Faith in Business: Balancing Profit with Purpose

Hello and welcome to the show. Today we're going to look at something that I don't think I've spoken about at all on the podcast and that is investing with faith, investing with impact or doing business around ethical and value based criteria. Let me put it that way. Now, the reason why I'm doing this is because at least from the bunch of folks that I hang out around on LinkedIn, it looks as if these ideas are now getting cache are becoming much more popular nowadays.

You know, people talking about doing things around business that have environmental impact or businesses that are supposed to have impact in the area of let's say women's development or children protection, all these sorts of things. So I figured let's just talk about some of these things and see what perspective that we can learn to the discourse when it comes to sales and business development, looking at things from a sales and business development perspective.

So now, First off, the typical conception of business, the usual idea that people have about business is that business is immoral. In other words, we don't bring morals into business. So so long as business is making you money, then what's the problem? So that's the typical idea that most people have business on one end, morals on the other end. But if you think about it just a little bit, you'll see that this is not entirely accurate because we do have moral and ethical considerations in every single thing that we do.

So moral right or wrong, ethical, how does, how is one supposed to how, how should one conduct themselves? So we have these considerations in every single thing that we do. So even though the average person listening to this podcast now thinks that business is immoral, morals are not a part of business. That's not actually the case because they are moral and ethical things to consider in absolutely every single thing that we do.

However, this whole debate about shareholder value or money returns versus ethical, religious, social, environmental concerns, in my own opinion, it's too drawn out. Now, what do I mean by that? If you listen to Western media, you know CNN Foxes and you know that kind of media, they make it look as if all the people who shout about shareholder value, how much returns are you giving me as an investor, blah, blah, blah.

They make it look as if those people are on one end of the spectrum. There are other people who talk about ethical issues or religious issues, environmental issues, social issues, as if they're on the other end of the spectrum. Now that is not entirely the case because there are some people who favour one over the other, but we find out that there's a healthy tension that has to remain for most businesses. As in, yes, we're making money.

And I think there's this whole thing about was it Nike, Nike and some of those Americans and, and other UK brands that get labour from Bangladesh and other parts of the world. So yes, there is some of that tension, shareholder value, we're making money. But then on the other end, social impact of what it is that we do, you know, are we putting people in unfavourable working conditions? So it's not as if or for most businesses anyway, you either have to pick one or the other,

how much money can I make, how many people can I impoverish or how many people can I keep in poor working environments? So there's usually some tension, but it doesn't have to be as extremes. So these concerns will always be there and that's the reason why some industries like the vice industries, adult sexual entertainment, illicit drugs, animal cruelty, blah, blah, blah. That's the reason why if you check in different parts of the world, whether Nigeria,

Australia, America or whatever, you see that those sectors in particular have concerns. So I guess the good thing to know is that most of us are not going to be in that situation that Nike is in or which other company any you cash adrift, all these other companies, you're not going to be in that situation where it's a matter of how much money am I milking out and how many people am I impoverishing or keeping in poor working environments.

But yes, I guess we have to consider it to some extent or another because even if it's all catfish, you know, these are some of the things that we have to consider the amount of profit that I'm making. And then the women who are drying the catfish, what are their working conditions? What are their health benefits, if any? What are their pay and all these sorts of things. So anyway, I guess what I'm just trying to say is that there is no business that is immoral and that morals don't go into it because every single business that we do, we're going to have moral things to consider.

We are going to have ethical things that we are going to consider. So with this small debate, now introduction to debate for those of you who are not aware, what is now the decision making criteria for business? Should it be shareholder value or money in my pocket? Or should it be ethical concerns and all that other stuff? The answer is both. So excuse me because if I'm going to pay attention to all the ethical stuff and then we don't pay attention to how much money enters my pocket, at the end of the day the business is going to die.

So back to the catfish example, if somebody's going to get involved in the catfish business and they see that for every 1000 there, they invest in the catfish business well, because they want to make sure that the women are paid well. The women who dried the fish are paid well. The technology for drying the fish is OK, let's well, I don't know if there's any alternative to using wood firewood to dry out the fish. But if there's some modern technology, let's say that OK,

the women are paid well, that modern technology, blah, blah, blah. And if the business owners find out that for every 1000 naira that they put inside, the only thing that comes out as profit for them at the end of the day is maybe 100 naira or 500 naira or whatever. At some point they will say, you know what? This thing is not worth my time, is not worth my investment, I'm out. And then they'll move the money to something else.

So in this case, you will see that if you're doing all ethical and you're not paying attention to how much money goes into my pocket, the business will die. So it has to be both. Then again, if you're going to pay attention to money over ethics, then the society suffers and then people are impoverished on an intellectual level, on a spiritual level, on a financial level. So it has to be both. We should be striving for both.

There should be a way for me to put some money in my pocket from this catfish business. And there also has to be a way to make sure that the women, usually older women who are the ones drying this catfish and packaging it and everything, making sure that the women have the best working conditions and that they have good salaries that are paid, paid on time. So it's not a matter of one over the other, but it is both. So I think for the next episode,

I would like us to look at one question about whether we can invest in faith or make decisions on faith or whether faith can serve us. And as a business or an investment criteria, can we use faith to decide which businesses we go into? Or is it just wishful thinking to say that we are being guided by faith? Or can we say that it's just a non rational thinking to say we're going into business and we're going to be guided by faith?

This can't be a question that we will ignore because there's a whole bunch of us who are involved in business and who are Christian. In fact, some people will say that we're Christians first before we are business people and whatever other thing it is that we do. So for the next broadcast episode, that is going to be one question that we're going to tackle. Can faith serve as a business criteria, investment criteria, business decision making criteria?

So we'll consider all that in the next episode. And don't worry, in case you are scared of these issues, you can stay here. This is not going to be an in depth philosophical treaties because that is beyond my area of specialty. I'm not a philosopher. I just happen to be an ordinary human being just like you, who happens to be good at or really interested at selling and figuring out ways to sell stuff. But I do think that there are interesting questions for us to tackle here.

So don't worry, don't run away. Maybe two or three episodes and then we'll be done with this and then we can get back to being greedy and talking about nothing else but money. For those of you who are like me and who are greedy sobs, I want to see how much money that we can make. So thank you very much for your time and attention. I'll catch you guys at the next episode. Remember to connect with me on WhatsApp. The phone number is 08064662140.

The country code is +234. For those of you who are not Nigerian, also connect with me on LinkedIn. My name is Tavishima Ayede, I'm the host of the show. You can confirm the spelling of my name so you can search for me appropriately and you can also confirm my e-mail address in case e-mail is your thing. You can confirm all these details from the excuse me from the link. We're currently listening to this episode, so thanks for your time and attention.

I'll catch you guys at the next episode.