InsideWork » Community

Tag: Community

June 2008

25: Business as Community

Humanness - that’s what we must stress, if we are really the children of God, redeemed as men. Without it community dies. So I would encourage all of us to outdo each other in order to create, in order to have something to share. Let us not take offense at what others have. Let us be stimulated to create thing of value ourselves. And let us cultivate spiritual values which we can also share, outdoing each other in godliness, in true faith, in true humanity and in true communion. Then indeed we will be able to speak the gospel in a living way.
Pro-existence (p. 59) by Udo Middelman, InterVarsity Press, 1974

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April 2008

16: Corrosion of Character

This conflict between family and work poses some questions about adult experience itself. How can long-term purposes be pursued in a short-term society? How can durable social relations be sustained? How can a human being develop a narrative of identity and life history in a society composed of episodes and fragments? The conditions of the new economy feed instead on experience which drifts in time, from place to place, from job to job…Short-term capitalism threatens to corrode…character, particularly those qualities of character which bind human beings to one another and furnishes each with a sense of sustainable self.
The Corrosion of Character (p. 26-27) by Richard Sennett, W.W. Norton & Company, 1998

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March 2008

12: Finish as a Team

Howard Schultz
Pour Your Heart Into It (p. 337-338), Hyperion, 1997
Remember: You’ll be left with an empty feeling if you hit the finish line alone. When you run a race as a team, though, you’ll discover that much of the reward comes from hitting the tape together. You want to be surrounded not just by cheering onlookers but by a crowd of winners, celebrating as one. Victory is much more meaningful when it comes not just from the efforts of one person, but from the joint achievements of many. The euphoria is lasting when all participants lead with their hearts, winning not just for themselves but for one another. Success is sweetest when it’s shared.

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9: Corporate Death

Arie de Geus
The Living Company, p. 3, Longview Publishing Limited, 1997
Moreover, there is something unnatural in the high corporate mortality rate; no living species, for instance, endures such a large gap between its maximum life expectancy and its average realization…Why, then, do so many companies die prematurely?…Companies die because their managers focus on the economic activity of producing goods and services, and they forget that their organizations’ true nature is that of a community of humans. The legal establishment, business educators, and the financial community all join them in the mistake.

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April 2007

9: Adding Value

John Stott
Work and Unemployment (18 February 1979), Sermon on Genesis 1 & 2
Work is an expenditure of energy in service which brings fulfillment to the worker, benefit to the community and glory to God.

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December 2006

Battling Discontent, Part Deux

The Potent Antidote - Generosity

A fifth and final antidote to discontent is generosity that it immediate and personal.

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November 2006

Communication Technology Fails to Connect People

The things that connect us distance us.

Sam Nguyen tells about his experiences with the distancing power of communication technology.

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October 2006

Why Do Businesses Die?

Dan Wooldridge raises the question and points to an answer at the fundamental core of a business

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August 2006

Contrary to common wisdom, people who have a best friend at work are seven times more engaged in their jobs. Different friends contribute different things to a friendship. The research reveals eight different but vital friendship roles each of us needs.

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May 2006

Are CEOs Underchallenged?

Pay Ratios Barely Scratch the Surface

MSNBC reports that executive pay in the United States is, on average, 430 times greater than the wages of average workers. Is a 430:1 ratio too high? At InsideWork, we think there may be an even bigger question.

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