Can improving society be a profitable business?

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Permalink Reply by André Clements on April 7, 2008 at 8:14am

I'm sure it can.
These guys don't seem to place much emphasis on profit and are more activism oriented but quite interesting, just something for the pot.

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Permalink Reply by nomad-one on April 9, 2008 at 12:35pm

Thanks Andre, going to check em out right now. there are a few companies who do what I have in mind in the UK, but nothing I have come across locally. I think with the trend towards healthier practices in business both socially and environmentally there might be a big demand for specialists in this area in the years to come.

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Permalink Reply by kim heismann on April 9, 2008 at 4:40pm

Hi - contact me at Pop Sustainability. We were a non-profit in manhattan founded in 1998 doing campaigns that tap popular culture to raise awareness of issues of sustainability. Now I'm operating in Cape Town as a social enterprise with the same concept of partnering with corporations (and NGOS, Governments) to create that win-win you speak of. Would love to chat. Have some great projects to get off the ground here very soon. old website www.popsustainability.org - all the best, Kim

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Permalink Reply by André Clements on April 10, 2008 at 12:29am

Something about the way you put this keeps 'pinging' me. Specifically the analyst in me I think and I want to try an explore what you say a bit further.

The hardest part of your statement of course is the 'right'. What exactly is the right mentality, method and strategy? What is the 'right' criteria to judge what is 'right' by?

Then, you say 'right mind-set and proper research and strategic approach', lets call it the three pillars of commercially successful social intervention;, with a bit of creative paraphrasing I get:
1. mentality (attention and culture)
2. method (systems and processes)
3. strategy (configuration and cognition)

I think for what we're after here the most critical aspect is strategy. In the light of some stuff that's going on for me right now I'd say the first thing to look at is the relationship between the fundamental 'thing' that the business does, and how that relates to the challenges it intends to make contributions towards.

But I don't think that is a very good 'formulation' because in it one is then trying to marry two fundamentally opposed mentalities. Successful business is usually built around opportunities, essentially a salutogenic mentality vs the mentality of focusing on solving problems - the 'pathologenic' mentality.

So in terms of strategy my conclusion is that in order to achieve commercially successful social intervention, one important 'issue' is to align as closely as possible the field of revenue generation with the social intervention undertaken. I suspect the lack of this alignment causes much difficulty and failure in many charity type initiatives and organizations. Then, what will ensure that the self-perpetuating nature of the persuit of profit doesn't negate or directly or indirectly sabotage the lofty ideals of positive social impact. Warm and fuzzy phrases are abundant in many less than ethical or socially irresponsible organizations, and sadly most those were originally penned in absolute sincerity.

Dunno if any of that makes sense to anyone except me but that's my 20c worth for the pot, for the moment :-)

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