There is no value in business without soul.
What comes to mind when you hear the word “business”? Suits in skyscrapers, or a corner shop owner wiping down a counter with a tired smile?
Let’s not get too theoretical over a simple question: What’s the point of the economy? At its core, the answer is practical: to allocate limited resources in ways that meet human needs and wants. “Optimal allocation” is the technical phrase, but what counts as “optimal” depends on how we define value. In transport, for example, it means moving as many people as fast and comfortably as possible while using as few resources as necessary.
Business exists to serve that broader economic function. But somewhere along the way, the word business started conjuring up polished prestige and glassy skyscrapers instead of real-world value. So we have to ask: are we serving the economy, or just fragile egos?
There’s a widely accepted belief that business is purely transactional. But we rarely stop to consider what that actually does to us. When everything becomes a transaction, business turns into a game – and in games, every move is a strategy. As long as it’s legal (or you’re powerful enough to make it legal), anything goes.
But this mindset comes at a cost. In a game, people stop being people. They become pieces on a board – not individuals with needs, dreams, or personalities, but leverage, assets, competition. And that’s fundamentally at odds with what makes us human.
We lose the very thing the Harvard study of adult development found most essential to a fulfilling life: deep, genuine human connection. And the cost isn’t just personal. There’s also a very real business cost. Just because opportunity cost is invisible doesn’t mean it isn’t real.
I’m not saying every desire should be fulfilled or every dream pursued. As a side note though – it is in our shared pragmatic interest that people’s basic needs are met so they can grow and contribute. But that’s beside the point.
I’m also not claiming business shouldn’t be transactional. Of course it should. But it also needs to be personal. Not because some vague moral code says so, but because that’s pragmatic and sustainable.
Structure and soul aren’t opposites. In fact, they work best together. Just think of great works of art or engineering achievements – you can’t say they are chaotic or soulless.
Think of the railways. Of course they have signal systems to keep the trains safe – no one’s saying trust means recklessness. But we don’t limit trains to 5 km/h or make them stop at every signal just because we don’t trust the system to work. And the train operators also don’t go around overthinking, “how do I make them go as fast as possible without crashing?”
That’s the function of trust: it’s emotional infrastructure, the kind that lets processes actually flow. Without it, you get decision bottlenecks, hesitation and second-guessing.
If you’re always thinking “am I the one screwing the other or am I the one being screwed?”, there can be no trust. And being in a constant Mexican standoff is exhausting. It drains time and energy – two of your most limited resources. Just imagine how much more you could accomplish if that energy went into something that actually builds value. The screw-or-be-screwed dilemma doesn’t build anything. It just burns fuel.
You can be the richest person on Earth, but there’s one thing you’ll never be able to buy back: your time.
Seeing business as structured relationships – not strategic games – isn’t some naïve moral stance, but a good business practice. Long-term relationships built on trust reduce the hidden costs of worry, hesitation, and second-guessing. That frees up your most valuable resource to be spent where it actually matters.
Playing zero-sum games doesn’t build anything and soulless corporations don’t thrive because they deliver meaningful value. It’s just that a broken system lets them run on inertia. That doesn’t mean they should define what good business means.
We want to redefine that with the way we do business, but we can’t do it alone. Join us.
