When Andreas Widmer talks about “principled entrepreneurship,” he starts by dismantling the narrative that business is intrinsically bad.
Widmer, who teaches in the Busch School of Business at the Catholic University of America, believes business in a free market is an inherent good that has brought about progress, productivity, and freedom, and has pulled people out of poverty. Although some may abuse it, he said, “Once you see it in a different way – the way it was meant to be, rather than the narrative – you can do good.”
In his new book, The Art of Principled Entrepreneurship, Widmer details that vision by offering five pillars that make business a force for good. The first is that the economy exists for people, not people for the economy. This is reflected in Widmer’s favorite sentence epitomizing business: How may I help you?
“It’s the quintessential business question and includes everything you need to know about how business works,” he said. “Another way to say it is, ‘How can I create value for you?’” This translates into a company that is customer-centered and measures its success by satisfaction rather than profitability. In other words, profit should be a natural result of finding customers and solving problems in a superior way.
Widmer’s other pillars are “To work is to create; to create is to be human,” which sees work as an imitation of God and a response to man’s mandate to be a good steward; “Culture eats strategy for breakfast,” which emphasizes the importance of strong cultural values that are consistent with and drive a company’s strategy; “Principled entrepreneurs always seek to create win-win solutions,” which focuses on working toward the common good; and “Always think like an entrepreneur,” which means constantly seeking the next solution to customers’ problems or needs.
Although Widmer’s pillars fall under the banner of principled performance, interestingly, none of them mentions “ethics.”
“I don’t use the word ‘ethics,’” he said, “because it’s been ruined. Rather than ‘ethics,’ I like to say, ‘Why are you doing this?’ That exposes what you worship.”
“We all have one value, something or somebody we put at the top,” Widmer explained, “There is always something that we assign the highest worth, and that is what we ‘worth-ship.’ So I ask, ‘What do you worth-ship? I can worship God, the true, the good, the beautiful. Or I can worth-ship money and bend everything into shape to go after the money.” This is not to say that profit is bad, he said. “I want profit, but only if I can do it in a Godly way.”
A WAY OF BEING
Alexandre Havard, who will speak January 25-27 at Legatus’ Summit 2024 in Dana Point, CA, espouses a similar view in his Virtuous Leadership System, which encourages leaders to achieve excellence by drawing out the greatness in themselves and others. Havard believes those in business are responsible to God for what they are doing and so can benefit from learning to make choices based on the heart, mind, and will working together. When leaders function this way, he said, they do so as fully integrated human beings, and excellence and virtue follow.
Virtuous Leadership focuses not on following a set of rules, but on a way of being.
“Rules are for children,” Havard said, “with no possibility of growth. There is a lot of self-righteousness in rules. People are happy with themselves because they obey the Ten Commandments, but they do not do well as human beings. Observing the rules doesn’t mean you are going to be an excellent human being and a saint.”
Rather than tell people how to behave, Havard said he tries to give them the capacity to make the right decisions before God.
“I help people develop the virtue of prudence, the mother of all virtues,” he said. “It is a virtue that helps you grasp the reality and make decisions that fit the reality.”
However, if someone makes a business decision only on the reality of facts without considering humanity, then he is not a real business professional. “Good business decisions may bring money, but that doesn’t mean they were good decisions,” Havard said. “To be a good business professional short-term doesn’t mean that you’re a good business professional long-term. Long-term has to do with the virtues.”
Havard, who has worked with CEOs, middle managers, the military, teachers, and others, said that when people change, they begin to see what must be done in their organizations. But he said they always must start with themselves. “When you become a better human being, virtue helps you understand what has to change after you change yourself,” he noted.
ON GENERAL PRINCIPLE
Retired Air Force Gen. Maryanne Miller, who also will speak at Summit 2024, used Havard’s Virtuous Leadership concepts with the 300-plus squadron commanders under her when she oversaw the Air Mobility Command at Scott Air Force Base.
“I would get our commanders together several times a year and talk about virtue. It became an eye-opener for everyone,” she said. “There’s so much power and strength in this that is different from what I’d ever seen or followed before.”
Miller said she was drawn to Virtuous Leadership by the goodness it imparts. “Virtue is doing good. People need good, and in my opinion there’s never enough of it in their lives.”
In presenting Virtuous Leadership concepts in a military environment, Miller said she was able to talk about virtue and goodness without mentioning God and yet, everybody knew she was talking about God. The principles she taught included the elements of a good decision, the courage to stay the course of good, and self-control. She also talked about temperaments, drawing from Havard’s book, From Temperament to Character.
“When you understand your temperament, you understand how virtue can keep the cap on the things that are not good and accelerate the good parts of your nature,” said Miller.
“It allows us to put a lid on and temper the things that are not so good about us.”
KNOW THYSELF
Miller said an executive can only strive for greatness by knowing himself or herself.
“When you understand who you truly are in the face of God, you are humble. For a powerful leader, a powerful CEO, or an executive to understand that they are dust, but created for greatness, that is amazing,” she explained. “That’s the equation to use the gifts God gave you to the maximum, to use the love of God in you to its maximum, using what God created for His purposes and His will to the maximum.”
The product or service an executive provides may be worth $1 billion, Miller said, but the material essence of that is irrelevant to God. “What’s relevant is your being and how you’re going to use your being to affect the world in a positive way and make those hard calls,” she said.
Widmer, who served in the Swiss Guard during the papacy of St. John Paul II, concurred, adding: “The first objective of work is not to make money, but to imitate God. What happens when we imitate God is we become more like Him. Work is an imitation of God and a part of our path to holiness. Work perfects the human person.”
Because “God saw that it was good” after He created, Widmer said, those who imitate Him in this way must continually ask whether the goods they create are truly good and whether the services they provide truly serve.
“Have this debate in the right circumstances with your team,” he advised. “How can we make our goods better? How can our services serve more?”
TWO LEADERSHIP VIRTUES: HUMILITY AND MAGNANIMITY
Alexandre Havard is on a mission to make the virtue of magnanimity known again.
“You don’t hear much about magnanimity,” he said, “but if you don’t speak about it, you don’t have the right direction for humility.”
In his Virtuous Leadership System, Havard teaches that true greatness is the result of the practice of magnanimity while service comes from practicing humility. Both are key to achieving excellence.
Saint Thomas Aquinas defines magnanimity as the “stretching forth of the soul to great things.” It complements humility in that the magnanimous person only pursues great things based on an honest assessment of his God-given gifts. Aquinas also called it the virtue of action.
Havard, who plans to talk about magnanimity at Summit 2024, said Christians have been educated in humility, yet often do not understand its real meaning.
“Magnanimity is a big part of humility,” he said. “That’s why Catholics have a serious problem with it and that’s why they very often don’t practice humility, but a false humility. All of us have had this problem.”
Conversely, when author Flannery O’Connor was asked why she wrote, her response was, “I write because I write well.”