E+E Leader: Sustainability Unveiled
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E+E Leader: Sustainability Unveiled
Climate Action in a Divided World: Insights from B Corp Leader Nathan Stuck
Nathan Stuck, award-winning B Corp leader and founder of Profitable Purpose Consulting, explores how businesses can navigate climate action and sustainability in today's increasingly polarized world.
• Moving beyond capitalism burnout to find purpose-driven business models
• Evolution of the B Corp movement from "business as a force for good" to greater advocacy
• Navigating political polarization while maintaining sustainability commitments
• Making the business case for diversity and inclusion initiatives when terminology becomes controversial
• Using the B Impact Assessment as a framework even for companies not seeking certification
• Focusing on measurable outcomes rather than terminology or labels
• Building intentionality into business models from the start rather than retrofitting later
• The rigorous B Corp certification process and common challenges companies face
Connect with Nathan on LinkedIn or visit ProfitablePurposeConsulting.com to learn more about implementing sustainable business practices.
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Welcome to another episode of Sustainability Unveiled, where we explore the intersection of business, sustainability and innovation. Today, we're tackling a critical and complex topic how do we navigate climate action in an increasingly polarized world? Our guest today is someone who has dedicated his career to proving that business can be a force for good. Nathan Stuck is an award-winning leader in the B Corp movement, founder of Profitable Purpose Consulting and a driving force behind Be Local Georgia and the BLD Southeast Conference. He's worked on over 25 B Corp certifications, teaches an MBA course on B Corp at the University of Georgia and is a sought-after speaker and author of Happy Monday Designing your Dream Career. Nathan brings deep expertise in building purpose-driven business, but he's also here to have a real, honest conversation about the challenges we face in pushing sustainability forward, especially in today's divided landscape. From cancel culture to collaboration, we're diving into the nuances of what it takes to bridge divides and keep the momentum going. Hey, then, welcome to Sustainability Unveiled. Thank you for being on with us.
Speaker 2:Thanks for having me, jessica, always excited to well talk sustainability. Maybe unveil something.
Speaker 1:Exactly, yes. Yes, now we have a lot to get into today, but before we get into the meat of our conversation, you know, I really want to talk about your involvement and your stance and just appreciation, along with support, of the B Corp movement. You've been a part of it for years. So, really, what drew you to this space and what keeps you involved at such a high?
Speaker 2:level. I'll save you a long answer. I'll tell you that in 20 I don't know probably like 2013 through 15, I kind of hardcore burned out on capitalism. I got laid off twice in the same year, um, I had a couple horrible jobs, um, and there's just a lot that was like kind of like unveiling itself. See what I did there, um, and just like. But as somebody who had business degrees, it was very hard to like. I wasn't like business is stupid. I just didn't like what I was seeing. Well, like why do we do it this way? Why is it so slimy? And then I got into like all good capitalism burnouts. I decided I should go get an MBA, keep studying business.
Speaker 2:And when I got there, though, like really early on, there was a project to help a company do B Corp certification. I had no idea what it was, but I met the CEO and his wife and a former MBA who had like interned for B Lab, and I was like, oh, is this the capitalism I've been looking for? And ended up getting a job with him after I graduated. We got him certified and I stayed there for five and a half years, started my own company in 21 as a side hustle 22 full-time.
Speaker 2:But along the way, like 2018, I started the B Culture Call, which is a call within the B Corp community. I started B Local Georgia 2020, I started Build Southeast. So I just kind of kept getting involved and I kept seeing gaps where there was nobody doing something, and so I just kind of naturally I guess I'm a gap plugger where I just jumped in and started doing the work and now I don't want to say that keeps me here, because I mean, I think you know I'm not one of those. You know you always have those employees who are like man, you'll see, if I ever leave, this place would crumble, like no, it won't. I do have some incredible it will keep going.
Speaker 2:Exactly, it's bigger than any of us. So it's not necessarily what keeps me here. I just really love the space, I love the people and I love the fight for a version of capitalism that works for more people and for the longterm and the sustainable. And I'm a market, a free market guy. So I also am kind of a little bit of like let's let the, let the, let the best system win. Like let the best version of capitalism win. Like, like I want the fight. I'm not trying to like re, like I'm re-imagining capitalism. I'm not like sitting here and going like like we have to systemically tear capitalism apart, like I think the tenets of capitalism are fine. It's just what we've let it become. That has become a little with throw up in the mouth inducing.
