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Ethics and integrity honored by Dean Institute

Kim Chaudoin | 615.966.6494 | 

Business Purpose 2014

Doing business the right way is the right way to do business.

Individuals and organizations that are doing business the right way were honored Wednesday, June 4, at the fourth annual Business with a Purpose awards luncheon and Integrity Forum. The event was presented by the Lipscomb University College of Business Hilton and Sallie Dean Institute for Corporate Governance and Integrity in partnership with the Center for Public Trust.

“Business with a Purpose is an event that celebrates the best of business,” said Turney Stevens, College of Business dean emeritus and director of the Dean Institute. “The annual Business with Purpose awards recognize those individuals and companies who have demonstrated their unusual commitments to outstanding service to the community, to encouraging their employees to achieve a higher social mission, and to achieving the highest level of profitability and financial success as well.”

The 2014 individual honorees include:

Global Business with Purpose Leadership Award
William E. (“Chip”) Connor, CEO of W.E. Connor & Company, Hong Kong
Connor was born and raised in Japan. He took over the family business in Tokyo in the mid 1980s, moved it to Hong Kong and expanded it throughout Asia and Europe to create one of the world’s largest global sourcing firms. The Connor Group is a worldwide merchandise-sourcing organization, managing the global sourcing requirements of more than 60 companies. These clients include some of the most significant brands, specialty and department stores, catalog companies and importers in North America, Europe, Latin America and Australia.

Academic Business with Purpose Leadership Award
Dr. Theodore Roosevelt Mallock, Yale University, author of “Doing Virtuous Business” and great-grandson of President Theodore Roosevelt
Malloch teaches at Yale University and chairs the Spiritual Enterprise Institute, which he founded in 2005. In the fall, he will move to Oxford University where he will head the university’s business ethics program. His books include “Issues in International Trade and Development Policy,” “Beyond Reductionism: Ideology and the Science of Politics,” “Unleashing the Power of Perpetual Learning” and “Renewing American Culture: The Pursuit of Happiness.” He has also been executive producer of four PBS documentaries, most recently, “Renewing American Culture and Spiritual Enterprise: Doing Virtuous Business.”

Marketplace Leadership Award
Mike Esterday, CEO, Integrity Solutions Inc.
Over the past 35 years, Esterday has experienced a wide variety of success in sales, management and training. In his first sales position, he was number one out of 6,000. Later, he founded several successful companies in the real estate industry. In 1985, he founded the largest distributorship for Integrity Solutions and since then has helped organizations from over 120 countries improve sales, service and coaching skills.

Organizations that were also recognized as part of the awards luncheon include:

Business with Purpose Award, large public company
Genesco
Genesco is a publicly owned specialty retailer of branded footwear, licensed and branded headwear and licensed sports apparel and accessories and is a wholesaler of branded and licensed footwear. Through its various subsidiaries as of the end of 2013, Genesco operates 2,459 retail stores throughout the United States, Puerto Rico, Canada, the United Kingdom, and the Republic of Ireland.

Business with Purpose Award, large private company
Churchill Mortgage
Founded in 1992, Churchill Mortgage Corporation is a leader in the mortgage industry, providing conventional, FHA, VA and USDA residential mortgages across 23 states. Through its consultative approach to lending and strong commitment to local communities, the lender focuses on the right loan product for each borrower, providing the education and tools necessary to ensure borrowers’ financial stability

Business with Purpose Award, small company
Advance Financial
Family owned and operated, Advance Financial was founded in 1996 in Franklin, Tenn. From its humble beginnings as a three-store chain, the company has grown to include more than 40 locations throughout Middle Tennessee, with plans to expand into Knoxville. It currently has a workforce of more than 400 employees.

Business with Purpose Award, not-for-profit organization:
Rocketown
Rocketown was founded in 1994 by musician Michael W. Smith. The first of its kind in the Southeast, Rocketown has grown into a regional outreach as well as a model for Christian-based relational outreach across the country. Following the tragedy of Columbine in 1999, Rocketown’s board was inspired to grow the scope of programming and move to a central location in downtown Nashville. The current facility features three stages for live entertainment, Middle Tennessee’s only indoor skatepark, The Hub snack bar, a recording studio, and photography, art and dance studios. More than 800 teens from across the Middle Tennessee region participate in programs each week and at an after-school program at Nashville’s McGavock High School.

Show Hope Foundation
Founded by musician Steven Curtis Chapman and his wife, Mary Beth, Show Hope’s mission is to engage the church to care for orphans and reduce the barriers to adoption. Since its inception, Show Hope has helped provide forever homes through Adoption Aid grants for more than 4,000 orphans from more than 50 countries, including the U.S. In addition, more than 1,000 orphans with special needs have received critically needed medical care through Show Hope’s Special Care Centers.

Hospital Corporation of America was also recognized as the only Nashville-based organization to receive a 2014 World’s Most Ethical Companies award from Ethisphere. This designation recognizes companies that go beyond making statements about doing business “ethically” and translate those words into action. WME honorees not only promote ethical business standards and practices internally, they exceed legal compliance minimums and shape future industry standards by introducing best practices today. HCA was one of this year’s 144 honorees, representing 41 industries.

Founded in 2008 through a generous gift from Hilton and Sallie Dean, former and current trustees of Lipscomb University, the Dean Institute took as its mission to provide thought leadership, networking opportunities and educational programming at both the local and national levels on the important boardroom issues that lie at the intersection of doing things right and doing the right things.

In 2009, Ethisphere Institute, a leading international think tank dedicated to the advancement of best practices in business ethics, named the institute and its leader, Turney Stevens, as one of the “100 Most Influential in Business Ethics.”

The institute has created or partnered with others in the creation of numerous programs:

  • Women on Corporate Boards, an annual event recognizing women serving on Tennessee public company boards, is sponsored by CABLE and the Dean Institute. An annual study is researched and written by faculty and students of the Lipscomb University College of Business.
  • The Student Center for the Public Trust, created as a national outreach of the Center for the Public Trust, originated its first campus chapter at the College of Business on Lipscomb University’s campus. Today, there are more than 20 chapters nationwide with more being added annually.
  • The SCPT Ethics Video Contest, a national competition open to all college students, is annually sponsored by the Center for the Public Trust and the Dean Institute.
  • Boardroom Briefings, a popular breakfast program, is sponsored by the Dean Institute and hosted on the Lipscomb University campus. This program features nationally recognized speakers and topics of concern and interest to public company directors.
  • Huffington Post has featured more than 100 posts on business ethics and corporate governance by Dean Institute Senior Scholar Dr. Brad Reid, a member of the faculty of the College of Business.
  • Dean Emeritus and Dean Institute Director Turney Stevens has spoken on business ethics around the world at events such as the Asia Ethics Summit in Hong Kong, the Latin America Ethics Summit in Sao Paulo (July 2014), and the Global Ethics Summit in New York. He has conducted ethics seminars and training for major corporations such as Bridgestone Americas and has served on the Selection Criteria Committee for the World’s Most Ethical Companies competition.

For more information about the Dean Institute, visit www.lipscomb.edu/deaninstitute