You may have read one of my recent blogs about my experience visiting apparel factories in Bangladesh as part of a consulting assignment examining work place nutrition. One of the biggest complaints we heard from factory owners providing food and snacks to employees was availability of healthy and nutritious options. Finding well-priced fruits, vegetables, legumes and other items seemed to be a challenge, though when visiting the local market we saw such a diversity of those such items. It was perplexing.

When probing a bit on this question, we realized that access isn’t always the issue, nor is cost.

​Food safety and reliability, as well as maintaining the freshness of food, were the real culprits in the lack of fruits, vegetables and other healthy items in factory canteens.

Photo by J. Sonenshine outside of Dhaka market

During our discussions, we learned of a project in India providing milk to underserved communities, that has been useful in combatting issues of food safety, reliability, access AND cost.

The project, run by Amul Dairy,  is the installation of a series of dairy ATMs (as in automatic teller machines, similar to snack machines, or money machines).  The milk comes out of the machine in pouches, and is cheap enough so affordability is not a challenge.  If you’ve visited Japan, seeing non-traditional snack items in a vending machine is no surprise. In Japan you can get almost anything from an ATM – drinks, pizza, movies, books, flowers electronics and the list goes on. What’s different about the Amul ATMs, however, is that the milk is inexpensive, chilled at the right temperature, available 24 hours a day and provides much needed nutrition and sustenance for its customers.

Photo: courtesy of rediff.com
 
The Amul milk ATM was launched in 2014, and appears to be flourishing across India. Similar vending systems have popped up in Kenya (along with salad ATMs!).

Providing access to food in this way, along with other items like personal care products, soap and even water, is becoming useful, affordable and dependable for rural communities. 


​On March 21st I’ll be attending the Chicago Council for Foreign Affairs Food Security Symposium, where speakers will address the following question: How will we grow an adequate quantity—and quality—of food to feed and nourish a rapidly growing, urbanizing world in the face of increasing water insecurity? Innovation is enabling greater food and product accessibility, and will most certainly continue as communities consider the best methods for feeding their residents, employees, families and future generations. I look forward to hearing how the panelists address this question, and how they see innovation and technology, like the use of vending systems, for example, helping to solve the challenges we face.

You would have to be hiding in a cave to miss that last Friday was International Women's Day. I always cringe when I think about causes having their own 'day' because it means indeed the issue is a 'cause' and not just how we look at life all the time. We need a day to focus on women?
 
Indeed we do. 
 
In fact in chatting with some girl friends this weekend, I was reminded why International Women’s Day is so critical to advancing women’s issues worldwide. One friend of mine works to abolish children sex trafficking, and has shared some pretty disturbing stories with me over the years. Speaking with her about the challenges women and girls face all over the world, including in the United States, reminds me that:

​I arrived just in time to hear the evening call to prayer. As an American, hearing the melodic chants bring a sense of the exotic, which when traveling to Bangladesh for the first time, is a feeling I’d expect regardless. The city of Dhaka at night looks more developed than I had anticipated. The truth will unveil herself in the morning. 

PHOTO: Garment worker community children in Gazipur

I am in town to learn about work-place nutrition programs (or lack thereof in many cases) in apparel factories for a project on which I am consulting. Given the fact that the garment sector makes up more than 80% of Bangladesh’s exports, it’s not hard to see the impact of the industry everywhere we go. 

​As we drive into town for our first meetings I notice all of the people walking to work are men. Yet in the garment sector, 60-65% of all employees are women. This largely breaks out into the categories of workers (women) and management (men) though I found a good representation of both genders when touring the factories. Having visited countless farms to understand how sustainable sourcing can be improved farm to fork, I am excited to see a different origin source in the case of apparel and how conditions affect the way our clothes are made.