Speaker 1:Now I can definitely see that, and you've been involved for such a long time, so how have you really seen this organization evolve over your time with them?
Speaker 2:Oh, I think B-Lab originally B-Lab. Just to throw this out so I don't confuse people B-Corp is the certification, b-lab is the parent nonprofit that oversees the certification. You might hear me use them interjectively. Oh, and full disclaimer, because everybody assumes this. I don't work for B-Lab. I work for my own company that does B-Corp consulting and then I run nonprofits that are in the B-Corp community. Anyway, now that that's out of the way, I think for me, I've seen it go from business as a force for good to a lot more advocacy. I don't know that that's good or bad.
Speaker 2:What do you?
Speaker 1:think has caused it to go from you know business for good to more the advocacy route. Do you think it's just the climate of what we are dealing with politically and socially over the past, you know, eight, 10 years?
Speaker 2:Yeah, I think some of it is that, I think trying to figure out. I think part of it was external forces, you know, especially, like you know, 2016 election. You know 2016 election and then I would say, probably everything that happened during 2020 between COVID and George Floyd and all those things, I think forced a lot of people to take a harder look in the mirror, and I think even B lab had its own reckoning, where it was like, was it three or four middle-aged white dudes that started it? You know kind of looking around like did we build this thing?
Speaker 2:And again I never say that knockingly, because I know many businesses where like it's hey, me and my buddy, you're gonna. You know you look at like just the way it's, it doesn't make it bad. But I don't think it was founded with as much intentionality as they would have liked to have done if they could have gone back and done it again, and so I think there was a little bit of that coming too that spurred some of the more of a focus on like this is is a very monocultured community. But you also have to look at like where did it start and where did it really take off? And it took off in places like Portland, oregon and, you know, upper New England, like New Hampshire, maine, vermont, like places that just aren't very diverse by.
Speaker 1:I mean just in general, they're just not diverse, yeah.
Speaker 2:Yeah, so you know, I think I think it got into that, and then a lot more climate action, and I think, if anything, I think there's a little bit of like the younger generation got introduced to the movement and I always like my Ted talk, I talk about how, like you know, they show up to the party with like a can of gas and a book of matches, looking to burn you know what to the ground, and I think I think they got involved too and I think for in a good way. You know again, if this is balanced it's good. If it becomes all this, it's bad, but in a nuanced, good way, I think, kind of forced B Corps to maybe evolve a little bit quicker and do a little bit more than just be like not bad, but to be, you know, you know or like exceeds, or like meets requirements on a corporate review, like it needs to. We need to exceed requirements.
Speaker 2:And so I think there are some, some, some voices that have pushed this community to do more and go further and, and you know, and that's ruffled some feathers, because there's some companies who are completely happy, kind of being verified as a good company, but necessarily, you know, I've heard the one quote somebody told me once was my advocacy is running my company as a B Corp, like I'm not going to go letter writing campaigns and do all these things and like we're just not going to do that. So it's a very interesting and you know, I think within the community right now you feel I don't want to call it tension, but you feel a little adding jobs, you know kind of showing that I think the business world, that this is a viable business model, that this isn't just a bunch of people sitting out in the woods hugging trees. So we are thinking Kumbaya.
Speaker 2:MBAs and PhDs and, you know, lifelong business people who have decided to run their business this way. That it isn't somebody who doesn't quote, unquote get it.
Speaker 1:And I think, especially right now, where there are so many I have friends that work for the federal government, that work at agencies, that are right now having to go through website pages and remove words like environmental, climate change, remove words like environmental climate change.
Speaker 1:Now it's it's, non, it's yeah. Everything is changing, so that's what they're spending their time doing. And there are so many people, too, that don't want their name associated with a piece of work that's published, for example, that you know might come back to, and then, lack of a better term, bite them in the ass later on, when it comes to funding, for example, that you know might come back to in a lack of a better term, bite them in the ass later on when it comes to funding, for example. So how do you help those companies really, you know, bridge that gap between you know wanting to hit your sustainability targets and goals and obviously be profitable, but you've got some people that are, you know, some stakeholders that are kind of stepping back now because there is just so much uncertainty and things are changing on a daily basis.
