Attitudes and views from 2500 years of experience
for our stressful everyday business and working life

In the meantime, many individuals and small to medium-sized companies have started to cultivate the views and attitudes from 2500 years of experience in their everyday lives. However, many of them are uncertain if and how they should go public with them.
In this sense you will find three kinds of references in this section:

• a list of the industries and cities in which we from Radiance Consulting work with individuals and companies
  
• personal references / experiences of workshop participants
  
• experiences from the USA (there the subject "Business and value-oriented views of Buddhism"
  is much better known)

Experiences from the USA:
EXECUTIVE DECISION, vol.1, no.3 - May/June 2005:
Mind Over Matter - Moving Beyond Financial Perks to Motivate Employees
by Kathleen J. Kile

At the Kaplan Thaler Group, one of the fastest growing ad agencies in the U.S., more than 200 business people crammed into one of the company's meeting rooms in mid-town Manhattan to hear American Buddhist Geshe Michael Roach speak. He tossed out a radical proposition-corporate leaders can more successfully run a business using Buddhist strategies. Inherent in that proposition would be ways to motivate employees. Mixing Tibetan Buddhist principles and business seems contrary to the cutthroat nature of business. But surprisingly, some businesses are logging impressive sales gains and instinctively using some principles that Roach used to build his diamond company. Two include the Kaplan Thaler Group and Stew Leonard's, a $300 million family-owned grocery chain in the Northeast that has sales growth increases of 10 to 20 percent per year, an impressive feat in the supermarket business.

Roach, the author of The Diamond Cutter: The Buddha on Strategies for Managing Your Business and Your Life, graduated from Princeton University and was the first American to complete 20 years of rigorous study to earn the ancient degree of Geshe, master of Buddhist learning. While finishing his studies, he and Andin's founders launched the Andin International Diamond Corporation in 1981 with a $50,000 loan. Today Andin makes more than $100 million in sales and employs about 800 people. Financial perks are important but in the long-run, financial rewards alone fail, Roach maintains. "Employees will leave for the next highest bidder." At Andin, employees were paid a good salary, but it was slightly under the industry average, he says. Using Tibetan Buddhist principles, some of which can be found in Roach's book, he suggests four ways to motivate employees. He encourages employees to meditate or find some way to achieve inner stillness; to develop a hobby or outside interests; to engage in physical activities to maintain one's health-Roach suggests corporations bring in yoga instructors-and lastly, to help those less fortunate. "Being of service for the needy really makes a person happy and helps people with their mental health," Roach advises. "As a result, they'll be more productive." Robin Koval, chief marketing officer and general manager at the Thaler Group, says, "When The Diamond Cutter came out, it spoke to us and we were inherently using some of the principles to develop our business. It's important how we treat others. If you demoralize a person, it can deflate the creative process. In the advertising industry, creativity is everything. The Thaler Group launched in 1997, with one $35 million account, and it has become the secondfastest- growing ad agency in the country, according to Advertising Age, and the fastest in New York. A memorable ad campaign includes the Aflac duck, which hit the airwaves in 1999. In 2004, the company raked in over $600 million in billings.

"Of course money is important, but money alone should not be the end-all motivator," Koval says. The Thaler Group tries to find ways to promote employees not based on traditional hierarchal upward moves, but promotions that will complement their true natures. "You're not going to put a good actor at the head of Paramount Studios and so we try to find ways to develop a track that fits who they are," she adds. Moreover, Thaler encourages employees to speak up. "What may start out as a stupid comment can turn into something brilliant," Koval explains. They also enforce the notion that there is plenty of glory to go around, so no hoarding. These practices seem to run counter to corporate America traditions where stars are rewarded, knowledge is rarely shared and people are hired based on one-size-fits-all interviewing techniques. Don Zinn, CEO and president of Execuserve Corp. in Tarrytown, N.Y., who has developed a psychological testing tool for hiring sales people, says that motivation comes down to hiring the right person for the position. "In order for employees to be successful in their jobs they need to be passionate and engaged," Zinn says. "A recent poll concluded that 75 percent of U.S. workers are not engaged." Companies hire based on a person's resume and that person may not fit into the organization, continues Zinn, who has spent years developing a process that arms interviewers with questions and techniques that will uncover a candidate's true nature. For instance, a company that needs people to bring in new business will not have the same personality traits as a national account manager, he explains. "A hunter can't be overly sensitive, whereas an account manager needs to tune into people and can be sensitive."

Stew Leonard, Jr., CEO and president of Stew Leonard's supermarket chain, says hiring the right person is indeed the most important step in motivating employees. "We spend a lot of time on the hiring process because you're never going to motivate someone unless it's a correct fit Managers need to watch new employees to see how they fit in their position. For instance, the supermarket hired someone to work in the bakery, a mostly solitary job. "This guy was always complaining, but then one day he went out on the floor with a tray of cookies and was talking to customers and singing in the aisle. We switched him from the bakery and now he's the number one demo guy and he's an important factor when we want to boost sales," Leonard says.For the fourth year in a row, Stew Leonard's made Fortune's list of the 100 Best Companies to Work For. It ranked number 29, impressive for supermarkets, which are usually plagued with high turnover. Each year, Leonard gives out the "Sweaty Palm Award" to employees who have taken risks. "Money is important, but it's not the secret of motivating people. You want to motivate people to take that next scary step."