Lead through questions to visualize your ‘Triple Bottom Line’ and transform your business.
Effect positive change for the planet and the lives and wellbeing of others. How to get started, for Start-ups to Corporations.
The following has all been written before, beautifully, by Michael Braungart and William McDonough in their seminal work ‘Cradle to Cradle’. But I’m returning to it here as I hope it might help to inspire and guide others, as it did me, when setting forth to lead my previous creative team on a journey that would explore the integrity of our products. It helped us uncover and focus on social and environmental issues; that through well informed, smart, day-to-day choices within the design process and working across our supply chain and with our human resources department, — would bring about transformative, positive change to our business, the planet, and the lives and wellbeing of others.
Within ‘Cradle to Cradle’, the authors imagined a thought exercise expressed as an equilateral triangle with the Economy, Equity and Ecology at each apex. These points are connected through leading questions that help you to think holistically about your business and how these nexus points resonate and apply to you. It can help you discover or reconnect you to your business’ reason to exist. Your core values and how you act on them. Help you ideate your unique product or service proposition, and bring new meaning to your voice and positioning in the market. It also reminds you how you are connected-to and fit-within a complex bigger picture.
This simple thought exercise helps you ‘start where you are’, and by leading through questions, challenges you to define: What kind of business do you want to have? How would you define the Future of Good Business?
Starting at the economy apex; a purely monetary minded approach to business might ask:
“What is the least we have to pay to bring our product or service to market and make a good profit according to what our consumer is willing to pay us?”
If they employ people within their business they might ask:
“Have we ensured that our employees are earning a fair living wage so that they can support themselves and their families, so they may continue to come to work everyday?”
A more egalitarian minded approach to business might ask these types of questions:
“Are the men and women in our company being paid the same for the same work? And have we created a diverse meritocracy where all are welcome, recognised and rewarded for their contribution?”
“Have we set the right workplace values and do we exhibit these behaviours to ensure our employees are treating each other, suppliers and consumers with respect? That they may stand as ambassadors for our business practice.”
“How do we inspire and facilitate better communication, collaboration, co-creation and fulfilment at work? That our employees feel that they are doing good, meaningful work.”
“Are we providing education, physical and mental healthcare, access to exercise and childcare in order to improve their wellbeing, individual growth and future opportunities?”
“Have we ensured that our employees and customers are not exposed to hazards and toxins in their workplace or in our products and services?”
When creating products and services with integrity these questions must go further than your immediate organisation. They must apply beyond mere salient risk management to support social fairness throughout your full value chain. Where there is opacity, there are organisations and certification standards to help guide you. Fairtrade International, the SA8000 Standard, Amfori BSCI, and the Social Hotspots Database are all good places to make your start.
Our equity nexus therefore defines the future of good business as harnessing the true and full potential of people.
Continuing on, a more conservationist minded approach to business might ask these types of questions:
“What can we do to ensure we’re not polluting the environment? And is our operation and full value chain environmentally friendly? What does it truly mean for a business to be environmentally friendly?”
As we explore our relationship to the environment we may start asking deeper questions, such as:
“Are we obeying nature’s laws, where waste equals food? Are we using our full solar income while reducing our carbon footprint? Are we sustaining not only our own species but all life on the planet?
Importantly we must ask ourselves how this plays into a cost benefit analysis with questions such as:
“Is our ecological strategy economically fecund? Does it have the potential to be abundantly regenerative, resilient and commercial?”
As only then will it be sustainable.
Creating new or reimagining existing products and services with the mission to lessen their environmental impact during creation, use and afterlife, — can lead to market leading innovative solutions and increase their intrinsic value. Our planetary resources are finite. Finding smart ways of reducing, reusing and recycling our waste within a closed loop, thus reducing the need for additional resources, in itself has the potential to increase profitability.
Our ecology nexus therefore defines the future of good business as a mission to safeguard all future resources.
There are organisations to help understand the full impact of our business actions, and how creators and consumers’ day-to-day choices affect the natural world. The Ellen MacArthur Foundation , the World Resources Institute and the World Wildlife Fund are three good places to start.
Finally, a more conscious minded approach to business might ask these types of questions:
“How can we bring a sustainable, eco-effective, waste free approach to our business? Could our product become a service that we steward from cradle to cradle?”
“How can we do less bad and more good, with less non-renewable resources? Could our business practice become carbon positive? Increase biodiversity?”
“How do we create our win-win for all people and all life on our planet?”
Which brings us back to the economy nexus. The future of good business can be defined therefore as the sum of all these parts, discovering and balancing your business’ triple bottom line.
Transparency, collaboration and communication become vitally important on this journey. Measuring, setting goals, taking positive action, being accountable and managing expectations, especially with your consumer is of prime importance. Give yourself scary, difficult targets, but celebrate the small wins, continually becoming 2% or 3% better is just as important as the headline changes you make.
Work together. Find your platform to inspire and energise your whole organisation, everyone can contribute and become a sustainability practitioner. Align your goals with the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals and find the relevant partners and certification schemes that resonant with your business and your consumer. You can discover more about the Cradle to Cradle certification here.
I hope this inspires you to make positive change and become a sustainability catalyst within your business — in whatever small or large ways you can. If you like what you’ve read please be sure to click the like, recommend, share and follow buttons — as a fledgling writer your feedback means a lot to me.
If you want to know more about me; I can be found on LinkedIn, Instagram and my Website. I’ve created a free PDF to download that illustrates Michael Braungart and William McDonough’s Triple Bottom Line thought exercise, which I’ve titled The Future Of Good Business.
