The ROAD is more important than the GOAL
Values in professional and private life
Sławomir Lachowski
The ROAD is more important than the GOAL. Values in professional and private life
Realizing what the message of Mahatma Gandhi means: „Be the change, which you would like to see in the world” I wrote a book, I’ve never planned.
The ROAD is more important than the GOAL. Values in professional and private life
The answer to the question about values, we follow every day and about their real impact on our lives requires deeper reflection, looking back and inside ourselves. The system of values, partly hidden in our subconsieousness and steering our actions from there, is a derivative of our needs, education, individual fascinations and beliefs.
The ROAD is more important than the GOAL. Values in professional and private life
“Life is a journey, not a destination.” - Ralph Waldo Emerson
The
answer to the question about our values is not easy and requires some effort, but answering it will let us identify who we really are and where
we are going to, and
- what will be shaping our way of life.
most importantly
The ROAD is more important than the GOAL. Values in professional and private life
Values cannot be seen as a formula for success. The question, if the values pay off doesn’t touch the core of the topic. It would be similar to say, that it’s worthhile
always pay off.
to be decent, but it doesn’t
The ROAD is more important than the GOAL. Values in professional and private life
The values are essential in our life, they also have huge impact on business. In great part these are the same values, because it’s not possible to leave them behind the door at home and use totally different ones at work. It could be in contradiction with our own individual system of values.
The ROAD is more important than the GOAL. Values in professional and private life
Egoism and even greed are fundamental rule, which economy relates to at every possibility. This is nothing more, than methodological monism, an attempt to cram everything into one general rule.
The ROAD is more important than the GOAL. Values in professional and private life
In times, when progress and economic growth became the greatest value, economy became a religion and economists and managers became its priests. At the same time, these priests, professors of economy and the CEOs of big corporations became celebrities, not less desirable, than the people from showbusiness.
The ROAD is more important than the GOAL. Values in professional and private life
The motto of present business: Greed is good. Greed is right. Greed works”
- Gordon Gekko, hero of „Wall Street” movie, 1988 year
The ROAD is more important than the GOAL. Values in professional and private life
But it is greed and maximization of profits at all costs, which led to two serious crisises of the last decade, which deprived millions of people of their jobs around the world, caused bancrupcy or put thousands of companies at risk of making considerable losses. At the same time many countries, including the wealthiest and most developed ones, faced debt growth, which threated their future.
The ROAD is more important than the GOAL. Values in professional and private life
Some time ago, it seemed to him, that greed was good. Todayone can see it is legal. Michael Douglas, who played Gordon Gecko, privately says loudly, that greed is bad. Additionaly, he recorded an advertising spot for FBI: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SvuCGvziCVI
The ROAD is more important than the GOAL. Values in professional and private life
Change in paradigm of economy and management: Not calculation, but animal instincts influence peoples’ behaviour and drive companies and economy
Regardless of the assumptions, how egoistic man can become, there are some clear rules he follows by nature, and thanks to that the fate of others is important to himand the others luck is essential for him, in spite of the fact, that it doesn’t give him nothing else, just the opportunity to observe the happiness of others.
Adam Smith
Businessman only pretends to himself, that he is driven mainly by what he claims in his prospect, regardless how precisely it was written. His acts basing on the rigorous calculation of the profits not to a greater extend, than in case of an expedition to the north pole.
John Maynard Keynes
The ROAD is more important than the GOAL. Values in professional and private life
Up to now, success in business has had just one dimension –profit. Recently, significant and permanent changes have been taking place here. The role of company objectives is becoming more complex, the absolute primacy of the profit is being questioned, the new priorities – partial objectives – are being introduced. These are client’s satisfaction, employees satisfaction, sustainable development, taking actions the local community can benefit from.
The ROAD is more important than the GOAL. Values in professional and private life
Credo in Latin means „I believe”. In Johnson & Johnson we believe in the values included in the words of our Credo, we believe, it is the foundation of the philosophy of our company and the basis for our actions.
- Robert Wood Johnson, CEO of Johnson&Johnson, 1943
The ROAD is more important than the GOAL. Values in professional and private life
I believe, that every organisation, which wants to survive and be successful, must have a good system of values, which drives its whole politics and all actions. I also believe, that the most important single factor influencing company’s succes is sticking to ones beliefs.
- Thomas Watson junior, 1963
The ROAD is more important than the GOAL. Values in professional and private life
Basic values remain unchanged since the times, when our founders created them. We can distinguish superior values from the applied methods and procedures. Superior values do not change, but procedures do. Moreover, it is clear to us, that the main reason, why the Hewlett-Packard company exists, no matter how important it is, is not a profit,.
- John Young, former CEO of Hewlett-Packard
Maximum of benefits and comfort in personal finance service.
The ROAD is more important than the GOAL. Values in professional and private life mBank spectacular success and indisputable MultiBank achievements, as well as joining by BRE Bank, which was built from scratch, three bibggest and most prospoerous Polish banks, is not a matter of strategy and its implementation, but first of all the result of putting company’s values into practice, the implementation of management through values.
The ROAD is more important than the GOAL. Values in professional and private life
„It is not indifferent, if we work at a place, where the effort we make is in accordance with the rules and values we follow and treat as basic ones, or it is not. I would like my work for mBank was at least partly the realization of the dreams of each of you. It is possible, I know it from my own experience. To make it realistic, we should define together, what is most important for us. It’s high time we worked out the code of mBank’s rules and values.”
Sławomir Lachowski’s e-mail to emplyees, 08.2002
e r f e c t i o n
e a l i z a t i o n
e s p o n s i b i l i t y
e a d i n e s s
n g a g e m e n t
The ROAD is more important than the GOAL. Values in professional and private life
My experience from the companies built and managed according to values prove that they are more profitable in long term, their clients are more loyal, and their employees more satisfied. mBank’s, MultiBank’s and BRE Bank’s histories prove that there is such a cause and effect chain.
