot stand up to universal acceptance. Values, by my understanding are really only a few such as care for others, love, fairness, integrity, courtesy and justice. A number could be added, but they have to meet the criterion of “do unto others” and are accepted by all reasonable people.

Business will always have a dilemma with these issues as long as it defines itself from a taking perspective, and as long as it sees its purpose as income rather than service, being driven by the wallet rather than the heart.

All of the shifts we have seen in the past few decades have still not addressed this fundamental issue. It is a leap of perception more than anything else. But perceptions create reality.

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