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1. Introduction
This paper is written for readers with limited or no knowledge of Buddhism. The second section describes the purpose of Buddhism and presents comments by Buddha relating to business ethics and practices. The third section introduces three Buddhist concepts useful for improving business performance. The fourth section presents the application of these concepts to organisational development, the fifth section to management development and the sixth and last section to teaching in business schools and executive management development programmes.
2. The purpose of Buddhism and Buddha's quotes relating to business
The goal of Buddha was to find a way to end suffering. Buddha summarised his conclusion in the "Four Noble Truths":
There is Suffering, there is an Origin to Suffering, the Passing Beyond Suffering and a Way to Calming the Suffering (Saddhatissa, 1987, p. 44).
He identified "craving" as the origin and the main cause of suffering. "Craving" is the state of mind when a person absolutely wants to have something, thinking only of his own interests and completely disregarding the interests of others.
There is no text of Buddha that is dedicated specifically to business management. He nevertheless made comments applicable to business ethics. For the readers of this paper, these comments should be sufficient to decide whether Buddhist ethics is relevant or not. But before presenting these comments, it is important to clarify how Buddha saw the purpose of his teachings and how we should view them:
My teaching is not a philosophy. It is the result of direct experience. My teaching is a means of practice, not something to hold on to or worship (Buddha, Quotations).
Buddha referred to business ethics and the practices of shopkeepers and householders in the following text:
The shopkeeper is recommended to be alert, capable and dependent. His clear-sightedness consists in judging the possibility of sale and amount to be obtained hereby and his capability in technique as a salesman. That he becomes a dependable person will be evident from the willingness of people to invest money in his ventures. By means of accumulation the wise man establishes himself, by skilful application small particles are fanned into a fire.
Having attained some success, it is necessary to make it enduring. Reasons for failure are: failing to...