Two years ago this month we hosted the Forum for Corporate Conscience, a CEO dialogue focusing on the corporation's responsibility beyond the bottom line.

On a rainy weekend at Ballantyne Resort, about 150 people gathered to discuss issues surrounding justice, the environment, community, family, economics and leadership. CEOs sat elbow to elbow with leading activists and advocates, willing to be challenged with viewpoints different than those they hear daily in the corporate boardroom.

They heard from people like Warren Buffett, environmentalist Paul Hawken, children's rights advocate Marian Wright-Edelman and best-selling author Kevin Philips. They broke into small discussion groups that sometimes looked more like group therapy than the World Economic Forum. They were wheedled, needled, and cajoled by each other and their adversaries.

Just before the conference began, David Gergen, who facilitated the Forum, asked me what my biggest fear was. My answer: that the CEOs would be gone by Sunday. I worried that we'd either bore them-or worse, prod them too much. I knew most of the attending CEOs "got it" but in the midst of Enron and WorldCom, it would be easy for some to doubt the sincerity of any corporate leader.

After two days of meetings, the CEOs gathered in small groups to make decisions. Their goal: a series of Collective Intentions; commitments to take back to their companies and their communities. I still remember the vibrations I felt that Sunday morning-the energy in the hotel was palpable while CEOs of the biggest companies in our region pounded out some tough measures. (None had left, by the way.)

I heard from a facilitator that Wachovia CEO Ken Thompson really challenged his fellow CEOs in shaping the Collective Intentions dealing with Family Issues. I asked him about it during a break. "Well, let's just say I went in that meeting with a few customers," he said. "I sure hope I left with some." Most of the CEOs who attended the Forum for Corporate Conscience came back with a broadened understanding of corporate responsibility. They made some changes in their organizations and started talking about the "Triple Bottom Line"-balancing economic, social and environmental performance all together.

Using Wachovia as an example, Ken has made an incredible impact on his organization and the community. They are embarking on an in-depth study of their environmental strategies, for instance. And at the end of 2004, he directed the unprecedented move of giving bonuses not to the top tiers of the organization, but to their lowest paid employees. Thousands of people saw bonuses, many for the first time in their lives, because the company had had a good year. Powerful stuff.

We don't have to employ 90,000 people to contribute in a big way. Melissa Swanson owns Occasions Catering, which has 6 employees. Twice a month, she and her staff get an earlier-than-usual start and take breakfast to the people in line at Crisis Assistance Ministry. They call it their "muffin ministry" and her employees love doing it-in some cases because they can remember what it's like to stand in line at 6:30 a.m. waiting for help.

No one asked Melissa to start doing this. No outside interests pressured her, no newspaper reporters took note. She just thinks it's the right thing to do.

Corporate Social Responsibility may be a new trend, and the triple bottom line a new buzzword, but it's no different than what the good guys have been doing all along: using whatever resources they have to make a difference beyond the bottom line. Ken Thompson may have hundreds of thousands of dollars to make a difference; Melissa Swanson may have a box of fresh Danish and an urn of hot coffee.

But what they have in common is immeasurable.

The closing speaker at the Forum was author Tom Wolfe.  Just as I led him into the ballroom, he asked if Paul Hawken, the environmentalist, was still there-they were old friends who hadn't seen each other in years.  I invited Paul to fill an empty seat at the head table and whispered an inquiry as to how they knew each other.  Turns out, they met in the sixties when Paul drove Tom around Haight Ashbury while he researched the Electric Kool-Aid Acid Test.