Martin C-Schmidt’s Post

This case is incredible! I am impressed by how perpetual purpose trust maintains a company's mission when transforming its ownership. To be honest, I did not expect a new business model to significantly change the way a company's decision-making, facing the burden of financial goals from its stakeholders that are mainly oriented by interest. But this case really changed my insight, and I highly recommend taking a look if you are working in a related field.

Best Friends Animal Society has it figured out: any organization can publish feel-good statements about its mission, core values, goals, and culture. But if your organization's *behavior* isn't congruent with its stated mission, values, goals, and culture, then those statements amount to pretty words and not much else. This is true of business in general, and it's true of data: *saying* that you're a data-driven company doesn't make it so unless you prioritize doing the not-so-flashy foundational work to make it happen. No, that's not easy, but the payoff is worth it. https://lnkd.in/gtCF8AhV

Onboarding 2 new HQ team members today and having our monthly All Staff meeting. In that 1 team member will present another with the "Buffalo Culture" award for embodying some aspect or all of our Culture Code. Reflecting on 2018-2019 when we first forged this leadership motif and culture code idea now known as Buffalo Culture at C12 Business Forums. Initially some holy discontent issues met "I have a dream" workplace visioneering resulted in ideas like results over glory, big trust, entrepreneurial spirit, leadership mindset, perpetual innovation, fight for health and "be the buffalo." All of that eventually gelled around this handle of "buffalo culture." Gradually the team refined the language into collective verb ideas: We Find a Way We Head into the Storm We Enjoy a Herd Mentality We Protect the Herd We are Always Moving It's not natural. Entropy and human drama will always pull away from it, but that's the kind of place I want work. I hope these 2 new folks experience and champion it quickly. It starts today! You can check out the 1 minute video about the idea and ethos for this @ https://lnkd.in/gY9hHWgt

Have you seen Common Ground (Movie) yet? If you are in New York City, or attending #RegenerativeNYC, come see the film with us tomorrow night! We'll have regenerative snacks too! Hit the link for details. #regenerativenyc #commonground #regenerativeagriculture

Clients of your business want to know and understand your business and its story. What is the background, how does your company do what it does , why does it do it this way, where do you want the business to be. All questions which your clients will have. McDonalds in Japan years ago ran a video showing black angus type cattle grazing in a green paddock with a stream running through the bottomof the paddock. These cattle "looked" happy and contented so the customer could feel better about the burger they were buying. Clean country, clean beef. I am a keen fishermen, many of the fishing videos talk about the founders, why they came to make the lures, they do, how they go about the manufacture of the lure, then they show a video of that lure catching fish. That lure has already caught me. Nomad do this very well, so dont be afraid to tell your business's story and customers can buy in.

I am so happy to have completed the Business Sustainability Management course by the Cambridge Institute for Sustainability Leadership (CISL) (with a distinction grade to boot, whoop!). It was hands down the most rewarding, intellectually stimulating and unexpectedly emotive experience this year. How can I best convey it to you? Oh, I know! Movie references! 🍿 We started with the big picture: the forces that impact sustainability and how they are interrelated (like when you were a kid looking up at the stars and realising we are all connected - or maybe it was "Avatar" that made the penny drop for you?). Then we considered the business case for sustainability and business models. Intrigued by the WEF Risks Report 2024 I went down a rabbit hole of aggregate data on global progress for my analysis. I am not going to lie, what I saw brought on anxiety-riddled, blood-boiling moments akin to Kate Dibiasky in "Don’t Look Up" wanting to punch those blissfully dismissing the proverbial comet hurling itself towards Earth. "Don’t despair", said the course tutors. “But do or do not. There’s no try". OK Yoda, I’ll soldier on. Next, we delved into regulations, production, design, communication, partnerships. Getting a handle on how they all fit together. It was like having Dumbledore, Hagrid, Snape and Sirius Black tooling up Harry for the ultimate challenge.   Then the day came to put all we learnt in an action plan! How to be a change agent that secures resources and influences. And that’s when the impossible began to seem possible. That we can turn the ship around. That it makes sense to choose the red pill of action over the blue pill of apathy. But that’s not all! I also found myself in a community of authentic, gutsy, like-minded people who give you hope that the tipping point is here. Because as Taika Waititi says in his credit scene cameo in “Last Goal Wins”: “it just goes to show when the going gets rough, when you feel like you can’t carry on, that there’s no hope or you just can’t do it.. anything can happen! And a whole lot of miracles. You just have a little bit of faith”. Thank you to the head tutors Beth Knight, Prof. Wayne Visser and Louise Nicholls for the transformative course. Thank you Laura Gherasim ( she/ her) for challenging us in the forum. Thank you Sandra Decasper for the constructive feedback that kept me improving. Thank you Matthew Kilgarriff for building an awesome community and Luca Condosta, Ph.D. (he/him) for rocking the Zurich group. Now the dust has settled, I find myself energised to continue doing my part to inspire change with communication. Aristotle had it figured out: it takes ethos, logos and pathos to persuade. But, as neuroscientist Antonio Damasio proved, there’s a nuance; it’s pathos that steers the decision-making wheel in our brains. We very much need some pathos to connect and galvanise us all. Genevieve Cote delivered it in 2min:22sec at BGT of all places.🤯 Make them feel. That’s the answer.

Exciting news! We've just opened our company account on LinkedIn. Follow us for updates on our latest projects, company culture, and industry insights. Let's connect and grow together! #NewBeginnings #CompanyCulture #LinkedInDebut"

Had a great opportunity to present and facilitate discussion around weed escape at #TechHubLIVE in Des Moines, Iowa today. What are the tools you are using to combat weed escape. Incorporating technology does not have to be a large expenses. However, ignoring weed escape and not addressing the issue will be an expense to your operation and business. It starts with having a good partnership with a trusted advisor such as Wilbur Ellis. Whether Wilbur Ellis, or another Ag Retailer, have the conversation…start making the investment in the tools and technology.

Do you: - know who manages your KiwiSaver fund? - if it's invested in animal cruelty, environmental degradation or human rights abuses? - what % return you made over the past year? If you answered 'no' to ANY of these, the free course below might be of interest. Run by the vibrant and wise Bryony Greenhalgh, you'll learn how to harness the power of your KiwiSaver to generate wealth and well-being. https://lnkd.in/ghJ8tBTa

A guy once pitched the most random idea I ever heard. Stuffed animals that turn into a hoodie. Maybe you’ve heard of Cubcoats. We ended up helping that company reach a $70M valuation. More to the story this week. 🔔 If you look behind the scenes - Good ideas come from the most unexpected ideas. Your idea is just the starting point. It’s what you do with it that counts: Écoute was supposed to be a notification lamp. When push comes to shove - our best ideas come from really bad ideas. Because they force you to investigate and research. And then it takes months to develop into something which actually works. When the stakes are high, you can bring us in to move things around you. Sign up here. https://lnkd.in/gwRHdDW3