Biblical Business Radical: Do Nothing from Selfish Ambition (ouch!)

 “Do nothing from selfish ambition or conceit…” (Philippians 2.3 ESV) “…or vain conceit…” (NIV)

…except to get promoted at work or have wonderful returns on investment or ”keep up with the Joneses.” Right? When we’re asked about our lives, can’t we talk about our work, career, business accomplishments? I mean we have to fill out a CV or resumé for any new job. As a business owner, couldn’t we mention how much we have in sales or how many employees we pay, how far we ship or how far our customers travel to get to us…?

“Don’t be selfish; don’t try to impress others.” (Philippians 2.3 NLT)

“Don’t push your way to the front; don’t sweet-talk your way to the top.” (MSG)

Doesn’t God allow for exceptions when it comes to our vocations, our career desires and our businesses? I don’t think so. I haven’t found any exclusions in scripture that certain character traits are only required at home and not at work, in the marketplace. Hmmm, this is a hard command to practice.

(Is it a command or a guideline or suggestion? Can I call it one of the latter and have a loophole?)

So what do I do? 

“…but in humility count others more significant than yourselves. Let each of you look not only to his own interests but also to the interests of others.” (Phil. 2.3-4 ESV) “Put yourself aside, and help others get ahead. Don’t be obsessed with getting your own advantage. Forget yourselves long enough to lend a helping hand.” (MSG) “Rather, in humility value others above yourselves, not looking to your own interests but each of you to the interests of others.” (NIV) “Be humble, thinking of others as better than yourselves.” (v. 3 NLT)

Easy to do with customers for a lot of us. Easy to do with employees if we practice servant leadership. We can talk about our accomplishments as a team effort, since that’s really what it is. No one person achieves anything without ideas or resources or assistance from others.

Maybe even easy to do with competitors because there’s the sales “rule” of not demeaning your competition. But can I look to the interests of my competitors? The closest I’ve found is to backfill their capacity when they have too much business or offload some business when I’ve not had enough capacity. And having strong competition is good for your business: you get stronger and your customers have solid choices. I had a friend who owned a lumber yard in a small city. When his one competitor went out of business, he worried he would also lose business. The reasoning: his contractor customers would think he was jacking up prices because there was no competitor and would then be willing to take their trade to another city with multiple yards.