What motivations inspire today’s generation of entrepreneurs and business leaders who shape the world of tomorrow? Many believe their organizations provide not just economic value but also social value in meeting the human needs for goods, services, jobs, fulfilment and economic well-being. In Great Company Michael Smith argues that, far from the ends justifying the means, the means actually determine the ends. Dishonest and acquisitive means in the events that led up to the crash of 2008 led to disastrous outcome. Those who are driven solely by acquisition are the disrupters and destroyers. Those who are motivated by a sense of contribution are the buildings towards the common good. Smith tells a wide range of stories, including those drawn from the Initiatives of Change centres in Caux, Switzerland, and Panchgani, India.
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"In Great Company, Mike Smith shares profound insights into the DNA of good business, in every sense. His easy, narrative style makes these insights both accessible and persuasive. A thoroughly recommended read for all those who care about a better business ethos."
Professor Roger Steare FRSA, Corporate Philosopher, Cass Business School, London
"Michael Smith and Initiatives of Change have been pursuing an urgent conversation on the new leadership for longer than most companies have realized that they needed it. He's clear-eyed about the scale and complexity of the challenge and impervious to the truisms, jargon and clichés with which most solutions are proposed. If you want to understand where leadership in the business world is going, you could ask for no better global guide."
Margaret Heffernan, Texan entrepreneur, Huffington Post blogger and best-selling business author of 'Wilful Blindness' and 'A Bigger Prize'
"The role of the corporation, and the harmony of its existence with community and society, has come into sharp focus in management thought and practice. Michael Smith has tackled a key subject of the future—very credibly and creditably."
R Copalakrishnan, Director, Tata Sons Limited, India
"To echo Michael Porter of Harvard Business School, 'We need a more sophisticated form of capitalism, one embedded with a social purpose. Not out of charity, but out of a deeper understanding of competition and economic value creation.' The Trust and Integrity conferences in Caux have addressed this challenge for many years. In Great Company, Mike Smith shares stories and reflections on this important theme in his eye-opening book."
Goran Carstedt, board member of IKEA, 1990 - 1997, and Chairman of Natural Step International
"Every time I work with Mike Smith and Initiatives of Change I come away strengthened in my belief that business can and must be a force for good. People forget that inside every CEO there is a human being trying to climb out. As this book testifies, Mike has a rare skill in providing CEOs with ladders and platforms!"
Mark Coyder, Founder-Director, Tomorrow's Company and author of 'Living Tomorrow's Company—Rediscovering the Human Purposes of Business'
"A resilient, sustainable and successful business is build on trust and integrity, amongst all stakeholders on the inside and between them and those on the outside. This is hard work and often comes face to face with adversity and tough decisions. In the end, however, society will respect and uphold those who work with the interest of the common good in mind. Great Company succeeds in bringing this message home through the interplay of the Initiatives of Change dialogues at Caux with the stories of women and men who chose for
trust and integrity over compromise, irrespective of the cost. The value of values is indeed both precious and priceless.
Arnold Smit, Director of the Centre for Business in Society at Stellenbosch Business School, South Africa
"Michael's book is packed with real examples of real people in the real world changing the way that their own business and communities are making real and positive social impact across the whole globe. This is a quite wonderful book. It is written with a gentle humility. It contains real inspiration— I would sincerely recommend that you read Mike's book."
Philip Birch, author of 'Ethiconomics—principles and practices of ethical business for the 21st century', writing in www, the3 rdimagazine, co.uk
"Smith's new book Great Company... updates that 80 richest people own more wealth than what is owned by one half of the human race and very soon just one percent of people will own wealth which equals what the 99 percent rest of us would have. Could the collective wisdom of business, governments, regulators, investors, leaders and people of all types bring about better distributive justice?"
Anant Nadkarni, The Times of India, 2 June 2015
"[The book] is aimed squarely at convincing... 'a generation of young entrepreneurs... to put into practice the highest moral and ethical standards' in their lives. Or to state it another way, 'to encourage the emergence of an equitable society and humane world'. In this narrow sense the book comes close to being a sustained assault on materialism, the profit motive and the 'me, more, now' culture of today's developed world. The result is a sometimes uncomfortable, if challenging, read.
Robin Knight, founder KnightWrite Ltd, and former Senior European Editor, US News and World Report
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