Communications 2019

Keynote Address for the Global Jesuit Business Ethics Conference: “The Ethics of Disruption” on Friday, July 12, 2019. 

My sincere thanks to Dean Caryn Beck-Dudley, for your kind introduction.

As one of my first acts as a freshly minted president, it is my pleasure to welcome you to Santa Clara University for this third conference in the series on the teaching of ethics in Jesuit business schools. Some of you attended the Colleagues in Jesuit Business Education conference here in 2001, and while Santa Clara and the world of business have changed greatly since that time, your commitment to an ethics-infused and firmly Ignatian business education continues to inspire. Given my commitment both to Jesuit education and to Ignatian spirituality, there is no better subject for my first formal address as president.

Thank you as well to the Leavey School of Business, the Markkula Center and their staffs who have worked to organize and host this conference. While it is just one of the many impressive programs that they coordinate and organize, each one feels special. They exemplify the hospitality so central to the Jesuit charism.

And a special thanks to Symantec and LinkedIn which hosted the faculty visits yesterday, and to the five organizations which have provided financial support for the conference. The partnerships we have entered into are not just exciting, but truly are models for the ways that universities, their business schools, and enterprises can learn from each other.

Jesuit Education & Business

To many outside this room, this gathering may seem strange, even ironic. We meet in Silicon Valley, the heart and soul of American innovation, where technology innovates at a rapid pace and whose culture prizes disruption. At the same time, most of us come from universities, an institution that dates back 1,000 years, and which traditionally is slow to change and which has a governance model that is unlike anything you would find in the Valley.

This encounter between a Jesuit university and the Valley—an odd partnership to some—is on closer examination most natural and fitting. In the Catholic imagination, the secular and the sacred, the practical and the transcendent, are not opposed but are two sides to the same coin. The world and all that is human is created good.

It was this hopeful view that impelled the Jesuits into education soon after St. Ignatius founded the Order in 1540. Ironically, Ignatius never intended the Jesuits to get involved in education because he feared that schools would tie them down too much. He intended the first Jesuits to be utility players, or today’s management consultants: expert in their field, able to move quickly but thoughtfully to serve where they were most needed, a radical model of religious life at the time. Their plan: identify the greater need, meet it, and move on.

What changed? Ignatius discovered that one of the most pressing needs—and opportunities—was education. Until the 16th century, education was limited to a select few and was not programmatic. In 1548, the emerging merchant class of Messina, Sicily came to the Jesuits and begged them to open a school to educate their sons, like the ones they had opened just for younger Jesuits in training. Their sons would be steeped not just in religious instruction but in the humanities and the natural sciences. In the Jesuit model of education, no field of inquiry was off limits because all creation is good, and good things are good to study.

Even more than that, the schools would form their students in virtue. The Jesuits’ intention then and now was very practical. Not only would the students become better people and citizens, but the fruits of their education in mind, body, and spirit would multiply exponentially when they entered careers in law, medicine, science, religion, and what we call today, business. The humanities humanize, forming good people and good people will do good things. This was the unstated brand of Jesuit schools as they opened across the globe.

At a pivotal meeting of Jesuit colleges and universities here at Santa Clara in 2000, Peter Hans Kolvenbach, S.J., the Superior General of the Jesuits, contemporized the mission of Jesuit education. The true measure of success at our universities is not simply what our students learn or do but who they become as persons. Students formed in goodness or ethics will do good or ethical things, for the greater glory of God and the welfare of humanity.

So your presence here, your work on business ethics as scholars and practitioners, your interest as business leaders in what is good and how to practice it, are all natural fits for a Jesuit school. This kind of deep conversation incubates new ideas, ferments new ways of viewing things, and helps us to see beyond the status quo in order to imagine what a more just, gentle, humane and sustainable world could be. In short, this kind of engaged conversation is how a Jesuit university disrupts.

Disruption Today

Over the last several years, ethical considerations about disruption have raised many questions and even doubts about Silicon Valley’s impact on individuals and society at large. Here’s senior Wired magazine writer Nitasha Tiku last year: “It is only now, a decade after the financial crisis, that the American public seems to appreciate that what we thought was disruption worked more like extraction—of our data, our attention, our time, our creativity, our content, our DNA, our homes, our cities, our relationships.”

One particular “tagline” of disruption, famously part of the 2012 Facebook IPO prospectus, has been hotly contested: “Move fast and break things.” Amit Taneja, managing director of General Catalyst, summarized the critique recently in the Harvard Business Review: “‘Move fast and break things’ is how entrepreneurs regard disruption: more is always better. We raced to put our products into consumers’ hands as fast as possible, without regard for the merit of—and rationale for—offline systems of governance.” Public criticism, and even fear about the economic, social, political and environmental harms of Silicon Valley innovation, continue to grow. Taneja goes on, “If innovation is to survive into the 21st century, we need to change how companies are built by changing the questions we ask of them.” These “offline systems of governance”, these “questions” that companies must ask and we need to ask of them—this requires deeper ethical reflection and what in the Jesuit tradition we call “discernment.”

An Ignatian Approach to Disruption

If “move fast and break things” is a questionable approach to disruption, then what can we offer as an alternative? Let me suggest an Ignatian ethic of disruption.

This is not a stern finger-wagging, or rejection of progress, or moralizing dismissal of technological disruption. Remember that Ignatius was not a technophobe, or a skeptic of the modern. He was a disrupter. Far from retreating from the world, he immersed himself in the Renaissance humanism, civic life, and exploratory fever of his time. He coupled the ancient and the new, both in spirituality and education, borrowing from others what worked, leaving behind what did not. One only has to do a quick Google or Wikipedia search to see all of the Jesuit chemists, physicists, astronomers, artists, actors, and more who embraced new technologies and ideas and led innovation in their fields. Or just look up at the moon, where there are over 30 craters named after Jesuit astronomers.

