A Conscious Business has a deeper purpose beyond only making profits. Just like individual people, by following their hearts, can discover their own sense of deeper purpose, so can the business enterprise.
John Mackey
Bentley College Commencement 2008, 2008
इस उद्धरण के पीछे की कहानी
In the final section of his address, Mackey laid out his vision for what he called 'Conscious Business'—a new model for 21st-century capitalism. He argued that while capitalism had decisively won the ideological battle with socialism, it had failed to capture people's hearts. Most people saw corporations as uncaring, greedy, and concerned only with maximizing profits. Mackey proposed two defining attributes of a Conscious Business: a deeper purpose beyond profit, and an understanding of the interdependency of all stakeholders—customers, employees, investors, suppliers, communities, and the environment. He pointed to Apple, Google, and Muhammad Yunus's Grameen Bank as examples, and challenged the Bentley graduates to become the founders and leaders of such businesses. This speech helped popularize ideas that Mackey would later develop in his book 'Conscious Capitalism.'