Ken Costa spoke to more than 80 people from the Birmingham business community on Wednesday 21st March. The breakfast event was hosted by ChaplaincyPlus at the Hotel du Vin.
ChaplaincyPlus, led by Chris Dinsdale, serves the professional business community by being part of daily business life, seeking to encourage and support professionals in Birmingham’s City Centre.
Ken spoke briefly about the challenges of the workplace today and why he was motivated to write God at Work. He then took questions from guests, ranging from the issue of ambition to the challenges of long working hours.
Ken Costa addressed The Trinity Forum at The St Stephen’s Club, London on the subject, ‘Success, Stress and Purpose in Today’s Business World’ on Monday 19th March.
Founded in 1991, The Trinity Forum is a leadership academy that works to cultivate networks of leaders whose integrity and vision will help to renew culture and promote human freedom. Their programs and publications have offered the opportunity for leaders to consider together the big ideas that have shaped Western civilization and the faith that has animated its highest achievements.
Hosted by Jonathan Aitken, the Executive Director of The Trinity Forum in Europe, Ken was introduced by a long standing friend and competitor, Lord Griffiths, Vice-Chairman of Goldman Sachs International.
Read the speech here.
City stalwart explains the influence of evangelical Christianity on his everyday business life in his newly published book God at Work
The Times, Business, Monday 14th March 2007
Attempting to square God with Mammon is not the usual pastime of investment bankers, especially ones who earn hundreds of thousands of pounds a year and whose deal résumé includes the likes of Anglo American’s £12 billion takeover of De Beers.
Ken Costa knows this. And he realises that his new book, God at Work, which focuses on the relationship between the Christian faith and working life, could have him accused of hypocrisy.
“The reservations are deep,” says the chairman of investment banking for Europe, Middle East and Africa at UBS. “Who wants to put themselves out as a target to be sniped at?”
A charge of hypocrisy would not sit easily with the author, a native South African. It was the perception of falseness that prompted Mr Costa, who came of age in apartheid-era student politics, initially to reject Christianity, or at least the “warped” version of it offered by his country’s regime at that time.
But now, towards the end of his career, and as chairman of Alpha International, the evangelical Christian organisation, he is willing to take any flak that may be directed his way. “The answer is that it is another part of one’s faith. If there is good news, tell it.”
Read more here.
Publishers Continuum and Alpha International celebrated the launch of God at Work by Ken Costa on Thursday 15th March at The Law Society, London.
Robin Baird-Smith of Continuum paid tribute to Ken Costa for writing an honest account about the difficulties of applying the Christian faith in the cut-throat world of the City.
Nicky Gumbel, Vicar of Holy Trinity Brompton and pioneer of the Alpha Course, said that there was ‘no one more qualified than Ken’ to write about the Christian faith in the workplace. A friend of Ken Costa since their days at Cambridge, he recalled the time when Ken was considering his future career.
‘Ken was praying about what he should be doing. Full time Christian service or whether it was banking or the City? He turned to the book of Luke and right at the end of the gospel, where Jesus told his disciples that they would receive power from on high. Ken got to this verse and got stuck on the first four words of that verse where it said ‘stay in the city’ and here we are over 30 years later and Ken has stayed in the city all those years! That is what has enabled him to write this book - he has stayed in the city and has combined that with this strong faith in Jesus Christ. It is what makes this book such an important book.’
Following his Vicar, Ken Costa gave a brief talk:
“Why write this book? Why does one want to do it? There was a moment when I asked honestly, ‘do I really want to do this to write something of this kind – some kind of practical help to others who struggle like I struggle?’
Well, the stakes are high, they really are and I think that unless we find the church is relevant to the workplace where people are spending all their time, then we should not be surprised if the churches are empty if we have got nothing to say to people doing their day to day work. This is a tiny little piece that might help in trying to work it out. I think that’s the first thing.
The second is much more exciting, I think society has just run out of energy. It really has. It hasn’t begun to understand the power of the resurrection, the newness of life, the throbbing excitement of living a life with God in a difficult and struggling place - the harshness of commercial compromise - that we all have to do every day in our workplace. And yet, this is where it is now.
We know the stakes are as high as they are. What are we going to do about? Well, we are going to live a life and we have got a life. I remember our wedding sermon which was preached on the text, ‘I came that you might have life in all its fullness.’ Sure it’s tough and sure its stressful but there is a fullness that I don’t know anyone else has. I look around at the bankruptcy of the ideas and the lack of oxygen and the lack of sense of hope for the future and I wonder to myself ‘if we don’t take a grip on this, then who is?’”
Ken ended by thanking the congregation of HTB and paid tribute to those who had helped to bring the book to publication and also to his family.
“They have been an amazing support as have you. I really want you to buy as many copies as possible! Check out the website. Buy the book! I want to thank you very much for being here.”
