Invitation to FLOW Speech in Austin

by John Mackey, June 5, 2008 | Permalink

Just a quick heads up that John Mackey will be speaking on Conscious Capitalism in Austin, Texas on June 12, 2008. It’s actually rare to have the opportunity to hear John speak in his hometown. The event serves as a fundraiser for FLOW, a non-profit organization that John co-founded in 2004. John’s talk will be followed by an extensive dialogue with Tami Simon, CEO of Sounds True; questions from the audience are invited. Click here for more specifics and to buy tickets. A limited number are still available. For those not in Austin, stay tuned for a multiple CD recording of the event to be released in 2009.

Bentley College Commencement Speech

by John Mackey, May 21, 2008 | Permalink

On Saturday, May 17, 2008, John Mackey delivered the following remarks to the graduating class at Bentley College in Waltham, Massachusetts.

I want to begin by thanking Bentley College’s President, Gloria Larson, for inviting me to be with you today and for Professor Rajendra Sisodia for recommending me as a speaker to President Larson. It is a great honor to be with all of you on this special occasion. I want to congratulate all of the students who are graduating. You have all accomplished something that I never have accomplished in my own life—finishing college. In the early 1970’s I attended two universities in Texas, Trinity in San Antonio and the University of Texas in Austin. I dropped in and out of these two schools a half dozen times over a 6 year period, piling up about 120 hours in various electives. I only took classes I was interested in, primarily philosophy, religion, and the humanities. To be perfectly honest with you, I spent my late teens and very early twenties primarily trying to figure out the meaning of life, or at least the meaning of my own life. I never took any business classes in school and if someone had told me back then that I was going to become a business entrepreneur when I was 24 and start my own business I would have laughed them out of the room.

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Past, Present and Future of Food

by John Mackey, March 13, 2007 | Permalink

As part of a recent public dialogue with Michael Pollan, I presented a slide show on the Past, Present and Future of Food. This slide show, as well as a link to a recorded version of the presentation and subsequent discussion with Pollan, are included in this blog post.

As an introduction to this material, I am sharing part of a monthly newsletter authored by Michael Strong, CEO and Chief Visionary for FLOW, a social entrepreneurial group I co-founded. He speaks to the events leading up to the conversation with Michael Pollan in Berkeley on February 27, 2007, as well as the greater meaning of the ongoing dialogue. Strong’s article adeptly references the linkage between this current presentation and my previous blog post on Conscious Capitalism. I invite you to read it with those things in mind while I work on an expanded, written version of my presentation to be posted on my blog in the near future.

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The Upward Flow of Human Development

by John Mackey, May 1, 2006 | Permalink

What follows is a modified version of John Mackey’s Keynote Speech at the March, 2006, Tribal Gathering of Whole Foods Market in Austin, Texas. Every few years, approximately 600 members of Whole Foods Market leadership come together for a long weekend dedicated to networking, education and inspiration. This speech was delivered on the final day of the gathering.

Much loud and sustained applause

Let’s hope you feel the same after hearing this speech. I went back and forth over whether to play it safe and give a typical keynote speech, but I decided to go for it and see if we can take Whole Foods Market to the next level—on our growing edge.

Today I’m going to paint a really big picture, a picture of “everything,” of how I think the world really works, and where Whole Foods Market and Grameen Bank fit into it. [Muhammad Yunus of Grameen Bank spoke immediately following this speech.] If I communicate this information in the way that I hope to, I guarantee you will never look at the world in the same way again. You won’t look at Whole Foods Market in quite the same way, either. So that is my goal.

My philosophy is that life is all about learning and growing, and that life can be a real adventure of learning, growing, compassion, and joyfulness. We all have the capability to grow all our lives—if we don’t get stuck—in emotional intelligence, wisdom, consciousness, ethical development, and love. And not only individuals are capable of growth. So are organizations such as Whole Foods Market and Grameen Bank, as well as larger collective societies, such as the United States.

One way to view human development is to see a decline in egocentrism. As Henry Gardner said, “The whole history of human development can be viewed as a progressive decline in egocentrism.” Consciousness development engenders a decrease in narcissism and an increase in caring and consciousness. Humans move from ego-centric to ethno-centric to world-centric as they develop in consciousness. The upward spiral of development is at the same time a spiral of compassion—from me to us to all of us.

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Winning the Battle for Freedom and Prosperity

by John Mackey, February 27, 2006 | Permalink

With a few minor edits, this is the speech I gave as the keynote speaker at FreedomFest in May of 2004. In it, I critique the freedom movement and highlight mistakes that have greatly lessened its impact and influence in the world, and I spell out specific actions the movement should take to evolve its purpose and values.

What I hope to accomplish tonight is to challenge your thinking about the modern freedom movement. I believe the freedom movement has been its own worst enemy by foolishly limiting its appeal and impact with an overly narrow interpretation about the meaning and purpose of freedom. From a business perspective, the freedom movement faces major marketing challenges, the result of its poor job of branding itself to the world.

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