Stephen Hicks, Ph.D.

Full interview with fashion-design entrepreneur Chan Luu

My full interview with Chan Luu is now posted at the Center for Ethics and Entrepreneurship’s site.

Chan Luu’s designs have been worn by many celebrities, including Jennifer Lopez, Lady Gaga, Kate Hudson, Reese Witherspoon, Sandra Bullock, Janet Jackson, and Jennifer Aniston. Much of the interview was published last month in Kaizen. I met with Luu in Los Angeles to discuss growing up in Vietnam, the relevance of business education to entrepreneurial success, and the complexities of doing business in the fast-changing world of celebrities and fashion.

More Kaizen interviews with leading entrepreneurs are at my site here or CEE’s site.

Steve Mariotti on teaching capitalism in the Soviet Union

In a recent Huffington Post piece entitled “Teaching Capitalism in the Last Days of the USSR,” Steve Mariotti discusses his experience teaching business and capitalism to young people during the final days of the Soviet Union. Fascinating.

I interviewed Mariotti for Kaizen on his excellent Network for Teaching Entrepreneurship (NFTE). Before founding NFTE, Mariotti was a successful entrepreneur and a teacher in some of New York’s worst schools. Because of his great successes and innovative methods, Mariotti was named New York State’s Teacher of the Year in 1988. Great guy.

Essay contest flyers for Spring 2011

The Center for Ethics and Entrepreneurship is sponsoring an essay contest for Rockford College students enrolled this semester in Introduction to Philosophy (PHIL 103) and Business and Economic Ethics (PHIL 325).

Here are links are to the contest flyers:

Introduction to Philosophy topic: What is independence, and is it a good thing? [pdf]

Business and Economic Ethics topic: “What essential character traits and business skills lead individuals and organizations to succeed?” Reflections on Forbes Greatest Business Stories of All Time, Atlas Shrugged, and Kaizen interviews with successful entrepreneurs [pdf]

The winners will receive cash prizes and be featured in upcoming issues of Kaizen.

Eduardo Marty — the full Kaizen interview

My full interview with Eduardo Marty, founder of Junior Achievement Argentina, is now posted at the CEE site. A lengthy excerpt was published in Kaizen last month.

A key quotation: “What else is important is curiosity. And to take risks. When you see a person of curiosity, asking questions, taking a risk—but persevering and feeling inside that the critics cannot hurt him too much—when you see that, I think that you will see a successful man.”

And about his experiences teaching entrepreneurship in Cuba: “I worked five years in Cuba. They have my pictures in the window of the immigration office in Cuba. I’m not allowed to get in anymore. Five of my JA professors in Cuba went in prison. They were released after one day, but they were taken by the police and kicked out because they were teaching entrepreneurship in Cuba.”

Kaizen 13 — The Robert Bradley interview

The latest issue of Kaizen [pdf] features my interview with Robert L. Bradley, founder of the Institute for Energy Research. Dr. Bradley was a speechwriter and researcher for Ken Lay, the late CEO of the late Enron. The theme of the interview is Enron and Political Entrepreneurship: we explore Dr. Bradley’s insider perspective on the distinction between market and political entrepreneurship, Enron’s political business strategy, and the key decisions and events that led to Enron’s downfall.

Also featured in Kaizen are the spring semester’s student essay contest winners — Brandon McNames and Matthew Weber — a report on guest speaker Jeffrey Orduno, and other news from the Center for Ethics and Entrepreneurship.

My full interview with Dr. Bradley will be posted at the CEE site next month.

If you would like to receive a complimentary issue of the print version of Kaizen, please email your name and postal address to CEE [at] Rockford [dot] edu.

More Kaizen interviews with leading entrepreneurs are at my site here or CEE’s site here.

Recent work by Newberry

A colorful list is here.

Michael Newberry finished Venus (pictured here) in 2008, the same year that my extended interview with him on the theme of Art and Entrepreneurship was published in Kaizen.

