Balanced Business 6: Sustainability Of Your Work & The World

When we master the art of conscious business, it is only natural that we continue our soulful growth and expand to bring positive impact to the world around us. This 6th episode of the Balanced Business podcast explores sustainability as a conscious practice for business leaders.

Transcript

Hello and welcome to the sixth episode on Balanced Business.

Today we are connecting with the outside world,

Stepping out of your inner balance into the harmony with nature and the communities around you.

We are going to do it through unpacking the concept of sustainability from the perspective of a conscious leader.

We've talked about personality and practices of the conscious leader in the previous episode and now we are equipping this conscious leader with sustainable development awareness and framework.

Most of you probably know about sustainable development goals formulated by the United Nations and this is a rich and accessible resource,

It's very brightly communicated all over the internet,

But you need to also be aware that many people use it for marketing purposes only.

There is nothing wrong with marketing,

But when there is no integrity and sincerity behind it,

There is something wrong with it.

And the publicity that is not centered in truth is all over the place.

So whenever you research something,

Try to be critical and ask questions,

And always check with your feeling,

Your intuition,

And rely on advice of your trusted colleagues to judge this and that,

The collaboration possibilities,

Maybe investing or supporting some sustainability initiatives,

It should always be very weighted,

It's not enough to see a green label or a sustainable development goal logo on the product to really understand the impact deeply.

Sustainability is the balance between three grand whales that are upholding our world,

They are sustaining it,

And they are the economy,

The society,

And nature.

When I say our world,

I mean the world of humans.

Sustainability is the ability of us humans to sustain our existence over a long term,

Really long,

Hundreds of years ahead,

Thousands,

We want to make sure that we don't die out,

Then we need to figure out how to be sustainable.

And that is what we need all these three grand pillars for.

When you find the balance of the three in your business,

Then it is stable not only today and tomorrow,

But in 10 years and in 100 years,

You can pass it on to your descendants,

Biological or energetical,

And the seeds and the fruits that will spring from the source of your business,

They will prosper over a great length of time if you really crack this concept of sustainability.

So economic values are taught widely in business schools,

And I want to underline that there is nothing wrong and it is only right for you as a business leader,

Even if you're leading very much socially and environmentally oriented enterprise,

There's nothing wrong with studying in a classic business school,

And don't be too critical about them bypassing the other components because the business education is given to you in order to understand this economic pillar of business.

But your role as a sustainable and conscious leader is to know that there are two more.

It's only one third of your business.

The thing is that in the other pillars,

In people and nature,

There is always this rhetoric Sustainability professionals are trying to motivate business leaders to do that socially and environmentally responsible practice,

And they're using the rhetoric of money.

They're trying to evaluate and put numbers to impact on nature.

They're trying to explain why caring for people is profitable,

Because you will have more talented professionals that will bring you more money,

Or maybe if you introduce meditations at the workspace,

Then you will save a lot of paid time off for recovery from some health issues.

But this is all hypocrisy.

Money is a neutral and valid and present and dignified form of energy exchange,

But it is not the only thing that the world is centered around.

When you are explaining nature through money or people through money,

Through monetary value,

This only feeds the mentality of business comes first.

Be unapologetic and say,

Here in the plane of business,

We will measure our impact with money and we will try to make as much money as possible because we are a business.

And here in the plane of people development,

We will measure our success in how people feel,

In how aligned we are,

And attuned in our energies,

And what is the purpose that we share,

And if we take joy in everyday work together,

And if we feel healthy,

And if we have the wellness.

And these can be put also through some frameworks,

Can be assigned some numbers,

But you don't need numbers.

You have your own intuition.

You have the perfect metric system inside this metering,

Measuring system that doesn't express itself in numbers.

It expresses itself in vibration,

In feelings.

And when you understand how you're feeling and how your team is feeling,

You will know that the people component of your business is being successful.

Of course,

In order to help people be happy and influence the communities around you in a beneficial way,

You need to have the knowledge.

So please go and study the social component of sustainability.

Understand the impacts that your business has on people,

Starting from your own team,

But not limited to people that produce products that you are using in your business,

People who deliver the goods that you are sending out,

All groups of people that are involved throughout the value chain.

And then the third component is nature,

Mother Earth,

The thing that is living beyond us and will live on however badly we treat it.

But we want to be good and caring,

And there is a lot of pain,

A lot of anger,

But we are just humble children of Mother Earth,

And we can only do as much as we can do.

Being really down to earth means accepting that there is a limit to what you can do.

