In November 2009, I was in San Francisco to hear Larry Brilliant of http://www.google.org/ (the charitable foundation of Google.com) present a heart wrenching and inspirational speech regarding the role of business beyond making a profit and employing people.
The role of business as a social force for good is perhaps difficult to fathom in times like these when survival seems to be the main focus but we want it to be a core value of our business. After listening to the presentation, I returned determined that our new company would be different, not only in terms of its technology and helping to grow a market; we would also be structured to reflect broader goals and purpose.
In the last week, we have began to speak with Lawyers and Accountants regarding how to do the following, all ideas inspired by Larry Brilliant, Google and http://www.salesforcefoundation.org/
- Give one per cent of equity to charitable organisations
- Give one per cent of profits to charitable organisations
- Enable all employees to spend one per cent of time on charitable projects
- Establish our own charitable foundation to work on projects that reflect the purpose and goals of our team and customers
We continue to explore this approach and whether it would result in the positive contribution we wish to make. In the next few weeks, we will share a questionnaire with our community and invite feedback / votes regarding the approach we should take and the causes / charities we should support.
In the meantime, if you or your organisation has also tried to / does operate with a similar philosophy, please share your experience so that we can learn from it and benefit the selected causes as quickly as possible
Please see this latest posting from Larry Brilliant / http://googleblog.blogspot.com/2009/02/next-chapter-for-googleorg.html for more information.
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