文章标题：The Universal Declaration of Human Rights
文章作者：The Drafting Committee
发表日期：1948年12月10日
发表媒体：《联合国》United Nations
PREAMBLE
Whereas recognition of the inherent dignity and of the equal and inalienable rights of all members of the human family is the foundation of freedom, justice and peace in the world,
Whereas disregard and contempt for human rights have resulted in barbarous acts which have outraged the conscience of mankind, and the advent of a world in which human beings shall enjoy freedom of speech and belief and freedom from fear and want has been proclaimed as the highest aspiration of the common people,
Whereas it is essential, if man is not to be compelled to have recourse, as a last resort, to rebellion against tyranny and oppression, that human rights should be protected by the rule of law,
Whereas it is essential to promote the development of friendly relations between nations,
Whereas the peoples of the United Nations have in the Charter reaffirmed their faith in fundamental human rights, in the dignity and worth of the human person and in the equal rights of men and women and have determined to promote social progress and better standards of life in larger freedom,
Whereas Member States have pledged themselves to achieve, in co-operation with the United Nations, the promotion of universal respect for and observance of human rights and fundamental freedoms,
Whereas a common understanding of these rights and freedoms is of the greatest importance for the full realization of this pledge,
Now, Therefore THE GENERAL ASSEMBLY proclaims THIS UNIVERSAL DECLARATION OF HUMAN RIGHTS as a common standard of achievement for all peoples and all nations, to the end that every individual and every organ of society, keeping this Declaration constantly in mind, shall strive by teaching and education to promote respect for these rights and freedoms and by progressive measures, national and international, to secure their universal and effective recognition and observance, both among the peoples of Member States themselves and among the peoples of territories under their jurisdiction.
Article 1.
All human beings are born free and equal in dignity and rights.They are endowed with reason and conscience and should act towards one another in a spirit of brotherhood.
Article 2.
Everyone is entitled to all the rights and freedoms set forth in this Declaration, without distinction of any kind, such as race, colour, sex, language, religion, political or other opinion, national or social origin, property, birth or other status. Furthermore, no distinction shall be made on the basis of the political, jurisdictional or international status of the country or territory to which a person belongs, whether it be independent, trust, non-self-governing or under any other limitation of sovereignty.
Article 3.
Everyone has the right to life, liberty and security of person.
Article 4.
No one shall be held in slavery or servitude; slavery and the slave trade shall be prohibited in all their forms.
Article 5.
No one shall be subjected to torture or to cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment.
Article 6.
Everyone has the right to recognition everywhere as a person before the law.
Article 7.
All are equal before the law and are entitled without any discrimination to equal protection of the law. All are entitled to equal protection against any discrimination in violation of this Declaration and against any incitement to such discrimination.
Article 8.
Everyone has the right to an effective remedy by the competent national tribunals for acts violating the fundamental rights granted him by the constitution or by law.
Article 9.
No one shall be subjected to arbitrary arrest, detention or exile.
Article 10.
Everyone is entitled in full equality to a fair and public hearing by an independent and impartial tribunal, in the determination of his rights and obligations and of any criminal charge against him.
Article 11.
(1) Everyone charged with a penal offence has the right to be presumed innocent until proved guilty according to law in a public trial at which he has had all the guarantees necessary for his defence.
(2) No one shall be held guilty of any penal offence on account of any act or omission which did not constitute a penal offence, under national or international law, at the time when it was committed. Nor shall a heavier penalty be imposed than the one that was applicable at the time the penal offence was committed.
Article 12.
No one shall be subjected to arbitrary interference with his privacy, family, home or correspondence, nor to attacks upon his honour and reputation. Everyone has the right to the protection of the law against such interference or attacks.
Article 13.
(1) Everyone has the right to freedom of movement and residence within the borders of each state.
(2) Everyone has the right to leave any country, including his own, and to return to his country.
Article 14.
(1) Everyone has the right to seek and to enjoy in other countries asylum from persecution.
(2) This right may not be invoked in the case of prosecutions genuinely arising from non-political crimes or from acts contrary to the purposes and principles of the United Nations.
Article 15.
(1) Everyone has the right to a nationality.
(2) No one shall be arbitrarily deprived of his nationality nor denied the right to change his nationality.
Article 16.
(1) Men and women of full age, without any limitation due to race, nationality or religion, have the right to marry and to found a family. They are entitled to equal rights as to marriage, during marriage and at its dissolution.
(2) Marriage shall be entered into only with the free and full consent of the intending spouses.
(3) The family is the natural and fundamental group unit of society and is entitled to protection by society and the State.
Article 17.
(1) Everyone has the right to own property alone as well as in association with others.
(2) No one shall be arbitrarily deprived of his property.
Article 18.
Everyone has the right to freedom of thought, conscience and religion; this right includes freedom to change his religion or belief, and freedom, either alone or in community with others and in public or private, to manifest his religion or belief in teaching, practice, worship and observance.
Article 19.
Everyone has the right to freedom of opinion and expression; this right includes freedom to hold opinions without interference and to seek, receive and impart information and ideas through any media and regardless of frontiers.
Article 20.
(1) Everyone has the right to freedom of peaceful assembly and association.
(2) No one may be compelled to belong to an association.
Article 21.
(1) Everyone has the right to take part in the government of his country, directly or through freely chosen representatives.
(2) Everyone has the right of equal access to public service in his country.
(3) The will of the people shall be the basis of the authority of government; this will shall be expressed in periodic and genuine elections which shall be by universal and equal suffrage and shall be held by secret vote or by equivalent free voting procedures.
Article 22.
Everyone, as a member of society, has the right to social security and is entitled to realization, through national effort and international co-operation and in accordance with the organization and resources of each State, of the economic, social and cultural rights indispensable for his dignity and the free development of his personality.
Article 23.
(1) Everyone has the right to work, to free choice of employment, to just and favourable conditions of work and to protection against unemployment.
(2) Everyone, without any discrimination, has the right to equal pay for equal work.
(3) Everyone who works has the right to just and favourable remuneration ensuring for himself and his family an existence worthy of human dignity, and supplemented, if necessary, by other means of social protection.
(4) Everyone has the right to form and to join trade unions for the protection of his interests.
Article 24.
Everyone has the right to rest and leisure, including reasonable limitation of working hours and periodic holidays with pay.
Article 25.
(1) Everyone has the right to a standard of living adequate for the health and well-being of himself and of his family, including food, clothing, housing and medical care and necessary social services, and the right to security in the event of unemployment, sickness, disability, widowhood, old age or other lack of livelihood in circumstances beyond his control.
(2) Motherhood and childhood are entitled to special care and assistance. All children, whether born in or out of wedlock, shall enjoy the same social protection.
Article 26.
(1) Everyone has the right to education. Education shall be free, at least in the elementary and fundamental stages. Elementary education shall be compulsory. Technical and professional education shall be made generally available and higher education shall be equally accessible to all on the basis of merit.
(2) Education shall be directed to the full development of the human personality and to the strengthening of respect for human rights and fundamental freedoms. It shall promote understanding, tolerance and friendship among all nations, racial or religious groups, and shall further the activities of the United Nations for the maintenance of peace.
(3) Parents have a prior right to choose the kind of education that shall be given to their children.
Article 27.
(1) Everyone has the right freely to participate in the cultural life of the community, to enjoy the arts and to share in scientific advancement and its benefits.
(2) Everyone has the right to the protection of the moral and material interests resulting from any scientific, literary or artistic production of which he is the author.
Article 28.
Everyone is entitled to a social and international order in which the rights and freedoms set forth in this Declaration can be fully realized.
Article 29.
(1) Everyone has duties to the community in which alone the free and full development of his personality is possible.
(2) In the exercise of his rights and freedoms, everyone shall be subject only to such limitations as are determined by law solely for the purpose of securing due recognition and respect for the rights and freedoms of others and of meeting the just requirements of morality, public order and the general welfare in a democratic society.
(3) These rights and freedoms may in no case be exercised contrary to the purposes and principles of the United Nations.
Article 30.
Nothing in this Declaration may be interpreted as implying for any State, group or person any right to engage in any activity or to perform any act aimed at the destruction of any of the rights and freedoms set forth herein.
《世界人权宣言》中文版
（按：1948年12月10日，联合国大会通过并颁布《世界人权宣言》。这一具有历史意义的《宣言》颁布后，大会要求所有会员国广为宣传，并且“不分国家或领土的政治地位，主要在各级学校和其他教育机构加以传播、展示、阅读和阐述。”）
序言
鉴于对人类家庭所有成员的固有尊严及其平等的和不移的权利的承认，乃是世界自由、正义与和平的基础，
鉴于对人权的无视和侮蔑已发展为野蛮暴行，这些暴行玷污了人类的良心，而一个人人享有言论和信仰自由并免予恐惧和匮乏的世界的来临，已被宣布为普通人民的最高愿望，
鉴于为使人类不致迫不得已铤而走险对暴政和压迫进行反叛，有必要使人权受法治的保护，
鉴于有必要促进各国间友好关系的发展，
鉴于各联合国国家的人民已在联合国宪章中重申他们对基本人权、人格尊严和价值以及男女平等权利的信念，并决心促成较大自由中的社会进步和生活水平的改善，
鉴于各会员国业已誓愿同联合国合作以促进对人权和基本自由的普遍尊重和遵行，
鉴于对这些权利和自由的普遍了解对于这个誓愿的充分实现具有很大的重要性，
因此现在，
大会，
发布这一世界人权宣言，作为所有人民和所有国家努力实现的共同标准，以期每一个人和社会机构经常铭念本宣言，努力通过教诲和教育促进对权利和自由的尊重，并通过国家的和国际的渐进措施，使这些权利和自由在各会员国本身人民及在其管辖下领土的人民中得到普遍和有效的承认和遵行；
第一条
人人生而自由，在尊严和权利上一律平等。他们赋有理性和良心，并应以兄弟关系的精神相对待。
第二条
人人有资格享有本宣言所载的一切权利和自由，不分种族、肤色、性别、语言、宗教、政治或其他见解、国籍或社会出身、财产、出生或其他身分等任何区别。并且不得因一人所属的国家或领土的政治的、行政的或者国际的地位之不同而有所区别，无论该领土是独立领土、托管领土、非自治领土或者处于其他任何主权受限制的情况之下。
第三条
人人有权享有生命、自由和人身安全。.
