It presents a vision of business that is, I would argue, much closer to
the vision of the free enterprise system that Adam Smith elegantly
defended than the narrow picture of the world often defended in his
name. The focus of the section is on integrity and what it means, and
how integrity can become the core value of corporate life and
corporate leadership at every level. But integrity is not a single virtue
or the embodiment of any one value. It is rather a sense of wholeness,
a way of tying one's life and one's career together. It gets cultivated
and realized in any number of more concrete virtues, including such
stalwarts as honesty, trustworthiness, and fairness.

The third part, accordingly, is a working catalog of the virtues in
business. For maximum utility, I have presented this in encyclopedia
form, with the virtues presented in alphabetical order. That means
that there is no need to insist that some virtues are more important
than others, which too often results in an overly rigid sense of
integrity. It also means that the food for thought and action provided
in this part of the book can be dined on in an individually customized
way, smorgasbord-style. I encourage the reader to browse and munch
at his or her own pace, rather than pursue the virtues "from Ability to
Zeal." My purpose is not to present the reader with a formula or
recipe for virtue, a pretension I find absurd, but to provide a new and
better way of thinking about business, in terms of the virtues and their
many combinations and manifestations.

Business is about integrity as well as profits, and the profits mean
little if their cost sacrifices integrity. (In other walks of life, this is
called "prostitution.") Business serves people and not the other way
around, and it is value and virtue that make business life rewarding
and meaningful. It is easy to say this, as an abstract philosophy, but it
is much more important to make it work in practice.

-xiii-