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Introduction
Aristotle is one of the most influential legendary philosophers that ever lived in the worlds history. Despite him being a Greek, his philosophies have influenced the way of life for people across the whole world. His ideas touched on almost all aspects of life whether in law, science, ethics, and philosophy among others.
However, there is a conflict between philosophical ideas of the legends and modernization in the 21st century. The world seems to have bumped off from the ideas of Aristotle and instead taken another unknown premise in search of happiness. For instance, Aristotle would disagree with the modern form of seeking happiness in the material things, as according to him, happiness is eternal and unique to every human being.
Virtue of Happiness
Aristotle described happiness as an eternal goodness that everybody strives to achieve in his or her day-to-day life. However, the striving for the achievement of happiness not only depends on every individuals reasons, but also on the virtues that play a major role in hastening the achievements.
According to Aristotle, some of the necessary forms of virtues for the achievement of happiness include confidence, generosity, justice, wisdom, humility, and courage. In addition, he described proper upbringing and the correctness of the law as the main factors on which the virtues depend on for their fecundity.
According to Aristotle, the true happiness is achieved naturally through actions that do not contradict the will and interests of a person. This assertion implies that happiness is brought about by passion rather than social obligation like it has been the case in the modern society.
Passion is a gift and its strength depends on the factors that define personal virtues (Aristotle, 89). Going back to those two factors, proper upbringing is an important factor for shaping the life of a human being. An individual brought up from a caring family is likely to have stronger virtues than one brought up in a less caring family.
This aspect implies that the nature of a family background is important in shaping the character and passion of a person. However, according to Aristotle, the goodness of the family background is subject to human relations as opposed to economic welfare. In addition, there could be exemptions where some individuals acquire behaviors that contradict the nature of their families, and in such cases, they develop their own unique behaviors, which are shaped by other unknown factors.
The correctness of the law is very important in determining the strength of human virtues. Aristotle lived when the world was chaotic and greatly affected by moral issues such as abortion, political chaos, capital punishment, and many world problems that are still in existence today. He chose to be a social activist despite him being a philosopher, and he said that correctness of the law shapes the moral behaviors and hence the virtues.
For instance, a child brought up in a chaotic environment is likely to adapt chaotic behaviors and consequently have problems in changing the behaviors at adulthood. This observation adds value to his argument that virtue is an element of practice not nature as is the case for passion; hence, the reason why the nature of current social justice system could affect the behaviors of future generations.
Civic Friendship
According to Aristotle, civic friendship is an essential element for human good and hence necessary in achieving a flourishing life. He defined civic friendship as a form of friendship that dominates in the public arena rather than in interpersonal relations in the case of mutual and personal forms of friendship.
The adjective civic , points at the political arena, by implying that friendship is defined at the level of citizenry relations for the goodness of the state. Aristotles idea holds that there is a direct relationship between personal and civic relationship, which is necessary for the maintenance of law and justice, but is also based on human virtues.
By looking at the modern world, it is clear that the fastest flourishing economies and companies define human relations as one of the factors that determine success. However, it does not mean that those relations are civic friendship as not every successful economy or company upholds human freedom for there are policies that define human relations in such environments.
Effective civic friendship makes people act kindly and politely to each other, thus creating a productive society where law and justice are upheld. In such a situation, people come together in the formation process of public policies that have benefits to the entire community.
This aspect explains the lack of civic friendship as the root to the animosity behaviors that are evident in the modern society. These ill behaviors include corruption that mainly comes from selfishness of the few in authority, which can render to the collapse of a seemingly successful company.
Traits of the Best Places to Work From the Best Places to Work Institute
Apparently, history repeats itself and what comes around goes around. Many research studies show that the American workplaces are destructive to the human virtues. Businesspersons and employers seem to have been ignored Aristotles ideas for a long time they have viewed employees as their most noble assets for their businesses. However, according to the Best Places to Work , the twenty first century has come with challenges that have rendered employers into reshaping their business strategies to conform with the ideas of the great philosophers like Aristotle.
According to the research study by Crowley, the American smart companies have realized that the greatest competitive advantage is achieved by ensuring that employees find a happy work place to the extent that potential employees would feel encouraged to apply for job opportunities in such firms. However, it is hard to make a good workplace where employees needs would be the employers first priority always (Crowley Para. 12).
According to the Best Work Places, employers should consider various factors in order to develop a good work place that would make employees happy at work. Those factors are designed according to the Aristotles idea of happiness, whereby it is eternal and closely related to virtues.
