Book Review - The Good Person Guidebook: Transforming Your Personal Life by Richard Bayer, Ph. D
Category Book Review Richard Bayer Ph D The Good Person Guidebook: Transforming Your Personal Life
Let's face it... For all the talk of ethics and responsibility these days, there's never a day goes by without some new story of executive X or celebrity Y doing something that reeks of greed, selfishness, or a "me first" attitude. That doesn't even begin to cover all the lapses of non-headliners, the Joe Six-Packs, who find themselves in less-than-desirable situations due to choices they've compromised on along the way. The Good Person Guidebook: Transforming Your Personal Life By Dr. Richard Bayer is a series of relatively short essays on how to be an ethical person in today's workplace, but the lessons apply to both the marketplace and the personal home front.
Contents:
Part 1 - A Perspective on Ethics: Ethics in the Information Age - The Puritan Work Ethic and Beyond; Our Social Nature; Law vs. Ethics - The Limits of Law; How to Overcome Suffering - Especially in Your Career; Humility and Success; Compassion; Hope! What Is It? What Good Is It? Who Needs It?; Generosity in Deed - The Virtue of Thrift; The Search for Truth - or Not: The Problem with Secularism; Cheated by Writing a Blank Check! - To Science; What Is America All About? A Perspective from "America the Beautiful"; How to Make Ethical Decisions in Business; Good Ethics Is Serious Business - Objections and Answers
Part 2 - What Type of Person Should I Be?: Why Be Moral?; Virtue in Your Personal Life - The Meaning of Love; Raising Children Well (Not as Complex as It Seems); Raising Children with Prudence; On Gratitude; Violence; Virtue in Your Work Life - What Makes a Meaningful Work Life?; One Economy "Under God"?; Avoiding Shipwreck: Ethics and Entrepreneurship; Human Capital - The Key to Our Future; Five O'Clock Clubbers Talk about Their Good Habits; Maintaining Focus
Part 3 - Guidelines - What Must We Do (Ethical Principles for Action): Freedom, License, and a Way Out; Getting Where You Are Going - The Only Way to Go!; Targeting - The Truth Is Out There; Be on Track - and the Right Track - A Reminder from Islam; An Approach to New Year's Resolutions; Is My Potential Employer Ethical?; When to Blow the Whistle; How to Terminate Employees While Respecting Human Dignity
Appendixes: The Seven Stories Exercise; Analyzing Your Seven Stories; Your Fifteen-Year Vision and Your Forty-Year Vision; Your Fifteen and Forty-Year Vision Worksheet
Index; About the Author; Five O'Clock Club Books; About the Five O'Clock Club; Fruytagie Wall Canvas
Dr. Bayer runs a company called The Five O'Clock Club, the goal of which is to develop good, moral, and ethical people who can then apply those principles to their lives in the corporate world and with the larger community as a whole. His book starts out with defining what is meant by "ethics", and what it means to be a "good" person. Don't assume that's an easy answer. If it was so easy, would we be in the trouble we're in as a society right now? The second part of the book then works to apply those principles to your core person, into the main areas of your life. Finally, part 3 gets into application. Now that we know all this (and have hopefully internalized and incorporated it into our being), what do we do with it? What happens when the company you work for is making decisions that breach your ethical standards? Do you look the other way and claim everyone else was doing it or you had no choice? Or do you take a stand, refuse to compromise on your principles, knowing the potential short term loss and pain will be far outweighed by the gains and peace of mind that comes from knowing you did the right thing?
These are deep questions with no pat answers, but Dr. Bayer does a good job in bringing them down to earth in a more concrete sense. You obviously can't read these 300 pages in one sitting, and then go out into the world, an enlightened ethical person ready to do all this is right. It takes work... I'd recommend you take a chapter or two each morning or night, read it slowly, and contemplate the ramifications of what is being said. The first part won't necessarily have you going out with a list of "do A, B, and C today", as you need to build the foundation before you can add the walls and furnishings. But if you're dissatisfied as to what and where you're going with yourself, starting here would be a good path to follow...