Speaker 2:You know, I think for most of us, I mean, unless you rely on government funding and grants, which some of us do, I mean, I've done some grant work. Usually it's private foundation, but still work. Usually it's private foundation, but still, um, I think you're going to be just fine. Uh, as far as the customer base, I mean, I think I don't know that it's going to get any more. You know, if you're not a Delta or a Walmart or a JP Morgan or nobody's coming after the average hundred employeeemployee company for still doing diversity work.
Speaker 2:I think, for a lot of my nonprofit friends which I'm on a lot of nonprofits, I run a nonprofit we're definitely scared and trying to figure out how to maintain our work without necessarily and you're almost, in this weird way, stuck in this ethical dilemma of does it make me a sellout to not say DEI anymore? And I don't know that there's a right answer for everybody. For me, I don't care, I'm here for the work. I'm not here for the, you know, the poster or the billboard or the awards, or to be the poster child of this work, like I just don't care, I'm, I'm here. Did we drive results today? Did we move this plan one step closer from idea to pilot? Did we raise money for you know this initiative? Did we raise money for you know this initiative? Did we, you know, like? So to me it's more about the outcomes and I think maybe, if anything, you're going to see, I think some people definitely are running a little bit scared and again, I'm not here to tell you that's wrong, depending on what your industry is, where you're located, you know, because a lot of this stuff was, you know, was never really controversial until recently. But also to me if you said it, just stick with it. I think you're seeing, you know, putting on my like corporate or my academic hat.
Speaker 2:You're seeing backlash against like you know, you saw it against Bud Light, and then it ended up. They got hit from both ends because when they got pushed by one side, then they completely backed and caved on the other side. So now they pissed off the people who they originally made the whole thing for. And then you have like target, same thing where, like target, you know, took out all the heat from the right, so then they caved. Now the left is, you know, so you're like, you're, you're. I think you're better off standing your ground, um, or, or you know, maybe coming up with a different term, or you know, like, kind of, take the bullseye off your back for a little bit, which is what I'm advising most people to do. Just call it. I mean, they know what we're doing anyway. They even said it in one of the executive orders like, and if they call it something else, like the whole, like program to rat out your co-worker who really secretly does dei work, but it's like when, yeah, when did dei become a negative term for people?
Speaker 2:yeah, I mean, I think you know if I'm being honest, I think we went, we, and I heard somebody say this on a call yesterday and I hadn't thought of it this succinctly if you ask the average person to define dei, if you ask 100 of us, you're going to get 100 very different responses and I think therein lied our lies, our problem, um, that we allowed the worst version of dei to be accepted as the narrative Because there was an element of you know, there's a difference between teaching history and feeling you know the prevalence with which white fragility circulated and if you can't admit you're a racist, you're an even bigger racist and some of it was very divisive and I wasn't a fan of a lot of it.
Speaker 2:I think we allowed it to become that worst version in other people's eyes, became the public version. You know and like we talk, you know the, the, the white fragility type books and everything, where everything did start to become a like, uh, and us versus them is kind of how we started to do some of this work, where you know again the whole premise of like, if you can't admit you're a racist, you're more of a racist, and you know, and everybody kind of taking the classes and I think we had everybody afraid, even on the left, of what you can say and what you can't say. One time, like everything on a scale of zero to 10, where one is borderline ridiculous, five is an actual microaggression and 10 is something like a klansman would say. Everything became a 10, um, and we just had this whole like paralysis of, like fear of doing anything. And in reality, I don't know some of the, some of it was needed for some people, but I think we distracted ourselves from the actual work because within that you started throwing away.
Speaker 2:You know you threw the baby out with the bath water and, like I, do a lot of work in atlanta and like stuff. Like you know, the fearless fund got wrapped into this where, like, all they did was go raise a fund with, with investors, private money to invest in black women-owned businesses. How the hell is that illegal? What's wrong with that? If that's what I want to put my money into, that's where I want to invest.
Speaker 1:Let me invest.
Speaker 2:Let me invest. So it became this thing where any sort of good work or intentional, outcome-driven systems design became this enemy of white. You know, like, oh, white people. I remember having this conversation with somebody like I'm worried for my 10 year old, they're not going to have any chance to succeed in the world. And you're like your 10 year old was parents. Both of them have corporate jobs and you live in Roswell, georgia. Your 10 year old's going to be fine, going to be fine.
