The Hunger Project is setting a whole new pace for charities.  They are one of the most financially efficient ‘Not-For-Profit’ organisations on the planet. They are committed to spending less than twenty percent on overheads, which includes fundraising and administration, while they go about the business of changing both the lives of the donor-investors and their recipients as equal partners in the process.

For example in 2012, thirteen percent of their income went toward fundraising and administration, while eighty seven percent went directly to programs.

They are setting new standards for the Not-For-Profit sector globally, in particular for women in the workplace, not just in the countries they are working in to end world hunger (more on that later) but also in companies of the developed world with whom they partner.  For example, one of Australia’s ‘Big Four’, the Commonwealth Bank, sends their top executives overseas on tour with The Hunger Project every year to learn more about leadership, diversity and entrepreneurship with deeper learning gained from every visit.

The Hunger Project does things differently.  They believe that hungry people themselves are the key to ending hunger. By changing mindsets of their village partners in India, Bangladesh and Africa, they empower women and men to bring about change in their own communities. Top-down, aid-driven charity models often fail to reach the people who need the most help. To be sustainable, The Hunger Project discovered three critical elements that, when combined, empower people to make rapid progress in overcoming hunger and poverty:-

1. Mobilisation for self-reliance
2. Empowering women as key change-agents for development
3. Making local government work

Here are some of the companies which are standing up, taking notice and getting on board with this this very small but influential global organisation:-

•    McKinsey and Co
•    Commonwealth Bank
•    Business Chicks

What is The Hunger Project doing that is getting people so excited and enthusiastic?  They are getting their investors deeply involved with the experience and process of working to end world hunger in the developing world and they are giving those of us who decide to help them in this quest a deeper sense of meaning and purpose in our own lives, through their process of investor engagement.

As world renowned psychologist and author Dr Martin Seligman PhD, states, “There are five key parts to leading a great authentic and purposeful life”:-

•    Positive emotions
•    Engagement (losing oneself in the moment and losing all sense of time)
•    Relationships (positive relationships)
•    Meaning and purpose
•    Accomplishment

The Hunger Project manages to not only help their village partners tap into all five categories, they also help their investors to tap deeply into every one of these aspects.  This is an example of an organisation that doesn’t try to take the credit – they are constantly giving credit to others at every possible turn.

This is how THP makes such a huge difference in the lives of both the givers and receivers…

Firstly, they ask people like you and me to agree to fundraise $10,000 to give to a community in the developing world.  Then they take us and other likeminded contributors along with them into that community to immerse ourselves in the project and witness first-hand the difference we are making.

They educate us as investors to look out for the incredible leadership skills we observe while in that village partner community. By asking the people of those communities to share their own stories with us, they ensure that we, the audience, receive genuine value from hearing those stories.

They educate the women in those communities who are being helped and encourage those of them who want to, to step into positions of local power. This takes a lot of courage for the women involved. Not every woman wants to and that’s okay.  The Hunger Project does this because statistically the women are far more likely to give back… to make a difference…  and to seek ways to empower their entire community.

They encourage participating investors who have been on the tours to run leadership programs for others.  They give them a stage to share the leadership stories that they have witnessed which in turn recruits others who may want to join the process as well as inspire people to give more and be part of making a much bigger contribution to the world.

The Hunger Project leaders think differently. They involve people at every level. They are forging new paths and opening minds in the process.  They are not just a charity, they are revolutionising the way people think when they give and are setting new standards of personal involvement.

Bruce Poon Tip, CEO and founder of Global award winning tour company G Adventures, made the comment that happiness has three components:-

1.    People need to feel connected (to each other/to a cause/to the planet – they just need to feel connected)
2.    They need to feel that they have control over their own life
3.    They need to be part of something bigger than themselves

G Adventures and The Hunger Project are examples of two organisations that allow their clients to do just that and the positive impact of their efforts are beginning to be felt around the globe.

Drop me an email at brian@precisionprofiling.com.au if you would like to discuss further how to join our September study tour and create the environment that attracts and retains the young leaders of the future for your organisation.

Until then… Let’s seek to understand more and judge less. Have a great week – Brian

Precision Profiling – What Makes You Tick? Through ‘Motivational Fingerprinting’ we uncover what you do, how you do it and why you do it, and most importantly, the hidden patterns that lead to your success, and that of your team.

The story of Reho Travel reads like a journey through the changing of the guard of business and society over the past thirty years.

Bucket Shop – The 80’s

The name Reho Travel originated in the dark grey streets of London back in the 70’s. In those days, many of the airfares sold were one way, and for only a few pounds one could escape a drab existence and create a brand new life on the shores of ‘the lucky country’ on the other side of the world. In 1982 the brand came to Australia and helped to transform the industry with the “bucket shop” concept, where low price was the key market differentiator.

Transformation – Building Values (90’s)

With the 90’s came the emergence of the internet and a time when low cost competition started appearing on every street corner. A decision was made at Reho Travel to transform its business. It felt that a strategy which was focused purely on price was simply a race to the bottom of the pool. Words like ‘quality, flexibility and creativity’  became commonplace; substantial investments in business re-design were made; major travel industry awards were won as a result and suddenly Reho Travel was picking up a new kind of traveller – the business traveller. Within a few years its clients became a mixture of corporate and leisure travellers with a diverse range of needs.

One specialised niche that grew exponentially during those years was the group travel market – in particular the management of Study Tours for universities, schools and private corporations which was a major contributor to its gross turnover.

Maturity – Developing Brands (The 00’s)

By the turn of the century, its clientele represented by the individual business traveller had morphed into a suite of global corporations and universities and Reho was rapidly becoming recognised as a Travel Management Company. At the same time the occasional group departure had developed into a separate division specialising solely in Study Tours, in addition to the corporate and leisure brands. It was now a highly visible travel management company where phrases like ‘Duty of Care, Self Booking Tool, Compliance and Data Analysis’ were significant considerations.