There is no limit to how sincerely and thoroughly you can act on what you can do.

So also study impacts of your business throughout the value chain,

But do not be distracted by the hype topics like only carbon emissions,

Carbon emissions and nothing else.

It's not this.

It is the holistic approach,

It is understanding how you're touching nature at every point.

It is talking to experts that understand the connections within ecosystems,

That know where the water of the river is coming from and where it is flowing,

And how the emissions that you have influence the soil,

Through the trees or whatever,

You know.

I'm not an ecologist,

But it is all connected.

There is a complex network of matter exchanging throughout air,

Water,

Earth,

And you are a part of it.

Your business is a part of nature.

We are like beavers building their dams and huts,

Just more advanced.

So we are also part of nature.

We have taken everything that we use in construction,

In chemistry,

In everything.

It is all from nature and we give back to nature.

And we often,

Mostly,

We give back in a bad way,

In a non-sustainable way,

Because we just don't know how to do it better.

So in your business,

Learn how to do it better.

And there are tricks to making sustainability work.

I will mention a couple of them.

First of all,

You need to have priorities and it is called the concept of materiality.

So what is material?

Imagine the word matter.

It is the fabric of what you are creating.

And there is some matter that is more present,

Something that is heavier,

Something that is really the substance of your business.

And from sustainable development goals,

There are so many topics that you can choose,

But only several of them will be the most relevant for you.

You don't want to spread yourself thin.

You want to concentrate on the areas where you bring the most impact.

In order to understand the materiality of your business,

You need to understand the impact.

And understanding the impact takes research,

Takes time and attention,

And it is always good to do it in a volume way.

It can be done in the way of double materiality.

It can be done even in triple,

3D way of conscious approach to materiality.

Materiality means that you are choosing the priority goals and topics for your business.

For example,

If you have a fashion brand,

Then it may be the sourcing of organic fabrics and avoiding some unethical forms of labor.

And it can be also the usage of water and colors.

And then it can be maybe recycling and disposal of the waste.

And if you are in an IT business,

It can be something completely different.

It can be the use of energy.

And it can also be something not only environmental.

There is also a big people component,

So there is always the ethical use of information.

There are just tons and tons of material on sustainability.

But you need to really choose just a few topics that are most relevant to you.

And to do it well and consciously,

You want to understand the impact from the point of view of your value chain,

Of everything that you are touching.

And also you need to understand what is important for you as the founder of the company,

What is just your passion and what you find important.

So these are two layers.

And to bring a volume to it,

You can also interview your team,

Talk about sustainability with them and ask them for their feedback and draw a mind map together of everything that is important.

And from all these components,

You create a top 5 or top 10 topics,

Maybe just top 3.

Something that you are willing to take actionable steps towards and approach it as a spiritual practice,

As giving back.

It is a very good thing to do in the creator stage of your business when you are shaping the processes.

And you can set up the whole system of sustainability management.

And be sincere.

Don't try to imitate other people that are using buzzwords in their sustainability reports.

Be real and understand what is important to you.

It all starts in the purpose and vision that you have set in the beginning of your business journey and it continues through tracing impacts that you have on everyone and everything around you.

All to reporting on it and writing a story that sets an example for others and is sincere and you can write on your successes and on your failures.

And here there is a second thing that is important for successful journey in sustainability.

It is clear communication.

You need to use the words that will be understandable by a broader audience that may read your sustainability report.

But you also need to stay true to your core values.

And there with this trade-off,

You want to communicate your true values,

But if you put all the vibrations and frequencies and spirituality stuff into your sustainability report,

Probably most people will not understand it and some will even be offended because they are approaching it from very rational and intellect-centered place and they will just disregard you if they don't understand what you're saying.

So choose words that represent you sincerely,

But that are also attainable for people who may not be at the same stage of enlightenment journey as you are.

And then use stories,

Don't just lay out facts.

Describe the journey,

The vision you've had,

People who have contributed,

Take pictures and approach it creatively,

Try to inspire others.

And in this way,

You can make your business not only a channel for your own purpose and life mission and your team's,

But also an oasis of sincerity in the world of grind and hustle,

A safe space for others to get reconnected to what true creative power should look like.

Don't hesitate to reach out and offer the stories of your businesses for the discussion on purposeful journey of sustainability and connection with the world and the community around you.

I will be grateful to learn what you are going through personally and I wish you the highest patience and passion to have both success and satisfaction from what you're doing every day in your business.

Thank you and talk to you next time in the final episode of this mini-series.