For the EVOLution of Business

Andrew Brady

Capitalism has created massive gains in prosperity and yet also led to such inequality that a majority of millennials don’t believe it’s the best way to organize our economy. Yet some companies embrace a more "conscious" capitalism, with a purpose beyond profit and a balancing of the needs of all stakeholders rather than prioritizing stockholders...and they end up more successful in the long run! Join the "For the EVOLution of Business" podcast to learn from business leaders at the forefront of Conscious Capitalism, creating more inclusive prosperity for society and the planet while also leading to more success for their companies.

  • 1 hour 9 minutes
    Is the Workplace the Perfect Place to Talk About Race? with Gina Greenlee and Margaret Greenberg

    [2:20] The phone conversation that turned into their new book, The Business of Race

    [5:30] Gina and Margaret's reconnection after the murder of George Floyd

    [10:00] Applying a growth mindset to conversations about race
    Gina: "Avoiding the conversation and doing nothing is the wrong thing to do."

    Dolly Chugh's TED Talk - How to Let Go of Being a "Good" Person and Become a Better Person
    https://www.ted.com/talks/dolly_chugh_how_to_let_go_of_being_a_good_person_and_become_a_better_person?language=en

    [20:00] Navigating racial conversations in their friendship
    Gina: "Rather than conflict resolution, I like to think about conflict transformation. Conflict is a tool for transformation. That's how people grow. That's how you know what's really going on in your relationships. If you aren't willing to take that risk then you'll never know."

    [28:00] How discussions of race in society and the workplace have evolved - from compliance and avoiding lawsuits to belonging and equity
    Gina: "Regardless of how we racially identify, we're in this together."

    [34:45] Passing "The Kumbaya Test" as an ally

    [40:00] Picking your moments to bring up conversations about race

    [43:00] Why the workplace is the best place to talk about race
    -Often the first or only place that we interact with people of other races
    -One of few places in society where there is some civility
    -One of the places where you must keep learning and growing to stay relevant
    "The workplace is the place where people of many different backgrounds and skillsets work together toward a common goal."

    [49:30] Taking an asset rather than deficit based lens to diversity in the workplace

    [52:00] The business model of slavery
    Gina: "Their business model was always broken and not sustainable...Here's a business model that we propose that is an asset-based model that's not based on the economic oppression of humans. We want to say to business people, don't be afraid of addresses this, you know how to do it and we're going to show you how to do it with the tools that you've been using all along: strategy, project planning..."

    [1:01:45] The "work before the work" and "prepping for the talk"
    Free recommended resources
    Coursera "Race and Cultural Diversity in American Life" (Free)
    https://www.coursera.org/learn/race-cultural-diversity-american-life

    "Race, the Power of an Illusion" series:
    https://www.racepowerofanillusion.org/

    Frontline: "A Class Divided" (Free):
    https://www.pbs.org/wgbh/frontline/film/class-divided/

    Read their series on talking about race in the workplace:
    https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/race-america-part-i-workplace-perfect-place-discuss-margaret-h-/

    Pre-order their book - Due August 31, 2021:
    https://www.amazon.com/Business-Race-Antiracist-Workplace_And-Actually/dp/126426884X/

    27 May 2021, 7:30 am
  • 1 hour 41 seconds
    Making REAL Progress on Diversity and Inclusion - Two Case Studies

    Recorded April 8th, 2021 by the Rochester, NY chapter of the global Conscious Capitalism movement working to "elevate humanity through business."

    Conscious Capitalism is based on four key tenets:

    -Higher Purpose (beyond profit)
    -Stakeholder Orientation (balancing the needs of employees, customers, suppliers, investors, society and the environment, rather than prioritizing stockholders)
    -Conscious Leadership (servant leaders that focus on we rather than me, keeping the organization focused on living its purpose)
    -Conscious Culture (fosters love and care and focuses on the holistic wellbeing of employees)

    Our mission is to be students and teachers practicing Conscious Capitalism with the belief that these principles empower and advance human flourishing.