Throughout this time of progressive change over the last twenty years, Reho Travel’s CEO, Karsten Horne has been the driving force behind developing the business into the highly visible award-winning and customer-focused establishment that it is today… a company that has grown from humble beginnings into a $30 million company.

With rapid technological and social change being witnessed in the second decade of the new millennium, Karsten and his people at Reho Travel have been broadening their horizons and re-thinking what it means to be a thriving business in an increasingly interdependent world. This comes in the form of a new level of sophistication regarding Reho’s place in the world as a global citizen.

The future – Making a Stand

As Reho Travel has grown and matured, its aim has been to create a work environment that attracts and retains high quality staff who are motivated to provide exceptional service and continuous innovation in a company that is highly respected within the travel industry.

But more importantly, Reho has also realised that it has a responsibility to take a stand and show leadership with its environmental and community initiatives. Everyone working at Reho Travel understands what a privilege it is for them to work for a company and in an industry that provides them with unlimited opportunities for personal travel and career development. It is essential for their own advancement that they travel widely to gain the experience and it is through seeing the world that they come to understand how lucky we all are to be living here in Australia.

Rehope – Making a Difference

Reho’s first step in taking on this more holistic perspective of global citizenship was the opening of Rehope Microcredit Agency in Malawi.

This initiative grew out of a chance meeting some years ago with a young street vendor in Malawi by Karsten Horne while he was on one of his many overseas travel experiences. Karsten was struck by the amazing spirit of hopefulness in one young man whose life seemed surrounded by despair and misfortune.  That young man was Alick, a talented student who was selling his artwork from the roadside in Malawi. At 21 he was one of the few older people you see on the streets of Malawi, with half the population under 15 and an average life expectancy of 34. Alick clearly reflected his country, full of hope, tentatively taking small steps onto the world stage but in need of support and encouragement from those with more experience and the resources to make a difference.

It was with this in mind that Reho Travel chose to support Alick. Not long after he was off the street and studying art at university. After graduating from the University of Malawi with honours, Alick moved to Lilongwe to further his career and work as a teacher at a local high school. He then embarked on a research project into the viability of establishing ‘Rehope’ as a micro-credit institution in Malawi, initially operating in Nkhata-bay.

Rehope’s aim has been to provide small affordable loans to extremely impoverished people in the country’s languishing communities for self-employment projects that will allow them to diversify their income in the hope of bettering their lives.

Since that original seed of an idea and the action taken by Alick supported directly by Karsten and his team at Reho Travel, Rehope Micro-credit Agency is now fully accredited by the Government of Malawi and authorised by the Reserve Bank of Malawi to operate as Microfinance Company. The establishment and administration of Rehope Micro-credit Agency is fully funded out of the profits of Reho Travel. The launch of Rehope Micro-credit Agency drew together senior government officers in Nkhata-Bay, the business community, civil servants, fishermen and so many other interested parties who have a keen interest in seeing this initiative take hold. Each year, two Reho Travel team members are selected to travel to Malawi and spend a week helping out in the Rehope Microcredit Agency office in Nkhata Bay and meet recipients of the loans in the district.

Reho Travel has now expanded its horizons and its reach further through its collaboration and involvement with the Empower Foundation. Empower is an Australian sustainable development organisation that works with rural communities in Malawi and Sri Lanka to action their holistic vision for a sustainable future. Empower develops and manages a network of like-minded partner organisations (both local and international) that collaborate to enable entrepreneurs to build self-reliant communities. Their approach involves a five year partnership with rural communities based on their own inclusive and holistic vision for self-reliance.

The Reho Brand

The Reho Brand is not just the logo, it’s so much more than that.  Reho Travel’s by-line, ‘Let our experience add to yours’ should be represented at every level according to Karsten. Reho’s team is experienced in many areas. They are all well travelled, have many years in the travel industry and a rich variety of life experiences, so it is no surprise that the people who work there have an emotional connection to their leader’s desire to make a difference in the lives of those less fortunate than themselves living on other sides of the world.

As soon as you walk in the door of the up-beat premises of Reho Travel in the heart of the business district of St Kilda Rd, Melbourne, or in the Sydney CBD, you feel a buzz. It is immediately evident, that here is a culture of people who are fully engaged and on purpose, working in an environment where their values are not just words on a wall, but behaviours in action.

A Culture of Opportunity

Not only has Reho Travel created a culture of opportunity for its staff and its thousands of loyal customers who walk through its doors every year, but also it has now embarked on creating a culture of opportunity for fellow travellers on life’s journey through its direct engagement at a global level within the communities of developing countries.

In the words of Karsten, “Our journey to make a difference does not end with the setting up of the Rehope Micro-credit Agency in Malawi. It is just the beginning. Who knows where the next ten years and beyond will lead us?

But one thing is for sure as we develop our brand offering further, we would like to think that we can find more partners and collaborators from within the ranks of our suppliers and clients and their respective companies who share our beliefs and support initiatives like these to make a difference in very tangible ways.

Maybe the only way forward for our planet and its people will be for commercial enterprises of the future to be driven by purpose-driven profit, where the shareholders of a company are not the only beneficiaries of its market success.”

In our opinion, the story of Reho Travel and its development from being a price driven commodity business; through years of full service offering; and then on to comprehensive travel management and finally now to the realisation of its wider responsibility as a global corporate citizen, is a journey that has been and will be repeated many, many times over by similar businesses as they now undergo a transformation into new levels of engagement with the world and its people. This encompasses a far more inclusive world-view where the term ‘stakeholder’ doesn’t just end with those who are in direct relationship with an organisation but draws its inspiration from the wider community at large both at the local and global level.

Drop me an email at brian@precisionprofiling.com.au if you would like to discuss further how to join our September study tour and create the environment that attracts and retains the young leaders of the future for your organisation.