Speaker 2:But that was the fear, and that was early post-George Floyd that I heard that comment and I was like this person's crazy. And then, the longer this went on, I started to realize that was the prevailing talking point on the right and I think this comes back to left too. We don't listen to what they're saying, we don't watch the news, and then we get in a conversation. We go, ah, you're crazy. And we turn around. But whether or not you think it's crazy if we are not listening and don't know what their fear is, cause if you're a parent, that's a fear Okay, there's going to be no opportunity for my kid. That's a fear for every parent. So I don't know that we were truly, really listening to what is it that people are so afraid of?
Speaker 2:Um, and I think we just kind of like, and I think we took joe biden's election in 2020 as a mandate on that. Like that, it was more of a, to me, a mandate on people wanted a moderate, they wanted somebody in the middle, they didn't want to have to check twitter 24 hours a day, they wanted somebody who was, you know, on the side of what I would say the DEI, so the right side of the historical conversation. But they didn't necessarily. I think we took it as a this is for the like, a mandate for kind of the what I would say, the more progressive wing of the party's politics, and I think that got us a lot of troubles. We were never really listening and we couldn't really have an honest conversation, because if you didn't agree with all of it, they kind of came for you with the pitchforks.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I want to keep talking about the whole listening aspect, because you are a professor at University of Georgia, so when you are working with your students, how do you teach them to listen and to really, you know, embrace both sides or multiple sides to come to, you know, to be able to work together for the greater good if they're working on a project or, you know, working within the community?
Speaker 2:Well, first of all, the professors get mad because they don't have a phd. So I'm a part-time lecturer, um got it.
Speaker 2:I honestly really try to teach my kids business, so I teach them the business of good business. So my biggest thing that in my class I'm not trying to I don't have some dream that every one of them is going to go work for a B Corp or I'm more teaching them how to implement these strategies in a non. You know, this isn't about being right, it isn't about being the most virtuous. It's about how do I make the business case. It's about how do I roll this out in a way that will actually be successful. Like you know, kind of using DEI as an example of like we're working with a company, because we worked with companies that wanted to certify, so my students work on those projects all semester.
Speaker 2:If we're working on, you know, a diversity plan for a company to bring in a more diverse set of employees, and then you know, obviously we get into the inclusion and the equity piece. But just if we're just starting here, you know looking at like, where are we recruiting, how are we? You know, looking at like, where are we recruiting, how are we? You know, because you'd see these, like you know, companies that they wanted to do good and they wanted to do these things and it's like how do you help them do it, though, in a way that is actually long term kind of systems changing even internally at their company?
Speaker 2:So where are we recruiting? What KPIs are we tracking? Applicants eyeballs opens, complete resumes, go like up for determination, what makes the most sense. But what are we actually tracking to help this company become better? Um, or if it's something like a sustainability initiative, okay, great. Yes, it's wonderful to do x, y and z. But how do we do x, y and how do we even if it's napkin math figure out, kind of start to look at what that payback period is?
Speaker 2:Let's talk in dollars and cents, because I think we make a lot of these arguments of, you know, oh, wouldn't it be nice to have solar on the roof? And oh, and the polar ice caps are melting, and this, and it's like, and after three years of power bill savings, the solar panels will be paid off. And then, like, if you make the case like that, teaching them how to kind of like be the, you know, make that even for things like you know again not to harp on the diversity thing, but you know, can you come back and prove to a CFO that your team cares about this? You know that there's a retention impact, that this is something your company is passionate about. It will drive your employee net promoter score. Like thinking about these things outside of just making the because it's the right thing to do, because in the way most corporations are structured, they do have a fiduciary duty to shareholders. And you're seeing that kind of play out now where, like anybody taking ESG, you better be able to back that up as a fiduciary item.
Speaker 1:Yeah, the books better speak for themselves at this point, in order to use that term.
Speaker 2:Yes, because you're seeing that start to play out where you're going to see lawsuits from shareholder I mean you already have and then you're seeing legislation introduced in places like Kentucky and, yeah, you're seeing some of this stuff really start to people starting to try to figure out. I mean, I kind of one of those. It's a win, not if people come after the I don't want to say B Corp community, but at least benefit corporations, like the legislation where you can incorporate as a benefit Corp that will. I mean, again, it's been introduced in several States, so I wouldn't be surprised if that continues to. You know, basically is a neglecting your fiduciary duty even though that's part of being a benefit corp is you have a duty to your shareholders and your stakeholders.
Speaker 2:But, we'll see how that plays out, but I'm kind of ready for it.
