Love as a Business Strategy

Milton Mayeroff in his philosophical book, "On Caring", defines love as "the selfless promotion of the growth of the other." When we help others grow and become their best selves, we are being loving and we grow. It is one of the most amazing counter-intuitive realities of this world; the more we give, the more we gain. I speak of this in the presentation that I've given at several industry events entitled "How Full Is Your Bucket?" We each carry an imaginary bucket and when that bucket is full of positive feelings, we operate in our zone, at our best and at peak performance. When our bucket gets emptied through the negative emotions of others, we cannot be or do our best. But the very best way to fill our own buckets back up is to consciously and conscientiously be filling the buckets of others.

So what does it mean to bring love into our professional lives and how does that create value? I like Sanders' definition: "Love is the act of intelligently and sensibly sharing your knowledge, networks and compassion with your business partners." When we are openly human with each other great things can happen. We can operate from the perspective of assuming positive intentions from each other and not creating drama skits of ulterior motives.

Some brilliant business minds have stated that the purpose of business is to make a profit or to maximize return to share holders. I could not disagree with that more. It leaves no room for the most powerfully motivating force on the planet: love. Love can propel you forward and give you a sense of meaning and satisfaction, which will help you do your best work and be your best you. The purpose of work is not to maximize profit. It is to come together to do good things, to help each other and bring about important and lasting changes to our society and our planet.