Until then… Let’s seek to understand more and judge less. Have a great week – Brian

Precision Profiling – What Makes You Tick? Through ‘Motivational Fingerprinting’ we uncover what you do, how you do it and why you do it, and most importantly, the hidden patterns that lead to your success, and that of your team.

After returning from a backpacking tour of Asia, in 1990, Canadian Bruce Poon Tip founded Gap Adventures (renamed G Adventures in 2012) with nothing more than two personal credit cards and a burning desire to create an authentic, sustainable travel experience like nothing the world had ever seen before. By offering adventure-craving travelers an alternative to the resorts, cruises and motor-coach tours they were accustomed to, he not only changed the way people looked at their holiday time, but changed the face of travel forever. What started off as a one-man show has since grown to become the world’s largest adventure travel company with over 1350 employees.

But it doesn’t just begin and end with unique travel experiences. G Adventures is itself a social enterprise, creating positive social change. They sell tours to countries all over the world that utilize local services, contribute to local economies, and provide employment opportunities and training in under-served regions of the globe that rely heavily on tourism as their only economic import. They even give grants for seed funding along with training to get new travel initiatives up and running in some cases.

The entire G Adventures enterprise was founded on the concept of sustainability and established travel practices that show due consideration for natural surroundings and local cultures. By limiting the average travel group size to around twelve people, and by using local transportation and staying in small, locally owned hotels and guesthouses, G Adventure travelers are able to minimize their footprint in foreign communities and gain maximum exposure to the local culture.

Poon Tip’s organisation supplies these locally operated businesses with ongoing tourism and the people at G Adventures are very passionate about the difference they and their clients make to the communities they serve. In return, their globetrotting tourists get engaged and motivated CEOs (the company calls all their Tour Guides, CEOs or ‘Chief Experience Officers’) and can witness first-hand the real difference that their presence and their tourism makes to these local communities. The families and the communities within G Adventures’ travel network benefit in so many ways from the extra income. It creates a ripple effect within the local economy connecting small businesses, cooperatives and even rural families directly to its supply chain, thus enabling more tourism dollars to stay in the local community.

G Adventures’ business model varies greatly to that of all-inclusive resorts or other tour operators. In a staggering statistic from the UNEP (United National Environmental Program), on average out of every $100 spent by a traveler in a developing community in an all-inclusive resort, only $5 actually benefits the local community. Bruce believes that travel can be the greatest form of wealth distribution on the planet if it’s done correctly. and it doesn’t rely on donations or handouts – it just relies on travelers making smart choices about how and who they travel with.

This is a business that cares, with a founder who is a revolutionary thinker and a great leader.

Planeterra Foundation

Established in 2003 by G Adventures as a way to give back through travel, The Planeterra Foundation is a legally constituted non‐profit organization that supports social and environmental solutions in destinations around the world via its global network of travelers. Planeterra works to ensure that communities are benefiting from the opportunity that tourism has to bring. Working directly with G Adventures to minimize the impact on the world’s great destinations and to promote sustainable solutions and economic growth for communities worldwide, Planeterra manages over 50 current and funded projects in threatened and developing regions all over the world. 

Together, G Adventures and Planeterra have partnered with the Inter-American Development Bank (IDB) in a multi-million dollar initiative that will promote sustainable, community-based tourism in Costa Rica, Guatemala, Nicaragua and Peru. This is the first time that IDB have partnered with a private organisation, and this highlights the great work that together G Adventures and Planeterra can achieve. The on-the-ground component of this joint venture (hiring, training etc.) is managed by Planeterra, who develop tourism projects, services and small businesses in these communities that have not historically benefited from the travel industry. Planeterra brings the knowledge and expertise in developing sustainable projects, while G Adventures provides a ready-made market for the product.

“Tourism is one of the largest industries on the planet. Vital to the livelihood of eighty-five per cent of developing nations, it creates employment opportunities, battles poverty and strengthens economies,” says the Executive Director of Planeterra. “Hundreds of millions of dollars have been spent on developing community-based tourism worldwide with little benefit to the hosting communities. The tourism industry has not traditionally been involved in international development activities. Where it has, it was only engaged at the very end, yielding high failure rates and unsuccessful projects. In order for community-based tourism development to be sustainable and effective, the private sector, specifically tour operators that possess the market power, must be engaged at the beginning and throughout the entire process.”

Some of the Planeterra projects include…

• A Women’s Weaving co-op in Peru. This is an incredible project that taught local women ancient weaving techniques as well as natural fabric dye processes. As a result of this project, local women now have employment where there was previously zero employment of women and it has reconnected a community with the importance of their own history. Today all G Adventures travel groups visiting the Sacred Valley in Peru have a chance to see and purchase high quality textiles produced by these weavers, all sold at fair trade prices.
• New Hope Cambodia – a Vocational Training Restaurant in Cambodia, which provides marginalized people in that community with hospitality skills to help them obtain new dignified job opportunities.
• Hope Africa – a day school for HIV/AIDS orphaned children in South Africa.
• A foundation in Honduras to help women start their own businesses.
• A community school in Ecuador.
• A drop-in centre for street children in Cuczo, Peru.
• An NGO in Costa Rica for environmental and wildlife conservation projects.

Once Planeterra has made its positive impact, G Adventures then provides consistent market access through its travelers as a sustainable source of income for these local communities. Its travelers bring long term success to these projects long after Planeterra’s initial investment has gone, so it is a business model that measures the social return on investment as a priority rather than just the company’s profits, but in the same breadth ensures that it remains financially viable over the longer term. A perfect example of ‘making a difference’ without sacrificing financial sustainability.

G Adventures funds Planeterra by covering all administrative costs, so one hundred per cent of donor funds go directly towards supporting each project. G Adventures also contributes $30,000 per year in matching funds made through individual donations online. Whether a traveler takes a trip with G Adventures, volunteers at one of Planeterra’s projects, or invests in their projects worldwide – he or she is helping to make Planeterra’s work possible.

