E078 - Dr Bruno Cignacco - The Art of Compassionate Business

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Welcome back to the Green Element Podcast. Where we feature business leaders and innovators transforming their operations to be more environmentally and socially sustainable. I'm your host, Will Richardson, and I can't wait to meet our guest today and help you on your journey of sustainability. Today we've got Dr. Bruno on, and he is discussing his book, The Art of Compassion in Business. He brings love into the equation, and who better to bring love into the equation than an Italian academic? The country of love. It's a fascinating conversation, really understanding and listening to Dr. Bruno on his insights and learnings as a consultant and academic. in the area of social purpose-driven business. So I can't wait for this episode. Welcome to the Green Element Podcast, Bruno. Thank you so much for coming. Now, Dr. Cygnacul, you've written a really, really good book, and I'll let you go on to describe the book and what it is that it's about. But you're giving us a roadmap on how to grow our business from all aspects in a purpose-driven and social purpose-driven way. And so, yeah, please, please explain your book and more about it, please.

Thank you very much. Thank you for your invite. First off, thank you for taking me on board on this podcast. I want to comment briefly about my experience and the book. I'm Dr. Bruno Signaco. I'm a university lecturer, business advisor, and also researcher on, especially on international marketing and also social marketing. This book that we will talk about is titled The Art of Compassionate Business: Main Principles for the Human-Oriented Enterprise. It's the result of 3-year research on social enterprise, and it's a very interesting book, and I encourage readers to have a look through this. And very important, what I talk about in the book is about how companies can approach business in a much more compassionate way, in a much more caring way. In a much more heartful way. And also at the same time connect with different stakeholders— stakeholders are individuals and organizations with interest in our organization, our company— in a much more meaningful way. So we're talking about also purpose-driven companies, we're talking about companies that have an attitude of generosity, companies that are also grateful with different stakeholders, and we are talking about companies that obviously approach business environment from the an abundance mindset perspective. So we will talk about— many people do not relate love and business. However, I want to comment that they are very well related. Love— many people relate love to romantic love, for example, love to close partner, or for example, relative or friend. But this is more than this. Many authors, humanistic authors, state that love includes some aspects like care, support, compassion, generosity, concern for others, and also empathy. And this is very important because most of the companies are profit-driven. This means that they look for the key performance indicators that are profitability, efficiency, competitiveness, but they don't take into account the concept of love. this concept feels like a bit alien to these companies. However, we have to understand that all business activities are developed in a business concept, in a business context, and I want to say that in this business context, companies relate to different stakeholders. These stakeholders are fundamental because all companies are interdependent with suppliers, employees, customers, and also they're interdependent with Obviously the community itself, the government, and companies cannot grow without stakeholders with good relationship with these stakeholders. So this means that when we nourish this relationship with the stakeholders, this means that we are more loving toward customer, more caring towards employees, and more communicative toward, for example, suppliers. These relationships are mutually beneficial and have a long-term orientation, and the business activity, when these relationships are nourished, tend to naturally grow in a, in a, by default. We can say that most companies should focus on relationships with these stakeholders, internal and external, instead of focusing so much on, for example, profit and revenues. Profit and revenues are important for company survival, and also companies thriving. But at the same time, we have to understand this interdependence with other stakeholders, that no company is acting in a vacuum. No company is acting on their own. No company, as an author would say, is an island. It's always connected to community, customer, supplier, and so on. So very important because some people relate love to this limited concept Concept. Now let's give an example of love applied to business environment. For example, if we are we have a lot of employees that are very committed, and these some of these employees overwork. So because they want to support the company with these objectives. However, these employees are overworking, but they're not recognized fairly by this company. For example, even sent a thank you letter, or for example, these employees are not even. given a special note or certificate for achievements, for example, of certain projects, or for example, these employees are not given any bonuses. So in practice, this company is not being generous with employees. And as a consequence of this, this company will have these employees against this company. So they won't be on their side. So what I want to comment is that companies should nourish relationship with stakeholders including customers. What is the example of customer that I always give in my talks? Customers are always feeling in many cases manipulated. For example, some companies try to hide the fine print in their contracts, some companies try to call customers in a very unsolicited way, some companies try to offer the best product that is the best for the company instead of the best for the customer cheated on. They feel deceived, and as a consequence of this, customers tend to be pushed away. We have to understand that most of the profit of a company comes from customers. The profit don't come from the sky, they don't come from the earth, they come from specific people that are paying for these goods and services. So if we not notice this relationship with customer, what happened that this customers will switch from our company to competitors. And what we have to understand, that customers also do not only switch but will give negative reviews online. They won't suggest that other friends would go to our company but will suggest other companies instead of ours. So I want to comment that it's very important to take into account. What about community? I know that we're talking about green business Community. Community should be nourished on a continuous basis, not only from the perspective of corporate social responsibility. That is very good. However, many companies use corporate social responsibility for approach to clean up their image. Relationship with the community should be on a continuous basis. For example, connecting with the local authorities, council, or for example, government agencies to see what are the needs of this community Also, when making big decisions, for example, opening a new branch, is this affecting negatively the social environment in a community? Can we, for example, get a consensus with the community so that we can agree on a way to expand our business in a mutually profitable way, profitable for the company but also beneficial for the community? So communities also should be noticed. And also we see some companies that they are careless with the environment. Well, there is a concept that is called triple bottom line. That means we have to get profits, we have to care for people, and we have to care for the planet. What this means? That is not only profit will be the basic of a company. Any company can do this if they have a good business plan. However, in a counterintuitive way, Not many companies will achieve this objective if they're not caring for people, because we saw people as stakeholders, and all organizations are composed of people. So at the end, the basic factor of business is people. And also planet. Well, we can see that many companies are depleting natural resources. They're using, they're using what we call a win-lose strategy. They're getting the gains from the environment using the resources in a very uncaring way. At the same time, they're not giving anything back. They're using resources that are not renewable. They're using energy sources that are not the best one, the most green ones. So very important. And this is my brief introduction to this topic. I'm not sure if you want to ask another question.

