Knowing Your Own Mind is Good Business Sense: Tips For Baby Boomers and Seniors

Who knows your mind better than you do, especially when it comes to business? As a baby boomer or senior returning to work, you have probably worked in many different employment scenarios where good business sense may or may not have prevailed. 

Good business sense comes down to common sense, but not everyone understands common sense, when it comes to business. Trying to function with principles and practice that reflect someone else’s mind is like looking at a mirrored image that may be exactly opposite what your own good business sense advocates.

Lewis Green from the “Marketing Profs” website, in an article entitled “Why Putting People First Makes Good Business Sense” suggests “Putting people first is a different and a better way to think and to measure success.”

He offers a number of business guidelines suggesting those of "a company that never violates its values or acts unethically, because your focus is on people, not profits.”

Your own personal moral, ethical and legal business sense is an extremely important part of good business sense. The love of others is one of the foundations for a successful business.

Consider the following example of how knowing own mind in terms of good business sense can become compromised, in an adverse employment situation.

You begin to work for a business and find that you no longer have the option of choosing to follow your own good, business sense. You are now in a position where you have to revert to the non-moral, non-ethical and non-legal principles and practice of your new employer. He or she appears to have the mind of someone to whom you cannot relate.

You are shocked and stunned when you see what is happening in this business, because it is hurting, not helping others. Ordered to carry out business practices that should never be part of any legitimate business, you experience instant revulsion. It goes against everything that you know in your mind to be good business sense. What is going on does not even fit into the category of common sense, as far as you are concerned.

What should you do? This can be a difficult decision for baby boomers and seniors.

You realize that although there should not be, there can be non-moral, non-ethical and non-legal principles and practices in any business. This kind of business is not something you feel comfortable with in terms of your personal values, work ethics or employment standards.

You also are aware that this business is an immediate reflection on you and your personal value system. It compromises your own business sense. Common sense prevails, as your conscience tells you it is wrong for a business to operate in this manner. Attempting to resolve the matter is your instinctive reaction.

You try to speak to your employer about the non-moral, non-ethical and non-legal business principles and practice of the business. He or she glosses over what you say and orders you back to work. All of your attempts to rectify the adverse situation prove to be in vain.

Your employer offers you the option of quitting, stating you have to follow company principles and practice, whether you agree with them or not. If you do not work under their business guidelines, your employment will end immediately.

You opt to quit, rather than having further confrontation with your employer about adverse business principles or practices.

Quitting your job because of non-moral, non-ethical and non-legal business principles and practices may put 

you in a difficult position, because you have to start looking for work all over again. Quitting for personal reasons is acceptable on an employment record. Fired on an employment record may make it difficult to obtain other employment.  

Knowing your own mind, you are determined to use your common sense this time, as you seek other work. You soon find appropriate employment that accurately reflects your good business sense. Because of this experience, you have come to know your own mind better.