第四条
任何人不得使为奴隶或奴役；一切形式的奴隶制度和奴隶买卖，均应予以禁止。
第五条
任何人不得加以酷刑，或施以残忍的、不人道的或侮辱性的待遇或刑罚。
第六条
人人在任何地方有权被承认在法律前的人格。
第七条
法律之前人人平等，并有权享受法律的平等保护，不受任何歧视。人人有权享受平等保护，以免受违反本宣言的任何歧视行为以及煽动这种歧视的任何行为之害。
第八条
任何人当宪法或法律所赋予他的基本权利遭受侵害时，有权由合格的国家法庭对这种侵害行为作有效的补救。
第九条
任何人不得加以任意逮捕、拘禁或放逐。
第十条
人人完全平等地有权由一个独立而无偏倚的法庭进行公正的和公开的审讯，以确定他的权利和义务并判定对他提出的任何刑事指控。
第十一条
㈠ 凡受刑事控告者，在未经获得辩护上所需的一切保证的公开审判而依法证实有罪以前，有权被视为无罪。
㈡ 任何人的任何行为或不行为，在其发生时依国家法或国际法均不构成刑事罪者，不得被判为犯有刑事罪。刑罚不得重于犯罪时适用的法律规定。
第十二条
任何人的私生活、家庭、住宅和通信不得任意干涉，他的荣誉和名誉不得加以攻击。人人有权享受法律保护，以免受这种干涉或攻击。
第十三条
㈠ 人人在各国境内有权自由迁徙和居住。
㈡ 人人有权离开任何国家，包括其本国在内，并有权返回他的国家。
第十四条
㈠ 人人有权在其他国家寻求和享受庇护以避免迫害。
㈡ 在真正由于非政治性的罪行或违背联合国的宗旨和原则的行为而被起诉的情况下，不得援用此种权利。
第十五条
㈠ 人人有权享有国籍。
㈡ 任何人的国籍不得任意剥夺，亦不得否认其改变国籍的权利。
第十六条
㈠ 成年男女，不受种族、国籍或宗教的任何限制有权婚嫁和成立家庭。他们在婚姻方面，在结婚期间和在解除婚约时，应有平等的权利。
㈡ 只有经男女双方的自由和完全的同意，才能缔婚。.
㈢ 家庭是天然的和基本的社会单元，并应受社会和国家的保护。
第十七条
㈠ 人人得有单独的财产所有权以及同他人合有的所有权。
㈡ 任何人的财产不得任意剥夺。
第十八条
人人有思想、良心和宗教自由的权利；此项权利包括改变他的宗教或信仰的自由，以及单独或集体、公开或秘密地以教义、实践、礼拜和戒律表示他的宗教或信仰的自由。
第十九条
人人有权享有主张和发表意见的自由；此项权利包括持有主张而不受干涉的自由，和通过任何媒介和不论国界寻求、接受和传递消息和思想的自由。
第二十条
㈠ 人人有权享有和平集会和结社的自由。
㈡ 任何人不得迫使隶属于某一团体。
第二十一条
㈠ 人人有直接或通过自由选择的代表参与治理本国的权利。
㈡ 人人有平等机会参加本国公务的权利。
㈢ 人民的意志是政府权力的基础；这一意志应以定期的和真正的选举予以表现，而选举应依据普遍和平等的投票权，并以不记名投票或相当的自由投票程序进行。
第二十二条
每个人，作为社会的一员，有权享受社会保障，并有权享受他的个人尊严和人格的自由发展所必需的经济、社会和文化方面各种权利的实现，这种实现是通过国家努力和国际合作并依照各国的组织和资源情况。
第二十三条
㈠ 人人有权工作、自由选择职业、享受公正和合适的工作条件并享受免于失业的保障。
㈡ 人人有同工同酬的权利，不受任何歧视。
㈢ 每一个工作的人，有权享受公正和合适的报酬，保证使他本人和家属有一个符合人的生活条件，必要时并辅以其他方式的社会保障。
㈣ 人人有为维护其利益而组织和参加工会的权利。
第二十四条
人人有享有休息和闲暇的权利，包括工作时间有合理限制和定期给薪休假的权利。
第二十五条
㈠ 人人有权享受为维持他本人和家属的健康和福利所需的生活水准，包括食物、衣着、住房、医疗和必要的社会服务；在遭到失业、疾病、残废、守寡、衰老或在其他不能控制的情况下丧失谋生能力时，有权享受保障。
㈡ 母亲和儿童有权享受特别照顾和协助。一切儿童，无论婚生或非婚生，都应享受同样的社会保护。
第二十六条
㈠ 人人都有受教育的权利，教育应当免费，至少在初级和基本阶段应如此。初级教育应属义务性质。技术和职业教育应普遍设立。高等教育应根据成绩而对一切人平等开放。
㈡ 教育的目的在于充分发展人的个性并加强对人权和基本自由的尊重。教育应促进各国、各种族或各宗教集团间的了解、容忍和友谊，并应促进联合国维护和平的各项活动。
㈢ 父母对其子女所应受的教育的种类，有优先选择的权利。
第二十七条
㈠ 人人有权自由参加社会的文化生活，享受艺术，并分享科学进步及其产生的福利。
㈡ 人人对由于他所创作的任何科学、文学或美术作品而产生的精神的和物质的利益，有享受保护的权利。
第二十八条
人人有权要求一种社会的和国际的秩序，在这种秩序中，本宣言所载的权利和自由能获得充分实现。
第二十九条
㈠ 人人对社会负有义务，因为只有在社会中他的个性才可能得到自由和充分的发展。
㈡ 人人在行使他的权利和自由时，只受法律所确定的限制，确定此种限制的唯一目的在于保证对旁人的权利和自由给予应有的承认和尊重，并在一个民主的社会中适应道德、公共秩序和普遍福利的正当需要。
㈢ 这些权利和自由的行使，无论在任何情形下均不得违背联合国的宗旨和原则。
第三十条
本宣言的任何条文，不得解释为默许任何国家、集团或个人有权进行任何旨在破坏本宣言所载的任何权利和自由的活动或行为。
Thursday, July 21, 2011
Wednesday, July 6, 2011
How Will You Measure Your Life
文章标题：How Will You Measure Your Life
文章作者：Clayton Christensen
发表日期：2010年7月1日
发表媒体：《哈佛商业评论》Harvard Business Review
Editorʼs Note: When the members of the class of 2010 entered business school, the economy was strong and their post-graduation ambitions could be limitless. Just a few weeks later, the economy went into a tailspin. Theyʼve spent the past two years recalibrating their worldview and their definition of success.
The students seem highly aware of how the world has changed (as the sampling of views in this article shows). In the spring, Harvard Business Schoolʼs graduating class asked HBS professor Clay Christensen to address them—but not on how to apply his principles and thinking to their post-HBS careers. The students wanted to know how to apply them to their personal lives. He shared with them a set of guidelines that have helped him find meaning in his own life. Though Christensenʼs thinking comes from his deep religious faith, we believe that these are strategies anyone can use. And so we asked him to share them with the readers of HBR. To learn more about Christensenʼs work, visit his HBR Author Page.
Before I published The Innovatorʼs Dilemma, I got a call from Andrew Grove, then the chairman of Intel. He had read one of my early papers about disruptive technology, and he asked if I could talk to his direct reports and explain my research and what it implied for Intel. Excited, I flew to Silicon Valley and showed up at the appointed time, only to have Grove say, “Look, stuff has happened. We have only 10 minutes for you. Tell us what your model of disruption means for Intel.” I said that I couldnʼt—that I needed a full 30 minutes to explain the model, because only with it as context would any comments about Intel make sense. Ten minutes into my explanation, Grove interrupted: “Look, Iʼve got your model. Just tell us what it means for Intel.”
I insisted that I needed 10 more minutes to describe how the process of disruption had worked its way through a very different industry, steel, so that he and his team could understand how disruption worked. I told the story of how Nucor and other steel minimills had begun by attacking the lowest end of the market—steel reinforcing bars, or rebar—and later moved up toward the high end, undercutting the traditional steel mills.
When I finished the minimill story, Grove said, “OK, I get it. What it means for Intel is...,” and then went on to articulate what would become the companyʼs strategy for going to the bottom of the market to launch the Celeron processor.
Iʼve thought about that a million times since. If I had been suckered into telling Andy Grove what he should think about the microprocessor business, Iʼd have been killed. But instead of telling him what to think, I taught him how to think—and then he reached what I felt was the correct decision on his own.
That experience had a profound influence on me. When people ask what I think they should do, I rarely answer their question directly. Instead, I run the question aloud through one of my models. Iʼll describe how the process in the model worked its way through an industry quite different from their own. And then, more often than not, theyʼll say, “OK, I get it.” And theyʼll answer their own question more insightfully than I could have.
My class at HBS is structured to help my students understand what good management theory is and how it is built. To that backbone I attach different models or theories that help students think about the various dimensions of a general managerʼs job in stimulating innovation and growth. In each session we look at one company through the lenses of those theories—using them to explain how the company got into its situation and to examine what managerial actions will yield the needed results.
On the last day of class, I ask my students to turn those theoretical lenses on themselves, to find cogent answers to three questions: First, how can I be sure that Iʼll be happy in my career? Second, how can I be sure that my relationships with my spouse and my family become an enduring source of happiness? Third, how can I be sure Iʼll stay out of jail? Though the last question sounds lighthearted, itʼs not. Two of the 32 people in my Rhodes scholar class spent time in jail. Jeff Skilling of Enron fame was a classmate of mine at HBS. These were good guys—but something in their lives sent them off in the wrong direction.