Yeah, that's really interesting to hear and understand what it is that you exploring within the book. What I would like to understand is what took you into this? Like, what brought you into it? Because we are seeing many more organizations understand the triple bottom line. I mean, we've seen the B Corp movements massively increasing around the world, and it's not necessarily just B Corp movements, it's also corporate responsibility and purpose-driven businesses as a whole. In the UK, we've got PlanetMark, we've got B Corp and lots of companies that aren't actually certifying themselves to any particular standard. They are just doing good. And it is all about people, purpose, planet. So what brought you into this and how is it that you ended up writing about a subject like this?

Yes, thank you for your question. A very interesting question. What brought me is that obviously I have been lecturing many business models on undergraduate level and postgraduate level for a long time and also advising of companies on, especially on international marketing. And what I saw that many entrepreneurs and also many business books, famous ones, treat business from a strategic perspective and tactic perspective using this concept, strategy, tactics. I'm not saying that planning is wrong, but these are concepts that are based on military theory, strategy, tactics, defeating competitors, Retaining customers, also keeping them. And what I observe that all this vocabulary, all these terms are not appropriate for a new generation of business that are coming out, obviously very slowly. But obviously you gave an example, very good example. Another company we can say that TOMS, the shoe manufacturer, and we can say Whole Foods, obviously the organic food company, they are taking the lead But in practice, there is a concept in business that is based on fear, and this is very important because, well, here we're talking about compassionate business. And many authors, especially spiritual authors in the, in the Eastern world, said that the opposite to love is fear. What do we mean? That when you feel fear, you are in a freeze-fight-flight mode. This means that you tend to focus on the threat, perceived threat or a real threat. For example, if the company is losing market share, this will be a threat. The company people might tend to focus on this threat. However, this approach that is based on fear, the freeze-fly approach, is the opposite to love. So in practice, when companies is focusing on threats, their cognitive skills, how they think, is narrowed down. They cannot become creative, they become reactive, they cannot be proactive. This is, you see, many of the business books talk about these strategic approaches and how to beat competitors, how to entrench in a specific market. All this that is underlying all this concept, you can see that there is a factor of fear. However, you see the concept of competition itself. Competition, you say, This is a win-lose game. So this means that you have to beat other companies to get— so this is also based on a concept of scarcity. However, what about cooperation? There are many examples of cooperation. Competition and cooperation. So cooperation means that you are developing mutually profitable partnership even with companies of your same sector. You are trying to share resources, you try to in some cases cut costs or share information. And also, and these cooperative ties can be also developed with customers, can be developed with employees, can be developed with the community. But what I've said also, that business is perceived from a very fragmented perspective. This is also one of the aspects because I believe in systemic approach. What is a systemic approach? Systemic approach— system is a set of components interrelated. So this means that the company is always related to other companies, to the community, to the world as a whole. If the company believes that they're on their own, by default they will tend to use a win-lose strategy. They will deplete the environment getting all the resources, and obviously at the same time the planet will get depleted. So the resources that are not renewable cannot get back. So interdependence is a concept that we have to bear in mind, and also love. What is the aspect of love that are so important? Love research stated this: when people have a loving attitude towards others, this releases oxytocin. Oxytocin is a hormone that is released by the brain that obviously creates belongingness, creates connection, creates bonding, creates trust. So very important, and also create a better attitude. And when you have a loving attitude toward others, your thoughts are expanded. You tend to become more creative. The opposite would happen when you are focused on threats or fear or any factor that could be affecting this company in a negative way. So what I'm saying