"Purpose” is THE buzz word for businesses in 2019. Every strategist and social impact leader is talking about it. A google search alone for “purpose” yields articles about writing for purpose, defining purpose, strategies for purpose, how purpose will save the world, and even eating with purpose. Eating with purpose? Is that the same thing as mindful eating? Yikes… it’s a lot to follow.
When I wrote Purposeful Profits: Inside Successful Businesses Making a Positive Global Impact last year, I wanted to shine a light on the purpose story that isn’t behind the headlines, though. I wanted to showcase why purpose is so critical for businesses wanting to make an impact, and why the most critical elements of purpose are imbedded deep within, behind the labels, behind the CEOs and behind the social impact reports. While some businesses may see finding purpose as a box to check off to stay relevant in 2019, others recognize that purpose equates to existence. Businesses that have purpose are businesses that have dedicated leaders sacrificing, innovating, taking risks, serving others and solving very challenging problems for the planet. Real purpose means real people. Real people doing really important work.
Take for example Shannon Keith, Founder of Sudara, an ethical clothing company that helps support women in India recently freed from the sex trade. Shannon started the company after feeling nearly powerless while visiting a red light district in India. She knew she had to do something. Shannon found her purpose in Sudara. Now she spends her days building a solid financial footing for women who were previously undermined and delegitimized. Shannon has brought identity back to so many who would have otherwise been forgotten. Sudara's purpose is Shannon's purpose. Behind her are the hundreds of women who now feel their own sense of purpose, as well.
The story of Pierrette Djemain, an entrepreneur who was born in Benin, was raised with eleven brothers and sisters, lost nearly everyone and everything, and found success growing moringa, is also what defines purpose. Starting a business with only 1,000 francs (about $2.00), Pierrette literally started from nothing but an idea. Now, her company Plantes Aromatiques des Collines (PAC) sells moringa to 25 different retail locations around Central Benin and employs women who face financial and personal challenges. Pierrette believes that she was put on this Earth to help those who have been disadvantaged by life. She sees opportunities to create sustainable and thriving futures for the vulnerable, (widows, orphans, forgotten women) by planting moringa trees, revitalizing the environment, and developing a value chain that provides entire families with a resilient source of income. These families have purpose. Pierrette found her purpose. The moringa tree has its purpose, too.
You can read more of these definitions of purpose in Purposeful Profits. Within the book are tales of individuals like Shannon and Pierrette, but there are also stories of individuals working for large companies, working to correct misgivings, to amplify positive solutions, and to try new things that can benefit all of humanity. Each of these individuals, and their companies, are what defines purpose. Behind each of us, no matter where we work, what we do or who we are, lies purpose. 
As purpose takes on its own evolution in 2019, and as companies amplify their purpose, market their purpose, brand their purpose or indeed sell “purpose,” let’s not forget that it is the human effort, heart, brain and dedication that defines purpose in the end.
Mission, brand awareness, and staying innovative are critical for companies' abilities to thrive. Finding purpose, highlighting the triumphs from within and leading by inspiration are just as important.

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Joanne Sonenshine is author of Purposeful Profits: Inside Successful Businesses Making a Positive Global Impact (available May 22) and Founder of Connective Impact, a partnership advisory firm helping mission-driven companies scale their impact through collaboration.

​I saw a headline last week from Inc Magazine (which of course now I can’t find!) that asked if social enterprises were the new nonprofits. I paused to take a quick look at the article, because that is a question I’ve asked myself, and clients have been asking themselves, quite frequently. How is that question valid? Well, social enterprises exist to make money, but also to give back to society in some way, whether it be through environmental investment, one-for-one programs, social impact, infrastructure support or other ‘for the greater good’ reasons. Until recently, a lot of those ‘for the greater good’ services were provided by nonprofits, in many cases in partnership with companies or governments. Increasingly, though, as corporate social responsibility becomes more imbedded within how businesses function, companies are asking their nonprofit partners to tilt a little, and adjust their missions to be more business-centric. By partnering with social enterprises, however, companies are almost guaranteed that at least the most critical business basics are a given and understood, and long term impact can be built into a more formidable market system.
 
This evolution of partnering between companies (particularly big brands) and social enterprises is fascinating to me, and I wrote about this trend in Purposeful Profits: Inside Successful Businesses Making a Positive Global Impact, out this May. (We will also visit this idea in our February webinar about partnering for impact for social enterprises.) In fact when writing this article I learned a out a new partnership that positions a big brand and social enterprise, once competitors, now as collaborators. Procter and Gamble has acquired women’s sanitary product company This is L. Companies like P&G (and General Mills, Kelloggs, Nestle and others) want to stay nimble and adaptive to changing consumer tastes and preferences. Companies like This is L, which is a B Corp, offers P&G a different angle to sell feminine products, one that is built on the messages of women’s empowerment, natural ingredients and purpose.
 
For companies trying to navigate this new world of niche collaboration (i.e. finding partners to explore new and evolving niche segments of consumers or other stakeholders,) we see the trends broken into the following categories:
 

• Fundraising: Finding ways to leverage new partners for capital to advance impact and also make a stronger case for return on investment.
• Scaling: Similar to the P&G model, bigger brands are seeking innovative partners/more dynamic business models to scale, grow and amplify business and impact.
• Niche Customers: Being specific on customer interest and targeting impact programs that appeal to new and different customer bases.
• Social Impact: Putting impact in a similar or greater (in some cases) category than profits
• Advocacy: Leveraging partners to advance causes or issues
• New Technologies: Finding ways to make impact more obtainable

 
We look forward to following these and other partnership trends as we determine how social enterprises and nonprofits function similarly, or different, in the space of social impact.