True Self

Moses was an effective leader because he told stories that reminded his people of their origins, that gave meaning to failure, and that reinforced a sense of individual and community purpose. In what he said and did Moses persuaded his people to claim the promise of their purpose and transcend current troubles.

Moses and the Burning Bush by Marc Chagall (1956)

For the next thirty days or so we will give further consideration to the notion of self or tsedeq or righteousness that was introduced over the month of January. To do this I will give particular attention to the self of Moses. My purpose is to suggest that in the life of Moses we can find some key principles of professional and personal differentiation.

Continuing to Explore

With daily posts since January 4 I have attempted to consider the business implications of the Sermon on the Mount. Yesterday's post completes this particular angle on understanding God's intention for us.

Monday I will begin looking a bit more at the issue of the self, what has previously been discussed as tsedeq or righteousness. For this purpose I will focus largely on the Books of Moses, the first five books of the Bible.

If you have any particular concerns or questions relevant to this topic, I would welcome you letting me know by using the comment function below. If you have any general recommendations for how this blog could be improved I would also welcome the guidance.

Sand or Rock?

Jesus would be a provocative business consultant or partner. He would push you to be clear about your goals and how those goals reflect reality and contribute to long-term relationships.

Jesus would coach you to find and develop your true self and help others discover their true selves. He would help you to be humble, listen, and learn from your mistakes. Jesus would teach you to empathize with others, to be clear and consistent in your objectives and communication, and – perhaps most of all – he would guide you in balancing the strengths of individuals with the needs of the community. With these conditions in place you would be much more effective in making fundamental decisions about your future direction and the direction of your enterprise.

Jesus would also coach you in attitudes and behavior needed to make daily progress in your chosen direction. He would emphasize respecting others, not being distracted by the attacks of others, and fully valuing the contributions of others and their relationship to you. Jesus would encourage you to focus on making choices that lead to sustainable outcomes, to stop worrying, and to critique yourself before criticizing others.

Jesus would ask you questions. He would expect you to ask him questions. He would coach you to see every answer as exploratory and mostly as another step to another question. Jesus would push you to remain open to an ever changing, always unfolding reality and help you deploy questions as your best tool for navigating a great adventure.

Jesus would not recognize the boundaries between your professional and personal lives. He would insist the boundary is an illusion. Jesus would push you to engage your parents, spouse, children, friends, and neighbors – even your enemies – with the same habits of truth-making and trust-building that he brings to your business life. In all things he would celebrate the relationships that bind us together. Finally, Jesus would point you toward a relationship with the ultimate source of reality. Here he would promise meaning, the final balancing of self and community, and the fulfillment of peace.

Like every experienced business consultant Jesus is a realist. He recognizes that he can only counsel, he cannot decide for you. But he would be clear that your decision will have consequences.

At the close of the Sermon on the Mount Jesus makes the choice very clear:

Everyone who pays attention to these words of mine and acts on them will be like a shrewd builder who erected a house on bedrock. Later the rain fell, and the torrents came, and the winds blew and pounded that house, yet it did not collapse, since its foundations rested on bedrock. Everyone who listens to these words of mine and doesn’t act on them will be like the careless builder, who erected a house on the sand. When the rain fell, and the torrents came, and the winds blew and pounded that house, it collapsed. Its collapse was colossal. (Matthew 7: 24-27)

Asking

Ask, and it will be given you; seek, and you will find; knock, and it will be opened to you. For every one who asks receives, and he who seeks finds, and to him who knocks it will be opened. (Matthew 7:7-12)

Usually when this is read our mind is captured by the indefinite pronoun. What “it” is Jesus discussing? Anything? Everything? Or perhaps it is something more specific that we should discern from context. Could it be righteousness? Could it be peace?

Many scholars believe this passage in Matthew may be based on a similar phrase in the Gospel of Thomas. A complete text of this lost gospel was found in 1945 at Nag Hammadi in Egypt. Thomas parallels Matthew, Mark, and Luke in many ways and is considered contemporary with, if not predating, the first three gospels of the New Testament. Some scholars date Thomas to as early as 60 AD.

The related text in Thomas emphasizes the verb, “Those who seek should not stop seeking until they find.” (Thomas 2:1) This would suggest that the very act of asking is fundamental to a faithful life. The next two verses in Thomas read, “When they find, they will be disturbed. When they are disturbed, they will marvel, and will reign over all.”

A question is the most powerful tool available to a manager. A question opens up new possibilities for both the questioner and the one questioned. The absence of a question suggests a continuation of the status quo, of the known, of the expected.

Every new product begins with a question. Most relationships are founded on and perpetuated by a shared interest in answering a question. In conceiving a strategy we are mostly asking questions about the future.

In seeking to understand what is real and what is unreal we ask questions of ourselves and others. The more we ask the more our assumptions are likely to be overturned – the more likely we are to perceive something new – and to be “disturbed.”



Image Duplicator by Roy Lichtenstein (1962)

As Jesus so often turned to Isaiah, I am inclined to draw on Peter Drucker. In 1992 discussing fundamental demographic and social shifts he wrote, “Business people need to ask: What do these accomplished facts mean for our business? What opportunities do they create? What threats? What changes do they demand – in the way the business is organized and run, in our goals, in our products, in our services, in our policies? And what changes do they make possible and likely to be advantageous? ... These are not particularly arcane matters. Most executives know the answers or how to get them. It’s just that they rarely ask the questions.” (Management in a Time of Great Change, pages 40 and 43)

The manager should seek to proactively disturb the status quo before competitors, customers, or others with less benign intent do so. The manager wants to ask a question that will lead to a new insight on reality – to an aha! moment – when we will marvel at a new understanding and its related opportunities.

An authentic question is a seed that will always blossom. When we ask and earnestly seek the answer, we will find it and – like a mustard seed (Matthew 13:31-32) – marvel at how our seed has grown.

Self-Awareness

More than thirty years ago Peter Drucker wrote Management: Tasks, Responsibilities, Practices. It is about the same thickness as the Bible. There are other parallels. Dr. Drucker wrote:

The starting point for any manager-development effort is a performance appraisal focused on what a man does well, what he can do well, and what limitations to his performance capacity he needs to overcome to get the most out of his strengths. Such an appraisal, however, should always be a joint effort. It requires work on the part of the man himself; it has to be a self-appraisal. But it also requires active leadership by a man’s manager. In appraising themselves people tend either to be too critical or not critical enough. They are likely to see their strengths in the wrong places and to pride themselves on nonabilities rather than abilities… a self-development appraisal should also ask, “What do I want out of life? What are my values, my aspirations, my directions? And what do I have to do, to learn, to change, to make myself capable of living up to my demands on myself and my expectations of my life. (Drucker, pages 426-427)

Too many managers perceive they begin to create value by critiquing others; rather they should begin with self-criticism and seek self-awareness.

Jesus asked, “Why do you see the speck that is in your brother’s eye, but do not notice the log that is in your own eye? Or how can you say to your brother, ‘Let me take the speck out of your eye,’ when there is a log in your own eye? You hypocrite, first take the log out of your own eye, and then you will see clearly to take the speck out of your brother’s eye.” (Matthew 7: 3-5)

What is your tsedaq? What is your source of righteousness? What is your true self? How can you assess others before you have made good progress in answering these questions about yourself?

Finding yourself is a first step in helping others find their own true self. A team, a division, or a firm of individuals confident in their innate strengths and consciously organized to complement one another has a significant competitive advantage. Operationalizing this capacity is a premier management responsibility. It could also be called creating a just community.

Margaret Wheatley argues that becoming profoundly self-aware allows the manager to find and articulate the meaning which must be at the heart of an effective organization. She writes, “All of us want so much to know the ‘why’ of what is going on. (How often have you heard yourself or others say, ‘I just wish they would tell me why we’re doing this’?) We instinctively reach out to leaders who work with us on creating meaning. Those who give voice and form to our search for meaning, and who help us make our work purposeful, are leaders we cherish, and to whom we return gift for gift.” (Wheatley, page 135)

To articulate meaning for others you must find it for yourself. This does not suggest that self-discovery is a lonely process. It is more common to find ourselves as we engage others. It is through our relationships with others that we are most likely to find our true self. As Tsedaq and Mishpat are balanced, we approach the fulfillment of self in community that is Shalom.

Anxiety

These are difficult economic times for many. But if so-inclined, even the best-of-times can cause worry.

A few years ago my principal business enterprise was dealing with several past-due receivables equal to roughly twenty-percent of annual revenue. Many receivables exceeded over 120 days past due. The coincidence of several clients being delinquent at the same time was difficult.