is that companies should adopt a loving attitude not only to nourish their relationship with stakeholders, but at the same time to become more creative, to become less traditional, to become much more innovative. There is research that relates the positive moods with creativity. When people are experiencing positive mood, for example, and there is research also that when a company is generous with stakeholders or people working for this company tend to experience positive mood. When this happens, the thought process tends to be expanded. This means that you look for other possibilities beyond the obvious, and in practice you are more prone to generate good ideas. Instead, when you are fearful— I will lose my market share, I will try to beat my competitors— you are focusing on the outside forces, and obviously you look at these forces from a negative perspective and you tend to get reactive. Another point that I want to highlight is that— that made me research on this topic is that many companies are focusing on technological devices that are very important. Technology helps a lot to do things easier, quicker, much more efficient. However, they lost the human touch. What do I mean by human touch? If you go to any work environment, I advise in many companies, you will see that the schedule is very tight. A meeting from 10 to 11, and then you have, for example, this project should be sent by this deadline, and everything is very structured. There is no time, no leeway for informal meetings, meeting with no business objective. I mentioned this in one full chapter in the book. I call this natural conversation. Natural conversation means taking into account the other person not as a means to a goal, but as a goal itself. I'm talking to you and communicating to you because I want to know you better. I want to recognize you as a legitimate being. However, most companies also do not allow emotional aspects to be included in the work environment. Only rational aspect— planning, budgeting, strategizing— but also they forget other aspects of the employee. For example, spiritual aspect, physical aspect, and emotional aspect, as I mentioned. It's natural conversation, and there's also research on this natural conversation, because people tend to feel more at ease and less business-oriented, are also a very important source of creative ideas. So because people do not have an agenda, the people do not have goals to meet, people can get their hair down because they're not playing their roles, they're not structured. Even their body language tends to be much more relaxed and people feel more at ease, they don't feel threatened. However, when people are with a very important time limit and they tend to be threatened by the deadline, threatened by the busyness, threatened by, for example, delivering certain projects, and there is no time for nothing else. There is no time for sharing their humanity, their common humanity with other companies. This tends to be only a formal aspect of the conversation. We don't get to the essence of the human beings. I'm not only applying this to employees. This can be applied to suppliers. So I know that many companies only contact suppliers when they have an order. to place or contact customer only to remind them that they have a new product that they're launching. Only business-oriented. What about sending a greeting, supposing that there is information in our database that, for example, an important date for this supplier that we can congratulate this company on, or we can greet this company because of this important date. The same with a customer. So should be less business-oriented. I know that sounds counterintuitive, but more human-oriented.

Nice.

Because at the base of any business are human beings. Even some companies, luckily not so many at present, treat customers as figures, as faceless figures, not as human beings with distinct needs. And some companies treat employees as cogs in a machine, in the organizational machine. So they use employees. So you see the concept of human resources. I'm also very challenged with this concept, human resources. Resources are to use. Instead, people, human beings— so for this reason, many companies are using now people team. People are to connect. Sorry, I'm talking too much.

No, no, I totally agree. You've touched on so many subjects I want to comment on. Human resources, can't stand that name. I don't understand why people would want to say that their humans are key resources. It makes no sense to me at all. Anyway, that's a personal thing. But going back to having meetings with no structure, it's interesting, isn't it? Because you are taught in business that you don't want to have meetings for the sake of meetings. So therefore, what you're saying is actually having meetings for the sake of meetings potentially is a good thing. It's a good thing.

