GUPTE: You’ve always emphasized “spiritual values” in your career. Isn’t it unusual to speak of the soul in the world of business? WICKER-MIURIN: It seems to be one of the politically incorrect topics to discuss in Western developed society. But it’s natural to me, because I believe in using all of our capabilities in whatever field we pursue. More and more in business, power doesn’t rest upon a centralized command structure. Managers need to care, connect with and lead others through their own humanity and strength. And many companies are beginning to highlight their values–there are pension funds with socially conscious investment policies, and firms like the Body Shop with socially conscious procurement procedures. There’s a fantastic program in the U.K. called Business in the Community that brings business leaders into disadvantaged neighborhoods to teach entrepreneurship.
What can business people learn from artists, and vice versa? Businesses today need people who can work in an interdisciplinary way to develop new products, solve problems and grow the business. Arts & Business, a Britain-based group, helps put businesses together with arts organizations to learn these skills. For example, one of Britain’s largest restaurant groups sends its wait staff to acting class to improve their responsiveness to customers. A major U.K. law firm has a poet in residence, to help remind lawyers of the beauty of words. Sainsbury’s, the grocery-store chain, has used actors to help its staff learn how to carefully probe suppliers about Y2K competence. On the other hand, if artists had better business skills, you might have opera houses that wouldn’t have to rely on subsidies from the government.
How can you encourage business people to think more creatively? It’s got to start with the way we educate our kids. In our schools–whether in the U.S. or in Europe–multidisciplinary educational studies are not encouraged. We shouldn’t force young people to develop only one side of their brains. Don’t track 11-year-old children into a science versus a language curriculum. Children should study all the disciplines, and develop their creative and intuitive sides as well as the logical and deductive dimensions. I’m not just talking about the arts. They also need to learn finance and money management. Eventually, they’ll need to provide for their retirement. Studies in the U.K. have shown that the major reason for low share ownership is a lack of understanding about how the stock market works. This creates a huge long-term problem for governments who need to fund huge pension liabilities.
Within the workplace, what can companies do to encourage flexible thinking? Allow workers to rotate jobs. Move them around the company so that they can experience different disciplines. Encourage work with community groups or arts organizations. These are all things a company could do to help employees build their skill sets. We need people who can connect lots of different ideas across a range of fields. That’s how new products are conceived, new plays are written and new inventions born. One of my small struggles is to fight against overspecialization. I miss the Renaissance people of the world.
As the new millennium approaches, what should international business leaders be thinking about? Jonas Salk had a wonderful quote. He said, “We have to learn to become better ancestors.” This means caring for the world we live in, and appreciating longer-term consequences of our actions, even on people far away. We also need to remember that we are human, and we do have an inner soul. As the world gets more complicated and anonymous, we can preserve our humanity by taking care of others as well as ourselves.
