Teaching the Call Vocation in International Business Education: Exploring and Developing the Vocation of the Business Leader as Pedagogy

Can faith and fortunate mix in international business? Less well known in both academic and public discourses are the parallels between the Jesuits and the commercial world and modern management. St. Ignatius, the founder of Society of Jesus, created Spiritual Exercises and Jesuit Constitutions--spiritual and organizational practices serve as a method for Jesuits to engage and train the self in routine activities that are then embedded in daily operations that are highly sophisticated moral and philosophical basis. This work will put forward Jesuit-inspired organizational principles that new socially responsible global startups could learn from. Modern corporation as a pivotal societal institution has great potential for good. Against this background, The Vocation of the Business Leader: a Reflection was published in 2012 by the Pontifical Council for Justice and Peace. This document formally asserts that the roles of the entrepreneur and the manager can be “genuine human and Christian calling,” though there are important complex factors (i.e., globalization, technological innovation, financialization, and cultural changes) within business along with the moral and spiritual issues they present that will challenge entrepreneurs and managers. We will address issues related to teaching the Vocation of the Business Leader in context of dominant theories and frameworks of international business education.