Planeterra’s mission is to support sustainable solutions in the places travelers love to visit and it does this through G Adventures – building projects into tours.

Global Recognition

The work of G Adventures and Bruce Poon Tip has not gone unnoticed. G Adventures and Bruce Poon Tip have been consistently recognized for leadership and outstanding business practices. G Adventures is among the Top 100 Employers and 50 Best Managed Companies in its country. Bruce has won Canada’s Entrepreneur of the Year and has been honoured as one of Canada’s 100 Leaders of Tomorrow.

In recognition of G Adventures’ dedication to ethical business practices’ and responsible travel, Bruce received the Ethics In Action Award. He has also received the Global Traders Award for his groundbreaking ideas in exporting services. In January of 2002 Bruce was invited to speak at the United Nations launch of the Year Of Eco Tourism in New York and in 2006 he spoke about the commitment to responsible tourism at the World Trade Organization’s ‘Ethics in Tourism’ Conference and at the World Tourism Conference.

Just recently Bruce was asked by the World Bank and UNESCO to represent a team to visit the Peoples Republic of China to speak on sustainable development.

Here are just some of Bruce’s tips for business leaders…
• Look beyond the triple bottom line and understand how to make a real difference.
• Sometimes big business can be alienated by the difference the smaller brands can make – allow them to understand the difference they also make by bringing a deeper sense of purpose and passion into their corporations. Bruce calls this ‘The Quintuple Bottom Line’ – People; Planet; Profit; Passion and Purpose.
•Bruce runs G Adventures using a happiness business model, where happiness drives performance, allowing G Adventures to maintain a global company culture that delivers on a very aggressive brand promise that differentiates itself based on a purpose-driven business model.
• Engage your customers beyond the product with every sale. Make them aware of the difference they make and help them to feel that difference every time they engage with your business.
• Engage with all people who touch your brand beyond the product.
• A company’s core values are more than just a sign on the office wall. Your employees need to live and breathe the company’s core values each and every day, and those core values must guide all decision making in the company.

The guiding principle behind everything that G Adventures does is quite simple… They’re about running their business in a way that respects people and the planet. A perfect example of ROI+I – Return on Investment and Integrity.

For more information contact me at brian@precisionprofiling.com.au.

Until then… Let’s seek to understand more and judge less. Have a great week – Brian

Precision Profiling – What Makes You Tick? Through ‘Motivational Fingerprinting’ we uncover what you do, how you do it and why you do it, and most importantly, the hidden patterns that lead to your success, and that of your team.

Society is heading towards a more sustainable, tolerant, progressive future. There are sweeping social and environmental changes that have been taking place this last decade that is being forced upon us by governments and consumers alike. And now it is taking shape as a business led movement driven by socially and globally aware employees; savvy investors for the future and inspired leaders of today. Just recently it was officially described as one of those deep-seated societal trends that we only see come our way every fifty or so years by the global trend tracking organisation Trendwatching in their September article “Demanding Brands.” So what is a demanding brand?

According to Trendwatching ‘Demanding Brands’ are ‘switched-on brands that are embarking on a journey towards a more sustainable and socially-responsible future that will demand that consumers also contribute.’ Even though that may cause some pain or inconvenience in the short term for the consumers when they are asked to respond to a meaningful demand on their time, energy or wallet, ultimately they will come to have a deep respect for those brands that push them towards taking action that they know to be right, as a condition of doing business with those brands.

Here are the four major demands that Trendwatching feels are beginning to have traction more and more in the hearts and minds of socially responsible businesses and consumers alike:-

The Planet: Demand action that is good for the environment, now or in the long term. (Think ‘reduce, re-use, recycle’ as an initiative of most local and national governments being promoted widely, taught in our schools today, and now promoted by more and more environmentally-conscious companies.)

Society: Demand action that is good for other people, whether that be close friends and family, local communities, or the larger sphere of society inhabiting our whole world. (For example, ThankYou Water and Zambrero here in Australia)

Lifestyles: Create products or services that demand consumers live healthy or behave well. (For example WholeFoods Markets in North America)

Nonprofits: Make demands on behalf of an established nonprofit, and insist that customers do something to support them. (For instance, our own Australian major charitable organisations of many years standing like World Vision Australia, Red Cross and their ilk are now increasingly looking at ways to partner with large corporations in a joint approach to the hearts and minds of consumers.)

Of course, consumers will not take action of this kind unless the brands that ask it of them are totally sincere, fully committed and completely transparent in their own efforts to make the world a better place. Meaningful action means just that, and those brands which don’t follow that golden rule of social consciousness will be caught out and discarded by the tidal wave of new consumers coming on to the scene in very quick time. So media stunts, one-off programs of the month, and consumer response promotions linked to customer loyalty programs fall into the ‘you’re not really serious’ consumer basket, and will be vilified and ostracised accordingly.

Authentic and concerted action by socially conscious brands in partnership with their equally concerned consumers is a trend that is growing bigger and bigger every day.

This demand on the consumer is a two-way street, because consumers everywhere are increasingly demanding it of their favourite brands. If you have any doubt about that, just consider how the ‘fair trade’ movement is rapidly gaining influence in the world today and the impact it is having on the coffee and chocolate industries of the developed nations as well as the current media and consumer focus on the Bangladeshi fashion clothing sweatshops and the impact that news is having on the ethical sourcing of products by fashion brands here in Australia.

Here are a couple of comments that describe the effect of this trend quite succinctly from the consumer-driven perspective… “91% of global consumers believe that companies must go beyond the minimum standards required by law to operate responsibly,”   (Cone Communications/ Echo, May 2013)….

and…..  “87% of global consumers believe business should place at least equal emphasis on social interests as business interests, and ‘purpose’ has increased as a purchase trigger by 26% since 2008.”  (Global Consulting firm, Edelman, 2012).

