Doing (good) Business

Grab a pen and paper for this episode! After the violence at the US Capitol on January 6th, Kelly called Lara with an idea for a bonus episode.

Put simply, we want to support you more and share tools to help you get from here (probably feeling like we are, and having a hard time connecting to hope and taking action) to there (more creativity, more compassion, more capacity to show up the way you want to in the world).

Think you can’t change the way you respond to things? Don't know how to get from reacting to thoughtful action? We walk you through the steps that you can take (for your organization AND yourself - because the micro is the macro and vice versa), to tap into creativity, look at things differently, and do good business. 

What started as an idea for a “quickie” bonus episode became 30+ minutes of actionable content for the leaders, solopreneur, and individual contributor - complete with spoiler alerts about next week’s episode!

Dana Rizer is the executive director of FEAST, a non-profit organization dedicated to helping individuals and families learn how to navigate a broken food environment more healthily by promoting wellness and enriching lives through the power of healthy foods and human connection. Dana shares the ways in which COVID is increasing health risks in high-poverty neighborhoods AND how families living within these inequitable and inadequate food ecosystems can live healthier and more nourishing lives by addressing the individual, social, and environmental factors that contribute to a healthy lifestyle.  

What does business have to do with it? We’re so glad you asked. Not only does Dana lead this non-profit, but other businesses can support FEAST’s work AND they reap the benefits. Healthier employees are always good business, and supporting organizations that create healthier communities benefits us all. This goes way beyond food.

Kelly & Lara are big proponents of bringing your whole self to work - and realize that as straight, white, cis-gendered women, it’s a lot easier for us to bring our whole selves to work than it is for those with marginalized identities. Robyn Gigl is a lawyer, author, activist - and she's also a transgender woman. She joins D(g)B to share how she used story in her career as a lawyer, even before she was an author. What it means for her to bring her whole self to work now, and what it looked like before she was free to be fully herself. She’s even got some advice for the folks who want to bring out more of their authenticity at work.

• What does an organization need to allow people to step into who they are? Inclusion with a capital I and diversity with a little d, because diversity doesn’t matter if we’re not Inclusive.
• Robyn’s #1 way for leaders to be more open & affirming? Humility.
• What to avoid? Walking away.
• What helped her most when she came out? Even if you don’t understand, be understanding.

Robyn Gigl, is the author of the upcoming #OwnVoices novel By Way of Sorrow (Kensington Publishing Corp. / March 31st, 2021) and is an attorney, speaker, and activist who has been honored by the ACLU-NJ and the NJ Pride Network for her 40+ years of work on behalf of the LGBTQIA+ community. 

Find all the ways to buy By Way for Sorrow (including indie sellers!) at https://robyngigl.com/books/

How do mentoring and DEI intersect? We're glad you asked! Our guest today, Lisa Fain, CEO of Center for Mentoring Excellence, has the answer. If you or your organization provides or wants to provide mentoring, you need to listen to Lisa (and read her book)!

HUGE takeaways:

• Mentors doesn’t have to have the answers! What they do need is good questions - the goal is to move away from the sage on stage model to being a guide on side
• A recent study shows that mentors have improved leadership skills in self efficacy, cultural competency & more
• If your organization is talking about a career ladder, it's time to shift that to a career lattice 
• How to start? Have conversations in relationships to determine what is working and what can be done better - take baby steps to create psychological safety FIRST
• 3 important inclusive behaviors for mentors & mentees: my normal may not be your normal, name the dynamic, constantly stay in relationship with one another 

Check out Lisa's book Bridging Differences for Better Mentoring 

Paul Birkett, founder and CEO of Automation Finance

Automation Finance has saved over 2000 families from foreclosure and we couldn’t be more excited to speak with their Founder & CEO Paul Birkett. Paul’s company, Automation Finance, pools consumer funds to invest in distressed assets and non-performing loans. Or, if you’re not in the financial industry, what that means is that they work with loans going into foreclosure to reformat them and keep the family in their home - all the while paying a nice return to their investors! Automation Finance uses crowdfunding, and investing starts at $250, so if you’re looking to support a D(g)B guest, check them out!

Thank you to Paul, for joining us (from Ireland!) and proving that doing good business is not only possible, it’s profitable.  

