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The Four Levels of Happiness^®

Happiness is the only goal that people pursue for its own sake, which makes it an ideal lens for explaining why people and organizations behave as they do. The Four Levels of Happiness model shows leaders how to elevate the powerful drive for happiness and direct it toward shared goals, strong ethics, and great performance. Click here for a full description of the Four Levels.

  

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More News

• The Many Faces of Fr. Spitzer
• Level 3 Culture Key to Success at Gonzaga
• Dialogue with ERC Fellows Underscores Challenge of Building Level 3 Cultures
• Untroubled Leadership in Troubled Times
• Construction Execs in New Orleans Receive Their First Spritz of Spitzer

Ask Fr. Spitzer

• Are Bailouts Ethical?
• How Many People Need to Change for Culture Change to Happen?
• A Level 3 Mission Doesn't Guarantee a Level 3 Culture
• Connection to Covey?
• Is There Nobility in Selling Paper Clips?
• Dealing With a Level 2 Aggressor
• What Are Your Views on the Banking Crisis?

The Levels in Action

• The Case for Making Forgiveness a Corporate Value
• The Mother of All Bureacracy
• Never Waste a Perfectly Good Recession
• The Web Conference From Hell
• The Tale of a Level 3 Leader's Trial by Fire
• Seeing the Best in Others
• The Perils of Making Managers Play the "Comparison Game" at Review Time

 Ethics in Action

• Good Ethics Is Good Business
• Ethics with a very Small "e"

 

The Pleasures and Perils of Working “Under the Radar”

“So how do you like the midnight shift,” I asked the security guard. It was 7:00 a.m., and he was just finishing up his “day” by escorting me to the conference room where I was scheduled to give a breakfast talk. Even though it was just the two of us in the  elevator, he adopted a conspiratorial tone.  “I love it!” he whispered. Then he winked, leaned a little closer, and confided, “I stay under the radar!” Read More �

Can Virtue Be Taught?

While the question may strike some as more philosophical than practical, growth in virtue is one of the keys to becoming more fulfilled in every aspect of life. In the following reflection, Fr. Robert Spitzer discusses common hurdles found along the path to virtue, and he highlights the interdependence of virtue and faith. Read More �

The Levels in Action

A Perfect Game Lost, But Perfect Virtue Found

By this point, nearly everybody – baseball fan or not – has heard of the “perfect” game by Armando Galarraga of the Detroit Tigers. The quotes that undermine “perfect” were contributed by Jim Joyce, the umpire who, in his own words, “kicked the [stuffing]” out of the call that should have capped the triumph. Read More �

The Tale of the Naïve, Uninvited Nuns

Back in my Fortune 100 days, my office afforded a view of the visitors' entrance to facility where I worked. One day, I happened to look up and see a quite peculiar sight – two nuns, in white flowing habits, strolling along the walkway toward the security lobby. What possible business could they have with the company? I wondered.  Who were they coming to see?  Did they even have an appointment, or were they simply dropping by? Read More �

 

Ten Lessons from Phoenix on Putting Fr. Spitzer’s Ideas into Practice

The Journey in the Diocese of Phoenix has been completed, but the personal and organizational progress it inspired will continue.  That sums up the responses from participants in the Journey to Excellence program, which held its final all-staff session on April 23. Leaders and diocesan staff were very generous in their feedback about the curriculum – what they liked most, what impact it had, and where it could be improved.  The comments received from evaluations and interviews are summarized below. Read More �

Video Story: Fr. Spitzer’s Inspiring Talk at the Crozier Gala

How does a young man bound for a career in business or law wind up in the priesthood? Fr. Spitzer’s lively retelling of his own vocation story at the Crozier Gala in Scoottsdale, Arizona, drew a standing ovation from the 650 attendees. His 20-minute talk can be viewed in this video story. Read More �

It’s Not Green That Makes People Mean, It’s Level 2

Last month, a story came out that sparked great interest and debate, particularly among advocates and skeptics of “green” consumerism. It concerned a University of Toronto research study that posed the question, “Do Green Products Make Us Better People?”  The study’s controversial answer was no, they do not make us better.  In fact, the researchers claimed that “people act less altruistically and are more likely to cheat and steal after purchasing green products as opposed to conventional products.” Read More �

The Four Indispensable Tools

The four Cardinal Virtues aren’t named for a bird, or a baseball team, or the men who elect the Pope. The word “cardinal” comes from the Latin, cardo, which means hinge. So the Cardinal Virtues literally mean those virtues on which all moral behavior depends.  A lack of these four makes it very hard to do the right thing consistently. Read More �

The Levels in Action

Why I Left the “A Team” After I Saw What the “A” Really Stood For

There’s a saying that goes, “When all you have is a hammer, everything starts to look like a nail.” When you’re stuck in a Level 2 outlook, every talent and gift you possess starts to look like a weapon. Your intelligence, your authority, your bank account, beauty, or brawn can all be picked up by the butt-end and used as a cudgel for pounding competitors into submission. In Level 2 organizations, this weaponization of skills may even be encouraged; it is how you show you are worthy to join the leadership class, and how you convey your membership.  I learned this lesson vividly 10 years ago, when I moved from a fairly aggressive, Level 2 culture to one much closer to Level 3. Read More �

The Four Levels of Happiness for Kids

There’s a comment we often hear from people taking the Journey to Excellence, or from people who hear one of Fr. Robert Spitzer’s talks about the Four Levels of Happiness®. Parents in particular say, “This is something we ought to be helping our kids understand.” The people at Healing the Culture, an institute founded by Fr. Spitzer, have made it much easier to introduce kids to these life-enhancing ideas. They maintain a website, fourlevelsofhappiness.com, which is designed with kids of grade-school age in mind. Read More �

The Level-Minded Observer

March Madness Ethics; Cost-cutting and Theft; New Friends, Products, and Website; and Fr. Spitzer’s Call

This month’s roundup column of shorter items dissects the ethics of a common sports tradition that raises questions in some quarters. Also, we look at the disturbing but sadly predictable findings of an ERC study, share news of three developments of interest, provide an imbedded video of Fr. Spitzer discussing his call to the priesthood, and end with a slightly amusing joke. Read More �

The Levels in Action

Young Man “Floored” By Four Levels Brings Spitzer’s Message to Others on the Road to Recovery

Though still just 20 years old, Edward J. Shehwen III has already faced one of life’s toughest challenges. Shehwen became addicted to drugs and alcohol in high school but has been in recovery now for more than two years. He has gone from being a stranger walking into a meeting of Alcoholics Anonymous to someone who greets other strangers just starting their own journey to sobriety. And part of the help that Shehwen offers begins with a question: “Have you ever heard of Fr. Spitzer and the Four Levels of Happiness?” Read More �

Confessions of a Recovering Spitzer Skeptic

It was one year ago that I first met Fr. Spitzer and started editing this website. Along the way, I’ve used stories to try to flesh out his philosophy, but I’ve never told the story of my own unlikely path to the Spitzer Center.  It’s unlikely because I had theretofore been a certified training skeptic – a fellow whose favorite part of any personal development course was lunch.  In my corporate career, which included altogether too many such courses, I regarded them as a waste of time on a par with watching reruns of Gilligan’s Island. Here's the story of how Fr. Spitzer changed my perspective. Read More �

Sign Up for Spitzer Daily Inspirations

Fr. Robert Spitzer has a saying about the Four Levels of Happiness^®: “Level 3 has to be chosen again and again.” It is not our default drive, but it can be a product of our freedom and our choices. But choosing it, day in and day out, takes discipline and thought. This challenge prompted the Diocese of Phoenix to give us a great suggestion a while back. Why don’t we provide a more regular way to help people start their day with some inspiration? Ideally, it should be something very brief, like a single quote, to remind people of the ideas they explored more fully in taking the Journey to Excellence program. Read More �

The Level-Minded Observer

Tiger Acknowledges Level 2 Outlook; the Happiness Machine; Invictus; the $177 Bagel

In the year since the Spitzer Center began to publish The Four-Level Leader, we’ve gotten a sense of what types of articles readers find most interesting. You like it when we use the Four Levels as a lens to illuminate events in the news or the broader culture. Articles that break information down into smaller, digestible chunks are also appreciated. This new feature, “The Level-Minded Observer,” aims to do both while providing brief updates on news from the Center.  Read More �

Techniques for Avoiding Roadblocks on the Journey to Higher Happiness

A few weeks ago, we talked about the challenge of staying at Level 3 in a Level 2 World. But the biggest hurdles don’t come from the outside but the inside. Seeing the beauty and benefits of Level 3 is one thing; overcoming ingrained habits of Level 2 thinking is another. Spitzer Center Executive Director Jim Berlucchi has been facilitating the Journey to Excellence for years, and he’s on the same journey himself.  What follows are some of his own techniques for achieving and keeping a Level 3 identity. Read More �

Spitzer, Collins See Eye to Eye on How the Mighty Fall

One test of the strength of any idea is seeing how closely it corresponds to the real world. The strength and real-world relevance of the Spitzer Center’s message can be seen in the pages of How the Mighty Fall. The best-seller is the latest in a series of books by Jim Collins that explore why some companies thrive while others decline.  Collins has aimed his spotlight at organizations Built to Last and described how others have made the journey From Good to Great. By contrast, How the Mighty Fall looks at companies that reached great heights, then stumbled. Read More �

A Dozen Tips for Staying at Level 3 in a Level 2 World

When you make the decision to move from Level 2 to Level 3, the biggest obstacles tend to come from your own internal defaults. But the task of making service to others your primary source of happiness can be tougher when you’re facing a Level 2 headwind. If your workplace or social life is marred by politics, gossip, and gamesmanship, how do you resist the provocations to revert to Level 2? How do you protect yourself while remaining a positive influence? Here are 12 tips to consider. Read More �

Did the Ethics of Health Care Reform Help Scott Brown Win in Massachusetts?

In the wake of Scott Brown’s upset win in the Massachusetts Senate election last week, a lot of observers have offered their views on how a Republican won in such a “blue state.”  A case can be made that the ethics of Washington politics helped to tip the balance toward Brown – and by ethics, I don’t mean scandals, crimes, or corruption. I mean that voters and politicians use different ethical standards in judging which actions are permissible and which aren’t. Read More �

Major Catholic Health Care System DEEMs the “Journey” a Trip Worth Taking

Like any large organization built on a mission of helping people, the Sisters of Charity Leavenworth Health System (SCLHS) needs mission-driven employees to succeed. Towards that end, the Catholic, faith-based network of 13 hospitals and clinics has deployed the Journey to Excellence program to help strengthen its broader employee development strategy. Read More �

The Top Ten Level 3 Stories of 2009

It’s customary at this time of year to reflect on the year that has just passed by compiling lists of notable people and events. I was tempted to pick the low-hanging Level 2 fruit every year provides (“2009’s Worst Ethical Lapses” or “The Year’s Most Infamous Cases of Level 2 Dominance”). But I had to ask myself, Do readers really want to rehash Galleon Group’s descent into insider trading … or Christian Bale’s obscenity-laden tirade … or the failings of Governor Sanford or Tiger Woods? While the editor lurking inside me said, “Yes, they do!” a nobler impulse prevailed. So here’s a look back at some of the year’s more memorable Level 3 moments. Read More �

An Antidote for Ethical Disasters

Part two of a two-part series on ethics education for businesses and organizations

If you do a search of companies that offer ethics training and education, you’ll find that many focus almost exclusively on the arena of legal compliance. I made the case earlier that compliance education is necessary but insufficient, and described the risks a company runs in reducing ethics to legal compliance alone. In fact, I called this cramped perspective a recipe for ethical disaster, which raises a question: What does the antidote look like? What follows is a brief overview of four ways to ensure that an organization is laying the groundwork for a truly ethical culture. Read More �

The Levels in Action

What the Media Have Missed in the Tiger Woods Story

We’re going to crawl out on a limb here and guess that Tiger Woods is a very Level 2 guy. It is not the Spitzer Center’s practice to pin this label on people, but we’ll make a guess here (and it is just a guess) because his highly publicized crisis suggests it. The “Tiger Is Level 2 Hypothesis” also helps to explain a lot of things that have his admirers scratching their heads. Read More �

Hollywood’s Greatest Tribute to Level 3

When I was a kid, my siblings and I found it fashionable to mock It’s a Wonderful Life, and regard it as one of those holiday chestnuts that TV stations roasted to death every Christmas.  The running joke was that after Thanksgiving, the movie took over the tube and held it hostage.  “Are there any movies on tonight besides It’s a Wonderful Life?” we’d ask each other. I have to admit, as I got older the film really grew on me, so much so that I bought my own copy and made it a family tradition to watch it every season.  I am not ashamed to admit that there are scenes I still can’t get through without moist eyes. Read More �

A Recipe for Ethical Disaster

Part one of a two-part series on ethics education for businesses and organizations

Is it possible that a common approach to business ethics training might do as much to cause ethical problems as prevent them? While that may seem counterintuitive, it’s a risk that companies run in reducing ethics to little more than legal compliance. Unfortunately, that’s the case today in many organizations, where a legalistic view of ethics holds sway. Read More �