    Thanks to our Visionary Partners: The XLR8 Team, Inc., CleanCraft LLC, The Bonadio Group

    Learn more about our Rochester, NY Chapter: https://consciouscapitalismroc.org/

    Learn more about the global Conscious Capitalism movement: https://consciouscapitalism.org/

    8 April 2021, 6:27 pm
  • 1 hour 14 minutes
    The Future of Conscious Capitalism with Alexander McCobin and Curtis Hite

    Recorded February 24th, 2021 by the Rochester, NY chapter of the global Conscious Capitalism movement working to "elevate humanity through business."

    Conscious Capitalism is based on four key tenets:

    -Higher Purpose (beyond profit)
    -Stakeholder Orientation (balancing the needs of employees, customers, suppliers, investors, society and the environment, rather than prioritizing stockholders)
    -Conscious Leadership (servant leaders that focus on we rather than me, keeping the organization focused on living its purpose)
    -Conscious Culture (fosters love and care and focuses on the holistic wellbeing of employees)

    Our mission is to be students and teachers practicing Conscious Capitalism with the belief that these principles empower and advance human flourishing.

    Thanks to our Visionary Partners: The XLR8 Team, Inc., CleanCraft LLC, The Bonadio Group

    Learn more about our Rochester, NY Chapter: https://consciouscapitalismroc.org/

    Learn more about the global Conscious Capitalism movement: https://consciouscapitalism.org/

    Learn more about Improving:
    https://improving.com/

    25 February 2021, 8:30 am
  • 1 hour 19 minutes
    The Intersection of Sustainability and Social Justice

    Recorded October 27th by the Rochester, NY chapter of the global Conscious Capitalism movement working to "elevate humanity through business."

    Conscious Capitalism is based on four key tenets:

    -Higher Purpose (beyond profit)
    -Stakeholder Orientation (balancing the needs of employees, customers, suppliers, investors, society and the environment, rather than prioritizing stockholders)
    -Conscious Leadership (servant leaders that focus on we rather than me, keeping the organization focused on living its purpose)
    -Conscious Culture (fosters love and care and focuses on the holistic wellbeing of employees)

    Our mission is to be students and teachers practicing Conscious Capitalism with the belief that these principles empower and advance human flourishing.

    Thanks to our Visionary Partners: The XLR8 Team, Inc., CleanCraft LLC, The Bonadio Group

    Learn more about our Rochester, NY Chapter: https://consciouscapitalismroc.org/

    Learn more about the global Conscious Capitalism movement: https://consciouscapitalism.org/

    28 October 2020, 1:19 am
  • 49 minutes 4 seconds
    Radical Inclusion Through Open Hiring

    [3:40] Founding of Greyston by a then-Buddhist Monk Bernie Glassman

    [7:50] The business case for Open Hiring

    [11:15] Piloting Open Hiring in Rochester, NY

    [14:30] How to get started with Open Hiring at your business
    View Open Hiring 101 Webinar here: https://us02web.zoom.us/rec/play/uMIkI--uq2o3HNWRsgSDUaB9W42_J6yshCUeqfEOzBrgUXkFMwaiZbNGZeQovDN7MDyf3rEIpwA4qlMK?continueMode=true&_x_zm_rtaid=yxVvUoIWRC-8jUvM3MtFag.1595019369785.ac5752f410a180da626b89cee54f904e&_x_zm_rhtaid=319

    [19:00] Open Hiring at the Body Shop - 60% reduction of turnover, productivity up 13%, reduced time to hire from 3-4 weeks to 7 days - hired 150 so far and looking to expand

    [21:45] How Open Hiring can actually INCREASE retention

    [28:30] How Open Hiring can inject purpose into an organization and positively impact the culture 

    [31:45] Sharing stories of impact with consumers

    [36:00] Radical inclusion through balancing accountability with support

    [38:30] Sara's path from Harvard Business School to Greyston

    [43:00] Mubarak's experience bridging non-profit and for profit

    [45:00] Defining success and looking toward the future of Open Hiring

    Learn more at www.greyston.org/about-the-greyston-center-for-open-hiring

    If you're in Rochester, contact Mubarak: [email protected]

