Corporate Culture and Spirituality

Trust is the breath of business, Ethics it's limbs, To Uplift the Spirit it's Goal.
- His Holiness Sri Sri Ravi Shankar, the Founder of the Art of Living Foundation and International Association for Human Values

Ethics in Business – Corporate Culture & Spirituality Symposium

Through the Symposium on Ethics in Business – Corporate Culture & Spirituality (CCS), the International Association for Human Values (IAHV) brings together business, academic and spiritual leaders to initiate a dialogue on new leadership styles that are sustainable and ensure profitability for businesses.

It provides a platform for leading minds to share their experiences and expertise on the value of an ethics-based approach to deal with today’s challenges in the global markets. It also examines the impact of this approach on the bottom line.

The CCS 2007 will be the fourth Symposium on Ethics in Business – Corporate Culture & Spirituality, and the second to be held in Europe. It is part of the International Business & Leadership Symposium and takes places in the European Parliament, Brussels.

Corruption can happen only beyond one's sense of belonging. If the sense of belonging is expanded, the natural tendency is to be uncorrupt. The tendency for corruption will go down drastically. A sense of sacrifice is what you want. - Sri Sri

The Symposium addresses:

• New leadership and stress management styles
• Culture and leadership of successful organizations
• General perceptions of business & ethics
• New ways towards innovation
• Secrets of successful global leaders
• Global issues such as terrorism, corruption and poverty
• Business opportunities between Europe and India

The 1st CSS World YOUTH Forum 2007 will be held at the same time, and poses a unique opportunity for young professionals worldwide.

 

For further information please visit the official website for the symposium: www.ccs2007.eu

...Isn't it then so that companies exist for making money and that it leads to greed rather than compassion?
- A company can make profit and still attend to human values. It is rather so that if they don't attend to human values they will not be sustainable successful, look at Enron, he says and refers to the scandal reputed American company whose rise and fall made big headlines in the papers. What is then the meaning of the business world? - To create abundance and happiness. - Sri Sri responding to a Swedish journalist from "Dagens Nyheter" in Stockholm

Ethics in Business – World YOUTH Forum 2007

The 1st CCS World YOUTH Forum is an extraordinary opportunity for 50 selected Young Professionals and Students in the age of 18 – 35 years. You can be one of them!

The Ethics in Business – CCS World YOUTH Forum 2007 is part of the Symposium on Ethics in Business – Corporate Culture & Spirituality (CCS) of the International Business & Leadership Symposium in the European Parliament,
Brussels, 1st – 4th December 2007.

It’s an initiative of the International Association for Human Values to create a platform for the Youth to send their message to the Decision takers of today‘s Global Economic and Political World and to the community at large.

The Pillars

• Identify and discuss urgent challenges and its possible solutions in the political and economical systems of today‘s world.
• Develop and strenghten the skills and capacities of the participants to take strong leadership in the World through the Workshop A New Dimension to Leadership.
• Learning from Leaders – interactive Sessions with Top-Leaders.
• Discuss the views of the Youth on the issue of Ethics, Human Values and Spirituality in the Business World with Top-Leaders of the World during the Session A Call of the Youth in the Symposium on Ethics in Business – Corporate Culture & Spirituality, in the European Parliament, 3rd December 2007.
  

The Youth are the Trustees of the World!

For further information please visit the official website for the symposium: www.ccs2007.eu

Sri Sri Ravi Shankar's message sounds simple, but also many times far away from what the world look like today. He speaks about the necessity of friendliness and compassion. That stress is dangerous, it opens for conflicts. - Many leaders make decisions under stress, without being open for negotiations. The one who is free from stress has more energy to use the intellect. To reduce the stress level you can either reduce the pace or increase the energy level, he means. The latter is, among other things, done through breathing techniques. - From Sri Sri's visit to Stockholm in the Swedish paper "Dagens Nyheter"

Achieving Personal Excellence - The APEX Workshop

The APEX Course is designed for business professionals by business professionals. It is a simple, practical, and effective training program that empowers managers and employees, and promotes calmness and focus in the midst of any challenge or responsibility. The APEX Course is based on an innovative breathing technology that permanently reduces stress and heightens mental clarity and awareness. These simple yet powerful techniques improve concentration, enhance creativity, increase efficiency, and build a greater sense of purpose and teamwork. The APEX Course effectively unleashes the potential for superior performance.

This course differs from most management- and employee-development programs because it is not based on quick-fix solutions, theoretical concepts, or superficial success formulas, but rather on practical techniques that offer direct and tangible results.

