3BL Media

It’s a Miracle: Financial Reform

Do you believe in miracles? Well, brace yourself. We may have another one coming down the pike. Financial reform bills have been passed by both the House and the Senate. Lawmakers are currently working on the final version. We just might see the most sweeping financial reform since the Great Depression within our lifetime. Considering the aggressive and well-funded lobbying by banks, financial institutions, large corporations, and highly placed politicians, this would truly be a miracle.

Why didn’t we have financial reform before this, you may wonder? Because… “The markets can...

BP Removed from Dow Jones Sustainability Indexes

Another nail in BP’s coffin. The oil company responsible for the worst environmental disaster in U.S. history was removed from the Dow Jones Sustainability Indexes (DJSI) effective May 31, 2010.

The DJSI are the first global indexes tracking the financial performance of leading sustainability-driven companies worldwide. Socially responsible investors use the DJSI to help them determine where their investing dollars should go. Many of us have 401(k) or IRA accounts, and we can...

HBR: Companies need to improve sustainability communications

In their Harvard Business Review article, The Sustainability Imperative, David A. Lubin and Daniel C. Esty say that companies need to get better at communicating sustainability. In the article, the authors identify sustainability as an emerging megatrend, similar to quality in the 1970's and IT in the 1980's.

In order for companies to gain advantage from this megatrend, they need to execute in five critical areas, one of which is reporting and communication. They write:

We see
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Microsoft’s CSR Accelerator Summit

It’s easy to forget just how pervasive Microsoft’s reach is from Xbox to Office or their effect on everybody’s lives over the past 35 years.

Ok, they may have lost market value top dog status to Apple, market share in the internet browser sector or have harbingers of doom awaiting the monster to fall as the Cloud approaches, but with competition such as Google acting like a righteous teenager, Facebook playing like a petulant child and Apple’s aspirations heading toward megalomania with their use of applications to control content, Microsoft could be said to be enjoying a...

The Century of Women

Last week, I was invited to speak at a United Nations NGO conference on the role that women play in the changing world order. The CONGO Committee of Spirituality, Values, and Global Concerns and its working group “Values and Business” presented an inspiring two-day conference. (GoodB will report on the events and speakers next week.) The first day of the conference was devoted to The Divine Feminine, Rapprochement, and the Culture of Peace...

How to Leverage Your Advisory Board (Because Their Name Isn’t All They Can Offer)

You have your board. Now what?

I wrote before about when and how to assemble your advisory board. If you already have an advisory board though, what can you realistically expect from the people who comprise it and how do you best leverage their skills and commitment?

The first part–what you can realistically expect from your advisors–should be agreed on before they commit. I spoke with one enterprenenur who realized in hindsight the criticality of setting...

Let’s Help Panera Bread Take Corporate Social Responsibility to a New Level

I was surprised to read about Panera Bread’s new cafe in St. Louis dubbed the St. Louis Bread Company Cares Cafe. The concept is simple yet groundbreaking… take whatever you want to eat or drink and instead of paying a cashier, drop whatever you can afford into a donation box. And if you don’t have any money, you can donate your time. Crazy concept, I know.

According to a great article in USA Today, Ron Shaich, who stepped down as Panera’s CEO last...

Is Green the old Black?

One of the biggest networks of green blogs is dropping the word "green" from its name. Green Options Media, the former home of Sustainablog, Gas 2.0 and Cleantechnica, and current home to ten blogs, has been renamed Important Media. Now, GreenOptions.com is a full fledged community, running on Huddler’s innovative forum/wiki/product platform.

I recently...

The New Girls’ Club

Remember the Old Boys’ Club…? The boring, cranky, devious one that controls the banks, the economy and most of our wealth creation and money supply from behind the scenes? The one where nearly every key position in government is occupied by an Old Boy? Yes, that one.

Well, there are still a few lifetime members of the OBC firmly entrenched in the Federal Reserve (Grandpa Ben), and the Treasury (Timmy G and Larrykins) who continue to give all our money away to their ever-popular clubby friends.

These are the same old boy club members who along with ex-Goldman partner and Treasury Secretary Robert Rubin gave the store away to the big banks in 1999 with the repeal of the Glass-Steagall Act. Ordinary banks like Citigroup could now legally play roulette with government guaranteed deposits. OB Robert Rubin thought it was such a great idea he took a job with Citibank only weeks after leaving the Treasury.

These same old boys, Summers, Greenspan, Geithner with OB Senator Phil Gramm (now a lobbyist for Swiss Bank UBS) the very next year pushed through the ill-fated Commodities Futures Modernization Act - otherwise known as Derivatives-Are-Born-Free Act. This little understood law overturned a century old rule that had prevented unregulated market bets since the Panic of 1907. Now all bets were off…

The Challenge of Translating Sustainability

Let’s face it: sustainability can be a challenging topic for many people to understand.

