A few weeks ago, I attended quite a unique talk at Anderson called, "East Meets West: What is Moral Capitalism?" It was by Dr. Hiroshi Tasaka, a distinguished business philosopher, prolific author, and founder of SophiaBank, a think tank that supports social entrepreneurs in Japan. He had flown in from Japan and spoke to a room of about 20 students over sushi (I didn't try the sushi though).
I just found online that he gave a similar talk at TEDxTokyo, which is the video embedded above. The subject of the talk was the invisible or moral values that are absent in a capitalistic culture that only focuses on economic or monetary values. These moral values are things like caring for each other, peace in the community, trust, and happiness of workers. He explained how the verb "to work" in Japanese means "to help my neighbor" (I'll see if that's true next quarter when I hopefully take a Japanese class). He taught these lessons through a philosophic fable he wrote which poked fun at how modern governments are trying to solve the current financial crises. His thesis was that by refocusing society and capitalism on a notion of invisible values, like culture, peace, and happiness, necessarily without quantifying them, we could achieve more stable and positive long-term results. The way he spoke about the moral values appealed to me and is a reason for my recent growing interest in social entrepreneurship. It was also neat to hear Tony Hsieh, the CEO of Zappos, talk to us the next day about culture at Zappos and how their core values are many of the invisible values Dr. Tasaka was preaching. I'll blog more about Tony's talk soon (which was riveting), and it was a nice coincidence to hear several speakers give their unique perspectives on a common topic. An economics professor in the audience of Dr. Tasaka's talk mentioned that there are several research studies in progress aiming to come up with a modified sense of GDP that takes into account society's contentment, peace, etc. Dr. Tasaka thought these efforts were well-intentioned but cautioned that the invisible values by definition cannot be measured or quantified. It sounded like something where you knew it when you saw it. I had also recently come across a proposal to build a social stock exchange where Social Benefit Enterprises (SBEs), or companies that are for-profit but create social good along the way, could trade and be combined into a diversified portfolio by investors who wanted to support their operations. I think all of these speakers and recent research show a growing trend towards socially responsible business, where the social good is not just a side effect but a major driver of value. It will be interesting to see how this develops in the coming years and to hopefully contribute to it as well.
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I'll keep this post short, as the message is pretty simple (but hard to implement in real life). We had a guest speaker in my finance class who was a private equity manager. Of all things, he chose to focus his talk on incentive alignment. As a private equity firm buys an existing company, they need to incentivize either the current or replacement management to achieve the company turnaround or growth goals that are planned from the beginning. He taught us that the status of incentive alignment explains performance. No matter what, people will be driven by the incentives placed before them and work to optimize the incentive formula, not necessarily the company's long-term value. He also pointed out that incentives may be good per individual but bad when mixed together. For example, sales people may get commissions on sales; marketing may get bonuses based on brand surveys; the CEO may get bonuses based on stock price. When looking at each individually, it seems like the incentive makes sense based on the individual's role and department. However, when combined into one organization, the incentives can often be at odds with each other and not have a lot of cohesion. Tying everyone to one incentive system also doesn't work that well because of different people's limited control over parts of the business that are not their own and the problem of free-riding, where some may benefit at the hard work of others. Finally, our guest taught us why it's hard to align incentives for the long term: things are changing all the time for a company, and it's hard to constantly revise incentive plans accordingly. Because incentive plans are forward-looking by nature (whereas company plans are drawn up based on past performance and the present outlook), there is always a lag in responding to a changing market environment when updating incentive systems. In addition, there's a sense of stickiness to incentives once put in place; if people got hired with a specific incentive scheme promised to them, it may be hard to renegotiate this. However, it's probably the right thing to do in the long run, and many companies probably are better off anyways without people who focus on incentives and compensation over learning and producing results. I've always been interested in the subject of incentives and compensation and am simultaneously frustrated and curious about the issues at play because there is clearly no right answer or optimal solution. I hope to learn more about this topic next quarter in my Pay & Rewards class. The last month or so has been particularly tough for my family. About 5 weeks ago, my last grandfather passed away, and yesterday, the second dog I ever had passed away. I've unfortunately had a lot of opportunity to think about life and mortality and struggle with the meaning of loss. The subject of loss I've heard is written about extensively, but luckily I have never really had a large need or motivation to study it. I find myself wondering now what others feel like, what I should feel like, and methods for coping. How quickly should one go on with one's life? Is it fair to be happy when someone else cannot? I've come to realize that I'm curious about the process of mourning and want to learn more about it. I'm also curious about how to best deal with loss and what it means to people as a community. I've seen that loss can bring people together and bring them closer, and it is sad that it sometimes requires loss to do that. But perhaps that is something good that the lost soul leaves to those who outlive him or her. I've also realized that dealing with loss is really personal. Though I'm curious how others feel and what they do, I'm happy with myself and the feelings I've had. I try to live my life in a way where if I or someone I love is gone the next day, I have minimal regrets. Therefore, I speak to every single person that's important in my life every day and see everyone in my family at least weekly. This might be my cultural upbringing and family norms, and I know it can seem strange to people raised differently than I was (or whose families live far away). But for me it feels natural and normal, and I'm happy about that. In addition to being close to the people I love when they're alive, when they're sick, I try to pray for them. And when they leave my life, I've tried to think about them in a positive light, to imagine they're in a better place, and most importantly to remember them for how happy they made me feel. To that end, I wanted to make a small tribute in this blog post to the memory of my grandfather and my dog. Below is a small description of each, including a brief glimpse into what they were all about, to both help me remember them in the future and to honor them in some small way. IzyaslavBio My grandfather Izyaslav (leftmost in the photo) was born in Chernivtsi, a small town in Ukraine. When he was a young boy, World War II broke out, and he was separated from his family for several years. He had to completely fend for himself as he journeyed alone and worked to reunite with his family. He was an engineer by training and handy with hands, working on cars and in industrial settings throughout his life. He was very proud of his son (my dad in the middle of the photo) for becoming a doctor and being first in his class, and always stressed the importance of hard work and being a good example to others. He always told me stories and explicitly tried to impart his wisdom on me whenever we were together, but he was also always curious about my life and wanted to hear everything about it. His dream was to dance at my wedding one day, and his dream came true just over one year before he passed away. Favorite things in life
I miss him very much, and he is in my thoughts everyday. I know that he is no longer suffering and sick, and I know he watches over me always. MarcelloBio We rescued my dog Marcello when I was in college, right after my first dog Mario died. These are the only two dogs I've ever had, and my family has always rescued Neapolitan Mastiffs. We love the breed, and I've been lucky to read about their unique history in several Italian and English books that I've collected over the years. Marcello was sick throughout his life with many mild/topical issues, and he began life very anxious around people and somewhat aggressive. However, the love our family gave him quickly brought him peace of heart, and he became an extremely loyal, protective, and loving member of our family. To me, he was like a brother or a friend; we always loved to play together outside and go for walks, and I missed him dearly when I moved out and could only visit him once a week to brush his teeth. Favorite things in life
I miss Marcello very much, and he is in my thoughts everyday. I know that he is no longer suffering and sick, and I know he is sunbathing and playing with Mario in a better place as well. |
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