It is June 2021, and by now we are extremely tired of consuming content about the effects of the pandemic. We all lived the massive shock together, on every front: economic, social, emotional, financial, and political. 

This won’t be another article about what happened, but a collection of observations and experiences.

A shift that the world was moving towards sluggishly was humanizing efforts. The pandemic created an abrupt massive disruption and forced the world to consider the human first.

A world with humans but without humanity

2020 threw a curveball: a real-life situation of keeping all things constant, how will the society function? What is the society built on? People. 

Now if you take the life out of the people, how will they function? We didn’t know until they had to. 

Even though we kind of always knew this, we were too busy to pay enough attention. 

Finally, the center of all systems – humans, collectively, were given back some power. And by humans, I mean even the ones who were not privileged. 

Productivity and performance were finally seen as holistic value-based functions rather than mere operational metrics. 

It was almost like the world had a collective awakening about productivity and performance correlated with how did the person feel and respond in a given situation. Mental health finally became mainstream. (or so we hope) 

Small steps in the right direction

Companies are rolling out more humane policies and setting social goals for their operations. The mindset shift is around not just benefitting the customers and themselves but also other stakeholders. Now, you must be wondering who are these other parties? They are everyone involved directly or indirectly: investors, government, society, etc.

It is a long and difficult journey to tread but at least there has been some movement, and that too in the right direction. 

Profit with a Purpose: Unicorn or Zebra?

Companies don’t just want to extract money from their customers but want to empower a larger community. They want to be an enabler, to empower all the parties involved. This could for example be: hiring a disadvantaged part of the population or making them the end beneficiary users. 

What do we call these companies? They are social enterprises: ones who are profit-making yet have a societal purpose/goal to fulfill. As I researched more and more about social entrepreneurship, I realized that the industry is still in its nascent stage but rapidly growing.

Studies suggest that social enterprises may not become unicorns. But there is another animal they can claim – zebra. Zebra companies are called antidotes of unicorns. As unicorns crave hockey-stick growth, zebras envision more sustainable, realistic, and community-driven growth. They want to make a profit with a purpose. 

With and the emergent mission-driven startup culture, the impact investing sector is beefing up as well. 

The advent of business behemoths Facebook, Uber, and the likes was well oriented with the yesteryear markets. The current market and trends are tending towards having a human-centered vision and societal impact. 

Pacing in tandem with the market shifts, working for the larger good is what will bring companies, clients. Vocalizing your intent as a company is what is working well with customers. 

We, at Leadogo, work towards accentuating personal, professional, and societal growth. We have just started our journey with a host of discoveries to follow. How might we internalize the impact mindset in our society? How might we accelerate growth in this direction? What are your thoughts?