How does Business Leader, Shawn Vij, meet the Dalai Lama?

We sat down with Global Business Leader and Author Shawn Vij to learn more about his new book, Moral Fiber – Living Our Values by Wiley Publishing. More importantly, we wanted to learn how he met the Dalai Lama and what he learned from it. Shawn gets candid with us and shares his journey and how meeting the Dalai Lama changed his approach in business.

First, a little bit about him. Vij was born on August 6th, 1969. He was raised in the US Midwest, Detroit area and currently resides in Seattle. He has held many executive-level positions at Ford Motor Company, Ernst & Young, VISA, Deloitte, Microsoft and Intel Corporation.

Vij's parents emigrated from India to the US in 1968. His father is a retired engineer, and college professor and his mother is a retired housewife having raised three children. He is the oldest of three children.

He claims his meetings with the Dalai Lama were not by chance. In fact, they opened an inner door to find a greater purpose both personally and professionally. You will find the interview refreshing, honest and enlightening. Here is the excerpts of Shawn Interview

What is your book about and what inspired you to write it?

Shawn: The book is about living our values. It is an attempt to awaken our core values so we can handle any compromising or toxic situation. It is everyone's right, no matter their age or position, to experience greater happiness and purpose in their lives while succeeding professionally. After meeting the Dalai Lama, I realized that we all suffer, but we can reduce it by returning to our core values like respect, compassion, and integrity, and then acting on them. Since living my values every day, I have watched my life in Corporate improve exponentially – I am healthier, happier, more productive, more efficient and more successful. I figured if my life could drastically change just by knowing and acting on my values, then perhaps other men and women could transform their lives too.

How did you meet the Dalai Lama?

Shawn: You will have to buy the book to find out. However, I can tell you 'why' I believe I met him and it was not by chance. I truly believe everything happens for a reason. I was at the worst ever personally and professionally. I had everything money could buy but hollow inside. I was at a place in my life where everything that had defined me shattered. I had stopped taking care of my health, my job was toxic and I had slowly distanced myself from my loved ones. I became crippled and found myself in an environment full of doubt and uncertainty. I was broken inside until I found a small dusty pocketbook on the Dalai Lama. I never really payed much attention to it for years but I randomly opened the book to this passage, "In my own experience, the period of greatest gain in knowledge and experience is the most difficult period in one's life…. Through a difficult period, you can learn, you can develop inner strength, determination, and courage to face the problem. Who give you this chance? Your enemy." – The Dalai Lama. At this moment, I knew I had become my own enemy and I had to meet the Dalai Lama. After meeting him, I knew my purpose: to share how compassion, gratitude and wisdom can open our inner door, unlocking a more purposeful life and career. More importantly, share how capitalism and compassion must co-exist to improve the overall human condition.

What is Conscious Capitalism?

I am a pure capitalist and believe everyone deserves the opportunity to make a lot of money. The difference is on 'how' we do it.'

What if companies just had a simple underlying mission, which was making people's lives better around the world. To do that, we need to reformulate the criteria of business success, and make it about humanity and ethics not adjuncts to profit, but it's very core.

Today, people want to buy from companies that have a purpose grounded in values. Most companies are designed to make profit, but they are now adapting to meet new social and political expectations. We are starting to see a shift from cut-throat business to conscious capitalism as more millennials enter the workplace.

If our only goal is to make money at no cost, then we're bound to harm others and ourselves in pursuit of those things. When this happens, we've used capitalism to cripple our value system.We have an opportunity to re-set how we define capitalism. The concept is anchored on stakeholder versus shareholder. Corporations that think long-term understand this message and are adapting to this cultural shift quickly. People want to buy from Companies that have a MORAL purpose grounded on human values. As Jamsetji Tata, founder of Tata Group once said, "the community is not just another stakeholder in the business but in fact the very purpose of its existence." We are seeing a shift where companies are taking a strong position and acting on their core values which come from listening to the collective voice of their diverse set of employees, customers and communities.

It is about 'being' a conscious business that raises the overall human condition. It is not about philanthropy, charity or corporate social responsibility but rather about always being a conscious business. It's about each of us doing the right thing always.We all have choices. And it is upon employees, customers and communities to help reclaim and re-discover these values.