Corporate Social Responsibility - part 2: How our working world could be
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Corporate Social Responsibility - part 2: How our working world could be
We have all heard of the buzzwords, corporate and social responsibility – but what do they truly mean? Is it possible that, as nations we can change the course, state and quality of our working world into a new state? In this piece, following on from Part 1 we consider exactly this and how our working world COULD be. The current pressure, constant on-the-go-lifestyles and stresses we experience nowadays both in and outside of work, we might honestly admit exist because of our choice to allow it.
So as individuals within a massive global system of work, what changes can we ourselves make so we can start to live a life we actually truly enjoy, and work in a job that we really truly love doing?
Is it actually plausible to consider that the reason why so many of us feel so miserable about work currently, and why the ‘Happiness Index’ is so low and that we don’t love our jobs, is because we know that there is a better way that we could all be living? Is it equally plausible that there is a much bigger picture at play here in regards to the real purpose behind work, and moreover the part we can all play concerning the real state of our working world?
Personal responsibility & total well-being
Our purpose, whether we are students, employees, workers, workforce returnees, chiefs of businesses and industries, or leaders of countries, is shared. No matter what our position in life or at work, we can all examine the way we are independently working, communicating, caring and living.
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What if – central to all of life – our choices really do matter, and that every single choice affects not just us, but also everyone else too?
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If this is so, is it not worth us looking at taking personal responsibility for our choices?
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Perhaps if we do start to really consider and look at this we may develop an understanding that:
1) The way we each live on a daily basis produces a certain quality or level of wellness or well-being that creates a ‘working lifestyle’, attitude and behaviour which affects everyone around us. Hence EVERYTHING else follows on from whatever foundation or working lifestyle we have set.
Wow! If that is true, it means that the way we feel, and the whole environment around us follows on from the foundation we choose and set – our way of working being based on what we ourselves choose.
And so -
2) What we produce, deliver and work; how as leaders and executives we manage, lead, develop, train and grow the employee talent pool; how we make every decision in which people are directly and indirectly affected – originates from us: the way we choose to live; that means our individual lifestyle determines the quality of the collective lifestyle we all then experience.
Again wow! And if that is the case, then doesn’t it blow right out of the water any excuse or statements we like to use such as:
- It’s all too hard
- What difference could I possibly make?
- I’m just one small person
- It doesn’t matter what I do
If each and every one of us adds to the whole – each and every one of us is adding to either one of the below:
A. The whole that we do not like – and therefore keeping it all the same
OR
B. The whole that reflects the amazingness of how we really want life and work to be
Which one are we adding to: A or B?
And so, if the above is true then -
3) Our ‘total well-being’: every individual, company, business, country and nation together adds up to equal the level and quality of our world's harmony.
The above points can teach us so much. For if we stop saying we are not responsible for any of it – and are just subject to the way the world is, then isn’t that just a convenient excuse to not accept, even abdicate from taking any personal responsibility? What if, as explained above, each one of us does add to the way-it-ALL-is, and ALL of the time?
If that is the case, then surely, ‘total collective well-being’ must be our global focus, and purpose.
And if we can accept this, then what can we do as individuals to play our part?
Our personal choices
It starts first with beginning to truly take personal, corporate and social responsibility to ensure that the way we work, and manage others to produce work or deliver - is in a way that does not disrespect and exhaust or deplete the natural vitality of our physical body.
Imagine if we worked in a way that truly respected our body and if we manage others, we treated them in the same way - what sort of body, and therefore worker would that produce?
Wouldn’t it be a body so cared for and hence efficiently designed for work?
A body keenly attuned to the purpose of whatever the work was at hand, such as producing goods, services and profits that feed our nation, and grow our businesses that fuel economic growth not for greed, but for the simplicity of working to create systems that support, respect and value life itself, and the people in it.
Put slightly differently...
What if we decide to treat ourselves with deep care and respect such as in the way we ate, slept, rested and exercised, because we knew that if we did, we would be applying this same level of care, respect and efficiency to the work we do, and thus produce work that works efficiently for the whole.
Imagine how our world would be, if we all lived and worked like this?
Would we not enjoy what we do for work, and love our jobs more?
We each have a part to play in this new state - how our working world COULD be, because we each constitute a part of the collective whole: Our individual lifestyles have immediate ripple-effect consequences that affect the state of our working world, the well-being of all who live in it; of humanity and thus all our future.
Filed under
Career, Lifestyle diseases, Mental health, Work life balance, Well-being
