Behind the Bottom Line: Powering Business Life with Spiritual Wisdom

In Behind the Bottom Line, Stephen R. Graves and Thomas G. Addington -- cofounders of the popular journal Life@Work-- offer businesspeople a much-needed resource for understanding the spiritual factors that have a profound (and often unheralded) influence on our day-to-day business lives. This personal guide shows how biblical wisdom can become a vital and integral part of our work lives and a pathway to business excellence. In each chapter, the authors examine one of the fifteen central themes of business life-- power, change, wealth, ambition, ethics, balance, stewardship, partnering, calling, rest, strategy, innovation, entrepreneurship, marketplace grace, and legacy-- and explore how spirituality is intrinsic to our professional lives. Throughout the book, Graves and Addington offer powerful, life-changing spiritual insights that can profoundly affect how we approach our life at work.

Stephen R. Graves and Thomas G. Addington have been business partners for over a decade. For the last twelve years, they have been exploring how to blend business excellence with biblical wisdom through consulting, teaching, mentoring, and writing around the world. This mission statement, originally scratched out on a breakfast napkin early one morning twelve years ago, has been their "never lost" system as they have journeyed through a variety of entrepreneurial endeavors and experiments. They founded Cornerstone Group Consulting and the Life@Work journal, they speak regularly in business, ministry, and academic settings, they publish frequently, they serve on national boards, and they are active in coaching leaders toward the finish line. Both hold a doctorate, both are deeply devoted to their families, and both love the never-ending challenge of meshing real life with the message of Jesus. They are the authors of Life@Work on Leadership: Enduring Insights for Men and Women of Faith (Jossey-Bass, 2002).