The Class of 2010 (Located at the end of this article)
As the students discuss the answers to these questions, I open my own life to them as a case study of sorts, to illustrate how they can use the theories from our course to guide their life decisions.
One of the theories that gives great insight on the first question—how to be sure we find happiness in our careers—is from Frederick Herzberg, who asserts that the powerful motivator in our lives isnʼt money; itʼs the opportunity to learn, grow in responsibilities, contribute to others, and be recognized for achievements. I tell the students about a vision of sorts I had while I was running the company I founded before becoming an academic. In my mindʼs eye I saw one of my managers leave for work one morning with a relatively strong level of self-esteem. Then I pictured her driving home to her family 10 hours later, feeling unappreciated, frustrated, underutilized, and demeaned. I imagined how profoundly her lowered self-esteem affected the way she interacted with her children. The vision in my mind then fast-forwarded to another day, when she drove home with greater self-esteem—feeling that she had learned a lot, been recognized for achieving valuable things, and played a significant role in the success of some important initiatives. I then imagined how positively that affected her as a spouse and a parent. My conclusion: Management is the most noble of professions if itʼs practiced well. No other occupation offers as many ways to help others learn and grow, take responsibility and be recognized for achievement, and contribute to the success of a team. More and more MBA students come to school thinking that a career in business means buying, selling, and investing in companies. Thatʼs unfortunate. Doing deals doesnʼt yield the deep rewards that come from building up people.
I want students to leave my classroom knowing that.
Create a Strategy for Your Life
A theory that is helpful in answering the second question—How can I ensure that my relationship with my family proves to be an enduring source of happiness?—concerns how strategy is defined and implemented. Its primary insight is that a companyʼs strategy is determined by the types of initiatives that management invests in. If a companyʼs resource allocation process is not managed masterfully, what emerges from it can be very different from what management intended. Because companiesʼ decision-making systems are designed to steer investments to initiatives that offer the most tangible and immediate returns, companies shortchange investments in initiatives that are crucial to their long-term strategies.
Over the years Iʼve watched the fates of my HBS classmates from 1979 unfold; Iʼve seen more and more of them come to reunions unhappy, divorced, and alienated from their children. I can guarantee you that not a single one of them graduated with the deliberate strategy of getting divorced and raising children who would become estranged from them. And yet a shocking number of them implemented that strategy. The reason? They didnʼt keep the purpose of their lives front and center as they decided how to spend their time, talents, and energy.
Itʼs quite startling that a significant fraction of the 900 students that HBS draws each year from the worldʼs best have given little thought to the purpose of their lives. I tell the students that HBS might be one of their last chances to reflect deeply on that question. If they think that theyʼll have more time and energy to reflect later, theyʼre nuts, because life only gets more demanding: You take on a mortgage; youʼre working 70 hours a week; you have a spouse and children.
For me, having a clear purpose in my life has been essential. But it was something I had to think long and hard about before I understood it. When I was a Rhodes scholar, I was in a very demanding academic program, trying to cram an extra yearʼs worth of work into my time at Oxford. I decided to spend an hour every night reading, thinking, and praying about why God put me on this earth. That was a very challenging commitment to keep, because every hour I spent doing that, I wasnʼt studying applied econometrics. I was conflicted about whether I could really afford to take that time away from my studies, but I stuck with it—and ultimately figured out the purpose of my life.
Had I instead spent that hour each day learning the latest techniques for mastering the problems of autocorrelation in regression analysis, I would have badly misspent my life. I apply the tools of econometrics a few times a year, but I apply my knowledge of the purpose of my life every day. Itʼs the single most useful thing Iʼve ever learned. I promise my students that if they take the time to figure out their life purpose, theyʼll look back on it as the most important thing they discovered at HBS. If they donʼt figure it out, they will just sail off without a rudder and get buffeted in the very rough seas of life. Clarity about their purpose will trump knowledge of activity-based costing, balanced scorecards, core competence, disruptive innovation, the four Ps, and the five forces.
My purpose grew out of my religious faith, but faith isnʼt the only thing that gives people direction. For example, one of my former students decided that his purpose was to bring honesty and economic prosperity to his country and to raise children who were as capably committed to this cause, and to each other, as he was. His purpose is focused on family and others—as mine is.
The choice and successful pursuit of a profession is but one tool for achieving your purpose. But without a purpose, life can become hollow.
Allocate Your Resources
Your decisions about allocating your personal time, energy, and talent ultimately shape your lifeʼs strategy.
I have a bunch of “businesses” that compete for these resources: Iʼm trying to have a rewarding relationship with my wife, raise great kids, contribute to my community, succeed in my career, contribute to my church, and so on. And I have exactly the same problem that a corporation does. I have a limited amount of time and energy and talent. How much do I devote to each of these pursuits?
Allocation choices can make your life turn out to be very different from what you intended. Sometimes thatʼs good: Opportunities that you never planned for emerge. But if you misinvest your resources, the outcome can be bad. As I think about my former classmates who inadvertently invested for lives of hollow unhappiness, I canʼt help believing that their troubles relate right back to a short-term perspective.
When people who have a high need for achievement—and that includes all Harvard Business School graduates—have an extra half hour of time or an extra ounce of energy, theyʼll unconsciously allocate it to activities that yield the most tangible accomplishments. And our careers provide the most concrete evidence that weʼre moving forward. You ship a product, finish a design, complete a presentation, close a sale, teach a class, publish a paper, get paid, get promoted. In contrast, investing time and energy in your relationship with your spouse and children typically doesnʼt offer that same immediate sense of achievement. Kids misbehave every day. Itʼs really not until 20 years down the road that you can put your hands on your hips and say, “I raised a good son or a good daughter.” You can neglect your relationship with your spouse, and on a day-to-day basis, it doesnʼt seem as if things are deteriorating. People who are driven to excel have this unconscious propensity to underinvest in their families and overinvest in their careers—even though intimate and loving relationships with their families are the most powerful and enduring source of happiness.
If you study the root causes of business disasters, over and over youʼll find this predisposition toward endeavors that offer immediate gratification. If you look at personal lives through that lens, youʼll see the same stunning and sobering pattern: people allocating fewer and fewer resources to the things they would have once said mattered most.
Create a Culture
Thereʼs an important model in our class called the Tools of Cooperation, which basically says that being a visionary manager isnʼt all itʼs cracked up to be. Itʼs one thing to see into the foggy future with acuity and chart the course corrections that the company must make. But itʼs quite another to persuade employees who might not see the changes ahead to line up and work cooperatively to take the company in that new direction. Knowing what tools to wield to elicit the needed cooperation is a critical managerial skill.
The theory arrays these tools along two dimensions—the extent to which members of the organization agree on what they want from their participation in the enterprise, and the extent to which they agree on what actions will produce the desired results. When there is little agreement on both axes, you have to use “power tools”—coercion, threats, punishment, and so on—to secure cooperation. Many companies start in this quadrant, which is why the founding executive team must play such an assertive role in defining what must be done and how. If employeesʼ ways of working together to address those tasks succeed over and over, consensus begins to form. MITʼs Edgar Schein has described this process as the mechanism by which a culture is built. Ultimately, people donʼt even think about whether their way of doing things yields success. They embrace priorities and follow procedures by instinct and assumption rather than by explicit decision—which means that theyʼve created a culture. Culture, in compelling but unspoken ways, dictates the proven, acceptable methods by which members of the group address recurrent problems. And culture defines the priority given to different types of problems. It can be a powerful management tool.
In using this model to address the question, How can I be sure that my family becomes an enduring source of happiness?, my students quickly see that the simplest tools that parents can wield to elicit cooperation from children are power tools. But there comes a point during the teen years when power tools no longer work. At that point parents start wishing that they had begun working with their children at a very young age to build a culture at home in which children instinctively behave respectfully toward one another, obey their parents, and choose the right thing to do. Families have cultures, just as companies do. Those cultures can be built consciously or evolve inadvertently.
If you want your kids to have strong self-esteem and confidence that they can solve hard problems, those qualities wonʼt magically materialize in high school. You have to design them into your familyʼs culture—and you have to think about this very early on. Like employees, children build self-esteem by doing things that are hard and learning what works.
Avoid the “Marginal Costs” Mistake
Weʼre taught in finance and economics that in evaluating alternative investments, we should ignore sunk and fixed costs, and instead base decisions on the marginal costs and marginal revenues that each alternative entails. We learn in our course that this doctrine biases companies to leverage what they have put in place to succeed in the past, instead of guiding them to create the capabilities theyʼll need in the future. If we knew the future would be exactly the same as the past, that approach would be fine. But if the futureʼs different—and it almost always is—then itʼs the wrong thing to do.
This theory addresses the third question I discuss with my students—how to live a life of integrity (stay out of jail). Unconsciously, we often employ the marginal cost doctrine in our personal lives when we choose between right and wrong. A voice in our head says, “Look, I know that as a general rule, most people shouldnʼt do this. But in this particular extenuating circumstance, just this once, itʼs OK.” The marginal cost of doing something wrong “just this once” always seems alluringly low. It suckers you in, and you donʼt ever look at where that path ultimately is headed and at the full costs that the choice entails. Justification for infidelity and dishonesty in all their manifestations lies in the marginal cost economics of “just this once.”
Iʼd like to share a story about how I came to understand the potential damage of “just this once” in my own life. I played on the Oxford University varsity basketball team. We worked our tails off and finished the season undefeated. The guys on the team were the best friends Iʼve ever had in my life. We got to the British equivalent of the NCAA tournament—and made it to the final four. It turned out the championship game was scheduled to be played on a Sunday. I had made a personal commitment to God at age 16 that I would never play ball on Sunday. So I went to the coach and explained my problem. He was incredulous. My teammates were, too, because I was the starting center. Every one of the guys on the team came to me and said, “Youʼve got to play. Canʼt you break the rule just this one time?”
