Karmic Capitalist - businesses with purpose

The rise in demand for local working spaces is very visible. It's unfortunate that the category was tarnished by WeWork founder Adam Neumann, whose fortune is dwarfed only by the lack of ethics displayed in building it. But it doesn't need to be so. An alternative would be to start to consciously build workspaces not only based on a pound per square foot and the distance to the nearest W...

A company that makes lawyers wealthier? On the Karmic Capitalist podcast? Have I sold out? Stay with me. This law company,  Aria Grace , intentionally does the following: It offers a legal service on a par with the large law partnerships for less cost to its clients It pays the lawyers nearly treble the portion of the fees than in traditional firms It donates ALL of its profit to charity It tackle...

"Move Fast and Break Things" is a terrible way to be anti-racist. This Karmic Capitalist podcast episode is FULL of gold. I talk to Javaughn and Jamey, VP of culture and CEO respectively of Agilian.com, a technology consulting firm that has absolutely nailed anti-racism and diversity to its mast. When, to his enormous shame, Jamey was shown data that the black female execs on his team we...

Helping big companies be good, and good companies get bigger. Not quite EdenLab 's motto, but not far off it. In this episode of the Karmic Capitalist podcast, I talk to Leo Rayman , founder and CEO, about his journey from agencyland to EdenLab - accelerating positive and sustainable ideas and the people who come up with them. Leo's premise, and the underlying one of EdenLab, is that wit...

A founder who doesn’t see himself as a salesman, targeting purpose-led companies that don't identify that way, to tackle a problem that people don't think exist. Recipe for success... And exactly what Tom Greenwood did with Wholegrain Digital , the company he founded and which, in sustainability stakes, was a way ahead of the curve. Tom's concern for the environment started when it...

Very few businesses have the level or resonance and commitment from founders more than those whose origins came from personal tragedy. MyBabble was born after founder Faisal Shaikh 's father sadly left home and didn't return. It transpired later that unknown to anyone, his dad had been dealing with loneliness. Faisal is a trained and practising psychiatrist, and was aware that this is a...

"How can we collectively increase the quantity and quality of giving to nonprofits, to charities, so that they can raise more awareness, raise more funds, deliver more impact in their communities?" If there's a question that defines Lightful's work, I think Vinay shares it in this. My guest on the Karmic Capitalist podcast this week is Vinay Nair, co-founder and CEO of Lightful...

From the high-stakes financial environment of the now defunct Lehman Brothers ("buy-and-sell in its most aggressive manner") to putting on an exhibition of some of the most ethical and long-term thinking brands. That’s the varied journey which my guest, Hussein Allawi, has been on. He took plenty of lessons from those early days, days which he found very lacking in purpose, but which hav...

"If going to a TGO gym can help unlock your potential not only for your life, but for your community, for your planet, that's the end game." Georgie Delaney MBE isn't short on a big vision. But critically - she's also not short on taking action. It was wonderful to talk to her about setting up and growing The Great Outdoor Gym Company (TGO). From a seed of inspiration seei...

So you're running an ethical agency. A criminal organisation posing as a listed company - let's call them Belgian Australian Tobacco - approaches you. "We fund an 'anti-smoking education programme' along with some of our other friends. But the challenge is that it's not as easy to find us on the web as it is lung cancer charities. We need your help to rank better.&quo...

This episode of the Karmic Capitalist tells the story of a company that stayed true to its mission while undergoing a substantial pivot, and a founder who left his own comfortable path in pursuit of his passion. For sanitation! Thomas Fudge was so incensed by our misuse and abuse of water that left his job in product design and marketing and went back to uni to complete a masters and doctorate in...

From Chris Froome to wellness in your office. That's the journey that Phill Bell and Paul Smith undertook to co-founding ART Health, a company that helps employees and employers to improve workplace wellbeing using evidence-based techniques. It was fascinating to have Phill join me on this edition of the Karmic Capitalist podcast to share the story. Phill is a sports scientist. He earned his...