For a number of reasons there was substantial confidence that payment would eventually be made in full. Our bankers were understanding and helpful. Now, years later, I can tell you all the payments were received. But, at the time, it was easy to worry.

Jesus teaches, “Therefore I tell you, do not be anxious about your life, what you shall eat or what you shall drink, nor about your body, what you shall put on. Is not life more than food and the body more than clothing? Look at the birds of the air: they neither sow nor reap nor gather into barns, and yet your heavenly Father feeds them. Are you not of more value than they. And which of you by being anxious can add one cubit to his span of life? ...your heavenly Father knows you need (all these things). But seek first his kingdom and his righteousness, and all these things shall be yours as well.” (Matthew 6: 25-33)

Our business intelligence system predicted the late payments about 30 to 60 days in advance. Vigilance is helpful. Our regular lines-of-credit and reserves were sufficient to fully cover about 90 days of late payments. Preparation is prudent. We reduced expenses and our Controller and client relationship managers were proactive in facilitating payment. Action is appropriate. We kept our subcontractors informed of how cash-flow might impact payments to them. Concern for others is just. We reviewed how we had contributed to the problem. Self-critique will help avoid repeating the problem.

Anxiety seems unavoidable, but it doesn’t contribute anything helpful and actually distracts from more truly productive work.

Simultaneous with the receivables problem I was shepherding the biggest new business contract this particular firm had seen. I was also engaged in cultivating another very promising new business prospect that seemed to be a few weeks from a major commitment.

Instead of worrying, Jesus says I should seek first the fundamental nature of God and how that nature is expressed in society. I should be giving priority to what is real and sustainable. I should not waste my time and disperse my energy in being anxious over what I cannot control.

Moreover Jesus teaches that if I will focus on the fundamental realities of righteousness and justice, what I truly need will also be provided.

Jesus is saying – as Michael Porter teaches and Peter Drucker advises and dozens of other strategists counsel – that investing in what you perceive will advance your long-term competitive advantage is always the best guarantee, where there are no guarantees. Be ready to adjust to meaningful feedback, be vigilant, be prepared, take action, but don’t worry.

The past due payments will not always be received. The new business will not always be closed. Tough times will come. But an active investment in a long-term, sustainable, and differentiated strategy is the best means to provide the foundation necessary to pull the enterprise through the tough times.

Sustainability

In most of the work-related parables of Jesus there is a focus on long-term and sustainable returns. In the Sermon on the Mount he is even more explicit:

Don’t acquire possessions here on earth, where moth or insect eats away and where robbers break in and steal. Instead gather your nest egg in heaven, where neither moth nor insect eats away and where no robbers break in or steal. As you know, what you treasure is your hearts true measure.

The most common interpretation of this teaching has been to disdain hoarding or preoccupation with material security. There is a kind of wealth that can be stolen and another kind of wealth that cannot be stolen. Jesus is clearly encouraging attention to a form of wealth that cannot be lost.

He says this kind of wealth is kept in heaven. How heaven is understood in the twenty-first century is quite unlike how it would have been understood in the first century.

The afterlife was not a major concern of Jewish faith. In striking contrast with their Egyptian and many Mesopotamian neighbors the Jewish faith of the period was very much of this world. The most common word in the Hebrew Scriptures for the abode of God is the same word (shamayim) that is used for the physical universe. The sense that God is somehow above and outside the physical universe is a fairly recent concept, and would have been quite difficult to grasp for those listening to Jesus.

When we read the quote from Matthew many moderns will also – usually without knowing it – hear it under the influence of Plato and Descartes. These harmonies would not have been there for those listening to Jesus. They would have heard a much more direct melody.

If Jesus was making the same point with modern listeners he might say something such as:

Don’t invest in short-term and speculative propositions. Instead focus on long-term and sustainable returns. And if this is the key to financial success, the same values are even more important in the rest of your life. Give priority to your long-term relationships with one another and with God. In all things give priority to what is real and lasting. As you know, what you treasure is your hearts true measure.

For most of the last twenty years, my professional life has involved the Internet and related technologies as a key differentiator. As a result, during the dot.com boom of the 1990s I was involved in several investment opportunities. In one case I joined some other experienced men to launch a start-up that went after venture capital support. We were experienced enough and our concept was sufficiently promising that we almost always received a serious hearing for an investment. But at some point the VCs always pushed for something that my co-founders and I found unrealistic and unsustainable. All of our business experience told us we were being asked to paint ourselves into an unattractive corner.

When our management team would reject these preconditions our request for funding would also be rejected. After several such mutual rejections, I began to feel especially old and out-of-touch. As billions of dollars flowed through the dot.com sector it became increasingly clear that I was ill-suited to the “new economy.” But I also recognized that I could not agree to the preconditions and be myself. Well before the dot.com bubble burst, I had stopped actively seeking the VC funding. In many ways it felt like a profound failure, an opportunity to which I was unable to adapt.

About nine months after I gave up, the bubble burst big-time. On several occasions since then the unsuccessful management team has given thanks for our unsuccess.

It is much more satisfying to build a business – no matter how modest – that is well-suited to your true self, than to undertake something badly matched and then spend months or years reducing staff, explaining missed targets, dealing with legal challenges, and trying to convert an unsustainable business model into something else.

I treasure the creative process, which means I treasure my co-creators: colleagues and clients (I should include competitors, but that would be a lie, I am not that spiritually mature; respect is as far as I can go). I want to make money. I need to make money. “Give us this day our daily bread,” is a very meaningful element of the Lords Prayer. But money is not treasure, it is a pale reflection of the treasure.

Many of the teachings of Jesus are far beyond my current faith and strength. But it is clear that money – whether it is a crisp cashiers check with many zeros or a moth eaten dollar bill – is just a tool. It has no meaning in itself. Value is produced through sustained engagement in creative problem-solving and sustained engagement in meaningful relationships.

Righteousness, justice, and peace create the kind of long-term value that is truly sustainable.

The image above is Death and the Miser by Hieronymous Bosch (1494 or later)

Love

A lawyer once asked Jesus, “Teacher, which is the great commandment of the law?” (Matthew 22:36) To which Jesus replied, “You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your mind. This is the great and first commandment. And a second is like it, You shall love your neighbor as yourself. On these two commandments depend all the law and the prophets.”

What is this love to which Jesus directs us? His is a concept of love that precedes St. Paul’s interpretation of sacrificial love exemplified in the crucifixion. This is a Jewish concept of love not yet fused with Platonic mysticism by St. Augustine. The life of love taught by Jesus was not burdened with medieval chivalry, or Victorian romanticism, or post-Freudian doubt. Yet it is also a love that goes far beyond simple obedience to narrowly defined legalism.

“You shall love your neighbor as yourself.” You shall understand your neighbor to be as real as yourself. You shall not reduce your neighbor to something less than an individual with a full claim to righteousness. You shall be in relationship with your neighbor. You shall empathize with your neighbor. You shall avoid categorizing your neighbor into convenient and illusory stereotypes and caricatures. You shall seek the tsedaq of your neighbor as assiduously as your own.

Love is primarily a sense of shared identity and ongoing relationship. Whether we are psychologically healthy or not – whether we like ourselves or not – we are engaged in our self-identity. Jesus tells us we should engage our neighbors as fully as we engage ourselves.

He goes even further. In the Sermon on the Mount Jesus teaches, “You have heard that it was said, ‘You shall love your neighbor and hate your enemy.’ But I say to you, Love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you.”

When I meet with senior colleagues our informal conversations usually revolve around those individuals and organizations perceived as threatening. It is an interesting contrast with the official agenda that is almost always focused on purposes, objectives, and more positive opportunities. Over coffee, at dinner, between planes, there is an ongoing effort to make sense of those who threaten us.

Overtime as we learn more and more about those who threaten us a narrative begins to emerge. We know about their early origins, typical behavior, apparent goals, weaknesses, and strengths. Individually or institutionally these “enemies” become very real to us. The more we know, usually the more we respect the enemy. In some cases as we come to better understand the other, we learn they are not as threatening as it seemed. In a few cases, we have been able to transform an enemy into a partner.

I have not encouraged my senior colleagues to love our enemies. But I have certainly talked about “getting inside their head" and "understanding their motivations.” I have always mistrusted a threat analysis that seems to disrespect the origin or capabilities of the threat. I have always felt most capable defending myself or my organization when I most empathized with the nature of the threat. I have been least able to manage risk when I did not understand how the threat – an individual or organization – understood itself.

A case can even be made that very seldom is your toughest competitor actually your enemy.