Iʼm a deeply religious man, so I went away and prayed about what I should do. I got a very clear feeling that I shouldnʼt break my commitment—so I didnʼt play in the championship game.
In many ways that was a small decision—involving one of several thousand Sundays in my life. In theory, surely I could have crossed over the line just that one time and then not done it again. But looking back on it, resisting the temptation whose logic was “In this extenuating circumstance, just this once, itʼs OK” has proven to be one of the most important decisions of my life. Why? My life has been one unending stream of extenuating circumstances. Had I crossed the line that one time, I would have done it over and over in the years that followed.
The lesson I learned from this is that itʼs easier to hold to your principles 100% of the time than it is to hold to them 98% of the time. If you give in to “just this once,” based on a marginal cost analysis, as some of my former classmates have done, youʼll regret where you end up. Youʼve got to define for yourself what you stand for and draw the line in a safe place.
Remember the Importance of Humility
I got this insight when I was asked to teach a class on humility at Harvard College. I asked all the students to describe the most humble person they knew. One characteristic of these humble people stood out: They had a high level of self-esteem. They knew who they were, and they felt good about who they were. We also decided that humility was defined not by selfdeprecating behavior or attitudes but by the esteem with which you regard others. Good behavior flows naturally from that kind of humility. For example, you would never steal from someone, because you respect that person too much. Youʼd never lie to someone, either.
Itʼs crucial to take a sense of humility into the world. By the time you make it to a top graduate school, almost all your learning has come from people who are smarter and more experienced than you: parents, teachers, bosses. But once youʼve finished at Harvard Business School or any other top academic institution, the vast majority of people youʼll interact with on a day-today basis may not be smarter than you. And if your attitude is that only smarter people have something to teach you, your learning opportunities will be very limited. But if you have a humble eagerness to learn something from everybody, your learning opportunities will be unlimited. Generally, you can be humble only if you feel really good about yourself—and you want to help those around you feel really good about themselves, too. When we see people acting in an abusive, arrogant, or demeaning manner toward others, their behavior almost always is a symptom of their lack of self-esteem. They need to put someone else down to feel good about themselves.
Choose the Right Yardstick
This past year I was diagnosed with cancer and faced the possibility that my life would end sooner than Iʼd planned. Thankfully, it now looks as if Iʼll be spared. But the experience has given me important insight into my life.
I have a pretty clear idea of how my ideas have generated enormous revenue for companies that have used my research; I know Iʼve had a substantial impact. But as Iʼve confronted this disease, itʼs been interesting to see how unimportant that impact is to me now. Iʼve concluded that the metric by which God will assess my life isnʼt dollars but the individual people whose lives Iʼve touched.
I think thatʼs the way it will work for us all. Donʼt worry about the level of individual prominence you have achieved; worry about the individuals you have helped become better people. This is my final recommendation: Think about the metric by which your life will be judged, and make a resolution to live every day so that in the end, your life will be judged a success.
The Class of 2010
“I came to business school knowing exactly what I wanted to do—and Iʼm leaving choosing the exact opposite. Iʼve worked in the private sector all my life, because everyone always told me thatʼs where smart people are. But Iʼve decided to try government and see if I can find more meaning there.
“I used to think that industry was very safe. The recession has shown us that nothing is safe.”
Ruhana Hafiz, Harvard Business School, Class of 2010
Her Plans: To join the FBI as a special adviser (a management track position)
“You could see a shift happening at HBS. Money used to be number one in the job search. When you make a ton of money, you want more of it. Ironic thing. You start to forget what the drivers of happiness are and what things are really important. A lot of people on campus see money differently now. They think, ʻWhatʼs the minimum I need to have, and what else drives my life?ʼ instead of ʻWhatʼs the place where I can get the maximum of both?ʼ”
Patrick Chun, Harvard Business School, Class of 2010
His Plans: To join Bain Capital
“The financial crisis helped me realize that you have to do what you really love in life. My current vision of success is based on the impact I can have, the experiences I can gain, and the happiness I can find personally, much more so than the pursuit of money or prestige. My main motivations are (1) to be with my family and people I care about; (2) to do something fun, exciting, and impactful; and (3) to pursue a long-term career in entrepreneurship, where I can build companies that change the way the world works.”
Matt Salzberg, Harvard Business School, Class of 2010
His Plans: To work for Bessemer Venture Partners
“Because Iʼm returning to McKinsey, it probably seems like not all that much has changed for me. But while I was at HBS, I decided to do the dual degree at the Kennedy School. With the elections in 2008 and the economy looking shaky, it seemed more compelling for me to get a better understanding of the public and nonprofit sectors. In a way, that drove my return to McKinsey, where Iʼll have the ability to explore private, public, and nonprofit sectors.
“The recession has made us step back and take stock of how lucky we are. The crisis to us is ʻAre we going to have a job by April?ʼ Crisis to a lot of people is ʻAre we going to stay in our home?ʼ”
John Coleman, Harvard Business School, Class of 2010
His Plans: To return to McKinsey & Company
Clayton M. Christensen (cchristensen@hbs.edu) is the Robert and Jane Cizik Professor of Business Administration at Harvard Business School.
文章作者：Clayton Christensen
发表日期：2010年7月1日
发表媒体：《哈佛商业评论》Harvard Business Review
Editorʼs Note: When the members of the class of 2010 entered business school, the economy was strong and their post-graduation ambitions could be limitless. Just a few weeks later, the economy went into a tailspin. Theyʼve spent the past two years recalibrating their worldview and their definition of success.
The students seem highly aware of how the world has changed (as the sampling of views in this article shows). In the spring, Harvard Business Schoolʼs graduating class asked HBS professor Clay Christensen to address them—but not on how to apply his principles and thinking to their post-HBS careers. The students wanted to know how to apply them to their personal lives. He shared with them a set of guidelines that have helped him find meaning in his own life. Though Christensenʼs thinking comes from his deep religious faith, we believe that these are strategies anyone can use. And so we asked him to share them with the readers of HBR. To learn more about Christensenʼs work, visit his HBR Author Page.
Before I published The Innovatorʼs Dilemma, I got a call from Andrew Grove, then the chairman of Intel. He had read one of my early papers about disruptive technology, and he asked if I could talk to his direct reports and explain my research and what it implied for Intel. Excited, I flew to Silicon Valley and showed up at the appointed time, only to have Grove say, “Look, stuff has happened. We have only 10 minutes for you. Tell us what your model of disruption means for Intel.” I said that I couldnʼt—that I needed a full 30 minutes to explain the model, because only with it as context would any comments about Intel make sense. Ten minutes into my explanation, Grove interrupted: “Look, Iʼve got your model. Just tell us what it means for Intel.”
I insisted that I needed 10 more minutes to describe how the process of disruption had worked its way through a very different industry, steel, so that he and his team could understand how disruption worked. I told the story of how Nucor and other steel minimills had begun by attacking the lowest end of the market—steel reinforcing bars, or rebar—and later moved up toward the high end, undercutting the traditional steel mills.
When I finished the minimill story, Grove said, “OK, I get it. What it means for Intel is...,” and then went on to articulate what would become the companyʼs strategy for going to the bottom of the market to launch the Celeron processor.
Iʼve thought about that a million times since. If I had been suckered into telling Andy Grove what he should think about the microprocessor business, Iʼd have been killed. But instead of telling him what to think, I taught him how to think—and then he reached what I felt was the correct decision on his own.
That experience had a profound influence on me. When people ask what I think they should do, I rarely answer their question directly. Instead, I run the question aloud through one of my models. Iʼll describe how the process in the model worked its way through an industry quite different from their own. And then, more often than not, theyʼll say, “OK, I get it.” And theyʼll answer their own question more insightfully than I could have.
My class at HBS is structured to help my students understand what good management theory is and how it is built. To that backbone I attach different models or theories that help students think about the various dimensions of a general managerʼs job in stimulating innovation and growth. In each session we look at one company through the lenses of those theories—using them to explain how the company got into its situation and to examine what managerial actions will yield the needed results.
On the last day of class, I ask my students to turn those theoretical lenses on themselves, to find cogent answers to three questions: First, how can I be sure that Iʼll be happy in my career? Second, how can I be sure that my relationships with my spouse and my family become an enduring source of happiness? Third, how can I be sure Iʼll stay out of jail? Though the last question sounds lighthearted, itʼs not. Two of the 32 people in my Rhodes scholar class spent time in jail. Jeff Skilling of Enron fame was a classmate of mine at HBS. These were good guys—but something in their lives sent them off in the wrong direction.
The Class of 2010 (Located at the end of this article)
As the students discuss the answers to these questions, I open my own life to them as a case study of sorts, to illustrate how they can use the theories from our course to guide their life decisions.
One of the theories that gives great insight on the first question—how to be sure we find happiness in our careers—is from Frederick Herzberg, who asserts that the powerful motivator in our lives isnʼt money; itʼs the opportunity to learn, grow in responsibilities, contribute to others, and be recognized for achievements. I tell the students about a vision of sorts I had while I was running the company I founded before becoming an academic. In my mindʼs eye I saw one of my managers leave for work one morning with a relatively strong level of self-esteem. Then I pictured her driving home to her family 10 hours later, feeling unappreciated, frustrated, underutilized, and demeaned. I imagined how profoundly her lowered self-esteem affected the way she interacted with her children. The vision in my mind then fast-forwarded to another day, when she drove home with greater self-esteem—feeling that she had learned a lot, been recognized for achieving valuable things, and played a significant role in the success of some important initiatives. I then imagined how positively that affected her as a spouse and a parent. My conclusion: Management is the most noble of professions if itʼs practiced well. No other occupation offers as many ways to help others learn and grow, take responsibility and be recognized for achievement, and contribute to the success of a team. More and more MBA students come to school thinking that a career in business means buying, selling, and investing in companies. Thatʼs unfortunate. Doing deals doesnʼt yield the deep rewards that come from building up people.
