Do you consider yourself moral in life and in business? Morality is something that varies from culture to culture, person to person, religion to religion, but there are distinct common themes. A comprehensive survey of 60 different cultures conducted by Oxford University found there are seven core moral rules that are considered good and common to people and cultures worldwide.

These principles are largely rooted in promoting cooperation and social harmony.

1. Help your family: Loyalty to kin and caring for family members.
2. Help your group: Loyalty to one’s group, community, or tribe, friends.
3. Returning favors/Reciprocity: Trusting others, reciprocating favors, and forgiving. Being reliable.
4. Bravery: Valuing courage and heroism. Speaking up. Showing up.
5. Deferring to superiors: Respecting authority and acknowledging those with rich, valuable experience. Learning from their experience and history.
6. Divide resources fairly and fairness in general: Dividing disputed resources fairly. Or as we might say, a meeting of the minds? Practicing a bit of compromise?
7. Respect others' property and property rights: Respecting prior possession, ie: not stealing!

Religions often formalize these social cooperation rules, with the most prominent shared principle being The Golden Rule: Treat others as you wish to be treated, a concept that appears in Christianity, Islam, Judaism, Hinduism, Buddhism, and Confucianism. Other important themes include: 

1. Care and Compassion: Protecting the vulnerable, particularly children, and caring for the sick, elderly, and weak.
2. Respect for Human Life: Prohibitions against unjust killing/violence, which include making, obeying, and enforcing laws.
3. Honesty/Truthfulness: Truth-telling, condemning lying, not stealing or cheating.
4.  Self-control: Promoting moderation, patience, and control over desire or anger.

How do you measure your success? Numbers?

Maybe today, pause and think about all the above to see how you can incorporate these themes into your daily life so that your success is not measured by numbers alone.