Emerging industries have the highest concentration of potential competitors. But at this stage the firms are engaged in a shared process of creating a market. More is often better, and the failure of a firm in an emerging market is more often self-inflicted than the result of direct competition.

In mature industries competition for market-share can become intense, but even here it is the give-and-take between tough competitors that spurs innovation in pricing and differentiation which generates value. Mature markets also generate buy-outs, mergers, and alliances, through which increased value is generated for the entire industry. These are often the exit strategies-of-choice for many entrepreneurs who are effective in an emerging industry, but less so in a mature industry.

It is primarily in a declining industry that a competitor may directly threaten the simple demise of a firm, and this usually reflects a failure on the part of the weaker firm to find or keep its tsedaq that creates differentiated value.

Business is mostly about being creative. Being part of a challenging community of other creators is helpful to each firm and the industry. Respecting and fully engaging your competitor is not inconsistent with pursuing your own business objectives.

In business we too often use analogies from war and sports where one wins and the other loses. The world of business is much more involved with creating new opportunities, new products, new relationships, and new value. Loving and creating are complementary.

Revenge

You will be attacked. From both inside your organization and outside the arrows will fly. It will hurt. You will probably be afraid. The fear will reflect a realistic possibility of failure.

How should you respond? Jesus taught, “But I say to you, do not resist one who is evil. But if any one strikes you on the right cheek, turn to him the other also.”

Business is primarily a creative endeavor. You create products. You create relationships. You create value. Revenge replaces a positive focus on creativity with a negative focus on destruction.

Even the less emotionally-charged concept of retaliation should be approached with care and considerable restraint. Michael Porter, a strategist with Harvard Business School, writes:

Every firm is vulnerable to attack by competitors. Attacks come from two types of competitors – new entrants to the industry and established competitors seeking to reposition themselves… A well implemented offensive strategy constitutes the single best defense against an attack by a challenger. A firm that continuously invests to gain competitive advantage by improving its relative cost position and differentiation will be difficult to challenge successfully. (Competitive Advantage, page 482)

According to Porter there are only two kinds of offensive strategy: Cost and differentiation. There are important similarities in how to approach a differentiation strategy and how to engage in a persistent search for tsedaq. Here is how Porter describes a positive strategy of differentiation:

A firm differentiates itself from its competitors if it can be unique in something that is valuable to buyers. Differentiation is one of the two types of competitive advantage a firm may possess. The extent to which competitors in an industry can differentiate themselves from each other is also an important element of industry structure. Despite the importance of differentiation, its sources are often not well understood. Firms view the potential sources of differentiation too narrowly. They see differentiation in terms of physical product or marketing practices, rather than potentially arising anywhere in the value chain. Firms are also often different but not differentiated, because they pursue forms of uniqueness that buyers do not value. (Competitive Advantage, page 119)

The true self is not a superficial quality; it is an aspect of personality that has deep and abiding value. The true self has meaning in community. Tsedaq depends on Mishpat. When an authentic, meaningful, and sustainable differentiation is achieved the community of both customers and competitors can benefit, even as the firm establishes a clear competitive advantage.

With such a well implemented offensive strategy and its resulting competitive advantage, retaliation is seldom required and anything close to revenge would be a waste of energy.

In most cases, an attack should simply encourage continued persistence in execution of your current strategy. Turn the other cheek and keep going.

Anger

Strategic insight is fundamental to crafting a sustained competitive advantage. The implementation of strategy requires several operational abilities – and avoidance of the most common operational errors.

In Matthew the Sermon on the Mount’s eight beatitudes are followed by twenty-three instructions on how to fulfill the law of God or how to operationalize the strategic insights. The first relates to the place of anger.

There is a tendency for many business leaders – men in particular – to use anger as a management tool. Many feel that anger is a form of honesty. It would seem that, if we are seeking to express our true self, anger would have a place in the mix.

Not according to Jesus. In Matthew 5 we read, “But I say to you that every one who is angry with his brother shall be liable to judgment: whoever insults his brother shall be liable to the council, and whoever says, “You fool!” shall be liable to the hell of fire.”

Anger of the type described by Jesus is dismissive of others and only possible when there is an absence of empathy. This kind of anger – especially in a leader – becomes an obstacle to the ability of many others and the organization to find their true selves. The anger – and others avoidance of anger – impedes the search for both righteousness and justice.


We Can Disappear You by Leon Golub (2001)

Anger that is dismissive of others is almost always an expression of an underlying lack of self-confidence. It is an expression of fear. It is a counter-attack on what the angry person perceives is a threat to his or her sense-of-self. This is evidence that the angry person is clinging to a very fragile self, something quite unlike the tsedaq of Isaiah and Jesus.

In my career I have had only one boss who was inclined toward anger. It was always the result of him being embarrassed or feeling on the edge of losing control. If he did not like the feedback he was receiving – at least from subordinates – he would reject the feedback in an assault of red-faced, profanity-laced rage. He did, however, avoid anger with clients and most superiors.

This did not engender respect. It did encourage caution and avoidance in providing feedback, which tended to place him in even more embarrassing situations with clients and superiors.
The most common Hebrew word for anger used in the Book of Isaiah also means a contortion of the face. In anger even the appearance of the self is lost.

Anger is a symptom. The underlying cause is the uncertainty, fear, and sorrow of not being your true self. It is impossible for such a person to be an effective strategist. In the long-term such a person is destructive to both self and community.

Even the self-righteous have a firmer grasp of reality than the person of anger. The self-righteous have, at least, embraced their tsedaq. The angry person has no clear angle on reality; neither tsedaq nor mishpat is available to him.

Fear, surprise, frustration, and embarrassment are all signals of incoming feedback. These emotional responses are alarms that can be very helpful to focus on what is happening and what it means. But to then respond in anger is to obscure or potentially reject the feedback, which is a rejection of reality.

Following his injunction against anger Jesus says, “So if you are bringing your gift to the altar and remember there that your brother has something against you, leave your gift there before the altar. First go away and make up with your brother; then come back and offer your gift.”

For Jesus the altar represents the fundamental reality of our relationship with God. He is warning us that we must put away anger before we can fully engage reality.

Persecuted

The Greek for persecuted is διώκω or dioko, which means to be pursued, to seek after eagerly, and to seek out to punish. Many of the related Hebrew words have the same mixed implication.

The eighth strategic insight from Jesus is: Blessed are those who are persecuted for the sake of righteousness; or congratulations to those who are aggressively pursued for being their true self.

The competitive advantage created by consistent application of the strategic insights of Jesus will attract attention. The best in the industry will want to work at such a firm. Alliances with other companies will be offered. Customers will challenge the organization’s commitments with high demand. Competitors will actively seek to undercut you. You will be pursued.

The most common religious meaning of dioko is to be unjustly and cruelly pursued. This is certainly the focus of this teaching from the Sermon on the Mount. In a business context, however, the other meanings are realistic – and welcome – outcomes. Being pursued by customers and investors is the sort of outcome a sustained competitive advantage should produce.

But on the way to such success – and coincident with a sustained competitive advantage – are periods when the enterprise, and especially its leaders, feel like the bulls-eye of a thousand arrows. The martyrdom of St. Sebastian – one of the premier warrior saints – comes to mind.

The arrows fly in from three directions: the skeptical, the fearful, and the betrayed. Like St. Sebastian you should survive the skeptics and the afraid, but watch out for the betrayed… their arrows are deadly.

Consistent application of the strategic insights of Jesus is so unusual that many customers, partners, and employees will initially respond with skepticism. Short-term and narrowly self-interested behavior is now so common that a different approach will create suspicion. It will take time and experience for them to view your strategy as authentic: as an expression of your organization’s true self.

As the market begins to accept your strategic differentiation you will feel the arrows of fearful competitors. They are unlikely to understand the source of your competitive advantage, but they will feel its impact. They will respond with various probes and attacks. The effectiveness of your tactical response is critical and entirely dependent on your specific context, but from a strategic perspective the competition’s action is a back-handed compliment to the effectiveness of your emerging competitive advantage. This is not the time to shift strategies.

Once the benefits of this sustained competitive advantage begin to emerge, competitors no longer present your biggest potential threat; rather you are potentially your own worst enemy.

Consistent application of these strategic insights results in a relationship of trust. Because employees trust their organization, they identify with it more fully, and cooperate with it more enthusiastically. Investors, partners, and customers – especially if they were skeptical at first – will make your success part of their own definition of success. The trusted brand is a rare but powerful phenomenon of business.

But within this relationship of trust any misstep – any behavior inconsistent with your authentic self and the fundamental needs of the community – will be swiftly punished. A momentary weakness or an unintentional mistake will be troublesome, but can be overcome. An intentional betrayal – real or perceived – is death.