Let's face it... For all the talk of ethics and responsibility these days, there's never a day goes by without some new story of executive X or celebrity Y doing something that reeks of greed, selfishness, or a "me first" attitude. That doesn't even begin to cover all the lapses of non-headliners, the Joe Six-Packs, who find themselves in less-than-desirable situations due to choices they've compromised on along the way. The Good Person Guidebook: Transforming Your Personal Life By Dr. Richard Bayer is a series of relatively short essays on how to be an ethical person in today's workplace, but the lessons apply to both the marketplace and the personal home front.
Contents:
Part 1 - A Perspective on Ethics: Ethics in the Information Age - The Puritan Work Ethic and Beyond; Our Social Nature; Law vs. Ethics - The Limits of Law; How to Overcome Suffering - Especially in Your Career; Humility and Success; Compassion; Hope! What Is It? What Good Is It? Who Needs It?; Generosity in Deed - The Virtue of Thrift; The Search for Truth - or Not: The Problem with Secularism; Cheated by Writing a Blank Check! - To Science; What Is America All About? A Perspective from "America the Beautiful"; How to Make Ethical Decisions in Business; Good Ethics Is Serious Business - Objections and Answers
Part 2 - What Type of Person Should I Be?: Why Be Moral?; Virtue in Your Personal Life - The Meaning of Love; Raising Children Well (Not as Complex as It Seems); Raising Children with Prudence; On Gratitude; Violence; Virtue in Your Work Life - What Makes a Meaningful Work Life?; One Economy "Under God"?; Avoiding Shipwreck: Ethics and Entrepreneurship; Human Capital - The Key to Our Future; Five O'Clock Clubbers Talk about Their Good Habits; Maintaining Focus
Part 3 - Guidelines - What Must We Do (Ethical Principles for Action): Freedom, License, and a Way Out; Getting Where You Are Going - The Only Way to Go!; Targeting - The Truth Is Out There; Be on Track - and the Right Track - A Reminder from Islam; An Approach to New Year's Resolutions; Is My Potential Employer Ethical?; When to Blow the Whistle; How to Terminate Employees While Respecting Human Dignity
Appendixes: The Seven Stories Exercise; Analyzing Your Seven Stories; Your Fifteen-Year Vision and Your Forty-Year Vision; Your Fifteen and Forty-Year Vision Worksheet
Index; About the Author; Five O'Clock Club Books; About the Five O'Clock Club; Fruytagie Wall Canvas
Dr. Bayer runs a company called The Five O'Clock Club, the goal of which is to develop good, moral, and ethical people who can then apply those principles to their lives in the corporate world and with the larger community as a whole. His book starts out with defining what is meant by "ethics", and what it means to be a "good" person. Don't assume that's an easy answer. If it was so easy, would we be in the trouble we're in as a society right now? The second part of the book then works to apply those principles to your core person, into the main areas of your life. Finally, part 3 gets into application. Now that we know all this (and have hopefully internalized and incorporated it into our being), what do we do with it? What happens when the company you work for is making decisions that breach your ethical standards? Do you look the other way and claim everyone else was doing it or you had no choice? Or do you take a stand, refuse to compromise on your principles, knowing the potential short term loss and pain will be far outweighed by the gains and peace of mind that comes from knowing you did the right thing?
These are deep questions with no pat answers, but Dr. Bayer does a good job in bringing them down to earth in a more concrete sense. You obviously can't read these 300 pages in one sitting, and then go out into the world, an enlightened ethical person ready to do all this is right. It takes work... I'd recommend you take a chapter or two each morning or night, read it slowly, and contemplate the ramifications of what is being said. The first part won't necessarily have you going out with a list of "do A, B, and C today", as you need to build the foundation before you can add the walls and furnishings. But if you're dissatisfied as to what and where you're going with yourself, starting here would be a good path to follow...
| Permalink |
