Ihad a college professor who was very into Aristotle. He said that of all the ancient Greek philosophers, Aristotle had the most relevance to what we would face once we hit the world of work.

What Aristotle said (translating loosely) is that the reason we work is to do our work well. This may seem overly obvious -- after all, who (aside from maybe Dilbert) goes to work to do their job badly? But there's a profound point here. Although we all work to obtain the basic necessities and comforts of life -- food, clothing, a nice house, security in old age or times of trouble -- the ultimate goal of our work is nothing less than to do our jobs to perfection.

So if you're the best real estate broker you don't necessarily sell more than anyone else. Instead, you figure out what the ideal real estate broker does, what the essential purpose of real estate brokering is -- perhaps, connecting people with the places where they can best achieve their business or personal goals (location, location, location) -- and then you endeavor to achieve that to the limit of your ability for each and every client.

This issue of Oregon Business features several people who I believe are striving for the Aristotelian ideal -- people who are both truly excellent at what they do, and unreservedly passionate about what they do, which may well be one and the same thing.

Chet Paulson, who wrote the First Person essay, argues persuasively for what might be called an Aristotelian principle of investment banking. He says the point is not simply to multiply an investor's principal, regardless of how that gain is obtained (say, by investing in tobacco, firearms or manufacturing processes that exploit workers and the environment). Instead, he says, the goal of investing capital should be the economic betterment of a company's stakeholders: customers, employees, communities. And by investing well, investors' portfolios do well, which wouldn't surprise Aristotle in the least.

Steve Smith, the subject of this month's In Character profile, has founded, built and sold two great tea brands -- first Stash, and then Tazo, which Starbucks bought in 1999. He could have retired or been kicked upstairs to a cushy corporate job. Instead, he's running rings around his young staff scouring the world for the perfect tea leaf. And when he gets a notion in his head to return a portion of Tazo's profit from tea back to the Indian villagers who grow it, he doesn't take "good enough" for an answer. If 15 villages can have clean water and new roads, then why not 30? If $600,000 can be raised, why not a million?

Our CEO of the Month, Rich Bader, runs EasyStreet Online Services, one of Oregon's most successful local ISPs. He's passionate about his extracurri-culars -- public broadcasting, education, the Software Association of Oregon. And he's every bit as passionate about biking and the out-of-doors. He asks: Do we want to be like the neurotic high-tech entrepreneurs in Seattle and Silicon Valley, all work and no play? Or, should we Oregonians strive for our own exquisite point of perfection in balancing our jobs and our lives?

If you have comments about any articles you've read in Oregon Business magazine, e-mail us at feedback@oregonbusiness.com.

Copyright 2004 Oregon Business magazine