Earn the community’s trust and then betray it and you will experience the full nightmare of persecution.

(This completes the eight requirements for strategic insight. Next we will consider eight operational challenges.)

Peace Makers

To make shalom is to balance and fulfill both self and community. In a just community each person has the ability to be his or her authentic self and, in doing so, contribute creatively and positively to the lives of others.

In a community of the righteous each person will fully value and empathize with their neighbors. In the shared lives of such a community the ultimate purpose of God is discovered and lived out.

Humility allows us to learn from our experiences, listen to others, and cooperate with others. In these experiences, and especially as we listen and cooperate with others, we come to truly know others and fully identify with them. With these skills, and the resulting wisdom, we are enabled to pursue our own purposes and the purposes of the community in a complementary manner. The outcome of this way of living together is shalom.

While this may sound like religious-talk, this is also the outcome of good management. Here is how our secular Saint Peter (Drucker) describes a similar process and outcome:

The knowledge-based organization therefore requires that everyone take responsibility for that organization’s objectives, contribution, and, indeed, for its behavior as well.

This implies that all members of the organization must think through their objectives and their contributions, and then take responsibility for both. It implies there are no “subordinates”; there are only “associates.” Furthermore, in the knowledge-based organization all members have to be able to control their own work by feedback from their results to their objectives. All members must ask themselves: “What is the one major contribution to this organization and its mission which I can make at this particular time?” It requires, in other words, that all members act as responsible decision-makers. All members have to see themselves as “executives.”

Next it is the responsibility of all members to communicate their objectives, their priorities, and their intended contributions to their fellow workers – up, down, and sideways. And it is the responsibility of all members to make sure that their own objectives fit with the objectives of the entire group. (Post-Capitalist Society, page 108)

Drucker insists that this culture of responsibility is fundamental to the productivity needed for business success today and in the future. The tone is different from the Gospel of Matthew, the substance is similar.

The ultimate fulfillment of a business organization is a product of blending and balancing the needs and gifts of individuals – workers inside and customers outside – with the goals of the enterprise. When managers succeed in creating this sort of environment they deserve to be called peacemakers.

Organizations which develop these characteristics have a sustained competitive advantage compared to organizations that do not. Workers are more productive and contributing, objectives are more likely to be achieved, innovation is more common, and customers and clients are more likely to be loyal.

Pure in Heart

For Jesus the Pharisees had mixed motives, they were not pure in heart. According to Matthew 21:31 a prostitute, with her clear motives, will enter heaven before a two-faced Pharisee. In modern language we would probably talk about being focused, or having integrity, or being self-aware.

The wrong target, clearly understood and consistently pursued, will result in greater progress than the best target that receives less than full attention. The humble person will accept that his or her targets will often be wrong. But the pure in heart will not allow the potential of being wrong dissuade them from focus, discipline, and doing what is possible.

The same humility will also help avoid obsession over the wrong target or confusing targets for purposes. Targets can change. Purposes should be much more persistent.


Target by Jasper Johns

Our ultimate purpose, according to Jesus, is to claim our authentic self and contribute to a just community. The targets we choose for advancing this purpose are important, but always provisional, and sometimes wrong, but still potentially helpful.

Bob Waterman and Tom Peters have argued famously that “attention is all there is.” According to these long-time McKinsey consultants the most important job of a manager is to decide what will be given attention.

How does change come about? First, and not so obvious it is the quantity of attention paid to the matter at hand rather than the quality, odd as that statement might sound. When senior folks… start to focus on a newish “it”… then the rest of the organization starts to pay attention to “it.” And what gets attended to gets done. Thus, if you want to focus on quality, Focus on quality, period. If you haven’t focused on quality a lot before, you won’t know exactly what to talk about at first. Conversations will drag, will be abstract. It doesn’t matter a whit. Everybody will eventually get the drift – that you’re focused on quality (and not some other, former priority – and equally important message). It doesn’t have to be a good conversation about quality, just a conversation about quality. In some fashion, pay significant attention to the blemmies, and somehow the blemmie rate goes down. Not because of a specific program you invented, but because of the energy that comes to be focused on “it.” (Peters and Austin, page 270)

The purpose is fulfilling the potential of the enterprise. The current target is reducing the blemmie rate. The clear motive can contribute to achieving the ultimate purpose.

Is reducing the blemmie rate the crucial target that must be achieved to advance the purposes of the enterprise? Who can know for certain? But if you sincerely perceive a crucial connection and you consistently pursue the target you should, at least, further clarify the relationship between that target and your purpose – as long as you do not confuse target with purpose.

This confusion was the fundamental error of the Pharisees. In their pursuit of righteousness the Pharisees developed a series of very ambitious targets. They pursued the targets – mostly related to pious living – with great consistency but too often without much self-criticism.

Overtime many Pharisees forgot their original motivation and purpose, and replaced it with satisfaction in achieving targets. Rather than righteousness, they settled for self-righteousness.

Clarity, sincerity, consistency, and humility are keys to being pure in heart. If we are very clear about our purposes, sincere in selecting targets to advance those purposes, consistent in pursuing our targets, and humble in assessing progress in achieving our purposes we are much more likely to differentiate the real from the unreal. For Jesus the ultimate reality is knowing God.

In business our realities are considerably less profound.

Merciful

Today mercy is used mostly in a religious or legal context. We throw ourselves on the mercy of God or the mercy of the court. In both cases, the implication is we are being judged and asking for a generous decision.

To be merciful is most often understood as forgiving and, perhaps, especially to extend a kind of undeserved forgiveness.

This kind of mercy is discussed by Jesus and others in the Bible, but this is probably not the mercy that Jesus refers to in the Sermon on the Mount. Jesus is almost certainly discussing the Hebrew רחם or racham, which is much closer to the English for empathize, or identify-with, or deeply-know, or even love.

Racham is the concept of mercy most often used in Isaiah and which is most coherent with the prophet’s focus on justice, righteousness, and peace. In Isaiah 49:15 we read, “Can a woman forget her sucking child that she should not have mercy on the son of her womb.” This use of racham is sometimes translated as compassion or love. There is such a deep sense of common identity that the other is treated as the self.

This profound sense of empathy produces a kind of understanding that may seem generous to those outside the relationship. But for the truly merciful they are not being generous, they are being just. Through their shared identity with and understanding of the other they are able to make a judgment that is entirely appropriate for the context.

The ability to authentically empathize is considered a key factor in emotional intelligence. Warren Bennis, in his classic study of corporate leadership, identifies empathy as a critical skill in getting people on your side. He quotes former Lucky Stores CEO Don Ritchey to make the point, “I think one of the biggest turn-ons is for people to know that their peers and particularly their bosses not only know they’re there but know pretty intimately what they’re doing and are involved with them on an almost daily basis, that it’s a partnership, that you’re really trying to run this thing well together, that if something goes wrong our goal is to fix it, not see who we can nail.” (On Becoming a Leader, page 147)

Humility and empathy are complementary conditions. One of the most counter-productive attributes of leadership is misplaced empathy, or what psychologists would call projection. In this situation, rather than perceiving what the other feels, we project on the other what we feel. This is as a big a turn-off as real empathy is a turn-on.

Outside our organizations a keen sense of empathy can be a great competitive advantage in marketing. An authentic empathy may be the best differentiator between sales and marketing. The salesman wants you to buy something regardless of your needs. A marketing effort is – or should be – focused on responding to authentic needs.

For Jesus being merciful is coming to know and understand others as well as you know and understand yourself. In such a relationship you will naturally honor the authentic character and value of the other. In so honoring the other you will act justly. In this way both justice and righteousness are achieved.

Originally the English word mercy was much more coherent with the teaching of Jesus. The word is derived from the Latin word, merces, which means the price of goods or wages. In exchanging fair value for fair value we are behaving in accord with the original meaning of mercy.

Hunger and Thirst

The first three preconditions for strategic insight – humility, learning from experience, listening and cooperating – are focused on self-control. But in the fourth, and again in the final beatitude, there is encouragement for self-expression.

Jesus taught: Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness.

Righteousness is a difficult concept. The English word suggests “being right,” but this tends to beg a question rather than provide an easy answer. What is right?

The Greek in which the Gospel of Matthew was originally written uses the term: dikaiosune. For the ancient Greeks dikaiosune was the quest for the right way to live. The nature of dikaiosune is the central issue in Plato’s Republic. Aristotle used the term to describe the well-balanced or well-ordered life.