I want students to leave my classroom knowing that.
Create a Strategy for Your Life
A theory that is helpful in answering the second question—How can I ensure that my relationship with my family proves to be an enduring source of happiness?—concerns how strategy is defined and implemented. Its primary insight is that a companyʼs strategy is determined by the types of initiatives that management invests in. If a companyʼs resource allocation process is not managed masterfully, what emerges from it can be very different from what management intended. Because companiesʼ decision-making systems are designed to steer investments to initiatives that offer the most tangible and immediate returns, companies shortchange investments in initiatives that are crucial to their long-term strategies.
Over the years Iʼve watched the fates of my HBS classmates from 1979 unfold; Iʼve seen more and more of them come to reunions unhappy, divorced, and alienated from their children. I can guarantee you that not a single one of them graduated with the deliberate strategy of getting divorced and raising children who would become estranged from them. And yet a shocking number of them implemented that strategy. The reason? They didnʼt keep the purpose of their lives front and center as they decided how to spend their time, talents, and energy.
Itʼs quite startling that a significant fraction of the 900 students that HBS draws each year from the worldʼs best have given little thought to the purpose of their lives. I tell the students that HBS might be one of their last chances to reflect deeply on that question. If they think that theyʼll have more time and energy to reflect later, theyʼre nuts, because life only gets more demanding: You take on a mortgage; youʼre working 70 hours a week; you have a spouse and children.
For me, having a clear purpose in my life has been essential. But it was something I had to think long and hard about before I understood it. When I was a Rhodes scholar, I was in a very demanding academic program, trying to cram an extra yearʼs worth of work into my time at Oxford. I decided to spend an hour every night reading, thinking, and praying about why God put me on this earth. That was a very challenging commitment to keep, because every hour I spent doing that, I wasnʼt studying applied econometrics. I was conflicted about whether I could really afford to take that time away from my studies, but I stuck with it—and ultimately figured out the purpose of my life.
Had I instead spent that hour each day learning the latest techniques for mastering the problems of autocorrelation in regression analysis, I would have badly misspent my life. I apply the tools of econometrics a few times a year, but I apply my knowledge of the purpose of my life every day. Itʼs the single most useful thing Iʼve ever learned. I promise my students that if they take the time to figure out their life purpose, theyʼll look back on it as the most important thing they discovered at HBS. If they donʼt figure it out, they will just sail off without a rudder and get buffeted in the very rough seas of life. Clarity about their purpose will trump knowledge of activity-based costing, balanced scorecards, core competence, disruptive innovation, the four Ps, and the five forces.
My purpose grew out of my religious faith, but faith isnʼt the only thing that gives people direction. For example, one of my former students decided that his purpose was to bring honesty and economic prosperity to his country and to raise children who were as capably committed to this cause, and to each other, as he was. His purpose is focused on family and others—as mine is.
The choice and successful pursuit of a profession is but one tool for achieving your purpose. But without a purpose, life can become hollow.
Allocate Your Resources
Your decisions about allocating your personal time, energy, and talent ultimately shape your lifeʼs strategy.
I have a bunch of “businesses” that compete for these resources: Iʼm trying to have a rewarding relationship with my wife, raise great kids, contribute to my community, succeed in my career, contribute to my church, and so on. And I have exactly the same problem that a corporation does. I have a limited amount of time and energy and talent. How much do I devote to each of these pursuits?
Allocation choices can make your life turn out to be very different from what you intended. Sometimes thatʼs good: Opportunities that you never planned for emerge. But if you misinvest your resources, the outcome can be bad. As I think about my former classmates who inadvertently invested for lives of hollow unhappiness, I canʼt help believing that their troubles relate right back to a short-term perspective.
When people who have a high need for achievement—and that includes all Harvard Business School graduates—have an extra half hour of time or an extra ounce of energy, theyʼll unconsciously allocate it to activities that yield the most tangible accomplishments. And our careers provide the most concrete evidence that weʼre moving forward. You ship a product, finish a design, complete a presentation, close a sale, teach a class, publish a paper, get paid, get promoted. In contrast, investing time and energy in your relationship with your spouse and children typically doesnʼt offer that same immediate sense of achievement. Kids misbehave every day. Itʼs really not until 20 years down the road that you can put your hands on your hips and say, “I raised a good son or a good daughter.” You can neglect your relationship with your spouse, and on a day-to-day basis, it doesnʼt seem as if things are deteriorating. People who are driven to excel have this unconscious propensity to underinvest in their families and overinvest in their careers—even though intimate and loving relationships with their families are the most powerful and enduring source of happiness.
If you study the root causes of business disasters, over and over youʼll find this predisposition toward endeavors that offer immediate gratification. If you look at personal lives through that lens, youʼll see the same stunning and sobering pattern: people allocating fewer and fewer resources to the things they would have once said mattered most.
Create a Culture
Thereʼs an important model in our class called the Tools of Cooperation, which basically says that being a visionary manager isnʼt all itʼs cracked up to be. Itʼs one thing to see into the foggy future with acuity and chart the course corrections that the company must make. But itʼs quite another to persuade employees who might not see the changes ahead to line up and work cooperatively to take the company in that new direction. Knowing what tools to wield to elicit the needed cooperation is a critical managerial skill.
The theory arrays these tools along two dimensions—the extent to which members of the organization agree on what they want from their participation in the enterprise, and the extent to which they agree on what actions will produce the desired results. When there is little agreement on both axes, you have to use “power tools”—coercion, threats, punishment, and so on—to secure cooperation. Many companies start in this quadrant, which is why the founding executive team must play such an assertive role in defining what must be done and how. If employeesʼ ways of working together to address those tasks succeed over and over, consensus begins to form. MITʼs Edgar Schein has described this process as the mechanism by which a culture is built. Ultimately, people donʼt even think about whether their way of doing things yields success. They embrace priorities and follow procedures by instinct and assumption rather than by explicit decision—which means that theyʼve created a culture. Culture, in compelling but unspoken ways, dictates the proven, acceptable methods by which members of the group address recurrent problems. And culture defines the priority given to different types of problems. It can be a powerful management tool.
In using this model to address the question, How can I be sure that my family becomes an enduring source of happiness?, my students quickly see that the simplest tools that parents can wield to elicit cooperation from children are power tools. But there comes a point during the teen years when power tools no longer work. At that point parents start wishing that they had begun working with their children at a very young age to build a culture at home in which children instinctively behave respectfully toward one another, obey their parents, and choose the right thing to do. Families have cultures, just as companies do. Those cultures can be built consciously or evolve inadvertently.
If you want your kids to have strong self-esteem and confidence that they can solve hard problems, those qualities wonʼt magically materialize in high school. You have to design them into your familyʼs culture—and you have to think about this very early on. Like employees, children build self-esteem by doing things that are hard and learning what works.
Avoid the “Marginal Costs” Mistake
Weʼre taught in finance and economics that in evaluating alternative investments, we should ignore sunk and fixed costs, and instead base decisions on the marginal costs and marginal revenues that each alternative entails. We learn in our course that this doctrine biases companies to leverage what they have put in place to succeed in the past, instead of guiding them to create the capabilities theyʼll need in the future. If we knew the future would be exactly the same as the past, that approach would be fine. But if the futureʼs different—and it almost always is—then itʼs the wrong thing to do.
This theory addresses the third question I discuss with my students—how to live a life of integrity (stay out of jail). Unconsciously, we often employ the marginal cost doctrine in our personal lives when we choose between right and wrong. A voice in our head says, “Look, I know that as a general rule, most people shouldnʼt do this. But in this particular extenuating circumstance, just this once, itʼs OK.” The marginal cost of doing something wrong “just this once” always seems alluringly low. It suckers you in, and you donʼt ever look at where that path ultimately is headed and at the full costs that the choice entails. Justification for infidelity and dishonesty in all their manifestations lies in the marginal cost economics of “just this once.”
Iʼd like to share a story about how I came to understand the potential damage of “just this once” in my own life. I played on the Oxford University varsity basketball team. We worked our tails off and finished the season undefeated. The guys on the team were the best friends Iʼve ever had in my life. We got to the British equivalent of the NCAA tournament—and made it to the final four. It turned out the championship game was scheduled to be played on a Sunday. I had made a personal commitment to God at age 16 that I would never play ball on Sunday. So I went to the coach and explained my problem. He was incredulous. My teammates were, too, because I was the starting center. Every one of the guys on the team came to me and said, “Youʼve got to play. Canʼt you break the rule just this one time?”
Iʼm a deeply religious man, so I went away and prayed about what I should do. I got a very clear feeling that I shouldnʼt break my commitment—so I didnʼt play in the championship game.
In many ways that was a small decision—involving one of several thousand Sundays in my life. In theory, surely I could have crossed over the line just that one time and then not done it again. But looking back on it, resisting the temptation whose logic was “In this extenuating circumstance, just this once, itʼs OK” has proven to be one of the most important decisions of my life. Why? My life has been one unending stream of extenuating circumstances. Had I crossed the line that one time, I would have done it over and over in the years that followed.
The lesson I learned from this is that itʼs easier to hold to your principles 100% of the time than it is to hold to them 98% of the time. If you give in to “just this once,” based on a marginal cost analysis, as some of my former classmates have done, youʼll regret where you end up. Youʼve got to define for yourself what you stand for and draw the line in a safe place.
Remember the Importance of Humility
I got this insight when I was asked to teach a class on humility at Harvard College. I asked all the students to describe the most humble person they knew. One characteristic of these humble people stood out: They had a high level of self-esteem. They knew who they were, and they felt good about who they were. We also decided that humility was defined not by selfdeprecating behavior or attitudes but by the esteem with which you regard others. Good behavior flows naturally from that kind of humility. For example, you would never steal from someone, because you respect that person too much. Youʼd never lie to someone, either.
