This news just in from EBBFer Carolina Sawicki, member of a team focused on Values Based Leadership. (Photo from a workshop they gave last year in Bratislava, Slovakia.)

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The Value Based Leadership initiative is an excellent example of how EBBF acts as a platform for like-minded individuals to meet and engage in activities that further EBBF’s vision and mission.

About two years ago, EBBF members Caroline Sawicki (Switzerland / Croatia), Marc Avanzo (France), Daniel Truran (Spain), Alain Noghiu (USA) and Maike Verhagen (Belgium / Kosovo) teamed up to create a Value Based Leadership (VBL) program that can be offered to a variety of organizations such as businesses and non-profits. In the past, several of the team members were connected with Nur University (Bolivia) where they learned about its Moral Leadership program. This experience fuelled a mutual desire to combine efforts in seeking ways to adapt and expand Nur’s approach and make it applicable to a western professional and organizational setting.

Judging by the increasing number of ethical scandals and the shifting discourse in media and academic circles, it appears clear that recognition about the importance of ethics in society and the corporate world is on the increase. Read the rest of this entry »

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EBBF frequently presents at AIESEC events but one interaction really caught our attention.
When one AIESEC president from Jordan wrote the following reaction to Arthur Dahl’s letter sent to one of this organization’s events this time in Jordan we felt you may want to read Arthur’s letter (you can by the way meet him and hear his keynote at the next EBBF International event 13-15th June) :

“Allow me to express my deepest gratitude and utter respect for the time you have dedicated in order to write this letter which will be an immense contribution to our event. It will unquestionably add value and lend weight to our event and the mission we are seeking to realize. I have shared your letter with the President of AIESEC in Jordan and with the Organizing Team, and you have instilled in us more passion and induced more drive towards realizing our sustainability initiative.

This letter is but a testimony of your sincere faith in the role of young people, and their ability in inspiring ethical conduct and mobilizing a mental revolution that is to take its first steps in re-shaping our region and building a future where the upcoming generations can prosper and contribute positively to the welfare of humanity. Allow me to express my admiration in the dedication and commitment you demonstrate which is a real inspiration.”

If you are curious to read what caused that reaction, you can find Arthur’s open letter below. Read the rest of this entry »

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The Ethical Trading Initiative (ETI) is a unique alliance of companies, trade unions and non-governmental organisations set up to improve the lives of workers and their families in global supply chains. They are seeking to recruit a competent and committed individual to maintain and produce a range of ETI communications products and services. The successful candidate will work alongside 3 colleagues in the Communications Team to help ensure that our growing ethical trade know-how is communicated as effectively as possible to companies and others who can make a difference to workers’ lives….

For more information visit their job offer website.

Deadline 15th of May.

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After describing the pattern of increasing global inequality and what can only be qualified as environmental destruction that characterizes our current economic model, author Bill McKibben underscores the values that accompany this model in his recent (2007) book, “Deep Economy”. The chief value he refers to as ‘hyper-individualism’. While the tone is a little bit accusatory and probably wouldn’t help foster a much needed dialogue between different elements involved in the econony, the idea about the existence of (unexamined) values in business is worthy of reflection.

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This ideological change [from what he describes as a healthy, liberating ‘individualism’, to the more pernicious ‘hyper’ version of the same] has sunk deep in almost every realm. Take Christianity, the faith that upward of 85 percent of Americans (including me) profess. An evangelical pollster, George Barna, recently asked a sampling of Christians a list of questions, the answers to some of which demonstrated a fairly pervasive biblical illiteracy (only 40 percent of respondents could conjure up any five of the Ten Commandments. A scant half of Americans can name any of the four Gospels. Twelve percent of American Christians are confident that Joan of Arc was Noah’s wife.) But more interesting was this finding: 75 percent of American Christians think the saying “God helps those who help themselves” can be found in the Bible. The sentiment is actually from the paragon of individualist vigor Benjamin Franklin, and the Bible of course says pretty much the opposite. Every time Jesus tries to sum up his message, he falls back on the formula” Love your God, and love your neighbor as yourself.” That is, he posits a life built around others. Read the rest of this entry »

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If you want to meet, interact and create with people like Wendi (see her post here),

Mika (see his post below),

George (see his publication here),

Arthur (see an excerpt of one of his recent talks here)

and a number of other people keen to “Act Now For The World Of Tomorrow” you may want to book your place at the next EBBF International event and enjoy a weekend in a medieval town in Italy - here’s more information.

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A preview of a recent interview with EBBF member Mika Korhonen (on right, with son) in which he speaks about applying values–or what he calls ’spiritual laws’–to the world of work, and life in general. The full interview will be published in an upcoming edition of the EBBF e-magazine, Inspire.

