Working Beyond Money

Thinking Out of the Box Working Beyond Money

Never Forget Your Heart

The economic downturn of the last few years has caused most business executives to take an inward look, causing much soul-searching regarding cost centers, profit centers and how to adjust marketing for maximum benefit. In this dramatic economic crisis, smart executives have learned a valuable lesson from what I call a “forced tutoring climate”: when you keep your eye on serving your client with the purest intent, assuring all you do is in keeping with this purpose, then the best results will flow. Dr. Arthur Brooks, author of the study Why Giving Matters, interviewed 30,000 US families. In the study he cites that in 2006 Americans gave over $300bn to charity: 3 times more than France, 7 times more than Germany, and 14 times more than Italy. America is the wealthiest nation in the world and the study overwhelmingly shows that companies and individuals who give are more prosperous than those who don’t. There are families of the same religion, education, income, race, and number of children who live in the same town: the giving families are three times wealthier. The same is true of businesses and corporations. Companies who have a cause retain and have happier employees. Prosperity is the outcome of exercising correct principles. Employees and business are energized when lives are improved through superior products and service. When executives lead by this example, employees follow and are inspired by the results of their efforts, focusing on people over profits. Somehow, money seems to follow.•

Mark L. Petersen

began leading Mentors International as President and CEO in 2007. A graduate of Weber State University, he worked in administration at

Weber State and

Dixie State College (DSC), served as the Executive

Director of Public

Relations and

Marketing at DSC, and was appointed by DSC's president to open the new Dolores Dore Eccles Fine Arts Center as Executive Director of Cultural Arts.

Why We Work

The near-total collapse of the economy is a chance to ask basic questions about why we do the things we do, about what gets us out of bed in the morning. The standard view of economists is that people work for pay and that financial incentives make the world go ‘round. 40 years of psychology research has shown this basic assumption to be false. People want work that is meaningful. They want work that makes a difference in other people’s lives and gives them a certain amount of discretion and autonomy. Employers can make these things available to employees for free. Tough economies offer employers opportunities to enrich the lives of their employees without cost. What is the difference between Bill Gates, Steve Jobs, Sergey Brin and Larry Page? The big difference is that for these titans of technology the point of their efforts was the technology they were developing. Great wealth was the byproduct of great innovation. We need a revolution in the way we think about work and motivation. We need to pay more attention to work conditions, and less to work compensation. Employers have to embrace this reorientation wholeheartedly. It won’t do to have employers getting rich on the backs of their under compensated employees. The entire organization must emphasize meaning, purpose and service to others more and the bottom line less. A sweeping change like this will obviously not be easy, but the economic crisis we are now all living through may give us the courage to take a chance.•

Barry Schwartz

is a professor of psychology at Swarthmore College, in Pennsylvania. He has been there since receiving his PhD from the University of Pennsylvania in 1971. He is also author of many books such as of The Paradox of Choice, and Practical Wisdom, among other books.