Speaker 1:We'll cross that bridge when we get there right. Yep, excellent. So I'm sure there's been a lot of of you know different trends you've seen over the years. So what do you expect for the future when it comes to B Corp and, you know, working with the clients that you work with now?
Speaker 2:Um, I see a future that's very bright. Uh, I, I think the toothpaste is out of the tube. I think the ship's left the harbor whatever stupid analogy being that, it's happening, and I say this all the time I have for a couple months now you can't legislate our values and you do, within the B Corp community, have a group. We had a beautiful call yesterday about how do we continue a lot of our DEI work, how do we continue a lot of our? You know, and maybe for some of this it means not calling it that and doing things. But I think you're going to start to see and I also feel like the future for us, especially in the DEI and the ESG space, or whatever three-letter acronyms we're not supposed to say anymore, and the building inclusive teams that perform better because the research tells us they do, or the you know, thinking about the sustainability environmental sustainability and the risks to our business.
Speaker 2:I think what you'll see is a pivot in the B Corp community now. I think we were leaders in the we must talk about this space, and so when I talk about that, sometimes it sounds like I'm like oh, I don't talk about it, but I also think now is the next phase of that like, oh, we talk about it and we put the thing on our website and we are committed to this. And now I think what you'll see is a pivot to a lot more action. And my hope is, in 10 years now you'll be able to see some like incredible. You know case studies like a, like a Grayson bakery who started this in the eighties, but like they're open hiring concept hiring concept, it's greater. There's workforce development program, like I think you're going to see a lot of really, really cool stuff that Maybe before was more, I don't know like less action oriented.
Speaker 1:I think you'll start to say more in theory before you know having ideas, but now people are putting those ideas into action and really making purposeful decisions for their company and for their communities.
Speaker 2:Yes, yes, and I think I don't know. I think that's good, I think that's going to be a really, really good thing for the community because we'll be able to stand here and and stand on profit and stand on also like being able to share those tangible stories of being the leaders. And you know, if you believe in this and you believe that it's the right thing to do and again, I'm not asking anybody to be the loudest person in the room but and kind of investing in our own businesses, you know there's a reason multinationals are doing this. There's a reason and I know that was a contentious thing in the B Corp community with, you know, nespresso getting certified, some of these multinationals getting certified. But to me, like, if they're doing this and they're huge, there's something about it.
Speaker 1:Maybe I should look at it.
Speaker 2:Yes, future-proofing your business. And you know and again, we can talk about that later or not at all, but I'm always happy to have that conversation of. To me, that's when the business case is starting to be made is when you get companies who make decisions based off the bottom line doing the right thing because it's the right thing for the bottom line and I don't really care if that's why somebody's doing it.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I mean I know you've worked on 25 or so B Corp certification projects. Maybe that number's wrong, but that's what I have.
Speaker 2:Like 42.
Speaker 1:Oh, it's more than that.
Speaker 2:So that prospect asked me to give him a number.
Speaker 1:I put a spreadsheet together. Excellent, all right. So what do you think, in your experience, is the biggest challenge that companies face when trying to align profit and purpose?
Speaker 2:Oh, the biggest. I might have to do a couple. I'll share them from opposite ends. I see one is people think that, oh, we want to do B Corp, and then you get into it and it's a hard standard to hit.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:And so, as we go through this, and if you're not willing to do this, and we don't want to do an annual impact report, or we don't really want to be transparent with our employees in that way, well, we don't really want to like be transparent with our employees in that way.
Speaker 1:Well, we don't really have that bad, you know, and it's not just this will cost something.
Speaker 2:It's just kind of like, um, you know it sounds good, but that's an extra cost there and like, I get it. You know, cost that up, but at some point, if you're not willing to do the work, to get b court. Nobody okay, very rarely has that had to happen. Does anybody just come in and go. I took my first run to the assessment and we're at 130, you need 80. Most people come in like, oh, we took our first run to the assessment and we're like at 42. So there's a lot of work to find that other 38 points in the assessment.
Speaker 2:And there are companies who I think come in and I don't know if they think they that this is a viable certification, um, but it isn't, so we're gonna have to do some. So I can, for the most part you can kind of tell going into this whether this is in the owner's dna or um. They think it's just going to be an easy layup. And you also meet the ones who know it won't be an easy layup, know they have a long way to go and are like telling you like no, this is it, we're in, I want this. Like you are going to work with me, you're going to coach me on what we need to do, you're going to help us implement it. And those are kind of my favorite clients because those are like what was the old Franz Kafka book, the, the, the metamorphosis, why?
