The Growth Imperative

The Growth Imperative

I assume that sustainable intellectual and material advance coincides with the most innate long-term needs and goals of social mankind. Man naturally seeks to learn and become better attuned and comfortable with nature. The need for growth is thus intuitively obvious to me, and virtually all management academicians, as it should be to you! The Darwinian-like drive to live and pass on good and better things to new generations is an inborn, genetic phenomenon. Why else would each individual and humanity in general, plod so diligently to advance thinking and increase personal material and economic health in order to be happier? It is essential that people evolve the capability of satisfying basic and higher order needs. This capability was given to humans as part of life, to use effectively. Why else does the blossom challenge the last frost in the early spring, if not to produce the grandest fruit of all time that is more likely to pass on a better genetic strain? This growth idea manifests itself in the self-evident truths that wise parents pass on. Consider for a moment the centrality of “the pursuit of happiness” that our forefathers spoke about in America’s Declaration of Independence. Pursuing happiness invariably leads down the road of “more and more.” Being happier is about advancing to a higher-order of happy. It’s a sensual, psychological, spiritual, emotional and physical growth to a higher condition. Thus, every society (social entity) naturally wants to more fully connect itself "sensually" with the material past, present and future across a hierarchy of personal and collective material phenomena; the highest goal is generally seen as a sensed, self-connection or actualization relative to a universally shared higher social order. Peter Senge (1990) discusses how system theorists have tried to capture this forceful energy in the mystical construct alignment.

“that we should bear fruit to God” Romans 7:4

Alignment for Americans springs from the concept "pursuit of happiness," which catapulted into mainstream human consciousness during the Renaissance and dominated early American philosophy, because it elevated man to a pursuit of social and economic advance. The collective satisfaction in a good and progressing society, like America, might be hypothesized to be conditions in which there is an increasing consensus of social perceptions (more participants and higher intensity) across time regarding the virtue of Americans sharing and leading the pursuit of material and psychic happiness together and for the world, along some collective trajectory that places Americans at the cutting edge of the advance. There is this great collective consensus about this direction in America, because America integrates diverse participants and their intensities better than any other nation. Although it seems to many ecologically-minded Americans that the ever more complex problems of civilized people living together on this planet should not, and cannot, be completely solved by producing more GDP; we are all partially trapped by our collective perception that success is measured by the ability to constantly produce, consume and inventory more of something. Let’s face it, we all like to spoil and pamper ourselves. People want to be more comfortable, and if nothing else more smart. We consequently want and desire our economic systems to produce more value, knowledge and wealth that we can leverage, hoard or share, so that each of us can live longer, healthier and the way we want to.

More recently, Americans more fully recognize that stewardship must be a key part of the plans for mutual growth and its management, but growth is still the imperative. In particular at the local level, communities are more willingly shed the bumpkin image and taking responsible, futuristic perspectives that are more systematic and circular, which simultaneously can harness our more short term imperatives, and the longer term opportunities that arise from fresh, creative, innovative and genuine inquiry into what can be. Sustainable growth needs balance between sensuality and sensibility, which only can be managed across a broad front. Communities, regions and nations will therefore learn to value more what we produce and more equitably distribute what we produce, rather than flaunt capricious consumption, exploitation and wastefulness. Yet, we are left with the fact that America is not a vacuum. We are just one part of a system within the totality of mankind that must lead in satisfying more needs, wants, and desires of more people within and across generations and cultures. I assume that it's a material fact of life that all advancing cultures endeavor to be more physically satisfied and progress towards more sensual satisfaction. Otherwise, their citizens get desperate, restless and rebellious as they digest information about what “can be” from others. A universal life contradiction is how to get more and how to be satisfied and sustainable with less. Every religion and ideology builds from this contradiction and eventually falls prey to it at some extreme. This is an intriguing theme that runs throughout this work.