Itʼs crucial to take a sense of humility into the world. By the time you make it to a top graduate school, almost all your learning has come from people who are smarter and more experienced than you: parents, teachers, bosses. But once youʼve finished at Harvard Business School or any other top academic institution, the vast majority of people youʼll interact with on a day-today basis may not be smarter than you. And if your attitude is that only smarter people have something to teach you, your learning opportunities will be very limited. But if you have a humble eagerness to learn something from everybody, your learning opportunities will be unlimited. Generally, you can be humble only if you feel really good about yourself—and you want to help those around you feel really good about themselves, too. When we see people acting in an abusive, arrogant, or demeaning manner toward others, their behavior almost always is a symptom of their lack of self-esteem. They need to put someone else down to feel good about themselves.
Choose the Right Yardstick
This past year I was diagnosed with cancer and faced the possibility that my life would end sooner than Iʼd planned. Thankfully, it now looks as if Iʼll be spared. But the experience has given me important insight into my life.
I have a pretty clear idea of how my ideas have generated enormous revenue for companies that have used my research; I know Iʼve had a substantial impact. But as Iʼve confronted this disease, itʼs been interesting to see how unimportant that impact is to me now. Iʼve concluded that the metric by which God will assess my life isnʼt dollars but the individual people whose lives Iʼve touched.
I think thatʼs the way it will work for us all. Donʼt worry about the level of individual prominence you have achieved; worry about the individuals you have helped become better people. This is my final recommendation: Think about the metric by which your life will be judged, and make a resolution to live every day so that in the end, your life will be judged a success.
The Class of 2010
“I came to business school knowing exactly what I wanted to do—and Iʼm leaving choosing the exact opposite. Iʼve worked in the private sector all my life, because everyone always told me thatʼs where smart people are. But Iʼve decided to try government and see if I can find more meaning there.
“I used to think that industry was very safe. The recession has shown us that nothing is safe.”
Ruhana Hafiz, Harvard Business School, Class of 2010
Her Plans: To join the FBI as a special adviser (a management track position)
“You could see a shift happening at HBS. Money used to be number one in the job search. When you make a ton of money, you want more of it. Ironic thing. You start to forget what the drivers of happiness are and what things are really important. A lot of people on campus see money differently now. They think, ʻWhatʼs the minimum I need to have, and what else drives my life?ʼ instead of ʻWhatʼs the place where I can get the maximum of both?ʼ”
Patrick Chun, Harvard Business School, Class of 2010
His Plans: To join Bain Capital
“The financial crisis helped me realize that you have to do what you really love in life. My current vision of success is based on the impact I can have, the experiences I can gain, and the happiness I can find personally, much more so than the pursuit of money or prestige. My main motivations are (1) to be with my family and people I care about; (2) to do something fun, exciting, and impactful; and (3) to pursue a long-term career in entrepreneurship, where I can build companies that change the way the world works.”
Matt Salzberg, Harvard Business School, Class of 2010
His Plans: To work for Bessemer Venture Partners
“Because Iʼm returning to McKinsey, it probably seems like not all that much has changed for me. But while I was at HBS, I decided to do the dual degree at the Kennedy School. With the elections in 2008 and the economy looking shaky, it seemed more compelling for me to get a better understanding of the public and nonprofit sectors. In a way, that drove my return to McKinsey, where Iʼll have the ability to explore private, public, and nonprofit sectors.
“The recession has made us step back and take stock of how lucky we are. The crisis to us is ʻAre we going to have a job by April?ʼ Crisis to a lot of people is ʻAre we going to stay in our home?ʼ”
John Coleman, Harvard Business School, Class of 2010
His Plans: To return to McKinsey & Company
Clayton M. Christensen (cchristensen@hbs.edu) is the Robert and Jane Cizik Professor of Business Administration at Harvard Business School.
Tuesday, June 21, 2011
提升国民素养，迈向优质民主
文章标题：提升国民素养，迈向优质民主——新加坡大选启示
文章作者：霍韬晦
发表日期：2011年6月21日
发表媒体：《联合早报•言论》
在刚过去的一个月，新加坡爆发了自独立以来从未有过如此震撼的政治风云，吸引全球视线，使执政党痛切反省，选后立即启动了一连串的政治措施；专家学者和普罗市民都纷纷发表意见，关切之情至今未息。
这是好事。《易经》《震卦》之后就是《艮卦》。
《震》是危机管理，当雷响的时候，大家会惊惧。其卦辞云：“震来虩虩，笑言哑哑；震惊百里，不丧匕鬯。”什么意思？就是执政者平时要有戒惧心、要有忧患感。新加坡承平太久了，经济发展、人民生活水平都居世界前列。这样的成果让执政党掉以轻心，过去的功劳谁能抹煞？国民应该满意和继续信赖，只要萧规曹随，便能稳步前进；于是对当前形势的变化估计不足，民情不能上达，致在大选中失去六个议席，并赔上两位优秀的阁员。在野工人党能在阿裕尼集选区获胜，正是在于其能攻执政党之弱，说他们封闭，单边单向，未能聆听人民的声音，因此需要有新的代表进入国会。可见今后无论谁来当家，都要居安思危，时时警惕，才能“言笑哑哑”。这一次，我觉得执政党是受到了教训。
有人认为：这次新加坡大选显示了民主潮流不可抗拒，并将之与突尼斯的“茉莉花革命”、“阿拉伯之春”联系起来，说这是“新加坡之春”。我觉得完全不类：突尼斯、埃及、利比亚，是民生问题、种族问题、资源分配不公问题、特权问题、腐败问题，新加坡基本上没有这些问题，新加坡政府非常廉洁，管治有序、高效，人民守法，生活安定，两者根本不可相提并论。
至于民主，这倒是值得研究。国外观点：总以为民主是必然，所以两党政治、直选也是必然。新加坡没有强大的反对党，长期以来都是一党执政，没有监督、没有异己声音、没有两党轮替，人民就没有选择，所以不对。这次工人党作了历史上的突破，将来是否能够再上层楼，成为强大的反对党呢？乃至有执政机会呢？很多人对此表示兴奋，认为执政党应该优容工人党，给他们成长的机会，这样新加坡就有可能实现政党轮替，成为真正的民主国家。
工人党有没有执政野心？她具不具备执政条件？这一连串问题目前可以不论，因为距离尚远。问题是把民主理解为政党轮替、两党政治、互相监督的这一操作形式很浅陋。我们不要以为美国的两党政治很成功便照搬。事实上美国共和、民主两党的剧斗已危害了国家利益，选民的分裂将导致整体的分裂。日本、台湾之执政党亦曾经长期独大，但经济发展顺利，至反对党形成，问鼎中原，政局就开始动荡，经济亦滑坡。至于反对党何以坐大？在日本是自民党腐败，在台湾是国民党有意栽培（台湾国民党总统李登辉是台湾民主之父，民进党总统陈水扁是台湾民主之子，虽然后来成为民主之耻）。日本在最近二十年，已换了十五任首相，台湾则族群撕裂，为祸不知何日方止。我不是反对政党轮替，也不是反对民主，但殷鉴不远，新加坡人要认识清楚。
民主不是凭借简单的理念就可以推行；何况，民主只是一种机制，一种通过选举来产生政府的机制。凡通过这个机制来取得政权的，就是合法政府，因为它具备人民的认受性，但并不保证其施政可以让人民受益，或令人民满意。这可以解释日本为什么那么频繁地更换首相，许多新任领导人上台不久民望就直线下泻的原因。
