What
Is Missing?

I have had a client whose name I do not need to mention because he just represents thousand of executives, who was building a very successful empire, taking more risks, working harder and harder.

“What for?” I asked him. “You have all the money you may ever need.”

“So I can get my self a bigger plane” he said with a smile.

And eventually he owned the biggest most luxurious, private jet.

Than he bought at high expense a beach compound for the summer. Than a 182 foot luxurious yacht. Than a compound in the mountains, and now was looking for a bigger mansion with a helicopter pad to live in.

It reminded me of a woman who has hundreds of shoes and still buys more. And shops for more and more cloth and more and more jewelry.

What is she missing?

May I suggest that she is missing a meaning in her life. It is as if she has a “hole” in the middle of her chest she is trying to fill with materialistic possessions.

When we miss a spiritual center, we try to fill it up with possessions which never suffice because a spiritual “hole” has no bottom..

Note that people who have a spiritual meaning to their life, their interest in materialistic possessions takes a back seat and those that are candidates for saint hood, to them material needs have no meaning whatsoever.

What I am suggesting here is that the person I described above had no spiritual meaning in his life. He had a “hole” and until he fills this “hole” with a meaning, he will continue building a material empire and no mater how big it will become, he will still feel unfulfilled.

Now imagine that there was a finishing school for young ladies where they were taught to measure their success in life. By how many shoes they had, how big was their closet and how expensive were the clothes and jewelry in it.

You would feel aghast, no?

But that is what business schools do.

They teach to measure success exclusively by measuring EBITA, and earnings per share and how much stockholders equity has increased..

We are creating a class of rich unhappy people unless they independently develop their spiritual life because they sure don't get it at the business school.

Many people confuse spiritual with religious. Big mistake. Some religions or the fringes of that religion, lost their spiritual orientation. They preach killing and destruction.

Spiritual to me means to feel to be part of and thus care to something bigger than yourself.

Let me give you an example from my consulting experience.

Years ago I had a client that was producing respiratory equipment for hospitals that treated people with respiratory diseases.

They had a quality control problem. The discussion was how many new quality control people they should hire.

I suggested an alternative solution; take two buses and the people from production, the social leaders and drive them to a hospital, to the childrens ward and visit children who had a respiratory disease. Take pictures of these kids breathing using the equipment the company was manufacturing.

Bring those pictures to the company and hang them everywhere.

What can that do to quality of the equipment?

Imagine these kids are your own sons and daughters.

We teach our future business leaders numbers, concepts, theories. We fill their heads. But their hearts are empty. They might pay attention to their heart at older age when they are dying and realize the futility of what they have done all their life. And they donate to charity their accumulated “shoes and jewels”. It is like atoning for their wasted life.

I have a suggestion to make.

No one should be admitted to a school of business and get accredited as a professional leader unless they have exhibited in their past that they care. Leading business school require that the applicant have prior business experience.. I suggest that they should have had past social care. They were in the peace core. That they worked as a community organizer. That they volunteered working in a non for profit organization.

And during their management education they must take an internship working for a whole summer helping people who need help. Build houses in habitat for humanity; work in poverty stricken neighborhoods. Raise funds for neighborhood medical centers that provide free medical care for those who can not afford medical coverage.

Without spiritual meaning life is empty and no mater how much we have

we still do not feel we are complete.