The Responsible Free Market Economy -- The Leader's Way, Chapter 9

Socialism and Capitalism

Socialism is a great concept. Conceptual, it should bring benefits to all and eliminate poverty. But in practice, power in socialistic society tends to be in the hand of a group of few people. Most people work very hard, but gain very little. Lacking motivation, socialistic economy tends to be stagnant. Although socialism focuses on the distribution of wealth, there is no wealth to distribute.

Capitalism, on the other hand, promotes competition in a free market. Freedom breeds competition. Free and fair competition leads to creation and wealth. Capitalism focuses on creation of wealth, not the distribution of wealth. Therefore, rich people become richer, while the poor remains poor.

Entrepreneurship and Poverty -- The Leader's Way, Chapter 8

"Poverty is a problem of the mind, not the lack of resources or the lack of intelligence of the people."

In order to improve poverty,

• Government must be motivated to help.
• Economy system must be a responsible one.
• Regulation must stimulate entrepreneurship
• Fair banking, property right, and family planning must be in place.

Poverty usually congregates around the poor. These people need to spend less, leading to stagnant economy and more unemployment. The government
needs to promote entrepreneurship among the poor. This will alleviate poverty
and increase liquidity.

The Challenge of Globalization -- The Leader's Way, Chapter 7

Globalization business model

Globalization has led the business through 3 following stages

1. Import/Export: Focus on trading on raw material and production
2. Satellites: All the branches take the commands from the headquarter. Build branches on several countries to
• Avoid importing/exporting raw material
• Understand local people better
• Avoid import/export regulation
3. Globally integrated: This stage is similar to the satellite model. The difference is that the business initiative can come from any country (not just the headquarter country).

Doing Business Right -- The Leader's Way, Chapter 6

Doing business right means doing business with warm hearts--meaning thinking of others' feeling. Although profit is essential, money can't buy happiness. Companies which do business right will attract consumers, investors, and employees. After all, people want to be a part of something they can be proud of.

Negative Factors

The following are negative factors which contribute to corporate bad reputation:

• Leaders without humility (Flashy leaders tend to be self-interest and lead the company into great risks).
• Creative or fraudulent accounting
• Increasing disparity in compensation
• Exploited practices
• Marketing of harmful product
• Human right and environment violation
• Countries without good governance

Creating Profit, Jobsor Happiness? -- The Leader's Way, Chapter 5

An organization is the place where people congregate. These people need common purposes and spontaneous leader.

"Any organization is both more and less than the sum of its members. It is less because the members of the group devote only a part of their time to the organization, and much more because the organization as a whole can accomplish tasks the individual members cannot succeed in carrying out on their own.''

A Living Entity

We can consider business as a living entity. If food is essential to life, profit is essential to business. Business can be motivated. It can thrives, withers, and renews itself. It can act responsibly or irresponsibly.

As people should not live to eat, business should not live to make profit only. Making less profit is similar to having less food to eat. But that's not necessarily a bad thing. Business has three important purposes: 1) Create profit, 2) serve the customers, 3) act responsibly.

The Leader’s Purpose -- The Leader's Way, Chapter 4

A leader needs to have wisdom (right view) and faith (support from followers). He must establish clear purposes for the company, and set the value that should be observed by all. He should act as an example to convince his follows to follow the principles.

Leaders' Roles
The leader's responsibilities include

• Set the values and purposes of the organization,
• Create faith, attract competent people, and encourage them to put great effort into the organization,
• Provide communication systems for people inside the organization, and
• Plan, organize, set priority, and make decisions.

A good leader should have technical knowledge and skill, determination, endeavor, and courage. The leader should understand the problem and know the solution. He or she should understand the organization and its people, culture and characteristics.

Doing the Right Thing -- The Leader's Way, Chapter 2

"A leader will only be respected, when he acts according to the principles in which he said he believes."

Leaders and Their Roles


If the leader does not follow the principles, his followers will not follow the principles, but will follow the leaders’ whimsical will.

The roles of leaders include making decision and taking actions for the organization and people working for them. Leader should practice right conduct, which is achieved when acting according to right view.

 "If the leader listens to you, it makes you feel valued and important."

Right conduct is an offspring of two following concepts: Right intention and wholesome actions.

Training the Mind -- The Leader's Way, Chapter 3

Why do we want to train our mind?

The purpose of training your mind is to

1. Be clam, collected, and concentrated all the time (especially when making decision).
2. Enable the mind to analyze things quickly.

Training your mind to the perfection is too difficult. So you should aim at steady progress.

Taking The Right View -- The Leader's Way, Chapter 1

"Right view relates to the intention behind the decision. Right conduct refers to the quality of actions."

Right View

Right view is based on three following facts:

1. Having right intention
2. Understanding cause-effect law
3. Having right state of mind

Having right intention is to think about self and others: not self, not other, but both self and others.

[BookReview] THE Leader's Way: Business, Buddhism and happiness in an interconnected world by His Holyiness The Dalai Lama and Laurens Van Den Muyzenberg

At first glace, business and religion seem to live in different world. But, in fact, both share the common purpose. They both seek happiness.  

The main idea of this book is to apply right view and right conduct to the free market world. The book consists of three parts. Part one focuses on a personal level. It presents the meaning of right view and right conduct that a leader should have, and instructs how one can train his/her mind in busy daily life. Part two moves on to what role leaders should play in an organization. Finally, Part three discusses the right role of the organization in our society.