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FIX CAPITALISM.
FIX THE AMERICAN DREAM.

Moving from "maximize profit" to optimize profit and the common good

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Enlightened Bottom Line

You’re wrestling with a problem. I know. No sense trying to deny or hide it.

 

How do I know? Because it’s the same problem I’m wrestling with.

 

In fact, it’s the same problem a clear and growing majority of us business leaders and owners across the country are wrestling with.

 

Phrased as a question, the problem could read something like, “What can I do so that my company better reflects me and my values?” Or, perhaps, “How do I structure my company to provide both profitability and a meaningful life?” Maybe more pointedly, “How do I run my company to be about more than just making money?” 

 

Don’t misunderstand! Everyone knows we’ve got to make profit at the end of the day, but at what price for that profit? How much sacrifice for that profit? To what amount of collateral damage for that profit?


We’ve Got a Solution

Welcome to the growing world of enlightened business ownership and leadership, where we’re working to solve this problem. You’ll recognize this world pretty quickly; it’s where old school “maximizing profit” is no longer the single guiding light or even holds a shine.

 

If you already live in this world, then what I’m about to offer you is another excellent tool in your growing toolbox. If you’re new to this world, welcome! What I’m about to offer you is an excellent door to enter through and receive a practical orientation.


Image Credit: Jenna Nicholas  


First, a super quick introduction to Jenna Nicholas, who earned her BA and MBA from Stanford. Among other credentials, Jenna is an angel investor, entrepreneur, and the president of LightPost Capital, the investment and acquisition firm she founded. Equally important, Jenna is actively engaged in her spiritual journey, which informs her business and investing activities. You can read more about Jenna here.

 

Jenna’s new book is Enlightened Bottom Line: Exploring the Intersection of Spirituality, Business and Investing (“Enlightened”). Before we move on, take a second to think about this subtitle. That’s right, your spirituality and your business are supposed to be connected. Disconnecting spirituality from business is how we all acquired our problem in the first place.

 

Enlightened opens with the opportunity to reflect on the ethics and values that matter to you, together with efficient guidance on that process. Just you reflecting on stuff you already own. It’s not hard, just too many of us are out of practice. Reflection may sound fluffy to the uninitiated, but that’s how you access the stuff that’s literally in your head and driving your business, so you need clarity about it.

 

With that clarity in focus, Enlightened moves us toward removing old paradigms that are our limitations and creating new paradigms that will better serve us. We hear about mindset change all the time. The nice thing about Enlightened is that it’s an insightful and efficient tool for mindset shifting.

 

Next, Enlightened helps you navigate to the core spiritual qualities relevant to your work or business. From these reflections and explorations that lead to reframing, you’re equipped to thoughtfully dive into Jenna’s framework of HEAL.

 

Hope – Empathy – Abundance – Legacy (HEAL) aren’t likely top-of-mind words in any business training you’ve had before, but they are now. Jenna provides this framework to help you – all of us – solve the problem of making our companies more than just places to make money. What's particularly encouraging about the way Jenna presents and connects these four pillars is that she does so from current experiences and examples. Nothing about HEAL is rainbows and unicorns. It’s solid, nuts and bolts guidance to help solve that problem we’re all wrestling with.

 

Image Credit: Jenna Nicholas


What’s Yours To Do?

Here’s your easy game plan:

  • Preorder Enlightened Bottom Line here.

  • Read it soon after it arrives; don’t just bury it in your reading stack.

  • Start immediately applying the guidance Jenna provides.

 

On the other hand, you could ignore the easy game plan I just laid out for you. But you do so at your continued peril of not running a business that reflects you and your values, of denying yourself and those in your business meaningful lives, and of not leaving a powerful legacy.

 

So it doesn’t make sense to ignore your easy game plan. After the first run of applying the guidance Jenna provides, you do it again, and again, and you continue until you’re confident the current problem is solved because your business is restructured such that it’s a vehicle for providing both profitability and a meaningful life.

 

As America trends toward a better capitalism and individuals are drawn to enlightened business ownership and leadership, we collectively need the tools to design and execute our transitions toward our better future. This need is driving the emergence of effective tools to help create and navigate these transitions well. We welcome Enlightened Bottom Line to the toolbox, and congratulate Jenna on a job well done.

 

Your call to action? Get Jenna’s book and start implementing your easy game plan. No reason to delay.

 

[Editor’s note: This review is a voluntary assessment after reading an advance copy of Enlightened Bottom Line for the benefit of our growing Better Capitalism community and beyond. Nothing of value was or will be exchanged for this review.]


Fix Capitalism. Fix the American Dream.


Our vision is to benefit society by transforming capitalism's current core ethic of 'maximize shareholder value' to the better core ethic of 'optimize mutual value.' We achieve our vision by impacting learning, opinion, beliefs, and policy. Institute for Better Capitalism, Inc.




"This book merits close, sustained attention as a compelling move beyond both careless thinking and easy ideology."—Walter Brueggemann, Columbia Theological Seminary


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