    Otherwise, contact Sara at: [email protected] 

    10 September 2020, 7:30 am
  • 1 hour 3 minutes
    Capitalism For The Common Good with Adrian Hale

    [3:00] Growing up in Rochester, then joining the Marines

    [6:30] Mentoring from Bob Duffy and coming back to Rochester

    [9:15] Applying his degree in urban education to Rochester's challenges

    [12:00] Taking a holistic approach to business - "differentiate free market, equal opportunity capitalism where there is healthy competition, from what we have now...corporate cannibalism"

    [15:00] "We need to be honest about tax avoidance...this idea that there is not an inherent obligation to the public good...by starving government, business is attempting to introduce themselves as saviors, which I'm hesitant to do. Doing good should not be an act of charity. Doing good should be part of our fundamental obligation to one another as people...there needs to be inherent in the business model, with this aspiration for profitability, how do we at the same time not create these negative externalities BEFORE you start thinking about how to do good."

    [20:00] "If you continue to subject people to a system that they know they have no real opportunity or chance of succeeding in, then you risk collapse...and if the system collapses, even those who have the most power become powerless."

    [23:00] How philanthropy can be a "Trojan horse" for corporate reputation that masks how inherent in their business model is the simultaneous cause of many of the problems they claim to ameliorate

    [27:00] Overcoming the temptation of short-term self interest - poverty as a deficit of aggregate choice - "for far too long, the nature of the problem has been ignored" - "so many people are better at being community-minded when they're OK...self-interest is inherently un-American"

    [34:00] Leading conversations on diversity, equity and inclusion in the Chamber and among Chamber members - New "Colors of Success" conversations, trainings and programming

    [40:00] Understanding systems and contexts that restrict opportunities

    [47:00] Attracting companies to Rochester, developing the talent they're looking for and enhancing the job quality

    [56:00] The intersection of education and poverty - "We need to focus on the policies, resource flows and conditions that are rendering them to a helpless status where they are not the determiners of who and what they can become. That is when we begin to deal with poverty. We cannot apply an ethics of individualism to people who cannot take action as individuals."

    3 September 2020, 12:03 pm
  • 1 hour 12 minutes
    Building Culture Virtually

    Recorded August 27th by the Rochester, NY chapter of the global Conscious Capitalism movement working to "elevate humanity through business."

    Conscious Capitalism is based on four key tenets:

    -Higher Purpose (beyond profit)
    -Stakeholder Orientation (balancing the needs of employees, customers, suppliers, investors, society and the environment, rather than prioritizing stockholders)
    -Conscious Leadership (servant leaders that focus on we rather than me, keeping the organization focused on living its purpose)
    -Conscious Culture (fosters love and care and focuses on the holistic wellbeing of employees)

    Our mission is to be students and teachers practicing Conscious Capitalism with the belief that these principles empower and advance human flourishing.

    Thanks to our Visionary Partners: The XLR8 Team, Inc., CleanCraft LLC, The Bonadio Group

    Learn more about our Rochester, NY Chapter: https://consciouscapitalismroc.org/

    Learn more about the global Conscious Capitalism movement: https://consciouscapitalism.org/

    27 August 2020, 11:54 pm
  • 53 minutes 7 seconds
    Regional Collaboration for Equitable Growth with Joe Stefko of ROC2025

    [2:00]  Building an interest in political science

    [3:55] Establishment of ROC2025 from the Boston Consulting Group's report on regional economic growth - for coordination and resource cultivation

    [7:30] Four main goals of ROC2025:
    1 - Adding 30,000 Net New Jobs
    2 - Increasing Regional Wealth by 20%
    3 - Elevating 20,000 out of Poverty
    4 - Increasing Regional GDP by 10%

    [10:15] The intersection of economic growth and equity
    "Economically inclusive communities experience higher rates of job growth and higher rates of income growth. Equity isn't tangential to our mission. It really is central...it's an opportunity to contribute to a changed future for our community." says Dr. Joe Stefko, President & CEO of ROC2025.