Our favorite takeaways:

• You can pursue “hard nose commercial business” (that generates an 8% target return for its investors) while also helping people
• Serving disadvantaged communities can still provide a profit/ROI
• Ordinary people want to invest money to help other ordinary people - and Automation Finance makes that possible - and pays dividends to those ordinary people, not to Wall Street 
• Over time, their results have been BETTER than the competitors who aren’t focused on helping people 

D(g)B welcomes Heather DeSantis, Founder & CEO of Publicity for good! Heather joined us from Branson, MO, where she and her fiancé live & work in a 23-foot Airstream - more on that at the end of the episode! Heather shares what good business and good PR means to her and her clients. You’ll learn why having a purpose-driven business is in Heather’s DNA, how this clear mission makes finding clients magnetic, and how she leads an international team and trusts them to deliver results - while trying to make the world better. 

Note: We had a little bit of wind noise at a few points in this episode.

Find Heather here:

https://publicityforgood.com/ 

www.Goodsidenews.com 

Kelly & Lara could not be more thrilled to welcome Bigelow Tea’s President and CEO Cindi Bigelow to D(g)B. If you haven’t heard of Bigelow Tea, you may have been living under a rock for the past several decades! Bigelow is the #1 specialty tea company in America producing 2 billion tea bags a year - and they are a Certified B Corporation! Cindi is the 3rd generation President and CEO of Bigelow, which was started by her grandmother over 75 years ago, at a time when women rarely worked outside the home, let alone founded companies!

Cindi is a leader who truly walks her talk. She runs her company in a way that reflects the family’s values and beliefs, and you can just feel the authenticity. 

Bigelow is 100% family owned, has 400 employees, and manufacturing, packaging, & blending are all done in the US.

In this episode, we talk about resilience, Cindi’s leadership, becoming zero waste, BLM & diversity. We learn how COVID impacted Bigelow and the good that’s come from this experience plus their programs for supporting the troops, sustainability, giving back, and even more in this fantastic episode. It didn’t even take 5 minutes to get to the first of many mic drops from Cindi in this episode. 

Did you know?

• Bigelow Tea is headquartered in Fairfield, CT (which is attached to one of their three plants) and has a community garden that feeds hundreds in their area through donations to a local homeless shelter - and Cindi had to negotiate to get 1 tomato per year!
• Cindi visits the places where the tea and other ingredients are sourced - AND she takes her sales & marketing folks, so they can be a part of the product in all ways possible
• You can learn some cool Bigelow tea tricks like Kelly did! Check out Tea Time with Cindi

Two, of several, mic drop moments:

• “You’re not going to be great unless you have other people who are pushing you forward.” 
• “If everyone thought about the greater good every day, the world would be a much better place.”

We couldn’t agree more, Cindi. 

Can you believe it's September already?! Kelly & Lara feel partially stuck back in March and partially like it's been 100 years since our last episode! Thanks, COVID...

One thing the hosts know for sure, is that there are so many opportunities to do good business right now, and we plan to feature as many as possible! Season 3 will have more guests, more talk on equity & inclusion, more sustainability, and so many other amazing topics that you're going to love!

The only constant is change, and that feels more true than ever right now. Join us this season to continue hearing from leaders who believe in changing the world (for good!) through business.

When your season 2 finale episode starts with the dulcet tones of the ice cream truck in the background, you know it's gonna be good!

Kelly & Lara reflect on the guests and topics from their second season, and walk their talk by continuing to refine the podcast format. You can expect to hear more guests in season 3, more overt conversations around DEI, and more attention on the good business that's happening - because it really is possible.

In the powerful words of Kelly Stewart (wholeheartedly supported by Lara Heacock):

If your company already values diversity, provides equity, and fosters inclusion – this is time to double down on what’s working and use that as a springboard to surface new ideas and expand your presence.

If your company aspires to value diversity, provide equity, and foster inclusion – then it’s time for an organizational self-reflection – to exam your values and practices, to ask “What do we care deeply about? What do we want to be known for going forward?” and understanding that the planning for “what you do” will look very different

If your company is comfortable with the status quo, then this is not really the podcast for you.

RESOURCES:

• DEI individual and organizational training: The Adaway Group
• Equality vs. Equity Cartoon - this is the simplest we've seen to help folks understand this conversation. 

In the words of The Tempos, we'll see you in September!