Synopsis
Think about 'Business: The Heart of the Matter' as a business catechism. A timely inquiry into the nature and essence of business, the book characterizes how business persons need to think about making business in America better, individually and institutionally. Tackling this issue in a world going "digital and global" is a challenge for even the supplest of business minds. 'The Heart of the Matter' is, simply, 'business from the inside out,” the insights gained by successful practitioners in their day-in, day-out search for improvement. Rarely if ever articulated, these principles are derived from practice and observation, not imposed by stricture. The book takes the reader on a journey through American business history like no other, for even in the midst of mundane investment decisions, the Founders of the American business republic, and their philosophical sources, are ever present. Frankly acknowledging the unique nature of the American experience, Tom Veblen, convener of The Superior Business Firm Roundtable, interweaves vignettes of his growing up on the northern prairie, and his apprenticeship as a commodity merchant, with those practices and principles that cause all business firms to grow and prosper. In this account, family history, the progress of business stewardship, and national destiny merge into one over-arching endeavor. The American business endeavor is overwhelmingly important to the welfare of all. 'The Heart of the Matter' comes at it from the basic organic unit of well-being, the business firm. From this perspective, multiply the business firms that figure out ”how to make things work better around here,” and you get an outpouring of products and services finely attuned to the evolving preferences of consumers—with workers' livelihoods ensured, and investors confident. It is neither coincidental nor surprising that voluntary cooperation working through millions of free transactions produces results superior to those wrought by coercion. Prosperity is made, not from the lofty precipices of policy prescription, but from the day-to-day gritty work of business survival. Around the Roundtable, and throughout modern society, “the wealth of nations” is debated as vigorously as it was in Adam Smith's day. What is wealth? How can it be created? What is a fair distribution of it? These are issues of enormous contemporary as well as historical concern. This book puts the business firm at the center of this concern, as it seeks to refocus public interest on where effort can be most profitably directed. Wealth is surely more than numbers on a financial statement. However much we may echo the sentiment expressed by the philosopher Sophie Tucker, “I’ve been poor and I've been rich, and Honey, rich is better,” wealth is still only a resource. Its only value is value-in-use. For every business firm, then, as for every individual, the question of the day is not how rich, but what for? The skill of the business practitioner is really in organizing wealth and putting it to its best use. Business practitioners must constantly think “why this and not something else” about what they do with all the resources entrusted to them—labor, money, physical assets, goodwill, trust, social capital, and all the resources they bring to bear on producing and distributing the goods and services they offer. This book doesn't tell us what to think, rather it reveals the essence of the thought process itself, as it shapes day-to-day decisions and adapts to the changing business and social environment. At once intuitive and philosophical, 'Business: The Heart of the Matter' conveys what is required for enterprises large and small to survive and prosper in a turbulent world.
About the Author
Tom Veblen is convener of The Superior Business Firm Roundtable and recently retired chair of Enterprise Consulting and Development, Inc., a real estate firm active in rehabilitating inner-city rental properties in Minneapolis and Duluth, Minnesota. Veblen’s business career includes extended stints with Cargill, Incorporated, as an elected officer; Stanford Research Institute, as director of the Institute’s Food and Agricultural Industries Department; and founder and managing director of Food System Associates, Inc. and Enterprise Consulting, Inc. He graduated from California State Polytechnic University with a Bachelor’s Degree in Agriculture and Oregon State University with a Master’s Degree in Agronomy and Plant Breeding and was elected to membership in Beta Beta Beta and Phi Sigma honorary societies. He is profiled in Marquis’ Who’s Who in America...in Finance and Industry...in the World. Veblen has served as board chair for the Freedom from Hunger Foundation, and on the Boards of the White House Fellows Association, the University of Kentucky Patterson School, ANERA (the American Near East Refugee Aid), and Pax World Foundation. He is a member of the Cosmos Club, the Hillsdale College President’s Club, The National Cathedral Association, and the White House Fellows Alumni Association. His business and civic interests have taken him throughout Asia, South America, Europe, and the Middle East. Mr. Veblen and his wife, Linda, reside in Washington, DC. Their five grown children live and work in Minnesota, Ontario, and England. Veblen's books, 'The Way of Business' (2011) and 'Business: The Heart of the Matter' (2017), seek to improve understanding of business and its societal and cultural roles in the creation and management of wealth—locally, nationally, and globally. In a monograph 'Advancing American Business,' Veblen posits the following: “In the American scheme of things business practitioners and firms are self-governing. Endeavoring we advance or retreat...improve or decline...get better or get worse. The idea is, of course, to get better, following a “way of business” that leads to right thinking and right acting on the things that really matter. “In addition to managing their own enterprise, business persons are naturally drawn to collaborate with their fellow citizens in bettering the American society and its institutions. Needless to say, the principles that guide practitioners in these endeavors warrant thoughtful scrutiny.”
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