Buzzwords like innovation certainly galvanise activity. But how often does that activity end with the design of lackluster goods and services? And how can an activated purpose help by providing the guard rails and fertile ground for thinking?
COVID-19 has forced an unprecedented shift to dispersed and remote working for organisations across the globe. Whilst some see this as a temporary response to a crisis, what David Solomon CEO of Goldman Sachs has referred to as “an aberration”, the more forward-thinking have chosen to use the crisis to adapt to a new way of working.
A brave leadership relies on some being the hero and many following fast. Leadership which stands up for what they know is right, not what has been done before. But it is not easy. The strength of the leaders at the top and to lead with your values intact takes strength.
UK companies just received a resounding ‘C Minus’ from the FRC who are disappointed, to say the least, in the standard of reporting required under the UK Corporate Governance Code. It found a lot of box ticking and little real attempt at measurement. But help is at hand from The Contexis Index, developed in partnership with Cambridge University.
It wasn’t easy to certify as a BCorp. And it is not the destination. We see it as a journey of improvement. This Report highlights the key things we’ve done over the last year to be a better business as a force for good.
Becoming a BCorp is hard. Which is as it should be. But if you genuinely believe your business does exist to make a positive impact and not just money, the process of certification can make you a better, and more humble, business.
Managing corporate risk is usually about processes and oversight to predict and aviod human error before a crisis. But we all know it’s people that cause problems, and who save you from them. As Warren Buffett says “culture, more than rule books, determine how a company behaves.”
How do you know if purpose is working effectively in your culture? And if it is not, why not? Larry Fink is right to say purpose leads to performance. But pursuing ‘purpose’ without understanding the cultural attributes that activate it is at best a waste of time and at worst fundamentally damaging to the cultural fabric of the business.
According to Forbes, the key things that derail resilience in the businesses they studied were all cultural; rigidity of hierarchy, lack of clarity, conflicting objectives with no clear prioritisation, and poor care of people. How can an authentic purpose help?
If diversity is the noun, inclusion is the verb. And inclusion can be ignited through a strong sense of shared purpose.
The first rule of purpose is that, for it to have any impact, it must not only be credible and congruent to the activities of the business. It must also be absolutely authentic.
90% of CEOs don’t believe their business is moving fast enough to adapt to the changing world. It raises a mass of questions. How do I create an agile, high performance culture? How do I engage and align our people? How do I drive productivity? Land strategy? Create trust in our business?
Purpose is not just doing ‘good stuff’. It has a clear commercial reason for being.
Kindness in business? Isn’t is just about being all fluffy and nice? Not at all
“What entrepreneurs do is that they care so passionately about an outcome – and the outcome matters – that they are prepared to take a personal risk to achieve that”
People are only human – we get excited about a sense of purpose or an intention – not so much about a product.
It wasn’t easy to certify as a BCorp. To make the grade we had to think far more deeply about every aspect of how we run our business and treat our people, our clients, our suppliers and the wider community and planet.
Here’s some good news. It is perfectly possible to make yourself and your people dramatically more productive. To turn conflict into creation, pressure into progress, breakdown into breakthrough. And make everyone a great deal more joyful in the process.
How can you get people aligned round your strategy? How can you speed up strategic implementation? 61% of C-Suite acknowledge that they fail between strategy formulation and its day-to-day implementation. We can learn a lot from entrepreneurial business. And it’s not hard to replicate their play-book.
What drives agile, highly productive businesses? It’s a question that leads directly from the current debate about culture and organisational ‘Purpose.’ It’s a question that has made us determined to understand and measure the impact purpose – and to show definitively whether purposeful companies are really better – both ethically and commercially.
What drives high-performing, agile businesses? What do they have that is missing in so many sluggish ‘corporate’ organisations? It’s a question that we have become obsessed with – and spent the last couple of years researching with leading institutions including the Universities of Cambridge and Plymouth. It’s a question we think we may just have answered.
Can purpose be measured may well be the question of the moment. How can we unpick the various factors that impact on company performance? In less than 2 minutes John Rosling explains why we think it can.
Purpose and entrepreneurs are natural bedfellows. They are both architects of social progress says EY’s Carmine Di Sibio
Help prove beyond doubt that purpose-led businesses are better businesses; better for people, planet and performance.
Our ambition is to measure the commercial impact of Purpose and show specifically how Purpose is acting to change human behaviours and drive business performance. It’s widely accepted that Purpose-led […]
If you knew, beyond doubt, that making 3 changes to your culture would make your people 30% more engaged, 29% more joyful and 26% more productive, would you make them?
In his 2015 book Thirteeners Daniel Prosser makes the claim that 87% of businesses fail to execute their strategy each year. The colossal waste in money, energy and simple human […]
Sometimes it seems as if the idea of talking about love in a work situation can bring people out in a rash. It’s just not British is it? Much less […]
How can you help individuals and teams to be more entrepreneurial, faster, more innovative – and perform under pressure?
We’re big on trust here. We believe it is one of the fundamental ways for an organisation to bridge the gap between its Purpose, as articulated by the board, and everyday reality for its people
Purpose in business has not gone away – it continues to be the topic of the moment. And thank goodness, as the prize for getting it right could make a real difference in the world. Read, digest and critique our pick of the best five articles for purpose-led leaders for 2017.
Gallup estimates lack of engagement at work is costing the US economy $450bn a year. If you factor that globally, that’s $1.7trillion. We could stop this by making our places of work fulfilling and purposeful, compassionate and meaningful
If your #purpose is congruent with the stuff you actually do it can drive business performance
Love in business? What an absurd, even uncomfortable idea. But what, after all, is ‘love’? Passion, regard, affection, enjoyment, zest, understanding and compassion? Are these not exactly the attributes we […]
What can CEO’s and boards learn from entrepreneurs about enabling their Purpose to drive actual behaviours
Leadership is nothing without followship
The prize for getting sustainability right is huge – John talks to The Eth Word about how to start on the journey.
It is said that most business owners don’t believe that their bank understands their business or, worse, even cares about them. Is this even true? And if it is, is […]
Love is central to every joint human endeavour; war, sport, relationships. Just business that’s weird
At a recent event on the concepts of corporate purpose and social responsibility, senior leaders of several large businesses were asked whether their organisations had a clear and inspiring purpose. […]