The APEX Course has been developed for businesses to facilitate change from within each employee and manager. The course also incorporates basic principles of effective living, emphasizing the essential human values that help professionals lead more fulfilling and productive lives. Participants report that they experience improved focus and concentration, enhanced creativity, and higher levels of energy throughout the day. Please read more details on the APEX Program for Business and Organizations in the Course section.

Balance can be achieved without lowering goals or lessening achievements — it is about managing stress and managing ourselves.

 

When a person has a goal, a commitment to a higher cause in life, it brings a shift from gaining to giving. In society, if everyone keeps thinking, ‘What can I gain?’ rather than ‘What can I contribute?’ or ‘How can I be useful to the people around me?’, then corruption cannot be rooted out. In society, we need to have this shift in our attitude, from ‘What can I gain?’ to ‘What can I contribute?’
- Sri Sri

Combating Corruption

From a talk by His Holiness Sri Sri Ravi Shankar

The big C of corruption can be countered by five more Cs! The first, I would say, is the sense of Connectedness. A lack of connectedness or sense of belongingness breeds corruption in society. That is why, often, you see people looking for connections, in order to avoid corruption! A sense of belongingness among people, among the community, can root out corruption. That is why corruption is lowest at the village level; but when it comes to urban areas, cities, it’s much more because there is no community sense there — no belongingness.

The second C is Courage. A lack of self-esteem or confidence in one’s own ability is one of the causes of corruption. It is fear, or insecurity in a person that makes one become more corrupt. He then tries to find his security only through money, which doesn’t really happen.

The more money he acquires, the insecurity doesn’t disappear. In fact, he becomes more afraid and more fearful because the money is not earned in a right manner. So the second C that we will have to focus on is to create that courage in a person — courage and confidence in one’s ability and in the laws of nature.

Third is an understanding of Cosmology — looking at one’s own life in the context of extended space and time. Just take a look at our own life. How long is it? Only 80-100 years! See life in the context of the huge dimension of time. Billions of years have passed since the creation. Our creation, as scientists say, is 50 billion years old. And everything in this creation is recycled. The air we breathe is old, every cell in our body, every atom is old, the oxygen and hydrogen is old!

And this will continue. Seeing life from a different perspective of space and time is what will deepen one’s vision about one’s life. Being corrupt, one amasses a lot of money and puts it in the bank. One can’t spend all that money and then one dies. One’s children inherit the property and then they fight over the inheritance! Seeing life in the context of this huge universe and unfathomable time can broaden one’s vision, can broaden one’s mind and can enrich one’s heart.

The fourth C, I would say, is Care and Compassion. Care and compassion in society can bring dedication. It is the lack of dedication that causes corruption. The Kumbha Mela in India was attended by a total of 30 million people — nearly 3 million people each day, and there was not a single incidence of violence, theft or robbery!

One night, we were distributing blankets to the poor as it was very cold and I came across a youth, who refused to take a blanket, saying that probably someone else there needed it more! That sense of care and compassion: ‘It doesn’t matter even if I don’t have, somebody needs this more. We have to care for them’. That care and compassion can root out corruption.

The last one I would like to emphasise is a sense of Commitment — commitment to contribution. When a person has a goal, a commitment to a higher cause in life, it brings a shift from gaining to giving. In society, if everyone keeps thinking, ‘What can I gain?’ rather than ‘What can I contribute?’ or ‘How can I be useful to the people around me?’, then corruption cannot be rooted out. In society, we need to have this shift in our attitude, from ‘What can I gain?’ to ‘What can I contribute?’

But all this cannot be possible without individual upliftment. Spiritual upliftment. A sense of belongingness with the whole world. Today the globe has become a village. We have globalised everything other than wisdom. And that is one of the causes of terrorism and unrest in the world today. We accept food from every part of the world, we accept music from every part of the world, but when it comes to wisdom, people seem to shy away.

If every child in the world learns a little bit about all cultures, a little bit about all values, the whole scenario will be different. Then one will not think, ‘Only I will go to heaven. Everyone else will go to hell’. This wrong education or lack of education has caused so many problems in the world. A sense of belongingness with the whole world — it doesn’t matter what colour or race you are — is that shared value that we are talking about today.

Even if one pocket in the world remains ignorant of these shared values, common values, the world will not be a safe place. So we need to address these issues with a lot of patience. It is not a job that we can do overnight, but through education and creating that sense of community, through inspiration and example.

Make a subtle distinction between spirituality and religion. Religion is like the banana skin and spirituality is the banana. Spirituality or the common values are the same, in every religion. The differences are only on the surface. and they are good! It’s good to have differences. Nurture the differences and at the same time enliven spiritual values. Then we all get together and make a change. Make a better society.