Measures that Matter
I call these pages like today's measures that matter. It's a phrase I lifted from my days of being a loudspeaker for the BCorps movement (that is no longer the case, though I do still support the central idea of BCorps in that they do encourage using business as a force for good in the world, not just tools to make money).
Unlike other dimensions, which seem solely intent on driving (explosive!!!) financial growth, the measures I present here have less to do with growth (of that nature, anyway) and little to do with the five pillars BCorps engages its disciples to measure: governance, workers, community, the environment, and customers, which all sound great on the surface, but in reality sometimes feel like just a bunch of slick, buzzwords corporations use to give any layman the impression they can feel good about buying whatever it is they're selling.
Instead, the topics I try and offer here, hopefully will help us all, in some way or another, make better sense of the world and maybe even reshape our thoughts so that we can be more hopeful for it. Doing good simply for the purpose of doing good, not because it helps someone's bottom line. Sometimes I might be off the mark, but in the words of Thoreau, "It's not what you look at that matters, it's what you see." So, there's that.
Generally, what I look for are stories, articles, bits and pieces here and there that either 1.) illuminate some bullshit that we must sidestep to live fully, authentically and intentionally, or 2.) proof that it can be done. In other words, to swipe a thought from the BCorps website: By measuring what matters, [we] have the data [we] need to understand where [we] need to improve; and what steps [we] need to take to get there.
There is a lot that rings true about that statement, but only if we read it as if it were us taking the measurement. Improve to get where? Richer? More powerful? Big enough to squash the competition? In what direction are things here being driven?
I know we made corporations people more than a hundred years ago, but I doubt many of them then, and much less today, think the purpose of improvement is to embrace mindfulness, cultivate gratitude, or increase their self-awareness. Or, in more quotidian terms: read more, meditate, listen to music, take more picnics.
At our bakery in America, we were a BCorps. At least we earned the title BCorps, but then stepped away from accepting the award when we learned the price of admission and found it simply too steep for our small little rural enterprise to afford. I argued with them about it, offered to help bring them realize the challengews but also shared with them it was of utmost importance that businesses like ours practice—and be recognized—for the way they were operating in smaller communities. It went nowhere.
But I'm not complaining, we are closed after all, so what does it matter? But I do still get my undies in wad over the experience and so when I come across anything that leans toward my own personal findings, I applaud it. Like today. Because the impediment to join this exclusive club should be the assessment, period. Not whether or not you can pay the membership fee. Right? I mean other places, like higher ed institutions, figured out a long time ago that to allow smart people who could't afford the cost of attendance could join with a little helping hand of a scholarship. Why couldn't BCorps do something like that? I don't know, and it's not my fight anymore. But the fight goes on, as indicated in this video posted a year ago on whether the certification could even be trusted. It's long, so here is a quick summary:
- BCORPs is a certification that a company meets certain ethical and sustainable practices and supports what is considered the triple bottom line: people, planet and profit.
- Nespresso is a company, owned by Nestle, a entity operating quite literally the opposite of what BCORPS claims to enshrine, and took a product, in this case coffee, and updated morning routines around the world, which had virtually zero waste, and put it into tiny pods which made it taste worse and of which you then had to throw away.
- Nespresso is now a BCORPS
- Ergo BCORPS is broken.
And now, here are a few other measures that matter:
- I consider myself a liberal, but sometimes I have to hold my nose at what I find coming out of the minds of like-minded politicians and economists. You are wrong about inflation and it's time you stop selling bullshit designed along party lines. Not everything is about winning an election. The truth out there fucking matters and if you aren't actually living a normal, middle-class American life don't write like you know what that's like. Ask someone who is for fuck's sake.
- On the flip side, here's this counter to all that talk about economics: "Wages have been rising faster than inflation since last year, and the average American is better off than before the pandemic." Except Who is the average American? Just over 17% are retired and as of this March, the increase of 3.5% to consumer prices tops the 3.2% COLA applied to Social Security benefits this year, vis a vis, that sucks. Next year's projected COLA of 2.6% doesn't paint a rosier picture. So, who's right? Probably neither of the journalists, just saying.
- One last item on this topic: "Americans work more, vacation less, spend more on healthcare, and die sooner than people in other high-income economies." These are the leading causes why more and more Americans are deciding that the only way to get ahead is to leave, as noted in this interesting piece, Priced out of America.
- I may have shared this before and if I did I'm sorry to duplicate it. I haven't been napping recently as often as I'd like and that makes me forgetful. And, maybe, if I'm honest, a little bit grumpy. So, on second thought, I'm not sorry. Read it again.
- We've been baking. That is all.
- If you missed last week's essay on Awe, I invite to check it out here. I feel like I didn't quite do justice to just how important experiencing awe is to our life's satisfaction. “Awe is on the cutting edge” of emotion research, said Judith T. Moskowitz, the professor of medical social sciences featured in one of the links I shared. “Intentional awe experiences, like walks in nature, collective movement, like dance or ceremony, even use of psychedelics improve psychological well-being.” Seriously, get out there and find a few moments of awe. Your heart will thank you.
- I was wrong. I do have one more thing to say about economics. A survey conducted in 2022 by the Authors Guild of published authors indicated the median gross pre-tax income of full-time, established writers was $25,000 per year—only $10,000 of which was from book-related sources. In 1989, that figure was closer to $60,000, when adjusted for inflation. Back when doing what you love, writing in this case, was considered a job and compensated accordingly.
Today, however, writers are often encouraged to work for exposure, or to think of low pay and lack of job security as a supposedly fair exchange for not being bored out of our skulls—yet another hat trick of neoliberalism, where the more work provides actual meaning in people’s lives, the more it’s denigrated as hobby or vanity project, which makes it easier to keep labor costs down across the board. —Alissa Quart, of Lit Hub
- When we support
corporations who(sorry, not a person) corporations that only measure performance in terms of explosive! growth we get the kind of situation we're in now, one that makes it harder, not easier, for people and the planet to thrive, which is the part of the BCorps mission I will always applaud and support. I hope you do, too.
So, please consider supporting a writer today. They need all the help they can get.
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Alle prossima!
SLG
