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Eat good food. Work soft. Play hard. |
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Volleyball is cool. |
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Organic extra-virgin olive oil is
even better. |
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Entertain friends often, with good conversation and music. |
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Free your mind. Stay connected. (And
may the force be with you!) |
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If you're not connected, get connected. |
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If you can't get connected, try updating
or just relax as it is. |
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Who wants to work for a big, faceless corporation? |
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Greece is quite possibly the centre
of civilization - or was that so? |
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The Mani is
quite possibly the centre of the universe ;-) |
…………………………………………………………………………………………………………
Comment on ethics by Fritz Bläuel, CEO of Bläuel Greek Organic
Products:
18.10.2009
So much for the fun aspect. (The above above fun-lines were written almost
a decade ago when we redesigned our web-site)
And right: ethics without a smile can be smothering.
But on the other hand, in society at large we have had some decades now
of attempting to get rid of this smothering quality of everything that
faintly resembled ethics and saw, that this approach also has its downside.
I mean the irony and cynicism that started to develop in the 80ies and
slowly took over during the 90ies, when relativism ruled out all rules
except the one that relativism rules - and that left us with a feeling
of stale emptiness. Me at least.
So I think it is time to reconsider ethics in a new light.
We have to go beyond the old meaning of the term, which was all about keeping
the ruling (economical system, church, class, political leaders, what have
you) in place. I mean ethics on the most basic level. Rescuing the baby
that was thrown out with the bathwater of relativism/cynicism.
One way I see a new ethics emerging is in a sort of camouflaged way behind
the term "sustainability".
What is sustainable business if not ethical behavior toward your business
partners.
What is sustainable environmentalism if not an ethical approach towards
all creatures around us.
What is sustainable social engagement if not felt and lived ethics in the
social network our business is embedded in plus the the social network
it embeds (our staff, co-workers and free-lancers).
What is the sustainable way of handling the energy/CO2 challenge if not
ethical behavior toward the coming generations on this planet.
But the return of the once tabooed term does not need to be in camouflage
and we could be straightforward about it.
I think ethics is "IT". It is what it's all about today. It is
what we should focus on.
I am serious, how about focussing on ethics instead of on old beliefs like "the
turnover has to grow" and "profits have to sky-rocket" or “if
there is no expansion everything falls apart” and other boring stuff
like that which was considered "written in stone"-kind of laws
of the business universe.
Now, since the ethics-conundrum seems to lie at the core of the problems
of our world today - e.g. see the greed-flue among top professionals that
had co-caused the financial crash of the last year. No no, I will not get
into lamenting about shortcomings like that - but my point is: I think
it can be healed and the recipe is easy and even the application of the
recipe is easy. And even though it obviously seems hopeless at times, especially
after watching the news on TV, we can do the little steps required - each
of us and one at a time.
Just being aware of our awareness of the ethical challenge.
And being aware of others who are aware of the same.
This is my ethical commitment on a personal, professional and global level.
Be well and please don't forget about the fun part of the story,
Fritz Bläuel |