Speaker 1:metamorphosis Yep.
Speaker 2:I have no idea, but it's kind of like you get to see the whole the transformation the whole fair vandalism of the, the whole transformation of these companies from like good into something really great, and you see the employees get excited and you see them, you know, actually make really, really, really big strides in the way they run their business, and so to me those are the most rewarding. But yeah, I think, coming in with the expectations of it being a little too simple, or maybe they did think that it was kind of a, not a pay to play. But, like you know, we'll check the boxes, we'll fill out the thing and then we will be certified.
Speaker 2:But we'll check a couple boxes, we'll fill out the thing and then we'll be certified. Yes, and it is contrary to what a now infamous soap company says. It is not easy for most companies to get to the certification. You can't just buy your way there. You can, but to buy your way there would mean benefits and pay raises and all these things. To get your points up. You can technically buy your way there, but everybody that works for you is going to be very grateful that you did so. I think that's important to call out too. Like the only way to buy yourself is like I guess we bought a lot of benefits for our team or you know like so there's not a lot.
Speaker 1:We're trying to improve morale in a way. So this is one way and our climate, culture and our climate and our organization. So we're just going to yeah, we're going to pay.
Speaker 2:Yeah, yeah, and you're going to pay in your client. I did have that happen one time where a company they weren't going to get full points for 100% of employees making a family living wage and they had somebody younger, single, no children, who was like 25 cents an hour off. Literally we're on with the analyst from B-Lab and the CEO went into Gusto gave him a 50 cents an hour raise. I was like, oh, that employee's gonna love them some B Corp.
Speaker 1:Yep, oh, that's funny. So when you start working with a company and I know this depends on you know that the initial intake score that they have along with you know. When you guys start working with a company and I know this depends on you know that the initial intake score that they, that they have along with you know. When you guys start working together, how long does it usually take for a company to get certified? I know there's variables, multiple variables to talk about here, but in general, if you had to give us, you know the average I mean average.
Speaker 2:it should be about a I don't want to say a year, because it can move faster Depends how big the company is and how complex it is. Like how much data are we going to have to pull and also are we pulling data or are we pulling data?
Speaker 2:You know what I mean. Do you have nine employees or do you have, you know, 340 employees? Where it's like, okay, this becomes a lot more intricate, intricate, and then I think it depends on the level of effort of you know, are they one of those that came in at a 40 or one of those that came in at a 72, where you're like, oh, we're pretty much. You know, we're documenting some stuff and then we need to figure out where these other eight points are going to come from. But there's not a ton to do here other than to make sure that you answer these questions correctly, that you can prove that you're doing the answers you claimed and those types of things. But I would say, from start to submit three months and then a couple months in evaluation and then right now I think it's up to four to six months in verification. So you should be able to get it done within a year.
Speaker 1:That's bad. In the grand scheme of things, it's not bad at all. A year goes by quickly.
Speaker 2:Yeah, and a lot of times you'll get clients like I have one right now still a prospect, but they are very they want to do B Corp. They've been in business for about a year so they're very excited. Like you have to be in business for a year so they're ready to do it. But also we started talking about the community section of the assessment and they were very hesitant of like we haven't done as much as we want to as far as our strategic impacts. That was part of why we want to bring you in, because we know you're so and they want to build out a really cool mentoring program. They want to do some, some, some work with some HBCUs up in the Northeast. So like they really have these crazy, amazing aspirational ideas they just don't know how to execute. So we're going to use that time while we're waiting in the queue and waiting for an analyst to really go deep in on their strategic impact and you know, and roadmap out.
