How
do businessmen define business success or how do workers define success at work?
Nine times out of ten a businessman or worker will tell you that success is
related to the amount of money you make and the portfolio of investments that
you have built.
Financial
prosperity may be the main objective of businessmen or workers but money cannot
be considered as the only criteria to judge success. Financial
prosperity without due consideration to moral and ethical issues leads to
amassing of illicit wealth which in extreme cases even results in killing others
to facilitate the fulfilment of one’s blind quest for wealth.
At
work or in business there are many other ethical considerations that need to be
pondered upon to judge success. If money is allowed to be the guiding factor to
judge success this would make all wealthy people very successful including
people who have amassed massive wealth after exploiting their fellow human
beings, or those who have amassed wealth through corrupt means or those who have
enriched themselves by stealing or those who have enriched themselves by not
repaying back loans given to them.
Only
yesterday I read about the business investments of one former President in a
neighbouring country. His investments, related to existing companies, are so
many that one would wonder if he was a businessmen or the President of a
country. Sadly in some African countries leaders consider their election or
appointment into office as a passport to amassing wealth. When seeing the list
of companies this former President was or still is involved in, one would
question his integrity. Again why would private companies want to have the
President involved in their affairs – obviously to obtain some form of undue
favours. This ex-President is considered extremely wealthy today but can one
consider him successful? No, because he failed to perform the task he was
entrusted to and more so because he was seen to divert attention to his personal
needs rather than the needs of the people and the economic woes of the country
he ruled.
Business
success emphasises contribution to society and spiritual fulfilment.
When traditional measures of business success – net profit, shareholder
return, market share, industry power, and so on – are subordinate to these
higher priorities, wealth can be generated while naturally promoting well-being
rather than harm. Wealth can be generated through service rather than greed and
businesses can be run with an uplifted spirit rather than unscrupulous
competition.
If
we look to the worldly definitions of success and pursue wealth and desires by
themselves we would be web locked in the cycle of greed, corruption and
disparity of wealth that are so prevalent in our world today. However, if we
allow religious wisdom to dictate our lives this would encourage us to foster
business success that produces harmony, wealth, satisfaction, and spiritual
fulfilment. This would also give us the peace of mind that remains evasive to
many for the simple reason that they allow wealth to dictate their life style or
allow money to dictate their way of business.
In
Tanzania we have some individuals who have been calling for indigenous ownership
of sensitive businesses but they do not realise that business success cannot
come through creating artificial classes in society. As said by President Mkapa
in his monthly address to the nation last week, true business success relates to
its direct contribution to the Gross National Product. He said that people
should not be delving on indigenous ownership; rather they should consider
building a patriotic national economy. Allowing incapable people to run
institutions that require special skills would backfire on the country at large
and take us back to the days when parastatals and cooperative societies run by
indigenous manpower were large business failures despite being continuously
supported with money from the central bank.
Rather than seeking protection through indigenization, business success to aspiring Tanzanians would be to take up the challenge to raise their management and technical skills to a level where they can power their way to run sensitive businesses without being provided any unfair protective buffers.