The book of Isaiah uses the term tsedaq which implies a condition of being spiritually clean. When we are righteous we are clean; we are restored; we are renewed. The implication is we have reclaimed an earlier and more fundamental identity. This is almost certainly the concept of righteousness to which Jesus was referring. For Jesus our true self is an expression of God and represents the outcome of our relationship with God.

Jesus congratulates us if we hunger and thirst for finding our true self. Until we become our true self we are empty, weak, and distracted. Only in claiming our true self and behaving consistently with our true self will we experience fulfillment.

For business leaders this strategic insight relates to both individuals and organizations.

What is the strength of each individual? How can management unleash and focus that strength? What is the firm’s core competence? How can management deploy and refine that competence?

Answering these questions provides much of the explanation for why the strategy of each enterprise will be different. The individuals involved are always unique. The organization’s core competence – emerging from these individuals, the mix of customers, the culture, and so many other contingencies – will never be the same as even the closest competitor in the most generic product-line.

Margaret Wheatley, an American management consultant, writes:

Companies organized around core competencies provide a good example of how an organization can obtain internal stability that leads both to well-defined boundaries and to openness over time. A business that focuses on its core competencies identifies itself as a portfolio of skills rather than as a portfolio of business units. It can respond quickly to new opportunities because it is not locked into the rigid boundaries of preestablished end products or businesses. Such an organization is both sensitive to its environment, and resilient from it. In deciding on products and markets, it is guided internally by its competencies, not just the attractiveness or difficulty of a particular market. The presence of a strong competency identity makes the company less vulnerable to environmental fluctuations; it develops an autonomy that makes it unnecessary to be always reactive.

The core competence of a firm emerges from a wide array of interrelationships. If recognized, the core competence can be refined and enhanced. Too often it is neglected and never finds its potential.

The authentic self also emerges from a wide array of interrelationships. The potential of the authentic self is dependent on the choices that each of us make to nurture or neglect our true self.

Thomas Merton, a Twentieth Century mystic in the Catholic tradition, writes:

A tree gives glory to God first of all by being a tree. For in being what God means for it to be, it is imitating an idea which is in God and which is not distinct from the essence of God, and therefore a tree imitates God by being a tree… With us it is different. God leaves us free to be whatever we like. We can be ourselves or not, as we please… There is only one problem on which all my existence, my peace, and my happiness depend: to discover myself in discovering God. If I find him, I will find myself and if I find my true self I will find Him. (Seeds of Contemplation, pages 24-29)

Wheatley argues that during periods of profound change the ability of an enterprise to respond rapidly and effectively to feedback requires a “strong competency identity.” It is this fundamental sense-of-self that provides an essential stability in the midst of dramatic environmental fluctuations. She writes:

Self-reference is what facilitates orderly change in turbulent environments. In human organizations, a clear sense of identity – of the values, traditions, aspirations, competencies, and culture that guide the operation – is the real source of independence from the environment. When the environment demands a new response, there is a reference point for change. This prevents the vacillations and the random search for new customers and new ventures that have destroyed so many businesses over the past several years. (Wheatley, page 94)

Righteousness is discovering who we are meant to be and becoming that unique expression of God that is available to no other person.

The core competence of an enterprise can be understood as the sum of righteousness found in its relationships. Each employee, investor, and customer is seeking his or her authentic self. Nurturing this seeking provides the firm a unique position and a sustainable competitive advantage.

In our organizations, we should hunger and thirst for finding our core competence and keeping faith with it. In our individual lives, Jesus proclaims we should hunger and thirst to find our true self. We should behave as if our very existence depends on finding ourselves.

In today’s rapidly changing world without a unique sense of self it is unlikely that either organizations or individuals will survive much less flourish.

Meek

Translated from the original Greek in which the gospel was written, we read “Blessed are the meek.” The ancient Greek πραΰς or praus can imply lowly and, perhaps, oppressed.

But the word Jesus used was almost certainly the Hebrew term used in Isaiah. This is ‘arnav which is much closer to the English word “gentle.” In the context of Isaiah ‘arnav is also suggestive of those who “cooperate in the purposes of God” or who are ready to listen to God. So we can understand this beatitude as, “Congratulations to those who listen and cooperate with God.”

In a business context: Congratulations to those who listen and cooperate with what they hear.

In recent years business processes have increasingly focused on generating “feedback” from shareholders, customers, employees, and others. The term feedback originates from theories of quantum physics and complex adaptive systems. These are scientific fields that study the natural reality of order within chaos.

Fundamental to these theories is the recognition that systems characterized by chaos are also the most resilient systems and those most likely to keep growing. Since change and growth are so important to business leaders, they have been quick to see potential lessons-learned in translating the reality of quantum physics to the reality of business.

A key characteristic of complex adaptive systems is how they listen and cooperate with feedback. In these systems there is a constant exchange of energy between events that are subtly yet profoundly connected. When feedback is rapidly assimilated by the system, the system changes and grows. This often involves a radical re-ordering of the system. But order is usually maintained.

The illustration above shows two regions of space for a Hénon map where the system is self-organizing around a strange attractor. (Michelitsch and Rössler 1989). Weisstein, Eric W. "Hénon Map." From MathWorld--A Wolfram Web Resource. http://mathworld.wolfram.com/HenonMap.html

The principal impediment to the preservation of order-within-change is a rigidity that rejects feedback. In such cases the result is entropy and eventual elimination.

In modern business we seek to measure and track everything we can. This is – or should be – the first step in listening. The feedback we receive from market surveys, employee meetings, focus groups, sales reports, financial statements, and more can help us understand how the future is taking shape. A strategist – like a quantum physicist – will be especially interested in tracking the relationships between these various sources of feedback.

As we review the results of feedback we can choose to cooperate with the emergent future or we can try to resist it. The insights of quantum physics would advise cooperation.

So would Jesus: Blessed are those who listen and cooperate with God.

Mourning

We mourn our losses. We mourn no longer being with friends and colleagues. We mourn the death of hopes and dreams. We mourn the passing of our youth and the sense of boundless possibilities.

But with each business failure we learn – or have the chance to learn – a great deal.

There is in the popular culture a tendency to quickly move past disappointments. This is not what Jesus taught. He said, “Blessed are those who mourn.” Another translation is, “Congratulations to those who grieve.”

Chrysostom asserts that to mourn is, once again, a chance for greater self-command. He preached, “This commandment is fitted to teach us entire self-control… For they that mourn, mourn for misdoings, and to such it is enough to enjoy forgiveness, and thereby to answer for themselves.” In mourning we reflect on the failure – large or small – seeking answers. When we find the answers, in mourning we will also accept responsibility for our role in the failure.

Chrysostom’s modern successor is evidently Peter Drucker who writes, “Management by objectives and self-control makes the commonweal the aim of every manager. It substitutes for control from the outside the stricter, more exacting, and more effective control of the inside. It motivates the manager to action, not because somebody tells him to do something or talks him into doing it, but because the objective task demands it.” (Management: Tasks, Responsibilities, Practices, page 442)

When the manager fails to achieve the objective set out, he or she should mourn, seek to understand why, and examine any personal role in the failure.

Mourning is different from “being sad.” Mourning is a structured process of learning and recovery. In modern Judaism there are three stages of mourning: shiva, sholshim, and yizkor. The first-century Jesus would recognize the basic structure, if not the details of this structure.

Shiva is a seven day period of personal and community grieving. Shiva embraces the suffering that is part of loss and gives us a chance to fully engage the suffering. During shiva the mourners avoid washing clothes, getting a haircut, wearing new clothes, trimming their nails and other acts that would obscure the reality of suffering. Shiva focuses on finding meaning in the loss.

For twenty-three days after completing shiva, mourners gradually reenter everyday life. This period of shloshim encourages the mourners to integrate the meaning uncovered during shiva into their daily life. This is an intentional but gradual process.

Thirty days after the funeral the period of mourning comes to a close. But on significant holidays a ritual of remembrance is practiced. This Yizkor is designed to keep alive the memory of the meaning found through mourning.

The structured process of mourning is focused on finding meaning or making meaning from the loss. If we engage our losses mindfully we will find meaning. This is why mourners are congratulated. By intentionally reflecting on what we have lost and why we have lost it, we will find meaning and the chance to apply that meaning to the rest of our life.

Business leaders should embrace every loss, go through a structured process of learning from the loss, and actively apply what they learn to future work.

(The eight principles for strategic insight can be found in the Gospel of Matthew, chapter five, verses one to twelve.)

Poor in Spirit

St. John Chrysostom’s fourth century sermon on the beatitudes insists that to be poor in spirit is to be “humble and contrite in mind.” The Saint also suggests, “He blesses them first, who by choice are humble and contract themselves.” Self-righteousness is avoided through purposefully cultivated humility.

