Corporate (social) responsibility (CSR), classically based on the gradual reduction of negative impacts, is necessary, but it is not always up to the ecological and societal challenges. To go further, 7,000 companies around the world are working on their mission and raison d'être, transforming their economic model to be compatible with planetary boundaries.
The B Corp community, founded in 2006 in the United States, brings together companies that want to (re)affirm their social mission at the heart of their raison d'être. They are for-profit companies that want to progress and demonstrate their positive impact (for purpose), and are evaluated on their overall performance every 3 years. They are organizations of all sizes and all sectors, historical icons like Patagonia, Natura, Alessi or Ecover, large companies like Danone, start-ups like Fairphone, change.org, or Kickstarter... and in Portugal the movement is growing, bringing together more than 20 companies, including Critical Software, Go Parity, Hovione, Maze, Symington, (and Sair da Casca), among others.
All of them seek, through their economic model, not to be the best IN the world, but the best FOR the world! In addition to their own approach to progress, they develop the principle of interdependence: projects between B Corp are privileged and each B Corp seeks to pollinate its entire ecosystem of suppliers, customers or partners.
To support the transformation, the NGO B Lab offers a demanding evaluation framework: the B Impact Assessment (BIA). This practical questionnaire, available free online, allows any company to make its diagnosis and apply for B Corp certification if it reaches the threshold of 80 points out of 200. In this case, the company must be able to provide evidence and its certification process will be verified by B Lab.
But in a first phase, the company can do a pre-assessment without necessarily completing the certification. It's a way of seeing where we are in relation to our peers and (often) a wake-up call to start a process of evolution and identify the companies that are most advanced in integrating sustainability challenges. The B Lab also provides templates, success stories and a wealth of content to support this journey. Do you want to test your company and find out, for example, the criteria for employees? It's here: app. bimpactassessment.net.
*Republished with the permission of RH Magazine (original version in RH Magazine July/August 2023)
