Forging A World that Works for All: The Times May Be Changing

Bernard Mohr Oct. 12 2021?

Reneé gets up most mornings to an alarm set on her mobile phone. She checks the news headlines using her NYT subscription and then the weather app that she is trialing for 30 days. Once she has brushed her teeth using her new sonic toothbrush that was recommended to her by a dentist who practices?with a dental chain, she showers under a rainfall shower head that was a birthday gift she bought with a “money card” purchased by her brother and serviced ?through a major financial institution, which as it turns out is also financing her recent purchase of a second hand car. ?Her clothes come from a popular discounter of contemporary fashions, the shoes she puts on are a “splurge purchase” from a top line manufacturer, which she ordered over the internet and which were delivered yesterday, a day after she ordered them. Before she has even had time to respond to the text from her health care provider asking her to use their portal so she can verify the medications she is on, Reneé has relied on easily more than a dozen services and products from corporations large and small, for profit and not for profit. And she has barely begun her day.

?Corporations have always prospered when successfully delivering products or services that met a need someone was willing to pay for. As a result we rely on corporations to provide almost everything - from birthing centers in hospitals; to the devices that fit in the palms of our hands through which we connect with the world, pay our bills, get our news and find our way to new destinations; to sophisticated specialty hospitals (full of neurologists, surgeons, internists, radiologists, oncologists, cardiologists etc.) that care for our pets; to funeral services that help us to deal with life’s end. ?

Corporations are unique socio-economic structures we invented to generate and deliver solutions to almost every need in modern life. But what if as a society we asked them to push a bit further? What if we asked them to develop and deliver solutions in areas of need such as racial injustice, or economic inequality or the ever more contaminated biosphere– not just within the walls of the corporation, not just within their supply chains. but at ecosystem scale?

The good news is that this call (this demand?) is emerging from a variety of places and sources – both expected and unexpected. Take for example the Edelman Trust Barometer global consumer surveys showing that

???????“80% agree that organizations must play a role in addressing societal issues”.

???????“86 expect CEOs to publicly speak out about one or more of these societal challenges (pandemic, societal issues, job automation, local community issues”

????????“68% say CEO’s should step in when government does not fix societal issues”

And perhaps from unexpected sources such as:

Larry Fink, CEO of Blackrock (a $7 trillion financial asset management firm),

“Society is demanding that companies, both public and private, serve a social purpose…..Companies must benefit all their stakeholders, including shareholders, employees, customers, and the communities within which they operate”

And..

The US Business Roundtable statement to members

“Each of?our stakeholders is essential. We commit to?deliver value to all of them, for the future?success of our companies, our communities?and our country.”?

?And…

The Davos World Economic Forum 2020 Manifesto

“The purpose of a company is to engage all its stakeholders in shared and sustained value creation. In creating such value, a company serves not only its shareholders, but all its stakeholders – employees, customers, suppliers, local communities and society at large”.

Add to this the expanding interest in movements and organizations such as B-Corporations, Conscious Capitalism, the RSA, Stakeholder Capitalism, Capitalism 2.0, the Shared Value Initiative and the plethora of research being conducted on new investment metrics (building on ESG concepts) at places like Harvard, Princeton and Yale’s schools of business – and one begins to sense the development of a sea change in the role business can and should play in society.

?So what?

The short answer is “its too early to tell definitively”

But, the times may be changing.

Bernard Mohr [email protected]