Humility is not a virtue that immediately leaps to mind when considering most business leaders. Partly this is an artifact of media coverage. There is a tendency to focus on the flamboyant, such as Donald Trump or Larry Ellison. We probably hear the most about those who are accused of serious wrong-doing, such as Bernard Madoff or Dennis Kozlowski. Excessive humility seldom seems to be the charge.

Psychometric studies of a broad range of business managers find that, in fact, introverts are much more common in the executive suite than in the population at large. Humility is a very pragmatic virtue for business leadership. The humble person is inclined to ask more and listen better. Humility encourages self-reflection and self-correction. Admitting mistakes is important in building trust with others, especially those who may be dependent on you.

When I was in my twenties and thirties I often envied those peers who seemed free of self-doubt. There are certainly situations where this kind of confidence can be helpful. Start-ups – when something has to be created from nothing – can especially benefit from an impervious sense of personal destiny.

But by the time I was in my forties, most of my doubt-free colleagues had either burned-out or seemed to be churning through one “sure bet” after another. A few who got in early on the dot.com bubble took home a great deal of cash, but that experience, if anything, seemed to encourage humility rather than confirm confidence.

Despite my own tendency toward self-doubt, I have spent most of my professional life in start-ups. By the time I was working on my third or fourth business plan I had become very thankful for my tendency toward doubt. Doubt is realistic. Doubt is a good discipline.

A start-up, like many aspects of business-life, involves stepping off into the unknown. You can very seldom be sure what is coming next. To be strategic means engaging in an explicit process of attempting to anticipate what is most likely to be coming at you and what you want to do about it. This involves listening to others, reflecting on your own experiences, and asking questions of yourself and others. Doubt, uncertainty, and humility stimulate helpful questions.

When someone announces, “failure is not an option,” doubt is an appropriate response. Not only is failure an option, it is – at some level – almost assured. This kind of impervious confidence is a suspension of reality.

No great enterprise can be constructed entirely on the foundation of an individual’s tsedaq. No matter how profound the individual gift, it requires being worked out in community. The greater the individual gift, the greater the need for humility.

St. Chrysostom claims, “For as pride is the foundation of all wickedness, so is humility the principle of self-command.”

(The eight principles for strategic insight can be found in the Gospel of Matthew, chapter five, verses one to twelve.)

Strategic Attitude

The strategic environment for each enterprise is different. Even in the same market a strategy appropriate for one enterprise will seldom be best for another. Making the right strategic choice for the particular context and capabilities of an enterprise requires an extraordinary level of self-discipline and self-awareness on the part of senior management.

Before beginning his ministry Jesus put himself through a sustained period of personal testing. In the gospel of Matthew (Chapter 4) three particular temptations are reported: physical desire, pride, and power. In each case Jesus rejected the temptations as contrary to his fundamental identity with God.

The passion that drives performance can be difficult to direct. In the Hebrew Scriptures, King David is the classic case of great achievements clouded by failures of equal stature. David succumbed to physical desire with Bathsheba and suffered the consequences (2 Samuel:11); David’s pride in his son Absalom (2 Samuel 13-18) nearly destroyed the kingdom; David sought to over-extend his personal power (1 Chronicles:21) and seventy-thousand died as a result.

Scan the business headlines and David is clearly not alone. Great accomplishments are tarnished by indulging a personal preference with corporate money; or a sense of personal pride interferes with developing the next generation of executives; or an attempt to expand too quickly or too widely implodes.

External threat analysis, competitor analysis, and other efforts to understand what is happening outside the enterprise are important. But even more important to developing an effective strategy is internal assessment of competencies and fundamental characteristics. Self-assessment by the CEO and others involved in strategy development is essential.

Jesus began by focusing on his own character. In the wilderness he recognized the powerful potential to confuse his personal needs with the needs of his mission. Throughout his ministry we can see Jesus engaging in self-reflection and encouraging his disciples to do the same.

There is a stereotype of the entrepreneur who can never make the shift from creator to sustainer. A similar stereotype is the successful salesman who can never manage others, or the brilliant engineer who always complains that his creation will work wonderfully if users would just follow the instructions.

In each case the stereotype is most dramatic when the individual has discovered his or her own tsedaq – or personal identity with God – that empowers confident creativity. But in these examples tsedaq is not balanced with mishpat. There is righteousness but not justice. This is self-righteousness.

Self-righteous people are poor strategists. In fact they are dangerous strategists. Like David resisting the counsel of Joab, they tend to get people killed (or at least lose jobs or money).

Righteousness without justice focuses on the self to the exclusion of the community; it promotes the self and, at best, patronizes others. When the power of tsedaq is unbridled from the requirements of mishpat, the self oppresses the community. One of the principal features of the ministry of Jesus is his impatience with the self-righteous. He would reach out lovingly and patiently to sinners of almost every sort – except the self-righteous.

Error – even profound failure – can be helpful to everyone, except the self-righteous. David failed, but he also accepted responsibility. While others learn, the self-righteous blame. Self-righteousness obscures every truth except that which is convenient to the individual’s idolatry of self.

Jesus warned of the unreality of self-righteousness in quoting Isaiah, “You will be ever hearing but never understanding; you will be ever seeing but never perceiving. For this people's heart has become calloused; they hardly hear with their ears, and they have closed their eyes.” (Matthew 13)

Cultivating a balance of righteousness and justice – and avoiding self-righteousness – is at the very core of the teachings of Jesus. Only when the balance is achieved can we perceive reality and deal effectively with reality. In more common business terms we might say that cultivating a balance of personal confidence and commitment to the community is fundamental to fulfilling our purpose and potential.

The ancient word from which tsedaq was derived originally meant to clean. To become righteous is to reclaim our original condition, to rediscover our fundamental purposes. To become your true self is to become righteous.

There is enormous power and potential in becoming our true selves. But according to Jesus – building on Isaiah – it is only within community that we become our true selves. The ancient Hebrew for justice originally meant “to fit” as a lintel fits a doorway. Our true self must fit with the needs of the community – not visa versa.

Some true selves – certainly not all – have the ability to be strategists. In the Bible these are men and women who perceive clearly and move forward realistically. They understand the fundamental nature of the human condition and the social environment in which they are operating. They are sometimes prophets, sometimes judges, sometimes kings, and sometimes generals. Their role changes with the needs of the community. They share an accuracy and acuteness of perception.

In the Sermon on the Mount Jesus outlines eight spiritual disciplines for engaging reality:

Blessed are the poor in spirit…
Blessed are those who mourn…
Blessed are the meek…
Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness…
Blessed are the merciful…
Blessed are the pure in heart…
Blessed are the peacemakers…
Blessed are those who are persecuted because of righteousness.

Over the next eight days we will examine each of the preconditions for strategic insight.

Strategy

Creating a workplace intentionally characterized by a balance of tsedaq and mishpat resulting in shalom will produce a sustainable competitive advantage.

This sort of advantage strengthens the ability of the business enterprise to avoid emerging threats and seize emerging opportunities. If the enterprise can avoid and seize more quickly and adroitly than its competitors, it will thrive.

Good strategy is especially valuable in a time of uncertainty. Drucker explains, “We face long years of profound changes. The changes are not primarily economic changes. They are not even primarily technological changes. They are changes in demographics, in politics, in society, in philosophy, and, above all in worldview… The only policy likely to succeed is to try to make the future… To try to make the future is highly risky. It is less risky, however, than not to try to make it.” (Management Challenges, pages 92-93)

Even in the midst of this profound change, however, there are some certainties. Many of these certainties reflect human nature.

When we read the Bible, Homer’s Iliad, Plato, or Shakespeare we may be surprised at how little human nature has changed over the many centuries. Our nobility and our perversions are remarkably consistent.

This consistency is helpful to the strategist.

David Aaker, a professor in the business school at UC-Berkeley, outlines six dimensions for strategic assessment:

• Customer Analysis
• Competitor Analysis
• Market Analysis
• Environmental Analysis
• Self-Analysis
• Portfolio Analysis

At least five of these dimensions – and a case can be made for all six – are focused on how humans behave and why.

Jesus is our most trust-worthy guide to the qualities and complexities of human nature.

Jesus was one of the most effective change-agents in history. If Drucker, Porter, Kotter, and others are right, business leadership is increasingly a matter of leading change. (See links to these authors in the right column.) What does the career of Jesus and his teachings tell us about how to lead change?

