Getting to the soul of service
This weekend a friend sent me a link to a Harvard Business Review video by Ikujiro Nonaka and Hirotaka Eustachian. In “The Big Idea: The Wise Leader” they put forward the philosophy of ‘idealist pragmatism’….making profit and serving the common good are not mutually exclusive. You can have both. Eg. Tata in India…..he saw Indian couples (and even families) on motor bikes getting wet in the rain, he set out to develop a $2,500 us car.
Yesterday, I met Colin Ferreira for the first time. He is the owner of Ferreira’s Optical. Colin is a wise leader. He has managed to do something that’s very rare. He’s brought his personal values to work with him. So while he has successfully managed to get his executive and team to embrace “service” as their competitive advantage; he has also gotten them to embrace the Proverbs he lives by, like: ” The righteous man walks with integrity, his children are blessed after him.’ And just in case you think he is some kind of nut case, his proverbs come with a healthy measure of pragmatism. And he has a 23% market share to prove it as he adds two stores to his five existing, in a recession.
The Business Development Company and Republic Bank who presented Colin, outdid themselves yesterday when they invited SME’s to “Choose to be Great instead of Big.” I have not spent a better $450tt for a very long time. (Albert Chow is making a huge impact on the BDC and I’m so proud of him, always knew he was a class act) Also telling their stories”, apart from Colin, were David Lewis, The Viscuna Brothers, Allison Magalhaes and feature speaker, Editor at Large at Inc. Magazine, Bo Burlingham. Each presenter was exceptional.
India has Ratan N Tata. Trinidad and Tobago has Colin Ferreira.
*The presentations will be posted on the BDC’s website in a few days: www.bdc.co.tt
