Hi, I'm Sam. I like to help people with money, web 2.0, and social justice awareness. I have a dream of using the social media space to help people in both little ways (wheelchair ramps down the road) and big ways (ending human trafficking). Here you can read, watch, and listen to my thoughts on all three.
So I picked up Love is the Killer App by Tim Sanders today and am about 50 pages in. I’m having an experience similar to when I started reading Keith Ferrazzi’s recent Who’s Got Your Back. For me, the effort to “humanize” business, along the lines of Sanders and Ferrazzi, seems like common sense. More than that, it seems like a realignment of real life and a repeat of history.
Global business quickly went from being huge, impersonal, and profit-driven to a relatively small community with the advent of the internet and social media. Businesses can rarely, if ever, make decisions that are quietly suffered by their customers. That can be the restaurant around the corner, or it can be a huge corporation (just look at Gamestop’s recent press).
With my own business, I find that, despite the massive technology pulling at us everyday, people still want to be able to sit down and talk. They want to know that someone cares about them, that someone wants what’s best for them, and that this person does, in fact, know what he or she is talking about.
Don’t get me wrong here — I am not saying I don’t need a book like Love or that I know everything. Far from it. But I can’t understand how things like being compassionate with others, treating people with respect, and giving without expectation of receiving are novel concepts to people in the business world. Maybe it’s growing up in the deep South, where hospitality is not optional, or maybe it’s being a part of this social media generation. Either way, I think these concepts of reciprocity and love, which may have been hidden under the search for profit for a few decades, are quickly resurfacing as keys to success in today’s difficult economy.
I’ll throw in a parallel no one is expecting here that will show you my roots. John Sommerville, who used to be a professor at my alma mater (Go Gators!) wrote a book a few years ago entitled The Decline of the Secular University. In the book, and through lectures by and conversations with Dr. Sommerville, I’ve picked up on some nuggets of his research. His theory is this: modern society has de-humanized some very critical areas of our culture (his focus is on the university), and we are slowly making a return to a more holistic view of humanity.
This is happening in business, too. Don’t let it pass you by.
What do you think?