In one of his best-known parables (Matthew 13) Jesus says, “A sower went out to sow. And as he sowed, some seeds fell along the path, and the birds came and devoured them. Other seeds fell on rocky ground, where they had not much soil, and immediately they sprang up, since they had no depth of soil, but when they sun rose they were scorched; and since they had no root they withered away. Other seeds fell upon thorns, and the thorns grew up and choked them. Other seeds fell on good soil, and brought forth grain, some hundred-fold, some sixty, some thirty.”

Have you ever tried to spread a new idea? In many cases you are barely heard, the audience is too self-absorbed to really pay attention. Some in the audience respond with immediate enthusiasm, but there is no follow-through. Some will make an earnest effort to hear and follow-through, but other issues and other problems undermine consistent implementation. In only a few instances will the new idea take hold, be nourished by colleagues, accepted by clients, and ultimately flourish.

Isn’t this reality? If this is reality, why are we so often surprised and disappointed by how difficult it is to promote a new idea? If we can reliably predict this range of response, why do we spend so much energy on the seeds among the thorns? Why don’t we do more to celebrate and support the few seeds among the good soil?

Why do we feed problems and starve opportunities?

In less than three years Jesus spread seeds of change that continue to produce. He approached his ministry with a strategy focused on radical change.

Jesus taught, “And you will hear of wars and rumors of wars… and there will be famines and earthquakes… And many false prophets will arise and lead many astray. And because wickedness is multiplied, most men’s love will grow cold. But he who endures to the end will be saved. And this gospel of the kingdom will be preached throughout the whole world, as a testimony to all nations; and then the end will come.” (Matthew 24: 6-14) John Kotter, author of Leading Change, would call this establishing a sense of urgency.

Jesus allied himself with John the Baptist and called together a team of twelve fellow change-agents. Kotter would call this creating a guiding coalition.

Shortly after the beginning of his public ministry Jesus gave the Sermon on the Mount. In this single statement he outlined most of his fundamental principles. Kotter calls this developing a vision and strategy.

Kotter emphasizes that management almost always undercommunicates the vision for change. He highlights the following key elements for effective communication:

• Simplicity,
• Metaphor, analogy, and example, Multiple forums
• Repetition
• Leadership by example,
• Explanation of seeming inconsistencies,
• Give-and-take.

Jesus did not read Kotter, but I wonder if Kotter has studied Jesus. Certainly the gospels demonstrate that Jesus was a master communicator.

Much of the gospels consist of private conversations between Jesus and his closest disciples. In these conversations Jesus helped his guiding coalition better understand the details behind the principles. He sent them out on missions of their own and he modeled effective ministry for them. Kotter would call this, empowering employees for broad-based action.

In the ministry of Jesus and in the generation immediately after the crucifixion it is also possible to observe the early Church observing Kotter’s final three stages of leading change: generating short-term wins, consolidating gains and producing more change, and anchoring new approaches in the culture.

Jesus has a goal. He has a strategy to achieve the goal. He applies expert tactics to implementing the strategy.

Peace

Jesus was a serious student of the book of Isaiah. Many of his precepts and parables are based on this text.

Isaiah teaches that when justice is realized in the community and righteousness characterizes the individual then the effective result is peace. The specific Hebrew word for this peace is שָׁלוֹם or shalom.

The peace of shalom is the achievement of balance, of wholeness, of completeness. This is the peace of right relationships fully realized. Shalom is used to describe the relationship of good friends. It is also used to describe the relationship of humans with God.

When our work-place is characterized by mutual respect and each employee is given the opportunity to develop his or her greatest strengths the effective result is shalom. I have been fortunate to be part of organizations that have experienced shalom. They are extraordinarily productive places.

In contrast, early in my business career I played a small role in a bitter labor-management dispute. I was part of a team providing counsel to the corporation’s CEO. The company was one of the great names in American manufacturing.

To this CEO and most of his senior managers the workers were principally cost-factors. To the workers the corporate officers were little more than over-paid exploiters. On both sides there was a sense of injustice. When management insisted on $100 million in labor concessions the contract talks soon broke-down.

Once the formal negotiations were cut-off both corporate and union leaders seemed to become more and more self-righteous (the opposite of biblical righteousness). In meetings with the CEO his language regarding the workers, and especially the union leadership, was increasingly abusive. This had become a personal fight and the CEO was convinced that to win he must destroy the union.

The strike continued for nearly six months. Eventually the company had to withdraw most of its demands and the CEO was dismissed by the Board. But within four years the number of employees working for the company had plummeted from over 103,000 to fewer than 16,000. The company never recovered. Neither did many of the union families.

No justice, no righteousness, no peace.

A work-place characterized by mutual respect and personal creativity is for many professional firms and other business organizations a real economic necessity.

Peter Drucker writes, “What motivates – and especially what motivates knowledge workers – is what motivates volunteers. Volunteers, we know… need, above all, challenge. They need to know the organization’s mission and to believe in it. They need continuous training. They need to see results… One does not “manage” people. The task is to lead people. And the goal is to make productive the specific strengths and knowledge of each individual.”

Isaiah was written at least 500 years before the birth of Jesus. Empowering individual creativity within a community of mutual respect is not a new idea. But it requires business leaders who are alert to the fundamentals of human nature.

Wealth

As the young man walks away, Jesus remarks, “Truly, I say to you, it will be hard for a rich man to enter the Kingdom of Heaven.”

Clearly the values of business and the values of Jesus can be in conflict. Even for the most creativity-loving entrepreneur, wealth is usually an important measure of success. There is, however, a difference between using wealth as one of many measures or as the only measure.

As the parable of the young man demonstrates, it is important not to obscure the fundamental question of self-identity. Are we only the sum of what we own, or are we something more and something much more profound?


Self-Portrait with Vanitas Symbols, David Bailey (1651)

In the business world the enthusiasm of entrepreneurship is often succeeded by the discipline of quarterly statements. An enterprise founded on audacious risk-taking, becomes acutely risk-averse. Once we have “got it” we almost always focus on “keeping it.” This focus on preserving instead of growing often sows the seeds of self-destruction.

Harvard Business School professor Michael Porter writes,

One common problem in emerging industries is that pioneers expend excessive resources defending high market shares and responding to competitors who may have little chance of becoming market forces in the long run. This can be partly an emotional reaction. Although it may sometimes be appropriate to respond to competitors vigorously in the emerging stage, it is more likely that the firm’s efforts are best spent in building its own strengths and developing the industry.

Build your own strengths – discover and amplify your authentic identity – and develop the industry – contribute positively to the community of customers and competitors that will expand your opportunities.

Wealth is not necessarily a problem. Greed, avarice, and fear of losing wealth are serious problems. Wealth that is used to advance justice – social harmony – and righteousness – personal identity with God – can be good, even very good.

Many business scholars argue that in today’s economic environment the primary role of the business leader is to perpetually challenge the enterprise to change and grow.

Peter Drucker has identified five deadly business sins:

1. Worship of high profit margins and of premium pricing.


2. Mispricing a new product by charging what the market will bear.


3. Cost-driven pricing.


4. Slaughtering tomorrow’s opportunity on the altar of yesterday.


5. Feeding problems and starving opportunities.
   

These are business sins because they seek short-term financial gain at the expense of long-term strategic advantage. Wealth is what we have today. Value is more than wealth. Value is the capacity of the enterprise to adapt to changing conditions, to be even more creative, and to be even more adept at taking risk.

Jesus does not want us to confuse wealth and value. We should not be possessed by what we own. We should use our possessions to fulfill our greater purposes, both as individuals and as business organizations.

Righteousness

In Isaiah 33 it is written, “Then justice will dwell in the wilderness, and righteousness abide in the fruitful field. And the effect of righteousness will be peace, and the result of righteousness, quietness and trust forever.”

Justice is the foundation of a healthy community. Righteousness is the foundation of a healthy individual.

In the book of Isaiah the most common Hebrew equivalents for righteousness are three forms of the verb צֶ֫דֶק or tsedaq. These terms are closely related to justice. But where mishpat (see yesterday's post) is a community value, tsedaq is more personal. Justice is evidence of God’s will expressed in community. Righteousness is evidence of God’s will expressed within the individual.

In Matthew 19 Jesus recites the six commandments of social justice and the young man responds, “All these I have observed; what do I still lack?” To which Jesus answers, “If you would be perfect, go, sell what you possess and give to the poor, and you will have treasure in heaven; and come follow me.”

The young man’s follow-on question suggests he has perceived a void. He has fulfilled the obligations of social justice. But at a deeply psychological and spiritual level his beliefs and behavior are not fully integrated. Something is missing.

