St. Vincent de Paul as CEO: an interview with Rev. Thomas McKenna, C.M.

Rev. Thomas McKenna, G.M., Provincial of the Eastern Province for the Congregation of the Mission (Vincentians)

Interviewed by Charles M.A. Clark, Department of Economics, St. John's University

Q. Can you briefly describe who St Vincent de Paul was and why he is so important to the mission of St. John's University?

A. St. Vincent de Paul was a French priest of the 17th century who not only brought reform to the Church and society of his day, but also founded or inspired a number of organizations -- whose memberships now numbers in the millions -- who carry his vision into the present He had an especially vibrant feel for the Gospel of Jesus Christ, particularly St Luke's version with its strong note of compassion for the downtrodden. Vincent did this not only by highlighting on the privileged place the poor have in Jesus' world but also by translating this conviction into many practical means to convince them of their God-given dignity. He also had a gift for spreading his vision, drawing many around him, clergy and lay, to serve in the same spirit.

Besides his general influence on generations of good-willed people, he is important to St John's because the group of priests and brothers he began founded St John's University. Known officially as the Congregation of the Mission and more popularly as Vincentians, they opened St John's in 1871 at the request of the bishop of Brooklyn to educate the children of immigrants. As with all their works, the Vincentians meant St. John's to be another medium for Vincent's vision in society. In the years since, this congregation has worked to put flesh on how Vincent de Paul would have inserted the Gospel into the world of education.

Q. You have contended in previous books and articles that Vincent's activities were very much like that of a CEO. Could you elaborate on the similarities and differences between Vincent's work and that of a contemporary CEO?

A. Vincent, I believe, would get high ratings on any performance analysis for a modern CEO. He pulled together the complex activities of organizations of many different types and in far flung countries. Through tens of thousands of letters, on-site supervision, and effective delegation, he exercised many of the same skills we value today in a corporate leader. Tight quality control (rules of office, mission statements, inspection tours), deft risk management (calculating opportunities and obstacles for new or troubled foundations), creative fund raising (from legacies to land management to real estate speculation and most every other revenue strategy in between), prescient market analysis (spotting needs which most everyone else had overlooked), ability to keep his operations mission-driven and his personnel motivated, he excelled in so many of the things that mark an effective executive.

The difference between him and a CEO lies not in managerial skills but in purpose. Financial profitability was not the bottom line for Vincent, even though he always strove for, and mostly achieved, balanced ledgers. His benchmark was whether the Kingdom which Jesus announced was becoming more visible and believable in the society. Especially did he look for whether the special ones of the Kingdom, the least of the brother and sisters, were actually being taken care of, accorded the respect due them as God's chosen. His mind and talent for institutional organization were at the service of this evangelical cause.

Q. Are there any insights for today's business men and women from Vincent's example as a manager? Would there be a Vincentian approach to management that would be applicable today?

A. One particular wisdom Vincent might afford today's manager is his example of what might be called shrewd honesty -- the hard balance between being street smart and forthright His words for these were prudence and simplicity. From a peasant background, he had practical savvy and was never naive or gullible. He counseled the prudence of the serpent to his followers, telling them to think things through and not always presume the goodwill of others. At the same time he repeatedly urged his men and women to be transparent -- to have the simplicity of the dove -- and himself enjoyed a lifelong reputation for telling things as they were. He recognized this balance between real-world thinking and personal honesty to be an art, a very subtle touch developed only by long practice, growing self knowledge, and ever deepening appreciation for the way in which Jesus himself lived it. As a manager, Vincent showed that enviable combination of being respected for his practical intelligence and trusted because of his forth rightness. In their dealings with him, people thought him anything but stupid (or otherworldly) and at the same time took his words as genuine and the reflection of his real feelings.

Q. How should a business education offered at a Vincentian university differ from that offered at a secular business school?

A. To reinterpret a current phrase I think a business education at a Vincentian school should be "value-added." That is to say, there should be a certain cluster of values added to the pedagogical mix, values that have to do with honest dealings, personal genuineness and sensitivity to the interests of those on society's underside. Particularly should there be a strong inculcation of respect for the inherent worth of all people, especially those on the margins. The mainspring for Vincent's prodigious activity was his conviction that each individual was precious, carried something of the divine inside, and gave off an aspect of Christ's face in the world. Especially did Vincent notice players whom most would overlook. Look at the other side of the scarred and used-up coin, he would say, and there you'll find the face of the Lord. It's this heightened sensitivity to the inalienable worth of humans that should mark a Vincentian education.

Q. Are there overlaps between the Catholic social tradition and the Vincentian tradition?

A. It's clear that there are very extensive overlaps between the Catholic social tradition and Vincent's view of the world. Both use the same Gospel as they come to grips with the link between God's desires for the world as Jesus presents them and the way things actually happen in that world. Both spring from the same lineage of interpreters of that Gospel, the saints, thinkers and activists who gave it flesh and bones in each age. In the wider field of the Catholic social tradition, Vincent is one of the most vivid embodiments of God's concern for the downtrodden, a theme present from the very beginning of both Testaments. A contemporary description of this is the preferential option for the poor. Vincent spoke of the poor as our lords and masters, and made attention to them the litmus test for whether religion was true or false.

Q. I like to define Catholic social thought as the application of Christian ethics to contemporary social issues. Clearly Vincent's work was grounded in the Gospels and his life was based on this tradition. However, did he ever look beyond individual problems of poverty and towards social structures that produce and perpetuate poverty?

A. In its modern sense, Catholic social thought did not come into existence until the Social Encyclicals of the late 19th century. It was only then that the sociological tools became available by which the popes and theologians could bring the Gospel to bear on societal structures as such. There was no social analysis as we know it in Vincent's day.

However, it is fair to say that while Vincent did not have the language for this analysis, he had the instincts for it. His signature approach to alleviating poverty was through the organization. From early on, he saw beyond the one-on-one response to crises to the necessity of setting up systems to deliver care and continue it. He organized (literally, wrote the organizational structure of) many societies of men and women who gave sustained attention to chronic social problems. He sat on blue-ribbon committees of the French Court which worked to raise the overall quality of organized religion (clergy reform) in the Realm. He attacked problems from a structural viewpoint, doing things such as handing out farming tools and seeds in famine sectors to insure the next crop, and setting up a complex of long-term residences for the refugees flooding Paris during a civil war. Perhaps most tellingly, he strove to change the prevailing attitude towards the poor. Whenever he had the chance, he spoke to the "haves" abou t the dignity of the "have-nots." He challenged their view that poverty was God's curse, the mark of Cain, and that being poor was synonymous with being criminal. So while not privy to our sociological insights, his fundamental beliefs about the inalienable worth of the poor spilled over into what can be seen as a pre-scientific social consciousness.

Q. Many great social and political thinkers have taken a hostile attitude towards business and business men and women (Aristotle is the classic case). The Catholic tradition is, in many ways more balanced, looking at the purpose of business as meeting human needs, and seeking to promote ethical business practices (Thomas Aquinas as a good example of this). How did Vincent see business, business men and women and their role in promoting the common good?