Awakening awesome. At The Awakened Company, we want to highlight awesome and realness in business. Conscious Brands is up to some super juicy stuff in Calgary despite the current economic downturn. Take a peak.
I recently had the opportunity to speak with Rob Sinclair (Founder & Sustainability Sherpa) and Matt Mayer (Sustainability Sherpa) to ask them about what they are up to. Here’s what they had to say:
How are you disrupting the status quo?
Conscious Brands’ core purpose is Activating Consciousness in Business. Practicing the new economy is at the core of what it offers to companies who are ready to do business differently, to do it better that fits the 21st century. It is also an incubator of the new economy by practicing on itself, living into its virtue of “how you do anything is how you do everything”.
Conscious Brands is disrupting traditional business models and practicing the new economy in several ways:
- Conscious Brands provides services that support organizations to increase their consciousness so as to be better. Disrupting business as usual is foundational to the services it provides and to the impact it makes to its clients, to the world and to future generations.
- It is a founding Canadian B Corp; a certification for companies that meets a higher level of social and environmental responsibility and transparency. Part of being a certified B Corp is amending its Articles of Incorporation to reflect its commitment to providing value to all stakeholders (i.e. environment, employees, community, shareholders, etc.) versus simply shareholders. Check out its public B Corp profile.
- Conscious Brands practices a management system called Holacracy that embeds distributed leadership and distributed authority in how the business is run. This means that there are no bosses and no managers, only leaders. Those who fill Roles at Conscious Brands fill multiple Roles and have authority to make decisions in those Roles that even the working shareholders don’t. Holacracy is a great way to honour the shift in power dynamics, high adaptability, evolving governance and learning-organization traits that the new economy is calling of us.
How has your company improved its bottom line during this time, and if not, what are you noticing?
Conscious Brands’ bottom-line is no different than any other professional services firm, it ebbs and flows. It is particularly dynamic because the new economy is emerging, demanding that the company be rapid, continuous learners and practicers in order to provide value to its clients. Due to this, the core purpose and Holacracy, it is constantly contacted for job opportunities from extremely bright and discerning individuals, of which, more opportunity will be available as it continues to generatively grow. Those who work with or for Conscious Brands are ambassadors, resonating with a level of professionalism and quirkiness in their approach that makes for strong relationships that tend to stick.
The company has never been as profitable despite the economic conditions in Calgary.
How is your employee retention? Speak to your experience with keeping great people?
In full transparency, in the last few months the two local employees at Conscious Brands chose to move on. The move was bitter sweet as the employees were exceptional people who grew as people and leaders tremendously in their time with Conscious Brands; it is always hard to spend less time with those kind of people. On the other hand, it was a gift from the universe as Conscious Brands was provided with a new opportunity to restructure when it was more needed that what was available to the naked eye.
Outside of this recent experience, Conscious Brands hasn’t had much engagement with employee retention because the model has been based on partnerships on a more project-to-project basis. Like its clients, these collaborators speak praises of collaborating with Conscious Brands and these bonds are durable and shared.
What practical practices would you suggest to other businesses in Calgary at this time?
- Check out and take the Quick B Impact Assessment (20-mins) or Full B Impact Assessment (~3hours).
- Enrol in the 30×30 challenge from the David Suzuki Foundation for the month of May. Participants pledge to spend a minimum of 30 minutes in nature each day for 30 days straight. The mental health research is jaw-dropping.
- Do a check-in at the start of every meeting, asking a question like “what has your attention right now?” so as to have people give context to how they REALLYare showing up to the meeting and what is currently distracting them from being present to the meeting. A check-out responding to a question like “what will you take away from this meeting?” is also a good way to bring reflection and an end-cap to the meeting so presence can be more seamlessly brought to the next endeavour.
- Consider utilizing a meditation app like HeadSpace which offers short (10-minute) meditations for free.
- Take as little as 5-minutes each morning and each evening to set intentions and reflect, respectively, on your days. This has incredibly useful benefits for leaders to live happier and healthier lives. A tool that we suggest is the 5-minute Journal.
This is a heart warming story of following your values and it pays off.
What suggestions do you have for Calgary organizations at this time?
Want to learn more about building a better, more sustainable and successful business? Check out best-seller, The Awakened Company.