Often, talk of triple bottom line boils down to what policies a company has to promote not only financial, but also social or environmental benefit. Charitable donations, health and safety considerations, maternity/paternity leave, carbon footprint reduction, sustainable development and many more emerging ideas are all proactive measures of a sound triple bottom line infrastructure.
There is a reactive side to the picture as well and I came across one such example today through Seth Godin's impassioned blog post, Corporations are not people. To summarize, Seth describes an ongoing situation with Progressive insurance using their retinue of lawyers to fight an otherwise open-and-shut case where one of their insured members was killed in a tragic car accident by another driver who ran a red light. Progressive is on the line for paying the family $75,000 and they are doing their best to pay nothing to 1/3 of that amount.
The paragraph that struck me most in Seth's post was this:
Any short term gain: $75,000 - legal fees (which could be a net negative), is lost on customer acquisition and retention. Simply on a financial level, it is a poor decision.
To "bet on short memories and the healing power of marketing dollars," is outdated and unfortunate. The power of blogs counters this influence and spreads the message that Seth sparked and Matt Fisher - the deceased's brother - continues to update us on.
The long since-emerged, internet-based, trust economy keeps corporations honest. Corporations are not people, but their growth - financial, social and environmental - depends on those peopling corporations. Commercials, discounts and marketing eventually lead back to word-of-mouth, still the strongest form of loyalty marketing. These hard-to-shake stories will proliferate and slowly dilute the message corporations want you to believe until the people who run it do unto others as you would have them do unto you.
There is a reactive side to the picture as well and I came across one such example today through Seth Godin's impassioned blog post, Corporations are not people. To summarize, Seth describes an ongoing situation with Progressive insurance using their retinue of lawyers to fight an otherwise open-and-shut case where one of their insured members was killed in a tragic car accident by another driver who ran a red light. Progressive is on the line for paying the family $75,000 and they are doing their best to pay nothing to 1/3 of that amount.
The paragraph that struck me most in Seth's post was this:
"Like many people, I'm disgusted by their strategy, but my point here is this: if someone in your neighborhood used this approach, treating others this way, if a human with a face and a house and a reputation did it, they'd have to move away in shame. If a local businessperson did this, no one in town would ever do business there again.
Corporations (even though it's possible that individuals working there might mean well) play a different game all too often. They bet on short memories and the healing power of marketing dollars, commercials and discounts. Employees are pushed to focus on bureaucratic policies and quarterly numbers, not a realization that individuals, not corporations, are responsible for what they do."Even beyond the direct social benefit that could be offered to the deceased's family and the overall benefit of earning long term goodwill with their customers, Progressive, as an insurance company is acting outside the boundaries of fiduciary responsibility to its members.
Any short term gain: $75,000 - legal fees (which could be a net negative), is lost on customer acquisition and retention. Simply on a financial level, it is a poor decision.
To "bet on short memories and the healing power of marketing dollars," is outdated and unfortunate. The power of blogs counters this influence and spreads the message that Seth sparked and Matt Fisher - the deceased's brother - continues to update us on.
The long since-emerged, internet-based, trust economy keeps corporations honest. Corporations are not people, but their growth - financial, social and environmental - depends on those peopling corporations. Commercials, discounts and marketing eventually lead back to word-of-mouth, still the strongest form of loyalty marketing. These hard-to-shake stories will proliferate and slowly dilute the message corporations want you to believe until the people who run it do unto others as you would have them do unto you.