For example, when you hear someone on the news or in business talk about alternative energy or cap and trade policy, can you honestly say you understand it all?

I’ll go out on a limb and admit that when I hear the word “carbon,” I sometimes struggle to pay attention – let alone understand what’s being discussed. That’s why tools like Annie Leonard’s Story of Stuff are so powerful – they take complicated subjects and translate them...

The Thrill is Gone

It used to be that indifferent wealth building and outsized risk was sexy. For thirty years, the world of high rolling high finance was the object of admiration and envy. The chants of “Wall Street sucks” some ten thousand strong in front of City Hall last week signify that the days of glamour and greed are over. Inarticulate and ineffectual as that phrase might be, it reveals the increasing rage building against Wall Street titans. In the wake of the deepest financial crisis since the Great Depression, economic hardship has become too real for too many.

Wall Street’s ”burn baby...

The New CSR Frontier: Integrating Sustainability and Community Investment

Of the Banks, by the Banks, for the Banks…

So much for democracy…

There isn’t even democracy among bankers these days. Community and regional banks are being shuttered around the country by the FDIC to the tune of 218 since 2007. Any bank that levered more than its fair share of capital, suffered losses due to bad subprime, and generally managed their money poorly dies a quick painful death as it is swallowed up by the government “safe banking” machine.

Any bank that is except for the Supersized Big Bailout Six…...

A Salary Cap for the Non-Profit Sector

Within the community investment community there’s still too much thinking about the money that goes in and not enough about what’s coming out the other end in terms of social capital. In Canada, a good illustration is the recent debate about salaries for executives in non-profit organizations.

In today’s issue of Charity Village’s Village Vibes weekly e-newsletter there’s an excellent piece by Andy Levy-Ajzenkopf about...

Do You Need a Corporate Responsibility Expert?

If you do, don’t bother calling me. Unfortunately, I’m just a beginner and wouldn’t be much use to a company that needs someone who really knows what they’re talking about. The good news for you, however, is that there now an extraordinary number of corporate responsibility experts, authorities, advisors, and consultants.

Employee Engagement Rethought

The post I wrote on Sunday about the institutionalization of corporate responsibility and the need for more innovation seems to have struck a chord. It’s also made me think more about how specific aspect of corporate responsibility have become ubiquitous and, as a result, may have lost a degree of meaning and impact.

Employee engagement is a good example. One the one hand, this area is one of the first elements of corporate responsibility to have a been documented as a business driver and direct contributor to key business metrics including recruitment, retention, productivity,...

Princeton University: A New Era in Social Economics

Last Friday, April 9, 2010, something wonderful happened at Princeton University.

David W. Miller, Director of Princeton’s Faith & Work Initiative, attempted to tackle the monumental job of “civilizing” the economy. No small task for anyone let alone the unusually courageous and innovative Miller. Formerly the Executive Director of the Yale Center for Faith & Culture, Miller also taught a popular course in the Management School, “Business Ethics: Succeeding without Selling Your Soul.”

The ebullient Miller holds a M.Div. and Ph.D in ethics from Princeton Theological...

Great Campaign from Starbucks and Free coffee!

Cliff Burrows, President of Starbucks Coffee U.S., spoke about their efforts to limit the environmental impact of coffee consumption at Fortune Magazine's Brainstorm Green conference. According to Burrows, they have made big strides in how coffee is grown and now one of their largest impacts is the coffee cups. Out of the millions of coffees they sell every day, only one percent are served in reusable mugs.

Starbucks wants to increase that number, but according to Burrows, the incentive of saving a...

Going the Distance in Corporate Responsibility

It’s truly remarkable how important corporate responsibility has become in such a short period of time.

In 2001, when I started Impakt, very few people had any idea what corporate responsibility was. Friends, family, and colleagues couldn’t imagine why I thought a business could be built in an area that was so esoteric. There were many times that I wondered the same thing. As recently as three years ago corporate responsibility was seen by executives as a marginal “nice-to-have” that had minimal impact on core business priorities such as...

The Golden Rule of Health Care

In the quiet beauty of Iowa farmland, a middle-aged unemployed “tea party” protestor, Randy, screamed his displeasure at the healthcare reform bill into a megaphone. He joins the ranks of radical activists mounting increasingly violent attacks on supporters of the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act. Randy and other equal-access healthcare opponents have medical insurance and they don’t want to share their good fortune.

“The most pro-choice president...

Why CVS’ Social Responsibility Programs Are Its Most Wasted Resource

If your company consistently runs social responsibility programs, but you doesn’t take the time or have the confidence in its programs to make sure I know about them, it’s doing me and itself a disservice.

Like Walgreens or Rite Aid, CVS is a national pharmacy chain. There’s no visible differentiation between it and its competitors. Maybe the aisles are cleaner and the coupons better, but maybe not.

