BUSINESS AND THE BUDDHA: Doing Well By Doing Good

When it comes to business, everyone wants to do well. But can we do good at the same time? Lloyd Field (and, indeed the Dalai Lama, who provides the foreword here) says 'Yes'. Field's book lays out the guidelines for putting ideas about individual and corporate social responsibility into practice without sacrificing the bottom line. The Enron days are over: no longer can business-big or small-focus solely on profit. Increasingly, our assessment of a business's worth must take into account its consideration of our shared human values. That doesn't mean a business can't or shouldn't compete; it means that investing in efforts to build a better society can be, on many levels, an asset. Drawing in a substantial and sophisticated way on traditional Buddhist teachings, Lloyd Field shows how, with attention to ethics, skillful means, and responsibility, decision-makers and entrepreneurs can achieve new levels of happiness and security both inside and outside the company, and take a power-position as a force for positive global change.