How business can improve the world, not just the bottom line | Esha Chhabra
Apr 29, 2024
auto_awesome
Environmental business journalist Esha Chhabra discusses how regenerative companies can drive real change by embedding purpose into their operations. She challenges the focus on profit, emphasizing the importance of sustainability and social impact. The podcast explores Veja's sustainable practices, the need for businesses to prioritize environmental regeneration, and integrating sustainability into all aspects of a company.
Regenerative businesses prioritize embedding impact into every operation, shifting focus from profit to solving social and environmental issues.
Success in regenerative business lies in localized replication of ethical, impact-driven models across industries and cultures.
Deep dives
The Rise of Regenerative Businesses
As traditional business models focused on growth and profit face criticism for their impact on the environment, there is a growing shift towards regenerative business practices. These businesses aim to restore communities, industries, and the environment by embedding impact into every aspect of their operations. Unlike simply adding sustainability as a marketing tactic, regenerative companies prioritize solving social and environmental problems at the core of their business model. Examples such as Veja, a shoe brand preserving the Amazon and empowering marginalized communities, showcase how regenerative design can create positive impact across the supply chain.
Moving Beyond Sustainability
The podcast highlights the limitations of traditional sustainability efforts, which often prioritize marketing labels over meaningful action. While sustainable and mission-driven brands made progress by incorporating concepts like recycling and carbon offsets, they are seen as a stepping stone towards true regenerative business strategies. Regenerative companies reframing the approach by focusing on impactful solutions to social and environmental challenges, with an emphasis on employee ownership, profit sharing, and waste reduction. The narrative shifts from sustaining a flawed system to regenerating communities, industries, and people in need.
Scaling Impact Through Replication
Entrepreneurs in the regenerative business space emphasize the importance of storytelling and replication in driving widespread change. Rather than aiming for massive global expansion, the focus is on creating multiple localized versions of ethical and impact-driven businesses across various industries and cultures. By redefining success beyond profit and growth, regenerative companies seek to build organizations that prioritize environmental regeneration, human-centric workplaces, and sustainable business practices for a more holistic approach to business.
"Sustainability has become more marketing than action," says environmental business journalist Esha Chhabra. Challenging conventional business models solely focused on profit, she shares how regenerative companies that embed purpose into every facet of their operations can drive real change — and make things better for people and the planet. After the talk, Modupe reflects on what it means to run a regenerative business.