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Boosting Employee and Stakeholder Satisfaction in a Conscious Business

How can a conscious business serve its people better?

People are the driving force behind the Conscious Capitalism movement. For businesses to thrive and improve their bottom line while serving both their internal and external stakeholders, they need to:

  1. Invest in leadership methods that prioritize employee happiness, performance, and accountability
  2. Consistently listen to their stakeholders, even when it’s challenging

Two of the four tenets of Conscious Capitalism — Conscious Culture and Stakeholder Orientation — highlight the importance of fostering a work environment that promotes trust, care, and collaboration among employees, while considering the needs and interests of all external stakeholders.

In the latest episode of The Conscious Capitalists podcast, Timothy Henry and Raj Sisodia speak to John Mackey, Co-Founder and former CEO of Whole Foods Market, about how he navigated both of these in his own business. 

Here’s what he had to say!

Leading Employees with Love

According to John, any conscious leader must operate from a place of ‘love’ in their business. 

But not necessarily the kind of love most people think about. 

People often think of love as nurturing, gentle, and soft,” John says, “but it’s is more complex than that.”

He explains that leading with love can also mean setting high standards and holding people accountable to meet them. 

It involves encouraging growth, being strict with your expectations, and if need be, even having tough conversations with care and empathy, and not cruelty.

As long as your employees are aware of exactly what is expected from them, know what behaviors will be rewarded or reprimanded, and feel comfortable enough to speak to their managers on a regular basis about these expectations, you’ll have a healthy, loving work culture. 

The bottom line? 

  • Leaders can lead with love without being purely altruistic. 
  • Setting high standards, holding people accountable, and providing clear reasons for rewards or reprimands are all acts of love. 
  • Leaders can create a culture of employee accountability and satisfaction by being transparent and empathetic. 

Listening to external stakeholders

While it’s important to lead with love internally, it’s equally crucial to extend the same attentiveness to your external stakeholders. 

These include your customers, suppliers, investors, society, and the environment/community around you. Listening to them and acting on their feedback can be challenging, but it’s the responsibility of every conscious leader to try their best.

In the podcast episode, John recounts a spring 2003 experience where he encountered animal rights groups protesting outside one of Whole Foods Market’s board meetings. According to them, the duck supplier the company was using engaged in unethical and abusive animal farming.  

Initially convinced of their supplier’s humane practices by his team, John’s perspective shifted after meeting protester Lauren Ornelas. He began an email dialogue with her, leading to personal visits to suppliers and further education on animal welfare during the summer. 

Ultimately acknowledging the need for change and agreeing with Lauren’s opinion, John invited her to work with him. They jointly developed leading animal welfare standards and initiated the Global Animal Partnership (GAP) with multiple stakeholders.

Putting your stakeholders first isn’t always going to be easy. But, here’s a good checklist to start with if you ever find yourself in that situation: 

  • Listen to their perspective without bias 
  • Introspect and see if there’s a gap in your leadership and/or within the organization that you can change
  • If there is, work with your stakeholders to bring about that change in a way that satisfies all parties involved
  • Be open, honest, and transparent with your stakeholders about the changes you are implementing

These are the same steps that LEGO followed in 2020 when they received letters from children, their primary user-base, urging them to eliminate the use of single-use plastic in their packaging. In response to the backlash, they not only phased out the plastic packaging, but also tested out prototypes made with different sustainable materials with hundreds of parents and children. 

A conscious business can only thrive if they keep ALL their stakeholders happy — be it internally with their employees or externally with investors, suppliers, customers, and the community they work in. 
If you’d like to dive deeper into how exactly John fosters a culture of love, high performance, and accountability in his business and how he actively practices stakeholder orientation, be sure to listen to his entire episode of The Conscious Capitalists podcast here!