Bob Sutton, after Manny's: 'Eric is the mensch we need right now'

The morning after moderating Eric's Manny's SF event, Stanford professor Bob Sutton publishes a heavyweight LinkedIn endorsement — calling Eric a 'compassionate capitalist' weaving leadership, mission, governance, and love (yes love) into a single argument for why mission-aligned companies survive and earn more in the long run.

“It was such a delight to interview Eric Ries and to engage with the thoughtful crowd at Manny's, a wonderful community gathering place in San Francisco's Mission District. Dar has a wonderful take below. I was struck by Eric's remarkable ability to weave together complex elements--leadership, mission, organizational design, governance, and love (yes love!)--to make such a compelling argument about what makes organizations great, why once great organizations turn corrupt, and how to build and sustain organizations stop the rot from creeping in. And he also has the rare gift of telling stories, stories with beautiful arc, to make his points...about Costco Wholesale, Patagonia, Novo Nordisk, to name a few. Eric is a compassionate capitalist, making a compelling argument that if you treat your customers and employees well, and resist the inevitable pressure to slowly treat them worse and and worse (to give more money to shareholders and senior management in the short-term), your company is more likely to survive and to make more money in the long-term. I hope he is right, I think he is right, and I am 100% sure that Eric is the mensch we need right now.” — Bob Sutton on LinkedIn