    [12:00] "Just" Growth and taking a regional focus - Study and book:
    http://justgrowth.org/

    [13:00] Other cities we can learn from and benchmarking against our peer metros

    [19:30] The impacts of COVID and Black Lives Matter on the 2025 goals

    [23:30] Early progress from initial investments of ROC2025

    Strategic Pillars (in collaboration with other Rochester economic development organizations)
    [26:00] Talent strategy (with Rochester Chamber) - growing the size of the employable labor pool - both retaining local graduates and creating access and training for middle skills jobs 

    [33:00] Business attraction, retention and expansion (with Greater Rochester Enterprise) - 4 out of 5 new jobs are created by jobs that are already here!

    [36:30] Support innovation and downtown development (with Rochester Downtown Development Corporation) - mobility, placemaking and growing street-level activity in the urban core

    [40:00] Greater ROC regional branding campaign - an opportunity to tell our story in a bold, powerful and audacious way

    [43:00] This isn't the first regional branding campaign...what makes this time different?

    "This is an open source brand. This is not the ROC2025 story. This is the community's story...Ours is not a region of one story. Everybody seems to have a different lens on what they love about this region. What we've attempted to do is engage the community in building out that story. This will be an ever-evolving story if we do our job right. It will be a story that incorporates diverse voices and diverse perspectives on what makes our region great...or 'Greater.'"

    [50:15] How can business leaders get involved

    Learn more about ROC2025 at https://www.roc2025.org/ and about the Greater ROC branding campaign at https://greaterroc.com/

    24 August 2020, 7:30 am
  • 48 minutes 55 seconds
    Harnessing Natural Intelligence for Innovation, Resilience and Sustainability

    [3:00] The false separateness we've created between ourselves and nature: "If we can go back to the essence of how life works to align how we design our economy, our companies and our innovation strategies with how nature works, we'd all be much better off."

    [5:00] Bringing natural intelligence and indigenous wisdom into our design: "We behave like we're isolated from nature, they behave like they're a part of nature."

    [6:00] Giving a voice to nature in decision making: "Their decision making is built on interdependency, while ours is built on human superiority and we don't take into account all of the relations that are actually vital for our lives."

    "As a citizen of the so-called 'developed' world, I wonder if we have developed the wrong things."

    [8:30] Changing our relationship with nature starts with the language we use. Indigenous cultures see nature as a relation and don't use the "it" pronoun, just as we wouldn't call a pet "it."

    [10:30] Nature filmmakers sometimes glorify the spectacle of a hunt, but it's not the main part of the story or even the most important part - "In your body, if you take away collaboration, you cease to exist. In nature, you more often see strategies to AVOID competition."

    [13:30] Competition is the exception, rather than the rule. Cancer is fundamentally cells that have forgotten about the system...cancer is what happens when collaboration fails."

    [17:30] Did we domesticate wolves, or did they domesticate themselves as a cooperative survival strategy?

    [21:30] How diversity creates resilience - "WE are an ecosystem" - every human is made up of more non-human cells than human cells
    "We're putting all of our focus on big technological interventions for the climate." Working WITH nature "would be so much easier, less risky and less costly to restore the planet. Not only would that be good for the climate, but it would be incredibly positive for the economy."

    [26:30] "Bio-logical" - It only counts as an investment if it makes the world better off

    [27:00] "Nature has been working with chemistry for billions of years. Imagine if our finest chemists understood how this worked and redesigned our products in nature's image" to be non-toxic for humans and for the planet

    [32:00] Biomimicry - nature has already solved many of the problems we face today
    -How sharkskin inspired a new surface that resists bacteria and viruses

    [35:30] Building an organizational structure on the natural intelligence of bottom-up agility - using simple rules rather than top-down hierarchy
    See Frederic Laloux's ReInventing Organizations here: https://www.reinventingorganizations.com/