管治一个国家不简单，如何寻觅一个有能力、有魅力、有识见的人出任领袖更不简单。中国过去推崇禅让政治，至禹而改变。禹不是有私心，而是人民的选择。当时“朝觐讼狱者，不之益而之启；讴歌者不讴歌益而讴歌启”（《孟子•万章上》），这就是人民的选择。所谓“天视自我民视，天听自我民听”，居上位者必须倾听人民的声音。这一点，孟子与当今的民主政治并无二致，理想政治必以民为本，急民之所急。所不同者，是其操作形式，领袖的产生没有经过有效、可靠的选举程序；而在观念上，亦未产生西方近代的人权；政权的合法性仍然归诸天命。这是时代的局限，未可苛求。今天我们有了清晰的选举形式，选举人和被选举人的资格都有了严格规定，但这就绝对公正了吗？世界上许多地区标榜民主选举，不是同样有贿选、舞弊、恐吓等手段发生吗？所以问题不在选举的形式，而在选举的文化、国民的质素。大家是否尊重规则，尊敬对手？不恶意攻击、不罗织罪名、不存心丑化、不玩弄手段，而公平较量，作君子之争？
从这一次新加坡大选，使人欣慰的是：双方都很有风度，当选的工人党代表，亦很谦虚，这是在台湾和香港所看不到的，难怪有人称之为“优质民主”。不过“优质民主”的概念应该有更多的内涵。我研究西方民主已有多年，从古希腊的城邦民主，到近代西方自由主义民主，到当代美式民主与亚洲邯郸学步的民主，我发觉它已经逐步走向颠倒，亢龙有悔。为什么？因为产生民主的文化底蕴没有了，培养人的正面的价值的教育没有了，民主只是一套寡头的制度。民主要求人人参与，不要放弃自己的权利，但参与者若没有公共目的，没有一个要实现或要奋斗的整体目标与终极理想，便只有现实的社会议题，随眼前利益而转，这必然会造成吵闹和内部消耗。人只有现实地生活，但失去意义，就不能安身立命。这种精神上的虚无，其祸患比什么都大。但现代人或新加坡人，有这样的危机感吗？民主若只提供运作方式，不提供内容，有用吗？
有感于此，我在七、八年前已提出“优质民主”的概念，不只要求选举制度的公平、透明、合理，还要求执政者向全民提供民主教育、道德教育、生命教育、文化教育，以提高选举人和被选举人的素养。只有把人的素养提高，民主的质素才能保证。
通过这次大选，我认为新加坡有此条件。人民行动党虽然受到挫折，但观乎李显龙总理从善如流，立即改组内阁，广听民意，又设立委员会检讨部长薪金，很符合《震卦》“不丧匕鬯”之义。领袖能够临危不乱，便可以“守宗庙社稷”。跟着，我想，政府就要订出改革目标，以符合从《震》到《艮》的创新历程；化古为今，在世界民主政制中，先行一步。
作者为思想文化学者，香港东方人文学院院长
文章作者：霍韬晦
发表日期：2011年6月21日
发表媒体：《联合早报•言论》
在刚过去的一个月，新加坡爆发了自独立以来从未有过如此震撼的政治风云，吸引全球视线，使执政党痛切反省，选后立即启动了一连串的政治措施；专家学者和普罗市民都纷纷发表意见，关切之情至今未息。
这是好事。《易经》《震卦》之后就是《艮卦》。
《震》是危机管理，当雷响的时候，大家会惊惧。其卦辞云：“震来虩虩，笑言哑哑；震惊百里，不丧匕鬯。”什么意思？就是执政者平时要有戒惧心、要有忧患感。新加坡承平太久了，经济发展、人民生活水平都居世界前列。这样的成果让执政党掉以轻心，过去的功劳谁能抹煞？国民应该满意和继续信赖，只要萧规曹随，便能稳步前进；于是对当前形势的变化估计不足，民情不能上达，致在大选中失去六个议席，并赔上两位优秀的阁员。在野工人党能在阿裕尼集选区获胜，正是在于其能攻执政党之弱，说他们封闭，单边单向，未能聆听人民的声音，因此需要有新的代表进入国会。可见今后无论谁来当家，都要居安思危，时时警惕，才能“言笑哑哑”。这一次，我觉得执政党是受到了教训。
有人认为：这次新加坡大选显示了民主潮流不可抗拒，并将之与突尼斯的“茉莉花革命”、“阿拉伯之春”联系起来，说这是“新加坡之春”。我觉得完全不类：突尼斯、埃及、利比亚，是民生问题、种族问题、资源分配不公问题、特权问题、腐败问题，新加坡基本上没有这些问题，新加坡政府非常廉洁，管治有序、高效，人民守法，生活安定，两者根本不可相提并论。
至于民主，这倒是值得研究。国外观点：总以为民主是必然，所以两党政治、直选也是必然。新加坡没有强大的反对党，长期以来都是一党执政，没有监督、没有异己声音、没有两党轮替，人民就没有选择，所以不对。这次工人党作了历史上的突破，将来是否能够再上层楼，成为强大的反对党呢？乃至有执政机会呢？很多人对此表示兴奋，认为执政党应该优容工人党，给他们成长的机会，这样新加坡就有可能实现政党轮替，成为真正的民主国家。
工人党有没有执政野心？她具不具备执政条件？这一连串问题目前可以不论，因为距离尚远。问题是把民主理解为政党轮替、两党政治、互相监督的这一操作形式很浅陋。我们不要以为美国的两党政治很成功便照搬。事实上美国共和、民主两党的剧斗已危害了国家利益，选民的分裂将导致整体的分裂。日本、台湾之执政党亦曾经长期独大，但经济发展顺利，至反对党形成，问鼎中原，政局就开始动荡，经济亦滑坡。至于反对党何以坐大？在日本是自民党腐败，在台湾是国民党有意栽培（台湾国民党总统李登辉是台湾民主之父，民进党总统陈水扁是台湾民主之子，虽然后来成为民主之耻）。日本在最近二十年，已换了十五任首相，台湾则族群撕裂，为祸不知何日方止。我不是反对政党轮替，也不是反对民主，但殷鉴不远，新加坡人要认识清楚。
民主不是凭借简单的理念就可以推行；何况，民主只是一种机制，一种通过选举来产生政府的机制。凡通过这个机制来取得政权的，就是合法政府，因为它具备人民的认受性，但并不保证其施政可以让人民受益，或令人民满意。这可以解释日本为什么那么频繁地更换首相，许多新任领导人上台不久民望就直线下泻的原因。
管治一个国家不简单，如何寻觅一个有能力、有魅力、有识见的人出任领袖更不简单。中国过去推崇禅让政治，至禹而改变。禹不是有私心，而是人民的选择。当时“朝觐讼狱者，不之益而之启；讴歌者不讴歌益而讴歌启”（《孟子•万章上》），这就是人民的选择。所谓“天视自我民视，天听自我民听”，居上位者必须倾听人民的声音。这一点，孟子与当今的民主政治并无二致，理想政治必以民为本，急民之所急。所不同者，是其操作形式，领袖的产生没有经过有效、可靠的选举程序；而在观念上，亦未产生西方近代的人权；政权的合法性仍然归诸天命。这是时代的局限，未可苛求。今天我们有了清晰的选举形式，选举人和被选举人的资格都有了严格规定，但这就绝对公正了吗？世界上许多地区标榜民主选举，不是同样有贿选、舞弊、恐吓等手段发生吗？所以问题不在选举的形式，而在选举的文化、国民的质素。大家是否尊重规则，尊敬对手？不恶意攻击、不罗织罪名、不存心丑化、不玩弄手段，而公平较量，作君子之争？
从这一次新加坡大选，使人欣慰的是：双方都很有风度，当选的工人党代表，亦很谦虚，这是在台湾和香港所看不到的，难怪有人称之为“优质民主”。不过“优质民主”的概念应该有更多的内涵。我研究西方民主已有多年，从古希腊的城邦民主，到近代西方自由主义民主，到当代美式民主与亚洲邯郸学步的民主，我发觉它已经逐步走向颠倒，亢龙有悔。为什么？因为产生民主的文化底蕴没有了，培养人的正面的价值的教育没有了，民主只是一套寡头的制度。民主要求人人参与，不要放弃自己的权利，但参与者若没有公共目的，没有一个要实现或要奋斗的整体目标与终极理想，便只有现实的社会议题，随眼前利益而转，这必然会造成吵闹和内部消耗。人只有现实地生活，但失去意义，就不能安身立命。这种精神上的虚无，其祸患比什么都大。但现代人或新加坡人，有这样的危机感吗？民主若只提供运作方式，不提供内容，有用吗？
有感于此，我在七、八年前已提出“优质民主”的概念，不只要求选举制度的公平、透明、合理，还要求执政者向全民提供民主教育、道德教育、生命教育、文化教育，以提高选举人和被选举人的素养。只有把人的素养提高，民主的质素才能保证。
通过这次大选，我认为新加坡有此条件。人民行动党虽然受到挫折，但观乎李显龙总理从善如流，立即改组内阁，广听民意，又设立委员会检讨部长薪金，很符合《震卦》“不丧匕鬯”之义。领袖能够临危不乱，便可以“守宗庙社稷”。跟着，我想，政府就要订出改革目标，以符合从《震》到《艮》的创新历程；化古为今，在世界民主政制中，先行一步。
作者为思想文化学者，香港东方人文学院院长
Friday, May 27, 2011
如何避免掉入民主政治的陷阱？
文章标题：如何避免掉入民主政治的陷阱？
文章作者：颜国伟
发表日期：2011年5月27日
发表媒体：《联合早报•言论》
假如你是一家上市公司的董事会主席，股东大会你只获得60%股东的支持，你会怎么做？
一、去了解这60%的股东为什么这么支持你？
二、尽力向另外40%的股东收集他们不支持你的原因，然后全力解决所有的问题？
从这个角度看这次新加坡大选所产生的舆论，可以看到焦点都在第二个选择。所有舆论几乎全都集中于报道与分析，为什么执政党失去选民的支持，以及政府该如何改变作风，多听取民意等等。诚然，这样的检讨是有其现实的必要性的，有如孟子所言：“得天下有道，得其民，斯得天下矣。得其民有道，得其心，斯得民矣。得其心有道，所欲与之聚之，所恶勿施尔也”。
然而，从选举结果到思考问题的根源在哪里，以便找出解决之道，长远看来，很难避免不出现庄子所言的“道术将为天下裂”，最终走向一个分化，甚至分裂的局面。因为有问题必然就有对立，有辩难，有反驳，有攻乎异己，有强调己意。随着全球局势的急剧变动，旧的问题还没解决，新的问题已经出现，而且每个人都可以根据自己的经历、感受、动机的不同，通过网上社交媒体抒发己见，加强影响力。任何政府要在施政上做到令大家都觉得受到照顾，受到尊重，根本是不可能的事。
让我们回顾一下1959年自治邦时代的一些要点。除了棘手的民生问题之外，当时的社会还存在着极具煽动性的语言、种族、宗教问题。当时的选民选党不选人，热烈拥护人民行动党上台执政，不是因为行动党就现实问题捞取了政治资本，而是因为行动党提出了一个凝聚民心的理念——建设一个公正平等的民主社会，是这个理想召唤了人心。从这段历史，我们得出的结论是，唯有打动民心的理想，才能凝聚人心，单向的问题导向思维，只会制造分化与分裂，很难不掉入民主政治的陷阱，出现在政党轮替的竞争中，夹杂现实利益与利害的破坏性作用。
五十年的建国路，行动党功不可没地使新加坡在经济发展上成为第一世界国家，但是经济发展并无法令国人感到快乐。盖洛普从2005年至2009年就全球155个国家的快乐指数调查结果显示，新加坡排行第81位，反映这几年新加坡虽然在全球经济衰退的时局之中取得骄人的经济成果，国人皆有增长花红可分，但整体上新加坡人还是不快乐。这次的选举可以解读成国人通过选票来反映自己的不快乐。
美国明尼苏达大学教授凯特琳（Katherine Vohs）的大量研究发现，一个重视金钱的人，行为会更加自我中心，更具斗争性。从种种社会现象来看，我们的表现似乎如此，所以我们都不快乐。
当代著名的心理学家荣格（Carl Jung）说过，人之所以不快乐，是因为缺乏信念。他也指出，人生最大和最重要的问题，在某种意义上来说是根本无法解决的，只能够被超越。如果个人能够把视野打开，具有更高更广阔的关怀，现实中那些无法解决的问题，将显得不那么迫切。日本人今年面对超强的大地震、核泄漏所带来的种种生命攸关的考验时，能够临危不乱，守望相助，印证了荣格于上世纪二十年代的真知灼见。
因此，我认为新加坡政治的分水岭不仅仅是反对党攻破了集选区的堡垒，也不只是资深政治领袖的退位，更在于要求我们一起来反思，面对未来，我们的共同理想是什么？过去，我们的社会能够安于以经济建设作为人心凝聚的号角，但趋势越来越明显，寡头的经济发展无法安顿躁动不安的人心。如何让国人在维持生计或致富之外，有更高更宽广意义的快乐，才能提升民主政治的素质，避免掉入民主政治的陷阱。
是时候掀开人文建设的新篇章，向日本学习。这是一项艰巨而长远的工程，它是良性的政治安全网，对国人乃至对有志于政治的人士都好。如果等到陷入民主政治的泥潭之后才来行动，恐怕良机已失，为时已晚。
本文作者在私人企业界从事人力开发工作
文章作者：颜国伟
发表日期：2011年5月27日
发表媒体：《联合早报•言论》
假如你是一家上市公司的董事会主席，股东大会你只获得60%股东的支持，你会怎么做？
一、去了解这60%的股东为什么这么支持你？
二、尽力向另外40%的股东收集他们不支持你的原因，然后全力解决所有的问题？
从这个角度看这次新加坡大选所产生的舆论，可以看到焦点都在第二个选择。所有舆论几乎全都集中于报道与分析，为什么执政党失去选民的支持，以及政府该如何改变作风，多听取民意等等。诚然，这样的检讨是有其现实的必要性的，有如孟子所言：“得天下有道，得其民，斯得天下矣。得其民有道，得其心，斯得民矣。得其心有道，所欲与之聚之，所恶勿施尔也”。
然而，从选举结果到思考问题的根源在哪里，以便找出解决之道，长远看来，很难避免不出现庄子所言的“道术将为天下裂”，最终走向一个分化，甚至分裂的局面。因为有问题必然就有对立，有辩难，有反驳，有攻乎异己，有强调己意。随着全球局势的急剧变动，旧的问题还没解决，新的问题已经出现，而且每个人都可以根据自己的经历、感受、动机的不同，通过网上社交媒体抒发己见，加强影响力。任何政府要在施政上做到令大家都觉得受到照顾，受到尊重，根本是不可能的事。
让我们回顾一下1959年自治邦时代的一些要点。除了棘手的民生问题之外，当时的社会还存在着极具煽动性的语言、种族、宗教问题。当时的选民选党不选人，热烈拥护人民行动党上台执政，不是因为行动党就现实问题捞取了政治资本，而是因为行动党提出了一个凝聚民心的理念——建设一个公正平等的民主社会，是这个理想召唤了人心。从这段历史，我们得出的结论是，唯有打动民心的理想，才能凝聚人心，单向的问题导向思维，只会制造分化与分裂，很难不掉入民主政治的陷阱，出现在政党轮替的竞争中，夹杂现实利益与利害的破坏性作用。
五十年的建国路，行动党功不可没地使新加坡在经济发展上成为第一世界国家，但是经济发展并无法令国人感到快乐。盖洛普从2005年至2009年就全球155个国家的快乐指数调查结果显示，新加坡排行第81位，反映这几年新加坡虽然在全球经济衰退的时局之中取得骄人的经济成果，国人皆有增长花红可分，但整体上新加坡人还是不快乐。这次的选举可以解读成国人通过选票来反映自己的不快乐。
