Chris Lowney on Jesuit tradition and corporate leadership
ALLY LEVISE and LAURA HAWATMEH
Issue date: 2/3/10 Section: Features
Self-awareness, ingenuity, heroism and love are critical to success as a business leader, according to a former Jesuit seminarian and Fortune 500 executive who spoke Jan. 25 in the ballroom on UDM's McNichols campus.
Chris Lowney, who became a managing director of J.P. Morgan in his thirties, is author of "Heroic Leadership: Best Practices from a 450-Year-Old Company that Changed the World," which applies Jesuit teachings to corporate America.
"Leadership is pointing out a way and influencing others," said Lowney, whose visit was sponsored by the UDM Leadership Development Institute. While with J.P. Morgan, Lowney contributed to making the financial services firm one of "America's Most Admired Companies," as recognized by Fortune magazine.
UDM is a company - "a group of people with whom you break bread," he said.
The school's Jesuit history offers students a unique moral and philosophical perspective on leadership, he said.
In his talk, Lowney focused on four, Jesuit-inspired aspects of leadership:
n Self-awareness. He said that to be a successful leader, one must know his or her strengths and weaknesses. He cited a psychological study that asserted that successful business people often have a clear purpose in life as a result of having suffered a crisis that forced them to answer these questions: "Who the hell am I? And what do I want out of my life?"
n Ingenuity. Part of ingenuity involves putting aside one's ego and personal fears to make good decisions, he said. This requires a certain amount of self-awareness.
"The world is changing," he said. "We have to keep changing with it."
Lowney said that his generation of corporate leaders has "done some wonderful things" but needs to be succeeded by a generation that will bring more imagination and ingenuity to solving America's serious problems.
n Heroism. Lowney said that heroism is not exclusive to extreme acts, but applies to the exercise of being courageous in one's own small vocation. Heroism involves seeing oneself as being part of something larger and more important than oneself and working as a team to achieve a common goal, he said.
Chris Lowney, who became a managing director of J.P. Morgan in his thirties, is author of "Heroic Leadership: Best Practices from a 450-Year-Old Company that Changed the World," which applies Jesuit teachings to corporate America.
"Leadership is pointing out a way and influencing others," said Lowney, whose visit was sponsored by the UDM Leadership Development Institute. While with J.P. Morgan, Lowney contributed to making the financial services firm one of "America's Most Admired Companies," as recognized by Fortune magazine.
UDM is a company - "a group of people with whom you break bread," he said.
The school's Jesuit history offers students a unique moral and philosophical perspective on leadership, he said.
In his talk, Lowney focused on four, Jesuit-inspired aspects of leadership:
n Self-awareness. He said that to be a successful leader, one must know his or her strengths and weaknesses. He cited a psychological study that asserted that successful business people often have a clear purpose in life as a result of having suffered a crisis that forced them to answer these questions: "Who the hell am I? And what do I want out of my life?"
n Ingenuity. Part of ingenuity involves putting aside one's ego and personal fears to make good decisions, he said. This requires a certain amount of self-awareness.
"The world is changing," he said. "We have to keep changing with it."
Lowney said that his generation of corporate leaders has "done some wonderful things" but needs to be succeeded by a generation that will bring more imagination and ingenuity to solving America's serious problems.
n Heroism. Lowney said that heroism is not exclusive to extreme acts, but applies to the exercise of being courageous in one's own small vocation. Heroism involves seeing oneself as being part of something larger and more important than oneself and working as a team to achieve a common goal, he said.
Be the first to comment on this story