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Business as a Calling: Work and the Examined Life
 
 
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Business as a Calling: Work and the Examined Life [Hardcover]

Michael Novak (Author)
3.5 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (6 customer reviews)

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Book Description

0684827484 978-0684827483 June 11, 1996 Gift Inscription on Fep
Why do we work so hard at our jobs, day after day? Why is a job well done important to us? We know there is more to a career than money and prestige, but what exactly do we mean by "fulfillment"? These are old but important questions. They belong with some newly discovered ones: Why are people in business more religious than the population as a whole? What do people of business know, and what do they do, that anchors their faith? In this ground-breaking and inspiring book, Michael Novak ties together these crucial questions by explaining the meaning of work as a vocation. Work should be more than just a job -- it should be a calling.

This book explains an important part of our lives in a new way, and readers will instantly recognize themselves in its pages. A larger proportion than ever before of the world's Christians, Jews, and other peoples of faith are spending their working lives in business. Business is a profession worthy of a person's highest ideals and aspirations, fraught with moral possibilities both of great good and of great evil. Novak takes on agonizing problems, such as downsizing, the tradeoffs that must sometimes be faced between profits and human rights, and the pitfalls of philanthropy. He also examines the daily questions of how an honest day's work contributes to the good of many people, both close at hand and far away. Our work connects us with one another. It also makes possible the universal advance out of poverty, and it is an essential prerequisite of democracy and the institutions of civil society.

This book is a spiritual feast, for everyone who wants to examine how to make a life through making a living.


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Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

In straightforward language, Novak (Belief and Unbelief) sets out to refute the popular conception that business leaders are materialistic and rapacious, asserting that "business not only creates social connections, lifts its participants out of poverty, and builds the foundation of democracy, but also can and must be morally uplifting." His central conceit is that, like the work of priests and ministers, the labors of businessmen and -women are often animated by a sense of calling. Novak cites a 1990 poll that found that after military officers, "more people in business attended church every week than any other elite." While it remains to be proven that the morals espoused in church or temple can and do hold sway on the battlefields of market competition, Novak's meditations should cause those who believe "enlightened capitalism" to be an oxymoron to think twice. Author tour. (June) FYI: Novak won the 1994 Templeton Prize for Progress in Religion.
Copyright 1996 Reed Business Information, Inc.

From Kirkus Reviews

A spirited defense of commerce as a worthy career and of democratic capitalism as the best socioeconomic system among known alternatives. Like John M. Hood (The Heroic Enterprise, page 504), Novak (The Catholic Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism, 1992, etc.) finds much to admire. Indeed, he argues that business has a vested interest in goodness if only because it cannot advance in the absence of such cardinal virtues as cooperation, courage, honesty, industry, innovation, practicality, and realism. The author goes on to document the many ways in which for-profit concerns benefit host communities and the wider world simply by measuring up to their basic obligations--creating new jobs, earning appropriate returns on investments, producing wealth, promoting respect for the rule of law, satisfying customers, et al. He also notes ways in which trade unions might play more constructive roles in an era of corporate downsizing, e.g., by organizing labor collectives to offer pools of skilled contract workers to employers. Novak (a sometime seminarian who makes no secret of his Roman Catholic faith) is at pains to couch his message in ecumenical rather than ecclesiastic terms. To this end, he dwells on studies indicating that, among America's elites, businesspeople trail only the clergy and military officers in the degree of their religiosity. While the author cites the achievements of a wealth of entrepreneurs and executives, moreover, he singles out Andrew Carnegie for extended attention as a sort of secular saint. In particular, Novak is fascinated by the ‚migr‚ industrialist's resolve to give away all his riches before he died. The author devotes the best part of his concluding chapter to this largesse and what he believes are the lessons to be learned from it. Vocational counseling of an unusual order, as tough-minded as it is good-hearted. (Author tour) -- Copyright ©1996, Kirkus Associates, LP. All rights reserved.

Product Details

  • Hardcover: 246 pages
  • Publisher: Free Press; Gift Inscription on Fep edition (June 11, 1996)
  • Language: English
  • ISBN-10: 0684827484
  • ISBN-13: 978-0684827483
  • Product Dimensions: 7.6 x 5.1 x 1 inches
  • Shipping Weight: 9.6 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
  • Average Customer Review: 3.5 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (6 customer reviews)
  • Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #33,640 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

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Average Customer Review
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21 of 23 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars BRINGING IT ALL TOGETHER, January 3, 2000
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This review is from: Business as a Calling: Work and the Examined Life (Hardcover)
This book was reccomended by a friend and I was fascinated by the title. The book is a quick read with many references to socio-economic theory and the Catholic way. The book was written by Mr. Novak, a distinguished author who grasps both the economic and theological apsects of modern day business activities. He does a good job of portraying work as a means to help the common good of all society.The idea that being productive as a person in business can benefit others in unseen ways is worthy. Even business can work in its' self interest while helping advance society. Business as a calling tied together many aspects of faith, work and finding meaning in a career. This book should be on the must read list of every young MBA or CEO.
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14 of 17 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars Student of Life, November 1, 2002
This review is from: Business as a Calling: Work and the Examined Life (Hardcover)
The view going in is very different than the view coming out. Novak's idealism helped to encourage me in my own. I read this book as an undergraduate business student struggling to find the balance that I saw in between greed and good. I so enjoyed his language, examples, and message that I recommended it to my Business Ethics professor. Last I heard, he was planning on using it as one of the textbooks. I gave it a 4 star rating because although it was a good read, it could always be better. Let's leave some room for improvement.
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5.0 out of 5 stars Great Book!, May 25, 2010
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This review is from: Business as a Calling: Work and the Examined Life (Hardcover)
If you're looking for that perfect job this book can help. Trying to find out what truly makes you happy while also making a living and a career.

I highly recommend this book.
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Inside This Book (learn more)
First Sentence:
This inquiry is for Jews, Christians, Muslims and others who take the inner life seriously, including those who while hesitant to belong to any church take seriously their vocation as thoughtful and self-questioning beings. Read the first page
Key Phrases - Statistically Improbable Phrases (SIPs): (learn more)
private business corporation, moral ecology, practical realism
Key Phrases - Capitalized Phrases (CAPs): (learn more)
United States, Andrew Carnegie, Adam Smith, Pope John Paul, Max Weber, Latin America, New York, Mister Johnson, World War, Aung San Suu Kyi, Centesimus Annus, Friedrich Hayek, Great Depression, Henry Clay Frick, Joseph Schumpeter, Soviet Union, Thomas Aquinas
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Front Cover | Table of Contents | First Pages | Index | Back Cover | Surprise Me!
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