Don't be trapped in dogma's, even not in management dogma's

A former student of mine mailed me the link to Steve Job's Stanford Commencement Speech 2005. And since coincidence does not exist, last week I participated in the Dalai Lama's teachings in France. It is striking how much great minds meet each other in the way they think, they believe and they operate.  Job's indeed summarized his speech saying certainly not to believe in dogma's, of any kind, and I add: also not in management dogma's.  And management dogma's we have.

Jobs asked to trust that the "dots" eventually will connect down the lane. As long as we love what we do, that is what keeps going, and that is what makes one realise great things. We should keep searching until we find. Imagine for a moment that this would be the last day of your life. Is what you are doing now, really what you would like to do on the last day of your life.  If not, change it.

Things have no meaning in themselves.  There is just a sequence of events, and it is our mind that gives precisely the meaning it wants to give to those events (a very free interpretation of the Dalai Lama's ideas, I admit). If you love what you do, you will give events that positive outcome that they deserve.

Turning a dogmatic management school curriculum into a stakeholder curriculum, sustainable, social, entrepreneurial, giving students the attitude of and focus on value creation, is most probably one of the challenges that most business schools are confronted with. To give some ideas to kick it off, I'd like to refer to an article of David Cooperrider "Sustainable Innovation".

Comments

[Emmanuelle M.]

Before answering the question "Do I love what I do?", I need to ask myself the question "Do I love what I do with the people I do it ?" as the human environment of my job does make the biggest difference. I am, like many people around me, sensitive to the pride I may (or may not) have in the organization I work for, more than to my day-to-day job. And hopefully the practical organization of my personal and family life will never compel me the take decisions I am not willing to take, and will never prevent me from taking actions that may seem hazardous and stupid in the first place.