Virtue in Business

In an article, “What’s a Business For?” it shares how the economy thrives off integrity and trust. Virtue and integrity are so vitally important to build up an economy. When there is trust and honesty, people will invest and spend their hard-earned money. When there is distrust and dishonesty, people aren’t comfortable with what the consequences or their chances could be, and they will take their money and invest it or spend it where they feel comfortable and where it will benefit them the most.  It seems that there used to be more honesty and integrity in companies and their CEO’s, nowadays it seems that is less and less. I feel it has a lot to do with the greed of money and how it makes people choose unwise or dishonest moves with their money and business. Thankfully there are still a lot of honest business owners who do look out for their employees and run their companies with great integrity. This is how I plan to run my business.

According to Charles Handy, the real justification for the existence of businesses is to make a profit so businesses can do something more or better, not just to make a proft. The two solutions he proposed are more corporate democracy and better corporate behavior by having a new vision of the purpose of the business. I agree with this because businesses need to associate their business with a cause and a purpose. It is even better if it is serving people and helping others. There has a to a purpose driven behind the business, but also a balance in that it is sustainable and provides a reasonable income. Anytime it becomes one sided, giving away too much or someone higher up is getting too rich off the company, it is time to reassess to balance it out again.

In Elder Gay's talk "Entrepreneurship and Consecration", he shared how our attitude on wealth is critical and greatly affects our lives. Our personal peace and happiness is key to have no matter what our financial situations are. When all is said and done with our lives on this Earth, it is who we have become and what good we have done in the world that will be all that matters. He had a good friend named Tom share an observation with him, “I had to teach myself something that the whole world around me laughed at, and it is this: it is not what you have, but who you are. And who you are is not what you say, but what you do.” We must be willing to follow the spirit and let him direct us in our businesses to make the best difference in ourselves, and in the world.