A disrupter, yes, but a certain kind of disrupter. What if, instead of a culture of “move fast and break things,” we advanced an Ignatian ethic of disruption of “move thoughtfully, and lift up people?” This means that we discern the disruption, asking two fundamental questions: first, does the disruption reflect who we want to be as persons, or who we want to be as university or business? Second, does the disruption lead to a noble purpose?

This call to “move thoughtfully and lift up people” does not mean excessive caution or slow-paced, never-ending decision-making. It does not minimize the urgency of the moment. We might still move fast, and even break things to meet a critical need, but through discernment we know why we are doing what we are doing. We do not just accept disruption as a “good” in itself simply because it is the newest thing or the hottest trend or the shiniest innovation.

If we want to be good people who will do good and sometimes heroic things, then we must have a clear sense of the good that drives and summons us. In his recent letter to CEOs, Larry Fink, CEO of Blackrock, emphasized this point: “When a company truly understands and expresses its purpose, it functions with the focus and strategic discipline that drive long-term profitability. Purpose unifies management, employees, and communities. It drives ethical behavior and creates an essential check on actions that go against the best interests of stakeholders.”

Consider for a moment that urging to “break things.” Notice the use of the word “things” here—it’s impersonal. It does not invite us to consider who we might be breaking with our disruptions. It assumes that breaking is always better. An Ignatian ethic of disruption calls that assumption into question by putting the human person at the center of our discernment.

In the Catholic and Jesuit tradition, the human person is created in the image of God with a dignity that can never be taken away. And the world is a good and holy place. These foundational principles thus require us to consider how the disruption will impact people and our common home, the earth. Moving thoughtfully means we take enough time to understand foreseeable consequences of our innovations and disruptive actions – for example, impacts on employment and the environment, or possible misuses by others.

In Jesuit education, we often talk about the value of cura personalis: caring for the whole person in mind, body and spirit. We consider all of who the student is. We can apply the same standard to disruption. To lift up people is to contribute to their economic and physical security, to improve their quality of life, to encourage a healthy lifestyle, to nourish their spiritual life, and to care for the environment in which they live. In the care of persons, the tradition of Catholic Social Teaching particularly focuses our discernment on how we can lift up those who are most poor and vulnerable and on the margins of our society.

There are two other principles in Catholic Social Teaching that enliven our discernment. This tradition seeks a balance between preserving individual rights and supporting institutions, customs and laws that promote the common good. Moreover, steeped in Catholic thought is the principle of inculturation, living our faith in a way that is sensitive to local contexts.

Without naming these principles of the common good or inculturation, a recent New York Times op-ed by Kevin Munger of Penn State offers a critique on those grounds. Contesting the trend to “move fast and break things,” Munger describes the demise of what he calls the “Palo Alto Consensus,” the belief that “American-made internet communication technologies (both hardware and software) should be distributed globally and that governments should be discouraged from restricting speech online.” An unregulated, global flow of information has achieved much good, for example, democratizing formerly closed systems, exposing corruption, and forming communities across national, racial and ethnic lines. However, unregulated social media has also fermented white nationalism, the “no vaccine” movement, sex trafficking, and bullying. A new consensus is emerging: we need some institutional guard rails to protect us from “fake news”; we also need to pay attention to local cultural contexts to assess how much “fake news” a society can tolerate without breaking down. Borrowing these lessons, when discerning a disruption, we ought to consider how it serves the common good; whether some reasonable institution or legal mechanism may be necessary to mitigate potential harm; and how different cultures and societies will receive the innovation.

These considerations compose a healthy discernment about disruption. We choose not just to move fast but thoughtfully; we opt to lift up people rather than simply break things. Yes, disruptive progress requires us to think differently, to take apart the way things are currently assembled, but only if we remain true to who we are and only if our end is noble.

Ignatian Disruption in Action

What does this Ignatian ethic of disruption look like? Let me offer a few examples of thoughtful disruption in education.

In 1996, John Foley, a Jesuit in Chicago, wanted to disrupt the educational system. Students from low-income families regularly received sub-par education and resources in Chicago public schools. Costly private schools, including the Jesuit high schools, were increasingly out of reach for these students. John wanted to deliver to the urban poor a quality, affordable, values-based education that directly led to employment and access to good jobs. So he disrupted the system thoughtfully (even prayerfully) and in a way that built up people and whole communities, like the Pilsen neighborhood where the first Cristo Rey school was founded. The model was this: students would go to school in a rigorous academic program four days a week, and then work in a sponsored job placement for the fifth day. Not only would the sponsoring corporation, hospital, college or law firm, for example, help pay their tuition but the student would learn important career skills. More than twenty years later, there are 35 Cristo Rey schools in 22 states with 3,450 corporate partners.

Outside the Jesuit world, consider how others have expanded access to education or innovated delivery. Khan Academy has transformed the way teachers teach and students learn, freeing up classroom time for more engaged learning while leaving content delivery to its online platform. Universities are using technology to deliver academic programs to students who otherwise would not have access to higher education. Faculty are connecting across continents to advance research. The buildings we teach and learn in are greener. The examples multiply.

Conclusion

Disruption in higher education and industry will continue, to which we can say both, “Thank God” and “Hold on.” Disrupt we will, but discern the disruption. In these days together, in this most innovative corner of the world, we will consider what moving thoughtfully and lifting up people look like in specific contexts. We will explore how an Ignatian ethic of disruption can be formed not just in schools but in businesses. Together, guided by our shared values, we like St. Ignatius can look at a rapidly changing world with great hope and anticipation, knowing that disruption can be for good if approached in the right way.