photo credit: ( Torsten )
When you first set out with your new business you have dreams to do great things, make people happy, healthy and the environment to overall be a better place. But sometimes along the way of increasing our business and growing to extremes we can loose sight of what we originally set out to do and we find ourselves more focused on our profits than our missions. Here are some suggestions on how you can focus on both at the same time:
Make it personal. Hybrid companies reject the idea that “it’s just business.” They create unusually close relationships with suppliers, producers, customers, and other stakeholders. Michael Potter, CEO of Michigan-based Eden Foods, says his employees’ personal relationships with the company’s supplying farmers and their families have created a competitive advantage for the organization: Eden has developed several new product ideas and capabilities based on input from these growers’ groups, he notes.
- Make sure that this mission for the companies social and environmental aspects is put right into the business model, and that it fits comfortably already in there. Then make sure you stick to it by putting the plan and mission into action.
- Market premium products such as all natural organic or “green” products. People who want quality as well as good for the environment expect to and will pay premium price for them.
- Create a high sense of patience amongst yourself as well as your team. When dealing with social and environmental missions at the same time, one needs to remember that changing the behaviors of the public can take not only years but generations as well, it’s a slow but steady process.