There are some excellent examples of brands that are making demands of their consumers as partners in this push to make a difference to our planet and all the people that inhabit it, in the feature article from Trendwatching titled ‘Demanding Brands.’ I think you’ll enjoy the examples they share with their global readership. I particularly like the one about the Brazilian soccer club, Vitoria, that promoted its charitable blood donation campaign through the progressive changing of the colour of the hoops on its players’ uniform strips each game from white to red to match the amount of blood being donated by their huge fan base each week.

From 17th-21st February next year, we will be leading interested executives from socially aware companies on a journey of discovery through the corridors of some of Australia’s most forward thinking organisations working in this sphere of social responsibility in harmony with commercial success. I would love you to join us on this study tour with a difference.

For more information contact me at brian@precisionprofiling.com.au and I will rush the details to you.

Until then… Let’s seek to understand more and judge less. Have a great week – Brian

Precision Profiling – What Makes You Tick? Through ‘Motivational Fingerprinting’ we uncover what you do, how you do it and why you do it, and most importantly, the hidden patterns that lead to your success, and that of your team.

Across the globe executives are realising that we need to change the way we are running our businesses, because the old ways don’t serve society and its people effectively any more. The current model has served us well for the last 150 years but the world is changing faster now than we have ever experienced at any other time in our history.  Businesses lose their relevance at the same rate that internal change lags behind the pace of external change.  We’re now at a time when we are facing the option of change or become irrelevant.

There is a global movement to redefine success in business from a much broader, more inclusive social perspective and it is happening everywhere we look.

So what do we do about it?  There are so many opinions out there (everyone has one) and there are plenty of consultants ready to share their well-rehearsed advice, but it’s all so confusing and who’s to say that the advice they have is going to work for you? Who’s actually already doing it successfully here in Australia, within our own unique culture and working around our own issues that we in Australia specifically face?

ROI+I* study tours have been designed not to tell you how to run your business, but to showcase successful businesses that are making waves and making a difference. These types of businesses are generally around 120% more profitable than standard S&P500 businesses within 3 years of operation and being nominated for all the best employer awards. They all live the principle of ‘doing good is good for business’ and it bursts at the seams in everything they do.

Attracting fully engaged, top talent is a major part of this new paradigm. It’s becoming one of the biggest challenges for employers today.

This study tour is about observing first-hand what is working for other businesses who are thriving and embracing this change as part of their daily existence, and deciding for yourself what will work for you and your own culture as it continues to evolve to remain relevant.

Don’t just be told about it.  Come along with us early in the new year and see for yourself how these businesses are redefining the way we operate in Australia and getting the incredible results that they are (in some cases even against insurmountable odds).

*R.O.I.+I. (“R.O. double I” – Return on Investment and Integrity)

For more information email me direct at  brian@precisionprofiling.com.au

Until then… Let’s seek to understand more and judge less. Have a great week – Brian

Precision Profiling – What Makes You Tick? Through ‘Motivational Fingerprinting’ we uncover what you do, how you do it and why you do it, and most importantly, the hidden patterns that lead to your success, and that of your team.

Welcome to a smarter, more socially and environmentally sustainable model for doing business today. It’s such a wonderful surprise to find a large, publicly listed company with more than 74,000 staff, in the highly competitive grocery industry boldly stand and say ‘noble cause before profits’.  This company even made the statement, ‘It’s not about share of wallet anymore, it’s about share of heart’ and the leaders of this company are happy to put both on the table, placing their trust in others by offering them a share in the profits as well as recognition for the difference they make in the world.

John Mackey, founder and CEO of Wholefoods Market is a force to be reckoned with.  He is fighting an American business war with loving kindness and generosity of spirit by putting people above profits and starting a global movement called ‘Conscious Capitalism’ and he is encouraging others to follow his example.

There are some out there who are hard-core believers that profit above all else is the only way to survive and that  Conscious Capitalism is a ‘Pollyanna’ point of view and not even possible for publicly listed companies to behave in such a way. But when companies like Walmart start looking over the fence at what is happening (and changing some of their own strategies to follow suit) there must be something in it beyond just being a nice thing to do.

There must be some pretty sound business principles and structures in place. So let’s look at why this is not just a great, ethically and socially responsible idea but why John Mackey, Wholefoods Market and Conscious Capitalism (which includes globally recognised brands such as South West Airlines, Google, IDEO and Timberland to name just a handful) are living proof that this is not just a rose coloured view of the world but a smart way to get ahead in business. It also supports Peter Drucker’s theory that culture eats strategy for breakfast. Strategy is still important but no matter how brilliant a company’s strategy might be, the strategy’s execution depends on great performance by the people inside the organization.

Let’s first compare the financials of businesses who operate under the banner of Conscious Capitalism to those who operate on more traditional models (a lot of these same companies were also studied and featured in the book, ‘Firms of Endearment’).

Investment Performance of Businesses Operating under the Conscious Capitalism model vs the S&P500

Ave S&P 500 Co.      – 3 Years   – Annualised  3.3%;    Cumulative  10.3%
Conscious Cap. Co. – 3 Years   – Annualised  21.1%;   Cumulative  77.4%

Ave S&P 500 Co.      – 10 Years  – Annualised  2.7%;     Cumulative  30.7%
Conscious Cap. Co. - 10 Years – Annualised  13.5%;  Cumulative  254.4%

Ave S&P 500 Co.      -  15 Years – Annualised   6.5%;    Cumulative  157.0%
Conscious Cap. Co. -  15 Years – Annualised  21.0%;  Cumulative 1,646.1%

There are four specific tenets of the Conscious Capitalism Model. 

Tenet Number One:  A Higher Purpose and Core Values.

A ‘noble cause’ is at the core of everything they do and the way they operate.  For Wholefoods Market it is to educate people and provide easy access to healthy eating to improve the world’s health. The people at Wholefoods Market live and breathe this noble cause – from conducting free nutritional seminars within their stores for their customers; educating their staff and giving them additional discounts on healthier foods; providing their own staff healthcare program; to a huge fund to help developing nations feed themselves by providing the materials for farming and sending their staff over each year to assist, plus many more projects of equal merit.