I don’t see a reason...

GLOBE 2010 Brings The World to the Individual Level

“A green economy needs to just be the economy,” said Dianne Dillon-Ridgley, a board director at InterFace Global and member of the closing Town Hall session at the 20th anniversary Globe 2010 in Vancouver. - a sentiment which would be shared by many and echoed throughout the conference.

Held every two years, Globe Foundation gathered over 10,000 participants from more than 80 countries to focus on a variety of themes that included Corporate Sustainability, Climate Change and Energy, Finance and Sustainability, Urban Infrastructure, Clean Technology, and Water: Impacts on Business.

According to many speakers, this year the conference seemed different – more participants, more women, and a greater number of students and young professionals. One young woman, summed up her generation’s challenge with a question to the panel – as she looks for her first sustainability job, should she work for an oil and gas company and try change them, or work for something new and different? Nicholas Parker, Executive Chairman, Cleantech Group LLC in San Francisco, CA, encouraged her to “work in the lion’s den and help create the change we, and they, need to be.” Those fossil fuel companies, Parker asserted, are facing necessary and inevitable transformation and we should all welcome and support it.

The Honorable John Yap, Minister of State for Climate Action, Government of British Columbia, Victoria, BC, David Runnalls, President & CEO, International Institute for Sustainable Development, Ottawa, ON and Tony Manwaring, Chief Executive, Tomorrow’s Company, London, UK rounded out the panel.

Reality vs. Perception in Corporate Sustainability

Consumers have very little understanding of which companies trying to be more sustainable and which ones are not. Duh, you say? Well, that conclusion was driven home by reading MapChange 2010 from the brand agency Change.

This sustainability brand map study looked at the perceived and actual sustainability scores for 97 companies in 10 sectors and found that they didn't exactly always mesh. Some companies that were highly sustainable were not perceived as such while some of the less responsible companies were perceived to be more sustainable. Depending on who you talk to, that is another example of a communications failure or an opportunity (or both).

Some of the results were quite eye-opening. In the food and beverage sector, Organic Yogurt maker Stonyfield Farm had the highest actual sustainability score but a below-average perception, which was inverse that of Kraft, Kellogg and General Mills.

In the household sector, the perception of Clorox far exceeded their actual sustainability score (perhaps because of their recently launched Green Works brand endorsed by the Sierra Club?) while L'Oreal didn't get the acknowledgement they deserved.

But perhaps the most interesting to me was the Internet/Software/Media sector brand scores. In this sector, the perceptions of net giants Google, Yahoo and Amazon all exceeded their actual scores, while the perceptions of General Electric and News Corporation were much worse than their actual scores. GE was surprising considering their highly visible ecomagination brand and their high ranking in other surveys. And News Corp's well-publicized goal of making their operations carbon neutral appears not to have helped their public perception (perhaps they need to use language the public understands, rather than "carbon neutral").

We Can Do More Good With a For-Profit Model: The Lesson of Speed

I used to consult with nonprofits as part of a firm. What I’m about to write comes from my observations doing this work.

We can do more good and do it more quickly with a for-profit model.

Nonprofits aren’t bad, their model just has some flaws. A nonprofit has two tasks: to serve its cause or constituents and to raise money. A for-profit’s only task is to satisfy its stakeholders. The by-product of doing this well is making money.

A nonprofit doesn’t get to the ‘good’ fast enough. There’s a lot of preparation to get started on fighting the cause or delivering services. Nonprofits paid our firm to tell them how and where to raise money. They paid us to do the research and write the proposals. But they weren’t off the hook for time. They still needed to spend time with us on their programs, budgets and contacts. They still needed to woo grant-makers, find new ways to grab donors’ attention and write follow-up reports. All this time took them away from their mission and the cause they were fighting.

Think of a guy who decides to take up running. He spends the first weekend researching and shopping for running shoes. The second weekend buying running shorts, the third weekend mapping the perfect route. On the fourth weekend he goes (but only if it doesn’t rain). That’s how I see the nonprofit survival model.

Compare this to the guy who decides to take up running. He grabs the closest pair of shorts that he probably slept in, laces up the shoes he has lying around and walks out his front door. He’ll move his legs like runners do and figure the rest out from there. That’s how I see for-profit start-ups. Able to get to the mission quickly and willing to course correct along the way.

Atlas Shrinks

Once upon a time in a far off land of sea monsters and fairies, there was a man named Adam. Now Adam was not the First Man. He was, however, the first man in his society to write down his ideas of man controlling his own economic destiny without the heavy hand of kings. Adam was a moral man and wrote that one’s “enlightened self-interest” and innate moral code should guide him in all matters of money and commerce.

Yet man is a funny beast, Adam knew, and in case of a lapse in reason a guiding hand, “The Invisible Hand,” existed to override his less intelligent and unjust impulses....

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