Around the beginning of April every year, Jews recall the Exodus from Egypt at the festival of Passover. The importance of this tradition, dating back thousands of years, was brought out during the Nazi Holocaust. There are stories of unleavened bread (matzah), proclaimed in the Bible, being smuggled into the concentration camps.

As a business mentor, I continue to find that the stories, anecdotes and explanations of the rituals and laws of the festival have meaning in a wider context. Specifically, they can be applied to our every day commercial lives.

This point was driven home as I was reading a series of articles about the late scion of American Jewry, Rabbi Yosef Soloveitchik, and his commentaries on what happened way down in Egypt all those years ago. Three examples:

1) Crying out

We read that the Children of Israel ‘cried out’ in pain. We assume that the pain was caused by the stressful workload imposed on the slaves. However, the question remains was this the only problem? Was it the real issue? More recent discussions reveal that the Jews were actually more troubled from the law which prohibited marital relations. It was only  a ‘higher and external authority’ who could understand the true underlying need and resolve the issue.

In modern parlance, I am sometimes approached by companies that ask me to find new them export markets. Fair enough, but why? It is not so much that they believe that they can make more money overseas. A common reason is because they have spare capacity to be exploited. Meanwhile, they have often ignored the issue of the costs of new marketing channels.

In other words, they have reached an operational decision based on a restricted understanding of their problems. It is the responsibility of a mentor to point that out and to encourage them to reflect on the basis of their decisions.

2) Living with your decisions

Rabbi Soloveitchik was an orthodox rabbi. For all the demands of his religion, any religion, he fervently preached that Judaism was something to be tasted and seen. To paraphrase, it should be felt as a comforting hand on your shoulder.

Similar words can be used for our own commercial environments. We cajole employees. We are desperate for the next client to sign up. We rush around trying to accomplish so many tasks everyday that we tend to lose sight of our vision.

My point is that work should be something that you want to do. Even when there is pressure, we should be able to understand why it is there and the potential benefits at the end of the assignment.  The day-to-day issues should be items that we want to liaise about with colleagues, below and above us. If not, well like any religion, life and work become a meaningless set of restrictions, which foster hatred and discontent.

3) Leadership

Moses is considered one of the great leaders of all time. However, with some irony, he is barely mentioned as the Jews leave Egypt. In contrast, his prime moment comes at Mt Sinai, when the 10 Commandments are imparted and eventually passed on to hundreds of thousands of eager followers. What we learn from this is that more than a leader, Moses was a teacher. He possessed talents to influence others.

Entrepreneurs often confuse titles: leadership, management, strategy.  Many a CEO believes that they are good at all three, when they rarely have the abilities to deliver on one of these separate skill sets. Moses was a modest person, acutely aware of what he was and was not good at. He never shirked to bring in help via his brother (Aaron) or sister (Miriam), or even to reach out to consultants’ such as his father-in-law, Jethro! How often does that happen in modern business? How many times to you hear of people being proud to accomplish things all by themsleves?

As a concluding thought, I am always encouraging friends and clients to keep up-to-date with new literature and alternative approaches in business. However, sometimes we have to remember that many of the best points have already been passed on to us several millenia ago.