From Vision to Action

The situation in most work environments points to an ever increasing gap between the role of business as an enhancer of the well being and prosperity of humankind and share price driven strategies.

The demands and pressures made on leaders by the compounded drivers of fast growth, acquisitive urge, stock-market expectations, peer-group pressure and competitive rivalry are increasing.

In this scenario EBBF strives to practice and then promote a new kind of leadership style: one that gives back meaning to our daily tasks at work and that ultimately brings success both for employees and for the enterprise as a whole. Both with a sustainable connection to the broader environment surrounding them.

This year EBBF has been particularly keen to open further communication channels with its members and contacts. A remark that we keep hearing is that the vision that EBBF’s activities communicate is a truly inspiring one but that there is also a wish to understand and learn how to translate that vision into practical steps to make a difference in one’s own work environment.

For this reason the image that we have chosen for this year’s Annual Report cover is one that communicates EBBF’s current focus: From Vision to Action.

EBBF believes that the best way to effectively move towards its vision is to give to each of its members and contacts both the vision and the path and steps to create leaders who operate through their values based compass.

A recent poll offered in one of EBBF’s new range of services, its Communications Centre, pointed out that the vast majority of individuals when asked “What obstacles do you face, as you strive to apply your values in your daily working life?” reply “I struggle to find practical ways to apply my values at work”.

EBBF has started and will continue to pursue the parallel actions of continuing to provide inspiring visions for the enterprise of the future and at the same time offering ways to make a practical difference in one’s own job.

The Highlights of this year’s EBBF activities include:

An additional annual event complementing the EBBF Annual Conference was created with participants from 15 different nations accepting the invitation, the new - Creating the Enterprise of the Future - EBBF weekend.
EBBF’s new Communications Centre has opened a new channel of interaction side by side with the continuing channel of INSPIRE.
The improvements in EBBF’s website, has allowed us to now constantly achieve over 10,000 visits every month with an average of three pages visited by every viewer.
The recently nominated National Representatives will be officially presented at the 2006 Annual Conference. They have already started to operate within their regions. No fewer than 15 individuals who will be facilitating the flow of information and ideas to and from their national level to the entire global network.
2005 Annual Conference, EBBF’s 16th yearly event witnessed a record number of participants from a record number of nations and was the highlight of the year.
A new project has been launched to develop course materials on Values Based Leadership.
The extension of our knowledge centre to include Social Entrepreneurship, Corporate Responsibility, Ethical Finance, and further development of the original two on Sustainable Development and Responsible Entrepreneurship.
The publication of a new paper “Purpose Beyond Profit – Towards a spiritual foundation for Corporate Responsibility” by Marjo Lips-Wiersma.

We particularly want to recognize the many achievements once again this year of EBBF Italia, and in particular their continued success in bringing our core values to an increasing number of students of business through the by now annual MBA course, the chair at the University of Bari, the annual event with AIESEC Italy and over 30 keynote presentations made this last year.

We were also greatly encouraged by the activity of our cluster in Brussels with a record number of EBBF Brussels Luncheons and Dinners organised and participation in a number of high-level international conferences.

London, Paris and New York, new activities in the Czech Republic together with the successful launch of the new Toronto Baha’í Business Forum are all confirmations of growing efforts and engagement at national level.

Respectfully Submitted,

The EBBF Governing Board