Two speakers argue that corporations should embrace visionary idealism like historical leaders did. Business leaders are now more trusted than politicians or institutions, giving them unique power to shape culture and drive societal progress toward goals like world peace.
Chapters
If you think about our nation, which is complicated and complex and imperfect and struggling at all times throughout its history.
But for some reason, we cling on to this ideal that was laid down.
For us in the Declaration of Independence, that all men are created equal, that all people are created equal.
And you see a nation struggling and.
Striving to get there. Sometimes we take a few steps back.
But you see, you see us pushing. And so I think. I think we have a desperate need.
In our corporate world today to bring.
Idealism back into business.
We've seemed to have lost idealism from our political leaders. If you go back to Ronald Reagan or John F. Kennedy, I don't care what your politics are.
They both literally use the terms world peace, peace on earth in their inaugural addresses. To talk about world peace now sounds corny. It literally sounds cheesy to say those words. And if you think about it, all the great idealists, George Eastman, Carnegie, Rockefeller, Henry Ford, Thomas Edison, these folks had visions of the world that were naive and impossible, but damn it, they were going to die trying to build those worlds that they imagined.
And I think we need idealism back.
In our nation and idealism back in our country.
CEOs don't speak in idealized, visionary terms. Vision is just that. It's like, I can see it in my imagination. I have a dream is a vision. It's idealism.
And we are in a very magical.
Period in our nation right now, if not in the world where people. This is not a good statistic, but it is a statistic that people trust business leaders more than almost any other kind of leader. Like, we don't trust our politicians at all. We don't trust clergy as much. You know, we don't trust authority figures, police. You know, like, trust is so low in these traditionally highly respected and highly trusted industries.
But corporate America is unbelievably trusted right now, which means that corporate America can actually change the world. Which means if you model and you start speaking in idealized terms of the world that you imagine, and you commit your culture and you commit your business to. To be one of the things that will help advance towards that ideal vision. The ripples. The ripples inspire a nation, repair wounds.