Tenet Number Two:  Stakeholder Integration.

They actively align the interests of all stakeholder groups, not just balance them against one another. They have carefully devised a business model where the objectives of each stakeholder can be met simultaneously and are strengthened by other stakeholders.

The key is that the activities within the business are executed within a system that allow for the active alignment not competition of stakeholder interests. Wholefoods Market captures this idea in its formal “Declaration of Interdependence,” which acknowledges the idea that all stakeholder groups constitute a family whose members depend on one another.

Tenet Number Three:  Conscious Leadership.

Leaders operating within this framework are required to display the characteristics we admire most in exemplary human beings such as emotional intelligence; spiritual intelligence (ability to access our deepest meanings, values and purposes); servant leadership; capacity for love and care; and systems intelligence. Such leaders are required to continually evolve, learn and grow in these areas.  John Mackey himself said that his own personal growth in these areas was necessary in order for his company to evolve and be of benefit to the lives it touched.

Tenet Number Four:  Conscious Culture and Management.

This revolves around the decentralisation of information to gain more widely dispersed collective intelligence and collaboration. People within a business operating inside of this model have a high degree of accountability and a shared fate… the better the company does… the better the customers do… the better the team members do… the better the shareholder investors do.

At a lot of companies, team members develop an entitlement mentality. They want to benefit from the boom times but want to be shielded from the tough times.  This is not the case at conscious companies.  All of the people within the company are required to put forward their ideas on getting through the tougher times and looking at all angles of what’s possible. This not only brings with it a lot of innovative thinking but brings solutions that can defy normal thinking. Structures and strategies to help innovation are seen everywhere within a conscious business.

Innovation, collaboration and self-management are important factors and tend to go hand-in-hand with the decentralisation of information and the empowerment of all.

According to Mackey, there are seven characteristics of a conscious business which can be summed up with the acronym… T.A.C.T.I.L.E.

Trust:  Conscious businesses have a high level of internal and external trust, both vertically (between leadership and frontline team members) and horizontally (within the leadership team as well as across teams at all levels).  Externally there’s a high degree of trust between the company and its customers; suppliers; other business partners; and the communities within which they operate.

Accountability:  Combined with those high levels of trust and caring is a strong emphasis on accountability. Team members are accountable to each other and to their customers.  People stick to their commitments and hold each other responsible for performance, efficiency and deliverables.  Suppliers are accountable to the company and vice versa.

Caring:  The human need to care and be cared for is extremely powerful, often equal to and exceeding the need to pursue self interest.  Conscious cultures are marked by their genuine heartfelt love and care for all stakeholders.  Caring begets caring and the company’s stakeholders in turn exhibit genuine caring towards the company.  People in conscious cultures behave in ways that are thoughtful, authentic, considerate and compassionate.

Transparency:  There are few secrets in a conscious culture because there is little to hide.  Financial books are usually open; salary information is more readily available and strategic plans are widely disseminated and discussed.  The reality is that we live in an increasingly transparent world in which most information of genuine significance becomes known anyway.  Conscious firms embrace this reality and benefit from it.

Integrity:  A conscious culture is marked by strict adherence to truth telling and fair dealing.  Conscious firms readily forgive lapses in judgement, but do not tolerate lapses in integrity.  Conscious firms are guided by what they believe is ethically right, not merely by what is legally required or socially acceptable.

Loyalty:  Conscious businesses exist in a system of high loyalty. All stakeholders are loyal to each other and to the company.  This is a natural consequence of the relationship mindset that permeates such businesses. It means that these businesses don’t have a ‘what have you done for me lately?’ attitude.  Stakeholders are more patient and understanding of each other when short term blips occur.

Egalitarianism:  Conscious businesses do not have a class system that separates their leaders from the team members at large.  Everyone is treated with the same respect and dignity. The salary differential between the top echelon and the front lines is smaller than typically found at traditional companies.  Senior executives generally do not enjoy special privileges and perks not available to others.  To a large extent all team members have input into how the company is managed and led.

Precision Profiling in collaboration with Leaders of Distinction, has created a one week ‘hands on’ study tour at the coalface of some of Australia’s leading exponents of these philosophies where Return on Investment and the total belief and support of a noble cause are jointly enshrined as integral to the  long term success of the  business.

The tour’s theme is “R.O.I + I.” (Return On Investment and Integrity), and it will include on-site case studies where we engage with and learn directly from those leading the way in this new paradigm of business and corporate responsibility, where making money and making a difference hold equal sway.

As Sir Richard Branson, arguably the most successful and internationally recognised entrepreneurs of our time and founder of the global Virgin mega-brand, puts it in his most recent book,  ‘Screw Business as Usual,’….  “There’s a massive generational shift occurring that will blur the distinction between doing good and doing business…  In our newly interconnected world, no one can any longer ignore the issues we are facing… I believe that business can be a force for good… because never has there been a more exciting time for all of us to explore this next great frontier where the boundaries between work and higher purpose are merging into one and where doing good really is good for business.”

For expressions of interest and background information on the make-up of the tour, its leaders, and the organisations we will be showcasing and visiting, send your requests for further information directly to brian@precisionprofiling.com.au

Until then… Let’s seek to understand more and judge less. Have a great week – Brian

Precision Profiling – What Makes You Tick? Through ‘Motivational Fingerprinting’ we uncover what you do, how you do it and why you do it, and most importantly, the hidden patterns that lead to your success, and that of your team.

When you think of some of the world’s most admired brands, there have been precious few who have lasted the distance remaining consistently near the top of all the “best” lists for the whole of their corporate life since inception. We have witnessed many burst on to the scene from nowhere only to disappear from view within a decade or so. And quite a few have remained in the public eye as product/service innovators one year; top financial performers another; employers of choice at other times; and maybe even good corporate citizens on other occasions.