Ray Stata on entrepreneurship and technology leadership

My full interview with Ray Stata is now online at CEE’s site. (An abridged version of the interview was published in the December issue of Kaizen [pdf].)

Ray Stata is Chairman of Analog Devices, Inc., based in Norwood, Massachusetts. Working out of his basement, Mr. Stata co-founded Analog Devices in the 1960s. As of 2009, ADI serves over 60,000 customers, has 9,000 employees and a market capitalization of over $6 billion.

The interview’s theme is Entrepreneurship and Technology Leadership. Two sample excerpts, the first on the best kind of education:

“We’re finding that it is very, very challenging to be at the top of your game as an engineer. First, the technical knowledge required is both deep and broad, often cutting across multiple disciplines. And products are so complex that it often takes large teams of engineers with different specialties working across international borders. That requires human skills and communication skills to encourage collaboration and manage teams with quite varied backgrounds and experiences. And engineers must understand the financial implications of manufacturing and product development cost, as well as customer requirements and where products should be positioned in the market with respect to competition. The most successful engineers truly are ‘Renaissance Men’ and not just technical specialists.”

And the second on trust:

“First, one way or other you’ve got to be good at something, even though that something will no doubt change over time. As you enter your career, strive to achieve excellence at whatever you do.
“Back to some of the things we talked about, you soon find out that you don’t get very much accomplished in life on your own. Now there are exceptions, like musicians, artists and writers who can go off on their own and accomplish remarkable things. But most of us find that we accomplish more by working in concert with others to leverage our combined skills and competencies.
“I’ve found that one of the most important factors in being a leader, or more generally in engaging with people, is to build trustful relationships. What does that mean? Trust is built on honesty, integrity, reliability, sincerity, competence. Conduct yourself so that people can depend on what you say and what you do, on the fact that you’re more often right than wrong, on the fact that you meet your commitments, on the fact that you are straight with people and tell it how it is. If people trust you and you trust them, you can get a lot more out of relationships and out of life.”

Update: Ray Stata will be commencement speaker for MIT’s 2010 graduation ceremony.

More Kaizen interviews with leading entrepreneurs are at my site here or at CEE’s site here.

Character and entrepreneurship

Business education is often good at teaching useful business theories and skills but less often good at teaching ethics. Ethics is often seen as irrelevant or as an obstacle, so business ethics is either not included in the core business curriculum or offered as an elective ornament.

Claim: Ethics is organically central to business success, and should be so built into business education. Two quotations from giants of American business in support.

First, from Georges Doriot, one of America’s trailblazing venture capitalists, as quoted in Jeffrey Young’s Forbes Greatest Technology Stories:

“Doriot spends most of his time talking to people who bring him prospective investments. He says he has considered no less than 5,000 of them since 1946. He is considered by friends and critics alike as a brilliant judge of character. But he has to be, he explains. ‘When someone comes in with an idea that’s never been tried, the only way you can judge is by the kind of man you’re dealing with’” (p. 101).

Second, from financier J. P. Morgan, who was once asked whether money was always loaned out based on one’s assets. Morgan replied, “No, sir, the first thing is character.” And, Morgan continued, if someone he couldn’t trust asked for funding, he wouldn’t make the loan even if he had “all the bonds in Christendom” (quoted in Kaizen, Issue 6 [pdf], featuring my interview with venture capitalist Kevin O’Connor).

For both Doriot and Morgan, character is fundamental. So what is good character? How does one acquire it, develop it, and make it second nature? How does one recognize it in others? How does one build institutions that support, nurture, and reward excellent character? That is a core part of business ethics.

And to make a plug for business and ethics here at Rockford College, the Center for Ethics and Entrepreneurship’s web log has a series of recent posts on patents and innovation, low-cost eye care in India, whether new jobs are most created in new or small businesses, and the psychic benefits of non-profit work.