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It is common in the Business As Mission world to speak of excellence as a primary value.  Certainly, we should do everything with excellence as unto God, shouldn’t we? Well ‘yes’ and ‘no’.  Here is why. In short, the point is that “perfection kills innovation”.  Entrepreneur Damon Brown spells out ‘why’ in a TED Talk […]

Many of the countries in central Asia are struggling to develop their economies so as to raise their GDP and improve the lives of their people.  There are many challenges, politically, socially and economically.  IBEC finds it a privilege to serve clients trying to overcome amazing hurdles as they serve the people with jobs through

My friend Tom was asked to share three lessons he learned while starting and growing a sizable manufacturing company in Asia.  I often wonder what I would pick if asked to do something like that – which three?  Why those?  How can I remember the three most important things? However, I thought that Tom’s choice

Those of us who live in northern climes, eagerly look for signs of spring about the month of March or April.  Having grown up in western and northern Canada, it became a ritual to identify positive signs that winter was waning. I now live in the northwest USA, and recently I saw some of those

A mission statement is a short statement of why an organization exists, what its overall goal is, and the expected outcomes. IBEC Ventures expresses this in terms of its purpose, its vision, and its values (see IBEC’s about page). Our statement includes the following important goals as we direct our efforts toward the most impoverished

Coaches have one composite skill – the asking of questions with resulting skillful conversation.  Bob Hancox, who co-authored the book Coaching for Engagement: Achieving Results Through Powerful Conversations.1  defines coaching as “a way of focusing and leading a conversation with the intent of facilitating learning, heightening engagement, and encouraging higher performance… the focus of the

The 5Ps of Employee Fulfillment I live across Lake Washington from Microsoft and I regularly see one of their employees’ pickup buses near my place.  Yes, Microsoft is a big player in the Seattle community, so my interest was piqued when I saw this article on LinkedIn on Dec 11, 2018.  The author is Kathleen

Daniel Lubetzky’s father survived the holocaust and he left a legacy of kindness both during the war and afterwards, something which has informed his son Daniel’s approach to business. Ever eat a KIND bar?  A billion a year are sold worldwide, and the company is valued in at billions of dollars. The podcast noted below

The month of February is the month we remember two great presidents of yesteryear.  Monday is Presidents’ Day, part way between the birth dates of Abraham Lincoln and George Washington. We do not readily associate these successful political figures with business, but both were one-time businessmen.  Washington was a large landowner in the planting industry

We hear a lot about fair trade these days and indeed many of the Business as Mission (BAM) businesses that IBEC serves are members of a fair-trade association.  The whole topic can be confusing as there are many organizations that claim a fair trade standard but in reality they do not following the principles of