Hence, to bring forth the employees eternal happiness, employers should consider the aspect of integrating the workers virtues in the package. In the majority of research studies carried out in the American corporations in the past decade to identify the source of employees job satisfaction, the findings were shocking.
It was found out that employees acquired job satisfaction from their coworkers relationships, but not from their relationships with their supervisors or bosses. In the twenty first century, some corporations like Google found out the strategy of developing the Best Work Place as a key competitive advantage and the company has performed better compared to others that are yet to adopt this strategy.
Some of the factors that make a Best Work Place include building trust at work place, acknowledging cultural diversity, building teamwork, and enhancing employee morale.
On building trust at work, employers are required to give minimum supervision to the employees in an effort to make the latter feel a sense of belonging and responsibility. This aspect enhances talent development and encourages horizontal communication strategy, whereby an employee does not feel inferior to talk to the senior personnel in the workplace.
Secondly, the twenty-first corporations should appreciate and acknowledge cultural diversity. The world has become a global village and advanced technological advancement has resulted to globalization, whereby a corporation is required to hire employees from different cultural orientations. In a bid to create a sense of belonging, employees are required to respect one another and appreciate cultural diversity for the goodness of the corporations operations across various cultures in the world.
Thirdly, employees are encouraged to embrace teamwork in their places of work. Gone are the days when workers were forced to give individual contribution at the workplace like was the case in the slavery period. Nowadays, employees are encouraged to work as a team against another opposing team as opposed to individual contribution. Team building is achieved through social events that are organized to bring the employees together.
Lastly, it is very important for employers to consider employees morale as a crucial element for the success of a corporate organization. There are various ways of enhancing employees morale that include awarding and recognition, training, pay rising, and promotions.
These ways are directed to the personal values and virtues, which are crucial factors for determining happiness. An employee would feel good whenever a boss calls and says thank you for the commendable job that you did. Moreover, other employees who do not receive awards and recognition would feel encouraged to work harder in an effort to make their contributions recognizable.
On the other hand, training and development is very important for both the corporate and employees. An employee who undergoes training receives up to date knowledge that would boost the corporations competitive advantage.
There are instances whereby some employees are founder to be weaker than others are, and in such cases, the employer has a moral obligation of improving employees skills. This goal could be achieved by placing the poor employees next to employees who are good in those fields and encourage them to assist one another whenever one is stuck.
Comparing and contrasting Aristotles ideas about civic relationships with these contemporary notions of best places to work
Aristotles ideas have been ignored for a long time, but research shows that American corporations have changed from the traditional methods of disregarding his ideas to a point of embracing the same. Employers have realized that employees job satisfaction is directly related to business performance in the contemporary world.
Aristotle stated that happiness comes from within and it depends on the virtues. Hence, employers are working on virtues by creating working environments that would encourage employees to build confidence and satisfaction in their work. In so doing, employers look into things and activities that would enable them to have a direct contact with employees.
Civic friendship is seen to dominate in the workplaces, which is also the basic determinant for a Best Work Place. Through civic friendship, employees can work as a team and develop good coworker relationships. According to the Aristotle, civic friendship allows an individual to care for one another in the public phenomenon, and thus corporate environments are the individuals public phenomenon. Civic friendship enhances social justice in a state as well as in a working environment.
This assertion implies that through the adoption of Aristotles ideas by the corporations of the twenty first century, employers have realized the need to ensure effective social justice mechanisms in the work place. The majority of the leading American corporations have legal mechanisms in place that deal with employees issues and grievances. Nowadays, American employees hardly to go to industrial courts after having disagreements with their employers due to effective policies and mechanisms put in place at the workplaces.
Conclusion
The most notable difference that contradicts the Aristotles idea of civic relationship with the traits of Best Places to Work is the element of hypocrisy in the latter. Aristotle was talking from the point of achieving common good for the entire humanity regardless of economic status, which is yet to be achieved in the contemporary corporations.
However, the American corporations of the twenty first century have moved to applying Aristotles ideas for the benefit improving employees performance, which essentially contributes towards the firms well being, but not that of the employee. This aspect implies that corporations are embracing Aristotles ideas for their own good, as opposed to the goodness of humanity.
Works Cited
Aristotle. The Nicomachean Ethics of Aristotle, New York: Filiquarian Publishing, LLC, 2007. Print.
Crowley, Mark. Why Companies Are (Finally) Falling All over Each Other to Become Best Places to Work, 2013. Web. <https://www.greatplacetowork.com/>
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