On the other hand, being satisfied with less is spiritually desirable. A dose of self-denial is important to all major religions, all forms of disciplined thinking, and all discussions of personal mastery that I have studied. At the very least, a balance between self-interest and self-denial is generally considered an essential ingredient to proper living. I personally like to frame this idea, relative to economics, under the topic of austerity. The ideals of austerity are fundamental components of the orientation I personally claim. Consider the following logic to support austerity as an entrepreneurship topic. Assume that satisfaction and happiness in humans is mostly perception (as illustrated routinely by the half-full/half-empty glass metaphor, which neatly places one as happy or sad based on the smallest of nuance). Further assume entrepreneurs are a major influence on fresh or changed perceptions (that's their job). It follows then that if entrepreneurs could get consumers to value austerity, they could consequently get more perceived value from less material. Such entrepreneurs would lead mankind to perceive windfall progress without producing more things. In fact, the opposite would be true; less would be happier. Seems absurd, but this idea of less demand enhancing perceived-value is growing in popularity with every new energy crisis or spot shortage. An austerity orientation is therefore a central theme in the nobler growth oriented entrepreneur that I imagine in the previous section. To further this example, I might contend that Americans could lead the world in a monumental material change that will produce a discontinuous leap forward in perceived happiness (not withstanding some who might see it as a leap backwards). Entrepreneurs could escalate breakthroughs in self-sacrifice, discipline, commitment and connectedness, not too dissimilar from the orientations of sub-cultures like the Amish, Mennonites, Hare Krishna, and so forth who find it satisfying to devote more time and energy resources to more socially and spiritually grounded activities. Wild idea, isn’t it?

Given the other side of the universal contradiction (i.e., we need real material growth), I personally believe our use of time is where the greatest potential for material growth exists. The idea of a "mass leisure class" has emerged as a real possibility over the last century. The masses in America and western cultures value leisure and discretionary time more than ever, as much as material itself; because we treat time like material (time is money?). Americans can't or don't know how to relax; and that is a growth market of immense potential. I believe that leisure time innovations will drive the next economic revolution and natural stage of humane and ethical mass-employment as the work experience is humanized and made more refreshing itself, while freeing workers from the lower aspects of its bondage. Tinkering with quality leisure time will be a key ingredient in the recipe for modern civilized progress. As productivity soars and we reduce the work week, we will also make work more pleasant and less demanding, while teaching people to more realistically value elusive leisure time. Empowered citizens will further dictate new rules for sharing the bounty of saved productive time. That’s how the system will work. Modern entrepreneurs of the next millennium will think up better ways for humans to consume and loaf within nature; while being more stewardly and austere. These contradictions will challenge entrepreneurs (including politicians or bureaucrats) to help mankind discover the new kinds of perceptual, spiritual and sensual value in nature where personal time and dignity becomes a major growth target.

American entrepreneurship has been particularly powerful and intentioned relative to producing economic growth and progress that is material-based, is exciting to the psyche and irreverent toward status quo. Who can argue that American materialism sets the standard for the world? Personally free and tolerant, Americans imagine and build material that has mass appeal around the world. We are the place to "come to," if you are "fleeing from" oppression, whether it is material or psychic. We are the "land of free opportunity," where you can build something from nothing and explore the frontier. We produce social and material forces that consistently make us the most inventive and innovative nation in the history of the world. Consumers and producers across the earth seek out the American market dream, a dream of progress, power and material growth. They immigrate, sneak-in, or use "black market" tactics to get a piece of the American bounty. All this excitement and commitment escalates the capacity for America to hedonistically grow and produce an upward, growing material spiral. We don't have to put up walls to segregate people out of our organizations, or to keep them from escaping; in fact, we can't keep them out, because they want a piece of the material game. America has been a continuously growing melting pot that has iteratively distributed wealth across a highly diversified social order over the last 200 years. The material frenzy makes our society, government and organizations especially cohesive, virile, and powerful at the cutting edge of economic growth and global business advance. The innovation, freedom and motivation inherent in America's free enterprise system, personifies the innate material imperative as a foundation of quality life. In short, the American brand of democracy and free enterprise is the modern model for producing and perceiving the finer things in an ever changing and growing material and psychological existence. American entrepreneurship will continue to lead in defining the "growth imperative" of advancing mankind in both the material and perceptual arenas for the foreseeable future.