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EBBF: When I first spoke with you, you said that the integration of values into work was less about heroes and heroines giving great talks and creating grandiose projects, but more ‘like a way of life’. What do you mean by this?

Mika: The past few years of my life have been quite ‘educational’, I have to say. I went high up in the career lift – from a software engineer to a director - and then ended up dropping off and spending fifteen months home with my two sons. I lost something in that process and I think it was the ‘wrong’ kind of ambition acquired by imitating the surrounding business culture. I thought that what I did defined who I was. If somebody asked who I was I usually answered with my work position and name of the employer but I eventually learned to replace that phrase with ‘I am a father of two boys’. What is important in life was redefined. It became clearer that I am happier if I do not make compromises with what I believe is right, even at the work place, and as a side effect I might also create something good.

Of course it is not just me defining what is right and what is wrong. Over the years I have learned that spiritual laws are as real as the laws of physical reality. Read the rest of this entry »

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George Starcher has just sent in this book review on the book “Why Women Mean Business: Understanding the emergence of our next economic revolution” by Avivah Wittenberg-Cox & Alison Maitland, Jossey-Bass, 2008.

During the past six months or so I have had the opportunity to read nearly a dozen books and countless articles on the subject of women in business. Most of them point out the many qualities of women managers and leaders and attempt to answer the burning issue of why so few women actually rise to the top and become board members, CEO’s and senior executives. Much of this literature is based on North American experience. This, the most recent book, and the most relevant for European readers, presents a convincing business case for promoting more women into responsible positions and explains such major barriers for women as the glass ceiling (or the sticky floor), stereotypes, male-dominated corporate cultures, work/life imbalances, and HR policies and practices. At the same time the authors emphasize the great need for more ‘bilingualism’ in men, that is, a greater sharing of feminine and masculine values in leadership. In so doing this book is directly relevant to understanding one of the core values of EBBF: “the partnership of women and men in all fields of endeavour”, and how this partnership can be achieved through a blending of male and female values and characteristics.

To give a taste of the flavor of this book, here are a few extracts from the many excellent reviews it has received. “There is a growing body of evidence that gender equality is not only the right thing to do: it is good for business and good for economies.” “Gender equality strengthens long-term economic development. (OECD)” “The promise of gender diversity remains elusive for many world-class companies.” “Women and men are not from Venus or Mars; both are from planet Earth” “today’s gender imbalanced business world”, “Economic growth is driven by women.”,  “attracting, retaining, inspiring and promoting talented women”, “The feminine approach to leadership is not confined to women

For EBBF members and friends seeking ways to win the war for talent, this excellent book is a “must read.”

Reviewed by George Starcher

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We have discovered and share with you a tremendous online resource offered by ReliefWeb that daily uploads new job offers in a wide range of “meaningful” fields. Vacancies include CEO and Directors´positions all the way to IT officers, logistics experts, junior and senior executives wanted to work in a number of for-profit and not-for-profit organizations addressing humanitarian issues:

You can find here the list of European based jobs

And here the full worldwide list, click on the LOCATION column title to sort by location and thus find a job offer in your geographical area of interest.

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EBBF honorary member Muhammad Yunus has come to be known across the world for his pioneering work with microcredit which has demonstrated the potential poor people (especially women) have to run successful businesses. He’s now promoting a complementary idea, that of ’social businesses’. Here’s the story taken from a recent issue of “Positive News“:

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The Next Big Idea from Muhammad Yunus

Positive News Issue 55
Muhammad Yunus, Nobel Prize winning founder of the Grameen Bank, has been in the UK to promote his latest ideas. Having seen micro-lending banks established in over 100 countries, lending to 100 million families, he is now on a mission to see that ‘social business’ – business designed to meet a social rather than a financial goal – becomes the next global development.

His new book, Creating a World Without Poverty, outlines the way social business can unleash the creative energies of all people and make abundance possible for every human being. Read the rest of this entry »

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Jean Pierre Méan, Chief Legal Officer at the multinational SGS group and EBBF member, recently appeared in a comprehensive article published on the Financial Times. The article underlines the complexities of implementing corporate policies across the many nations that a multinational may be involved in. The frequent incongruence arising between the corporate focus on corruption and what actually happens with employees in different countries.

“…bribery has become the number one fear among compliance officers, many of whom are struggling to implement policies across dozens of countries, among thousands of employees, without sufficient boardroom support. “

Jean Pierre Méan’s first hand experiences shape the article: he was asked to join the multinational at the time when it was embroiled in a corruption scandal and had to set up and put into practice a comprehensive worldwide set of anti-corruption policies to stem out any likelihood of such events occurring and restoring the internal and external trust in the organization.

You can read here the full article.

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