But to be recognised as consistently high achievers in the triple bottom line of Financial, Social and Environmental performance takes a special kind of company with a special kind of culture and ‘servant leadership’ who understand the true meaning of ‘stewardship’ and all that it represents. In my opinion there is one company in the USA that has remained the stand-out performer for almost all of its 42 years in an industry littered with failures, and it continues to outperform on its “R.O. Double I” to this day. And no, it is neither a hi-tech nor an IT based company. It plies its trade in a brown fields industry that has been around for decades.

If I told you that this company has managed to maintain a special place in the heart of its millions of customers and the community at large every year with a workforce that numbers over 40,000 then its achievements become even more amazing given that this gives it 40,000 opportunities every hour of every day to ‘get things wrong.’ Invariably it gets it right 99% of the time.

This company continues to gather awards and accolades in all of the triple bottom line measurements that matter most year-in, year-out with a consistency of performance that is unsurpassed. I am talking about one of the World’s Most Admired Companies according to Fortune Magazine’s annual survey of corporate reputations (on the ‘Most Admired’ list every year since 1994 and all but twice in the ‘Most Admired’ Top 10); which is consistently awarded as ‘One of the Best Places to Work;’ ‘One of the Most Respected Corporations in the Community;’ a consistent ‘Green Leader’ on sustainability measures; a Positively Outrageous Service provider (that title is a clue); and a record holder for the longest running profitability streak in its industry with an unprecedented 40 consecutive years of profits and sustained operational excellence. It therefore comes as no surprise to learn that when Forbes completed its exhaustive market research in 2012 of the USA’s most desired brand, according to both men and women, this brand won the coveted #1 position.

The amazing brand that I speak of is none other than SWA – Southwest Airlines.

The low-cost (not ‘cheap and nasty’) airline universally recognised and feted for a plethora of “bests” across the whole gamut of Key Performance Indicators:–

• Best on-time performance
• Best baggage handling
• Fewest flight cancellations
• Fastest gate turn-around
• Lowest employee turnover rates in its industry
• Fewest industry customer complaints/highest ratings
• Over 60% market dominance in every city-city route it enters
• One of USA’s safest airlines and newest fleets
• Stock value consistently rising decade after decade
• Most worker/shareholder millionaires
• Growth of 20-30% pa in an airline industry littered with failures
• Standard and Poors rating that is one of the best in its industry
• Innovations in operational procedures, initial web design and on-line ticketing that turned the industry on its head.

And over those forty years of unabated profits it has all been achieved without the need to resort to lay-offs or pay cuts. That is a remarkable feat unmatched in US aviation history.

So how does Southwest Airlines do it? What makes its business model and its brand recognition and reverence so successful one might ask?

The most obvious answer is often found with the spiritual head of an organisation – the CEO. And Southwest Airlines had both a CEO and a 2-ic who almost reached mythical status during their time at the top over 35 of those 42 years. The co-founder, one time lawyer Herb Kelleher (President) and his 2-ic, one time legal secretary Colleen Barrett (Director of Culture) have created a culture built around fun and love (NYSE moniker – LUV) by never taking themselves seriously, hiring people with a sense of humour, and espousing a theory of delivering Positively Outrageous Service whilst achieving it all at the lowest possible operating costs, in the fledgling years out of necessity and ultimately as an industry game-changer. You can’t do that unless you engage your people and all of their diversity at a level of productivity and service where they are the difference that makes the difference in a ‘no- frills, low-fare, high-frequency’ airline with their good-natured attitude and ‘can do’ work ethic. To top it off, Southwest Airlines has always been a fully unionised workforce, so there are no corners cut through contracted or underpaid labour. I had the undoubted pleasure of witnessing this culture first hand over a period of seven years in the mid 90s when I led my world best practice study tours to the USA and Europe.

The Southwest operation and its head office at Love Field in Dallas, Texas, was always a favourite destination of mine because walking into their head office and touring their group departments for the day was like walking into a combination of an evangelical revival meeting and a Disney theme park all rolled into one, especially if one visited during Halloween.

The joy, the fun and the sense of camaraderie was palpable every single time. It literally jumped out at you off the walls of the place and was replicated in every personal story, every piece of written material, and every wall covered in photos and plaques and newspaper clippings and wacky stories everywhere you looked. This was not a contrived scene, it was organic. I know because I and my tour guests experienced it consistently year after year and I still have the photos and videos to prove it. What’s more, we never witnessed anything quite like it in any other best practice company elsewhere in the world in all of the fifteen tours I led over that seven year period, and certainly not in a ‘corporate’ environment with over 30,000 staff at that time. And remember – it was consistently profitable and consistently outperforming its competition in all of the industry benchmarks that mattered.

I once mused on one of my many visits back then whether this amazing environment would remain so special once its much loved co-founder Herb Kelleher and his ‘keeper of the culture,’ Colleen Barrett, finally retired and exited the scene. I was assured by anyone at SWA whom I happened to ask that there was ‘never any chance of the culture of love, fun, self sacrifice and passion abating,’ and they were right. Both Herb and Colleen have been gone from the scene for over six years now, and by all available measures the culture and the achievements – financial, social and societal – continue to this day. I believe this is because between Herb and Colleen, and their many thousands of colleagues, they not only led by example from the front, but they crafted a corporate architecture that focused on the highest aspirations of love; fun; service; humility and self deprecating humour that left no room for arrogance or false pride in its make-up. And they selected, hired, and trained accordingly.

From my observations, way back in the late 80s and early 90s, Southwest Airlines was the only company which could boast a company director at the highest level of seniority who was responsible as chief custodian of ‘culture.’ Ms Barrett headed up the committee whose sole focus was to ‘spread, keep and enrich the company culture and family spirit.’ I wonder if even today there are that many public corporations as significant as SWA who venerate and resource culture as a specific focus separate to their HR department or things of that ilk? As Colleen Barrett said herself back then, “Basically we hire attitudes. People don’t think of working for this company as a mere job. It’s a cause.” They actively seek out fun loving people who think outside the box in an industry where strict governance and uncompromising rules of safety must apply, and yet this does not detract from their enviable record of efficiency, safety and productivity, it enhances it.