The follow-on answer Jesus gives for filling the void is not well-received. Matthew reports, “When the young man heard this he went away sorrowful; for he had great possessions.”

Jesus perceived in the young man an unresolved tension. Was his fundamental sense-of-self a reflection of his possessions? Or was the young man’s self-identity a reflection of his relationship with God?

The young man was unable to readily conceive of a self that was not dependent on his possessions. The young man was also unable to conceive of a more profound self entirely independent of any externality. Righteousness is a full acceptance of our shared identity with God; the discovery of our authentic selves within the purpose of God.

Are we creatures of our salary, our office, our authority over others, or are we expressions of the creativity and love of God?

The corporate bureaucrat – so well captured by the Dilbert cartoons – is desperate to preserve every illusion of authority and prestige. Most of us have encountered the petty tyrannies that result from what is basically a fearful seeking for control and external assurance of meaning. For such a personality, giving up the external symbols of success is too great a risk.

Alternatively most entrepreneurs I have known display very little concern for the external symbols of success. Jeff Bezos, founder of Amazon.com, is famous for still using a wooden door on saw-horses as his desk. Entrepreneurs are much more focused on the thrill of the creative process.

The risks of real creativity require a sense of self that will survive multiple failures large and small. The business leader who succeeds over the long-term – through good times and bad – is someone whose whole personality is ready to take the risk that is always part of creation. In religious language we might say, the righteous person is ready to take the risk that is always part of giving oneself over to God.

Justice

The parable of the vineyard is based on the Song of the Vineyard in the fifth chapter of Isaiah. Jesus draws heavily on the book of Isaiah and its recurrent themes of justice, righteousness, and peace.

For Jesus, what is justice? The ancient Hebrew equivalent for justice most often used in Isaiah is mishpat. This is not a philosophical abstract or a promise of a heavenly future. Mishpat is here and now. It is justice-in-action. The claims of justice are real, and if justice is ignored the consequences – here and how – are serious.

Mishpat is especially concerned with a harmonious web of human relationships. Justice is a community value. The vulnerable should be protected. The powerful should be restrained. The widow and the orphan must be sustained. The rich man should share.

The Ten Commandments are foundational to justice. When a rich young man comes to Jesus asking, “What good deed must I do, to have eternal life?” (Matthew 19:16) Jesus responds by referring to the six commandments focused on social relationships.

The workplace is – or should be – a community. The social relationship of manager to managed, colleague with colleague, and professional to client is the essential reality of commerce. When these relationships are not sufficiently and appropriately nurtured, the enterprise will suffer. The community of work, as with any community, depends primarily on the level of trust that exists between the parties.

In the business context, we might re-phrase the six commandments given to the young man as:

• You shall not kill the career plans or good ideas of another merely to advance yourself,
• You shall not cheat on your colleagues or employer by fooling around with competitors,
• You shall not steal money, ideas, or credit that is due others,
• You shall not bear false witness,
• Honor those who have hired you, supported you, mentored you, and given you professional opportunities,
• You shall love your colleague, your client, and your competitor as yourself.

Behaving consistently with these principles of trust-making and trust-keeping builds the foundation of future success. Persistent failure in maintaining trust will lead to the eventual failure of any business enterprise.

In the same chapter of Isaiah as the Song of the Vineyard we read: “Woe to those who draw iniquity with cords of falsehood… Woe to those who call evil good and good evil… Woe to those who are wise in their own eyes and shrewd in those own sight… Therefore, as the tongue of fire devours the stubble, and as dry grass sinks down in flame, so their root will be as rottenness and their blossom go up like dust.”

There are often short-term benefits to bad behavior. But lying, stealing, and breaking trust are rotten and will finally produce nothing but dust.

When employees know they can count on their employer to behave justly and when customers are confident they will be treated justly, such a business enterprise will – over the long-term - enjoy a very substantial strategic advantage.

Work

Work was as much part of self-identity in the First Century as in the Twenty-first Century. Throughout the gospels we are introduced to vivid characters primarily in terms of the role they play in the community: householder, tax collector, teacher, herdsman, fisherman, centurion, scribe, and more. We often do not know the character’s name, but we are told their economic and social role.

Jesus fully embraced the world of work. When he wanted to clearly explain some difficult teaching he often chose a work-related analogy.

In the Gospel of Matthew, Jesus tells spiritually purposeful stories about farmers, merchants, shepherds, kings, servants, day-laborers, tenant farmers, capitalists, lawyers, scribes, and investment managers. He refers to a wide range of other occupations. Jesus saw the world of work as a common reference point and a rich resource for spiritual wisdom.

Jesus viewed the world of work as ripe with spiritual potential. He also recognized that it could be easily be spoiled by spiritual neglect.

The world of modern corporations – huge enterprises serving mass-markets with thousands of employees scattered around the globe – was not a feature of the First Century economy. But even here a careful reading of the gospels can find relevant counsel.

In the twenty-third chapter of Matthew, beginning with verse 33, we read of an early capitalist who “planted a vineyard, and set a hedge about it, and dug a wine press in it, and built a tower, and let it out to tenants, and went into another country.”


The Red Vineyard, Vincent Van Gogh (1888)

But when the absentee landlord sent business agents to collect the rent, the tenants refused to pay. The tenants even “beat one, killed another, and stoned another.”

Finally the landlord sends his own son, who the tenants also kill. Asked by Jesus to finish the outcome of the story, the disciples predicted the landlord would put the original tenants to death and find new tenants “who will give him the fruits in their seasons.”

The parable clearly endorses the worth of what we would now call “value-added” work. Most interpreters of the passage perceive that the work of the early capitalist is analogous to the work of God in creating the underlying potential for future productivity. The early investment justifies a long-term return.

Some contemporary interpreters also see in the parable an early inkling of the “alienation of labor.” The tenants were not around to see the work of the landlord. The landlord is not, evidently, in any sort of direct relationship with the tenants. The tenants have had to work hard to nurture and harvest the vineyard. Some would argue that a sense of antagonism regarding the demands of the landlord is human nature.

But Jesus makes it clear that a rental fee is entirely justified – in fact it is profoundly just.

Jesus in Our Context

To fully benefit from the insights of Jesus we must approach his teachings with a fresh perspective. Too often Jesus is read with a kind of awe and piety he would disdain.

Christianity proclaims that Jesus, the son of God, was fully human. He prayed for daily bread, he enjoyed a fine wine, he laughed with his friends, and he feared death.

For Jesus faith is not a set of religious beliefs, it is a way of living.

But for many modern Christians their faith is focused on another world, not the everyday world of work, politics, entertainment, preparing for retirement, and making ends meet. Faith is a private matter that looks beyond the everyday to the eternal.

This separation would be entirely alien – would probably be repugnant – to Jesus. Fundamental to the teachings of Jesus is the integrity of faith and daily life. Faith is a way, not just to heaven, but to living in harmony with our most basic nature. For Jesus, human nature was created by God and at its core is incorruptibly good.

Whenever we live in a manner that is inconsistent with this nature we are setting ourselves up for unhappiness, failure, and worse. Living our lives in a manner that is coherent with our fundamental nature is the way of justice, righteousness, peace… and ultimate satisfaction.

Jesus was, of course, very much alive – and entirely contemporary – to those whom he encountered. But for us there are only a few stories passed down through twenty centuries wrapped in a social and economic context that is unfamiliar to us.

Jesus has been further distanced from us by a wide array of religious imagery and ritual that would often cause him to smile and occasionally frown. Unfortunately, many of these practices – beautiful and rich with meaning – can also serve to make Jesus seem outside our daily reality, when his teachings were meant to shape our daily reality.

In the following we will re-examine the teachings of Jesus, mostly from the Gospel of Matthew, with a particular emphasis on their implications for the daily life of business and commerce.

For some Christians this effort to insert Jesus into the heart of the modern business enterprise will be troublesome. Some will perceive that in the process of updating the teachings of Jesus for a corporate context I have misconstrued and misrepresented the essential gospel. I am sure my skills are insufficient to the task, but I am equally confident that if Jesus was walking with us today, he would be visiting the corporate canyons more often than the great cathedrals.

For some Christians – and even more non-Christians – this blog will seem a fatally flawed effort to join the sacred and the profane. For these readers any corporate leader who gives serious attention to the counsels of Jesus is clearly unsuited for the hard-nosed competitive turmoil of corporate life. Corporate leaders require a warrior instinct, not the sensitivity of a saint. I would respond that more than a few saints were also warriors and business leaders would benefit from the courage, consistency, and realism that characterized the life and teachings of Jesus.

But this requires a new – and probably more accurate – understanding of both Jesus and his First Century context.