- SMEs make up 96% of the B Corp community
- What does being a B Corp mean to us?
- B Corp certification isn’t the destination
I could wax lyrical about B Corp, the growing community of progressive companies reinventing business by pursuing purpose, but I realise that some of these words will fall on deaf ears. It is B Corp Month in March, an annual, global campaign to celebrate everything it means to be a B Corp, so the noise around the movement will be louder than normal, however there are people who question the validity of the certification. This is against the backdrop of the likes of Clean Creatives putting pressure on B Lab (the not-for-profit behind B Corp certification) to strip subsidiary companies of fossil-fuel organisations of accreditation. Chris Turner, executive director of B Lab UK, attests that SMEs still make up 96% of the B Corp community.
But, I suppose you could say I am evangelical about being a B Corp accredited organisation and I strongly believe in its value. It is a big deal for our company. The B Corp accreditation is validation that our business has been, is and will continue to do well by doing good. We didn’t alter any of our working practices or approaches to ‘fit’ the B Impact Assessment and score the benchmark 80 points to move through the certification process (we scored 101.2…!). The assessment is rigorous and sought out evidence across the entirety of our business operations, there is nowhere to hide, so to speak.
In a recent interview with a potential new recruit, I was taken aback when asked the question “what does being a B Corp mean to Conscious Communications?”. I was pleasantly surprised that they had noticed the logo on our website, took the time to understand that it meant something to us and wanted to learn more. Will Butler-Adams, CEO of Brompton Bicycle, a fellow B Corp, recently contributed to an article in Business Leader where he highlighted what being B Corp means for staff, which certainly mirrors our experience at Conscious Communications. He said: "It means a huge amount to the staff to feel like they’re committing their lives to a business that actually cares and isn’t doing nasty things”.
Gaining the B Corp certification was a huge accomplishment for Conscious Communications, but what it stands for is so deeply embedded in our company, and has been from the outset, that the day we received our B Corp status was icing on the cake. Our Investors in People assessor recently said: “You have a profound understanding and unwavering dedication to your conscious purpose and values. It’s the lifeblood that fuels your existence. You’ve never been anything but a conscious business, and it’s truly incredible to see the depth of appreciation and alignment of these principles amongst your team and is undoubtedly their most powerful source of motivation and inspiration”.
In the 10 months since we were certified we have welcomed the opportunity to be part of the B Corp community, have conversations with like-minded businesses, share ideas and get our team involved in what’s next. As a company we rarely stand still, we are always thinking about what’s next, what can we do better, what more can we do to have greater impact. Whether it’s through pro bono work or reflecting on the clients we work with and who the end-beneficiaries are, we’ll never stop looking for new ways to grow our impact. So, while this B Corp Month we want to show the world how we can move forward, together, by highlighting and celebrating all that is B Corp, this is also an opportunity to reiterate that B Corp certification isn’t the destination but rather a journey to better business and we want to bring as many people as possible along for the ride.