In the words of Gary Kelly, the current Chairman of the Board, CEO and President, “With a Warrior Spirit, a Servant’s Heart, and Fun-LUVing Attitude, our nearly 46,000 employees create the unique Southwest culture that continues to maintain the excellence we have built up over four decades with our brand (in the form of Customer Service, Operational Excellence, Community Engagement and Consecutive Annual Profits)… We are committed to our purpose – to connect people to what’s important in their lives through friendly, reliable and low-cost air travel. It is that purpose that will guide us forward in pursuit of our vision to become The World’s Most Loved, Most Flown, and Most Profitable Airline.”

Southwest bonds its employees to one another by shared values that include such traditional virtues as integrity, trust and altruism. For the worker ‘evangelists’ at SWA, it isn’t just a job it’s a crusade. And if the key to a highly successful brand is the level of trust that it engenders in the community then Southwest Airlines has turned trust into an organisational art-form through consistently Aligning the Attitudes; Being the Behaviours and Managing the Message.

What are the three elements that drive that intrinsic brand trust? I believe that it can best be described as:-

•    Trust in one’s Competence (organisationally this may be represented by operating efficiency and safety)
•    Trust in one’s Commitment (organisationally this may be represented by service, pricing, and customer experience)
•    Trust in one’s Character (organisationally this may be represented by community engagement and support)

Southwest Airlines doesn’t just strive to achieve outstanding results in the triple bottom line of Financial, Social and Environmental performance. Nor does it lay claim to winning various awards in these areas while it hides anything less than optimal from its public. It actively and transparently engages in measuring its results in these three areas each financial year in the form of its ‘Southwest Airlines One Report’ which lists all of the good, bad and the ugly KPIs under the triple headings of:– Performance (financial and operational); People (cultural and social); and Planet (environmental and societal).

R.O. ‘Double’ I

In the work that I have been doing in this area of R.O.I.+I. (Return on Investment and Integrity) or ‘conscious capitalism’ as it has also been termed, I have begun to notice that companies are finally beginning to have quite a unique approach to key areas of business that until this millennium, were almost non-existent. (The old paradigms of R.O.I.; growth for growth sake; command and control; headcount on a balance sheet; and a focus on ‘giving back’ only after the shareholder returns and executive bonuses have been fully accounted for, and where corporate citizenship fell under the banner of public affairs/PR, are still widely in evidence as the main order of the day, but thankfully this is slowly changing.)

In no particular order, these changes in thinking with a differentiated approach fall under the general headings of:- Innovation; Engagement; Environment; Servant Leadership; Culture and Mythology, and are built around a Noble Cause as the new sustainable model of business (Financial and Operational best practices assumed). What I have been discovering is that companies that are changing our world and the way we do business, are coming from a much larger paradigm of heart-centeredness interwoven into the hard edged fabric of sustainable financial results. Such things go hand in hand. They are no longer mutually exclusive. Many (but not all) of these leaders are coming out of the ranks of business entrepreneurs who have only entered the workforce since 2000. They are a new breed of leader and they want to make a difference to all lives, not just their own. What’s more, they have the technological means and the social media street smarts to do so.

Logos, Pathos and Ethos

If we go right back to the time of the Greek philosopher Aristotle we will see evidence of this thinking as the source of influence, in the form of Logos (Intellect); Pathos (Emotion) and Ethos (Character). For too many years now we have witnessed only the Logos or rational approach to business sustainability. During the 90s, we began to see evidence of the Pathos or emotional appeal becoming part of the fabric of business in the form of customer service, employee engagement and cultural values as a focus. But now I believe that with the turn of the millennium we are beginning to witness the third critical element come to the fore in the form of Ethos or ethical behaviour in its broadest sense as an integral part of the new business model.

Back in the 90s, Southwest Airlines was one of the pioneering few profit-generating organisations that was doing the unthinkable…bringing ‘fun and love’ into the boardroom.

Some people view this idea of ‘conscious capitalism’ (or R.O.I.+I. as I call it) as idealistic and impractical. In their view the business world is a tough and brutal ‘dog-eat-dog’ world. To them, this is just a pipe dream – wishful thinking for the woolly headed idealists. In fact this way of doing business not only creates wellbeing for all stakeholders but it also creates sustained high performance. Traditional businesses that compete against an authentic socially conscious business soon discover just how strong, resolute and resilient these enterprises can be.  Just ask any executive of some of the now bankrupt or defunct airlines in the USA who marched to the beat of the older drums, what it was like to compete against Southwest Airlines in its own backyard for the last 40 years.

I will end this longer-than-usual article with the words of Herb Kelleher in his ‘Message to the Field’ back in the 90s in one of his famous addresses to his Southwest employees:–

“When you’re sitting around with your grandchildren, I want you to be able to tell them that being connected to Southwest Airlines was one of the finest things that ever happened to you in your entire life.

I want you to be able to say, ‘Southwest Airlines ennobled and enriched my life; it made me better, and bigger and stronger than I ever could have been alone.’

And if, indeed, that happens with your grandchildren, then that will be the greatest contribution that I could have made to Southwest Airlines and to its future.”

What are your thoughts on ‘R.O.I.+I.’ and the amazing SWA story? I’d love to hear them.

Drop me an email to brian@precisionprofiling.com.au if you would like to discuss further how to create the environment that attracts and retains the young leaders of the future for your organisation.

Until then… Let’s seek to understand more and judge less. Have a great week – Brian

Precision Profiling – What Makes You Tick? Through ‘Motivational Fingerprinting’ we uncover what you do, how you do it and why you do it, and most importantly, the hidden patterns that lead to your success, and that of your team.