There’s a moral case for your company to give equal opportunities for your team regardless of gender (or background, or sexual orientation, or ethnicity, etc). And there’s a business-performance one in terms of the improved decision-making that results from cognitive diversity. But although we are without a doubt making progress, it can feel slow. Recruiting women into senior roles is welcome. But...

Giving to charity is one of the easiest ways to do good. But have you ever wondered what impact your donation actually has? Enter my guest on the Karmic Capitalist podcast, Rachael Murray, founder of a company appropriately called Making Impact Matter (MiM). Making Impact Matter helps charities figure out how to measure impact. But doing the work has more outcomes than just measurement. Figuring o...

I remember in the early 90s being told to staple my photograph to any CVs I sent out applying for work. I'm no George Clooney, so I wondered why. I later found out it was so that people who only had my name to go on would see that I wasn't Pakistani! So offensive at so many levels. If I were Pakistani, why would that be a problem? What if I were a white Pakistani? How about that I'm...

When it comes to sustainability and human rights, Fashion has earned a terrible reputation. And mostly for very good reason. But there are some shining examples who are showing what good can look like in the industry. One of these is pre-owned luxury fashion retailer Sign of the times . The original Chelsea shop was founded to media buzz in the 1970s. Antonia Johnstone trained there before foundin...

You’ve just moved from one end of the planet to the other. You’re pregnant. And you want to be working. What do you do? It’s a sad indictment on how the workplace still treats pregnancy that for my guest on this #KarmicCapitalist podcast episode, starting a company seemed a more plausible route than finding employment. But start a company while pregnant is what Steph did. She started marketing age...

"Create wealth like a Capitalist, distribute it like a Marxist." Here's what that looks like... Simon Biltcliffe believes that Capitalism is a great way to create wealth, but is terrible at distributing it. And Marxism can't create wealth for toffee, but has great principles for distributing it. Adjust for externalities, and there you have the principles on which Webmart was fo...

We have a bit of an employment paradox in the UK. As Matt Powell, the founder and CEO of Breaking Barriers , puts it "We have a government that is anti-immigration, and an economy that needs immigration to function at its capacity." That's the gap, the gap between refugees that have made it to the UK and the unfilled jobs in the UK, that Breaking Barriers helps to fill. Matt was alw...

What do you do if the prevailing business model is very clearly saying one thing, yet your values and what the world needs are in diametric opposition to this? That's the dilemma that faced my Karmic Capitalist guest on this week's podcast, Seán Wood CEO of Positive News . "Bad news sells". We hear this mantra because it's commercially true. But as Seán says, we've re...

Like probably most people who start a business, Derek Moore founded Coffee and TV because he believed that there might be a better way to do things than how it was being done in the industry.  Key for him was that there had to be a better model than pushing people to work harder for longer and for less. So Coffee and TV took an approach of doing business in a more human way. And as the reputation...

Karl Farrow was awarded a medal by the Mexican authorities for his role as a volunteer overseeing the safe destruction of buildings in the immediate aftermath of the Mexico City earthquake of 2017. What's that got to do with the company he founded and runs? Plenty, I think. I dive into this episode in his life, one that gave him more fulfilment than almost anything else, not just because it w...

This episode of the Karmic Capitalist podcast is a real testament to the role of innovation in cutting our environmental footprint while creating a more profitable and attractive solution. The film production industry has a shocking track record in terms of its environmental impact. In order to create a top end 30 second advert, vast sets are produced and used once only, huge production teams are...

For business to be better, we (i.e. humans) need to be better. The way most companies have been doing business in the last few decades has been having a glaringly detrimental impact on society and the environment. If we're to pull it back, we need to do it quickly. Tom Rippin is a systems thinker. In his view, the most effective place to start is with people, i.e. us. And where that impact ca...

A fundamental principle if you want to do purpose well in your company is to look after your profit. Note that "look after" is not the same as "maximise". Ruth Hartnoll, co-founder and CEO of Matchstick Creative , has seen what that looks like up close! In this episode of the Karmic Capitalist podcast, she tells the (nearly) 5 year story of Matchstick Creative's journey fr...