Speaker 2:Okay, if this is the end goal, is this mentorship program with students from an HBCU, like what is the end of year one goal? Because it's not going to be there yet. So how do we start to figure out how to set them up for success as they work towards these things and really have the impact they want? And how do we not have zero impact until we get to finish dream ideal state? So that'll be the fun part, but we can use some of the downtime. While we're just again waiting in line for a B-Lab analyst to free up to look at our assessment, we can use that time to kind of work on some of the other stuff, some of the implementation, some of the network connections, making sure people get to meet other people in their industry or potential buyers or just people I think that they will become friends with in the B Corp community. So using as much of that downtime as possible to do something you know productive for them.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I love that. And when we met before, you know we talked about some of the projects that you've worked on and networking and making those connections. So what advice do you have for business owners? Maybe just starting out could be students too. You know of how to get your. I don't even want to say get your foot in the door, but but take those steps to attend, whether it's a community meeting or you know a local governor, a local town hall, just to get you know your face out there, your name out there, that you want to be involved.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I mean a lot of regions have be locals so we've got like be local. Georgia. We do virtual stuff, most of it's in person, some of them are just volunteer days, so like there's a ton of ways to get involved. I will say same thing from a student perspective. There's a lot of people in the B Corp community, I mean I think in the general business community, that will'll make time for students, because we were all a student at some point, even if we didn't go to college. We were a student in high school. We were a young professional trying to figure out our career. So I would definitely play the student card as much as you can. But what was the other one? Small business, I'd also say really for anybody, small business, even though you have to be a for-profit business to certify, the assessment tool is free. So whether you're a small business or a college within a university or a department, like you can use that assessment and go through it and kind of look at like how are we doing according to these standards? And again, you're never going to certify, but you can use that tool as kind of a framework for improvement. And for small businesses, young businesses I mean, as soon as I hit one year. I submitted my assessment because I was ready. Use it as a foundational piece to build the company that you want to be when you grow up.
Speaker 2:You know thinking about that future state and where do we want to be? Because some stuff won't be realistic at the beginning. You know, small sometimes it's not. We're going to do a healthcare stipend but we can't get a policy. Or you know we probably won't have a 401k for a couple of years, but we want one, so let's accrue for one. Like some of those things of like, what do we want to be and what are these actually going to cost? Are we out? What is the viable way to get to said desired state?
Speaker 2:I think the B impact assessment, which is the verification tool, is an incredible, incredible asset to kind of look through. And even if you're just wondering, like I don't know how much secondary caregiver leave you're going to have, does anybody think about that when they're starting a business? No, does anybody think about that when they're starting a business? No, is anybody thinking about volunteer time off or paid time off? Or, you know, is our 401k going to have a sustainable investing option? Like, you're not thinking about these things? So not that they should distract from your main business, but it doesn't hurt to kind of put these, plant these seeds in your head, for you know, because the last thing you want to do is get so far out of the stable. Look how many analogies can I use. Out of the harbor, out of the stable, toothpaste out of the tube.
Speaker 1:I love it.
Speaker 2:So far out, though, that now you don't have to put a new window on the house, you have to bulldoze the house, tear up the foundation and completely start over, and it becomes kind of turning the ocean liner versus turning the speedboat as far as the amount of effort now to kind of correct early foundational mistakes in building this with intention and building what you wanted to build and the kind of company that you wanted to build and will be proud of.
Speaker 1:Yeah, no, I love that. That's absolutely great advice and I definitely want to have you on another time to talk about future proofing your business, because I feel like we could have an entire episode just on that. Just on that. But for those who are listening, if you are on the podcast webpage, we will put a link to to be corp, to the certification, just to get some more information to our listeners. But if people want to contact you, get in touch with you. What is the best method?
Speaker 2:Let's see LinkedIn. I'm a LinkedIn junkie.
Speaker 1:I think most of us are.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I mean, it's the only one worth Every other one too. I just get sucked in. We have Be Local Georgia. We have an Instagram for the nonprofit, but yeah, I'll go on to like post. The next thing you know, I've watched an hour's worth of reels and you're like where did my day go? So I'm pretty much there. Yes, Pretty weird LinkedIn's now, like here, there's videos. I'm like not interested, Nope, Just just not interested. So, yeah, so I'm, so I'm pretty much on there. You can also get, you can connect through our website ProfitablePurposeConsultingcom but chances are I'm always on LinkedIn.
Speaker 1:Okay, wonderful. Well, thank you for being on with us. I've enjoyed it. Ask yourself how can I contribute to a brighter, more sustainable future yourself? How can I contribute to a brighter, more sustainable future, not just personally, but professionally? Let's embark on this journey together and shape the landscape of sustainable leadership for tomorrow. Take the first step now and make a commitment to lead with sustainability in mind. That's all for this episode of Sustainability Unveiled. Join us next time as we continue exploring the forefront of sustainable business practices. Until then, stay informed, stay sustainable.