美国明尼苏达大学教授凯特琳（Katherine Vohs）的大量研究发现，一个重视金钱的人，行为会更加自我中心，更具斗争性。从种种社会现象来看，我们的表现似乎如此，所以我们都不快乐。
当代著名的心理学家荣格（Carl Jung）说过，人之所以不快乐，是因为缺乏信念。他也指出，人生最大和最重要的问题，在某种意义上来说是根本无法解决的，只能够被超越。如果个人能够把视野打开，具有更高更广阔的关怀，现实中那些无法解决的问题，将显得不那么迫切。日本人今年面对超强的大地震、核泄漏所带来的种种生命攸关的考验时，能够临危不乱，守望相助，印证了荣格于上世纪二十年代的真知灼见。
因此，我认为新加坡政治的分水岭不仅仅是反对党攻破了集选区的堡垒，也不只是资深政治领袖的退位，更在于要求我们一起来反思，面对未来，我们的共同理想是什么？过去，我们的社会能够安于以经济建设作为人心凝聚的号角，但趋势越来越明显，寡头的经济发展无法安顿躁动不安的人心。如何让国人在维持生计或致富之外，有更高更宽广意义的快乐，才能提升民主政治的素质，避免掉入民主政治的陷阱。
是时候掀开人文建设的新篇章，向日本学习。这是一项艰巨而长远的工程，它是良性的政治安全网，对国人乃至对有志于政治的人士都好。如果等到陷入民主政治的泥潭之后才来行动，恐怕良机已失，为时已晚。
本文作者在私人企业界从事人力开发工作
Monday, May 23, 2011
Moral behind story of the four wives
文章标题：Moral behind story of the four wives
文章作者：Geoff Tan
发表日期：2011年5月23日
发表媒体：《我报》My Paper
I AM well aware that Singapore does not encourage bigamy but, nonetheless, there is a lesson to learn from this story about a rich merchant with four wives.
The man loved his fourth wife the most and gave her only the best. He also loved his third wife, and was always showing her off to his friends.
His second wife was the confidante whom he turned to when he had problems. And his first wife was loyal to him and helped him to maintain his wealth and business, and took care of the household. However, the merchant hardly took notice of her.
One day, the merchant fell ill and was told that he would soon die. He thought of his life of luxury and told himself: “Now, I have four wives. But when I die, I’ll be alone. How lonely I’ll be!”
He asked the fourth wife: “I’ve loved you most and given you the finest clothing. Now that I’m dying, would you follow me and keep me company?”
She replied: “No way!” Then she walked away. That hurt him terribly.
The man asked his third wife the same thing, but she replied: “Life is so good here! I’m going to remarry when you die!” The merchant’s heart sank.
He asked the second wife: “I’ve always turned to you for help, and you’ve always helped me. When I die, would you follow me and keep me company?” She replied: “At most, I can only send you to your grave.” The merchant was devastated.
Then, his first wife spoke: “I’ll leave with you. I’ll follow you wherever you go.” She was skinny, and seemed almost as if she was suffering from malnutrition. In tears, the merchant said: “I should have taken better care of you when I could!”
What is the moral of this story? Well, let’s consider that we each have four “wives” in our lives. The fourth “wife” is our body. No matter how much time and effort we take to make it look good, it will leave us when we die.
Our third “wife” would be our possessions, status and wealth. When we die, others will take them from us. The second “wife” is our family and friends. Even if they are alive, the furthest they can stay with us is up to the grave.
The first “wife” is, in fact, our soul, the part that will be with us when we die. It is ironic that our soul is often neglected in our pursuit of material goals.
And when we eventually realise how important this first “wife” is, many of us will regret how we have neglected it for most of our lives, and wish we had paid more attention to it.
I’m sure you know now which “wife” you should look after most!
The writer is a senior vice-president of Singapore Press Holdings’ marketing division.
文章作者：Geoff Tan
发表日期：2011年5月23日
发表媒体：《我报》My Paper
I AM well aware that Singapore does not encourage bigamy but, nonetheless, there is a lesson to learn from this story about a rich merchant with four wives.
The man loved his fourth wife the most and gave her only the best. He also loved his third wife, and was always showing her off to his friends.
His second wife was the confidante whom he turned to when he had problems. And his first wife was loyal to him and helped him to maintain his wealth and business, and took care of the household. However, the merchant hardly took notice of her.
One day, the merchant fell ill and was told that he would soon die. He thought of his life of luxury and told himself: “Now, I have four wives. But when I die, I’ll be alone. How lonely I’ll be!”
He asked the fourth wife: “I’ve loved you most and given you the finest clothing. Now that I’m dying, would you follow me and keep me company?”
She replied: “No way!” Then she walked away. That hurt him terribly.
The man asked his third wife the same thing, but she replied: “Life is so good here! I’m going to remarry when you die!” The merchant’s heart sank.
He asked the second wife: “I’ve always turned to you for help, and you’ve always helped me. When I die, would you follow me and keep me company?” She replied: “At most, I can only send you to your grave.” The merchant was devastated.
Then, his first wife spoke: “I’ll leave with you. I’ll follow you wherever you go.” She was skinny, and seemed almost as if she was suffering from malnutrition. In tears, the merchant said: “I should have taken better care of you when I could!”
What is the moral of this story? Well, let’s consider that we each have four “wives” in our lives. The fourth “wife” is our body. No matter how much time and effort we take to make it look good, it will leave us when we die.
Our third “wife” would be our possessions, status and wealth. When we die, others will take them from us. The second “wife” is our family and friends. Even if they are alive, the furthest they can stay with us is up to the grave.
The first “wife” is, in fact, our soul, the part that will be with us when we die. It is ironic that our soul is often neglected in our pursuit of material goals.
And when we eventually realise how important this first “wife” is, many of us will regret how we have neglected it for most of our lives, and wish we had paid more attention to it.
I’m sure you know now which “wife” you should look after most!
The writer is a senior vice-president of Singapore Press Holdings’ marketing division.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)