Talking Business Now

August Turak joins Talking Business Now host Kelly Scanlon to discuss the business lessons he learned from the Trappist monks.Turak was a founding employee of MTV and the A&E Network. Later, he founded software companies that eventually sold to BMC Software for $150 million. He currently runs a not-for-profit called the Self-Knowledge Symposium Foundation.As a successful entrepreneur and award-winning author, Turak attributes much of his success to his 20-year stint as a frequent monastic guest of the Trappist monks of Mepkin Abbey. As a monastic guest, he lives and works alongside the monks sometimes for months at a time.In 1996, a skydiving accident triggered the emotional crisis or “Dark Night of the Soul” that sent Turak to Mepkin Abbey in search of the spiritual solace he so desperately needed and the monks so graciously provided.In 2004, at the encouragement of some former students, Turak decided to enter the John Templeton Foundation’s Power of Purpose essay contest. He had 3,500 words in which to