    [42:00] How to get started on the journey of natural intelligence
    -Product-level, process-level, systems-level
    -From de-generative to re-generative

    Learn more and purchase the book here:
    https://www.naturalintelligence.info/

    or contact Leen through LinkedIn:
    https://www.linkedin.com/in/leen-gorissen-86aa508/

    17 August 2020, 7:30 am
  • 56 minutes 18 seconds
    Opportunities and Support for Post-Traumatic Growth at Pathstone

    [1:30] Pathstone's various workforce development programs

    [5:00] The hopes, dreams and fears of people returning from incarceration

    [8:30] "Ban the box" and employment discrimination

    [12:30] The path through the Young Adult Re-Entry program

    [15:20] Taking an individualized approach

    [18:00] Working with other partners in the training ecosystem

    [20:30] The inner work: changing mindsets for success

    [26:00] Grequan's path to Pathstone
    Learn more here:
    https://www.linkedin.com/in/grequancarter/

    ...and buy his book!
    https://store.bookbaby.com/bookshop/book/index.aspx?bookURL=Journey-of-a-Maturation-Rollercoaster

    [30:45] Toni's path to Pathstone
    "Turn your pain into power, and then you pour that into the young people on a daily basis."
    Learn more about Post-Traumatic Growth here:
    https://www.apa.org/monitor/2016/11/growth-trauma

    [35:00] Joshua's path to Pathstone
    Learn more here:
    https://www.linkedin.com/in/joshua-murphy-79160a90/

    Check out past episodes with Rich Ryan:
    https://fortheevolutionofbusiness.simplecast.com/episodes/sdt
    ...and Tina Paradiso of Imprintable Solutions:
    https://fortheevolutionofbusiness.simplecast.com/episodes/imprintinglives

    [40:30] A Pathstone success story

    [46:00] Why success looks different for everyone

    [49:00] Barriers to scaling the Young Adult Re-Entry program

    [52:00] A message to employers on why they should consider hiring these young adults that are hungry for opportunity

    Learn more about workforce development programs at Pathstone:
    https://pathstone.org/workforce-development/
    or if you're an employer interested in learning more, contact Joshua Murphy directly at: [email protected]

    10 August 2020, 2:58 pm
  • 42 minutes 4 seconds
    Children Are Stakeholders Too! with Laura Hall

    [2:30] Children are stakeholders too!
    "Children are going to lead the next stage of our evolution."

    [6:00] Laura's upbringing and how it influenced her life and career
    "We have a moral as well as a business obligation to build strong children."

    [10:00] Having conversations on equity and inclusion with children

    [15:00] Bringing discussions of fairness from kindergarten into the business world

    [20:00] Encouraging children's natural creativity and inquisitiveness - "While you're working from home, they're going to be on your advisory board whether you like it or not."

    [25:00] "We used to tell the customer what to buy. Now, the consumer tells us what they want to buy. It has never been more important for us to listen to these young people."

    [27:30] Embracing the journey of Conscious Capitalism - "It's about progress, not perfection."

    [30:00] During this pandemic, "it is MORE important for us to be conscious and act as a community, to share, and to build it together." 

    [31:30] Sustainability in the fashion industry - "It has never been more important for customers to vote with their pocketbook...children are very much aware."

    [36:00] "We are what we measure and we must measure what matters."
    Learn more abut Caring Economics and Dr. Riane Eisler here:
    https://centerforpartnership.org/programs/caring-economy/

    Pick up a copy (or several!) of The ABCs of Conscious Capitalism for Kids here:
    https://www.consciouscapitalismpress.com/collections/the-abcs-of-conscious-capitalism-for-kids

    Check out Laura's blog post about why the pandemic is a great time for kids to become the conscious leaders our world needs! 
    https://www.roundtablecompanies.com/blog/calling-all-conscious-kids

    Learn more about Laura and WHYZ Partners here:
    https://www.retailconsultingfirm.com/

    4 August 2020, 7:30 am
  • More Episodes? Get the App
About For the EVOLution of Business
© MoonFM 2024. All rights reserved.