Tilman Bauer

Aalto University School of Business, Helsinki, Finland
Fellow

Tilman Bauer is a young professional in the fields of business vis-à-vis peace, social sustainability, and CSR (Corporate Social Responsibility). Double nationality (Finland+Germany) who lived in eight  countries on five continents and traveled to 50 countries on all six continents. His professional career aspirations are to work for peace in the interface of business and society. He desires to base all actions on sustainable and ethical values and to realize the potential of business to foster peace, which he defines not merely as the absence of war or violence but positively for example as the presence of true wellbeing and prosperity, as positive social impact, as cultural diversity, and ultimately as a higher purpose. Tilman believes that the ultimate responsibility of managers – indeed, of all human beings – is to live and coexist peacefully and to contribute to the overall happiness of humankind by creating products and services that foster the greater good. The one who does most good earns most money. Here, Tilman is influenced by his experiences 2009-2010 at the United Nations-mandated University for Peace in Costa Rica where he obtained a Master of Arts in International Peace Studies. Tilman is currently doing a second and a third master's degree at Erasmus University Rotterdam School of Management and at Aalto University School of Business in order to find out the answer to the following question: How can responsible leaders motivate managers to accomplish the shift from the current value set to a new paradigm where shared value is created for shareholders and society at large?

As Tilman sees it, the difference between responsible management and outdated greed is a fine line. Serendipity, the sagacious skill to harness tacit destiny – coupled with the humanization of business and a sense of ethics – is a skill that enables managers to transform short-term threats (of reduced income) into long-term opportunities to create a peaceful society. Originally from Finland and Germany, Tilman is fully proficient in Finnish, German, and English, conversational in French and Spanish and to a lesser extent Swedish, and beginner in Russian and Dutch.