It's a good thing because people get their defenses down. Instead, in the business meeting, most people are playing their role and the roles are all interlocked. So imagine that there are hierarchies for the reason— also I mentioned this in my book, The Art of Compassionate Business— that there is also a need for playful activities, time-off activities, social events. Many companies are lack in this event. They have only celebration by the end of the year, Christmas dinner, that's it. What about celebration of achievements? Achievement, for example, a new project that was successful. What about— some companies are changing this approach. Some companies, for example, they go to some spiritual retreat with employees, or some companies, for example, they organize some games, or some companies, for example, like Google, they have also some game facilities at their venues. So we have to change because at the end, play, interacting with others in a social way, not only in a business perspective, so make companies much more caring, appear more caring with customers, and they're not so focused on the business perspective that in many cases This, in the case of employees, can feel manipulated. They can feel used. They can feel unrecognized. They can feel even neglected. Let's give an example of the employee. If the employee is only going to the company to work and the work is a bit monotonous, the employee doesn't feel that this work is, for example, meaningful, that doesn't contribute to a purpose-driven project. In practice, this employee will be demotivated, naturally demotivated, and won't be feeling the excitement to go to work. Instead, when employees know that also beside business activity there could be also other events, and also there could be other conversation beside business conversation, well, in this case employees tend to reciprocate. There is a law in social psychology that is called the law of reciprocity. So And to put it simple, if you treat employees well, they are more likely to reciprocate, mean to act in a similar way. If you cheat on employees, they're more likely to distrust you and also not cooperating with your company. So in practice, this is also a win-win approach because in practice, treating everyone in this company and outside the company in a loving way allows the company not only to thrive economically speaking, but also to nourish this important base, business base, that is the relationship, the stakeholders.

Do you see more and more companies going this way from your research?

I will give you an example. One of the biggest companies, if not the biggest now, you see Amazon. Amazon, you know the company Amazon, very well known, and also obviously grew a lot over these years. And Amazon, believe it or not, has a compassionate and caring attitude toward customers. I buy a lot of books every week and I read a lot of books every week. And so what I've seen that every time that I buy a book, Amazon, because obviously know me as a very good customer, Give me recommendations, simplify my buying process. So for example, you read this or you bought this book, we recommend these related books such as this, this, this. But also, if I want a book and I want to be— this book to be delivered as soon as possible, Amazon saves time for me. So this means that they're delivering— if you have a subscription to Prime, they will deliver, for example, the book during the same day. So this is amazing because not many companies do this. They take the— and this takes a lot of work. You see, you don't see the work behind, but there is a lot of work to set this system and make recommendations that are tailor-made, customized to specific readers. The same for other products. But I will give another comment, another comment about this is about the company that It's called UPS, UPS, and obviously UPS use a lot of planes, but also they are committed not only to contribute to communities, but so what is very important, they do donation activities, social oriented, but also they, what they do is reducing this carbon dioxide emission that, you know, that are very important and also contribute to the environment. In some cases, companies that are compassionate go beyond what is said by law, because respecting the law is the basis of any business activity. If not, you will get in trouble, legal troubles. But the idea is going beyond what is said by law, by legislation, and also contributing in a way that is meaningful. This not only brings about positive results from the economic perspective, but also improves the company's image and and at the same time create a much more attractive image to bring about new stakeholders that are aligned with our mission. For example, if a company is purpose-driven, it's more likely to attract a lot of talented people as compared with a company with no purpose. Why? Because talented people are very choosy and will try to look for companies that they feel at ease, that can contribute, they can feel of value for this company. But the very important point also I want to highlight is that from the business perspective, let's talk about customers a bit. Customers are obviously the concept of marketing regarding customers is that the most important stakeholders is an external stakeholder. However, marketing only limits these activities to satisfying customer needs. My approach in business from the compassionate perspective is to exceed customer perspective, and I want to give you an example. I'm half Italian, and when I went to, in the past, to a coffee shop, I went and I like this coffee shop. It was a very big chain, an international chain, and I I asked for a cappuccino and the lady at the counter told me, okay, we will bring. Wasn't in a good mood, but I was okay. The lady was not in a good mood and I said, you can wait there, we can bring you the cappuccino. 15 minutes later, she brought the cappuccino. I tried to drink the cappuccino and the cappuccino was cold. So the cappuccino late and cold. I went to the competitor venues, and this means obviously I don't want to reveal the name of the companies, but and I asked for similar cappuccino, and I asked this person, the vendor, and told me, okay, okay, wait here. In one minute you will have the cappuccino ready. Okay, good. So when she brought the cappuccino, I saw a tray and I said with some biscuit. I said, sorry. So there is a mistake, there is a mistake here. Sorry, I didn't order the biscuit. I don't want to pay for them. No, no, you don't have to pay. This is a gift. This is a gift. The biscuits, from the viewpoint of this company, was the cost was pennies. From my viewpoint, the biscuits were perfect with this cappuccino. They have a good match. So, and the cappuccino was very nice, very savory, and very hot, and delivered on time. Now I ask the listeners, which of these 2 companies do you think that the customer will go back? The first company delivering this late, cold, no additional products as a surprise. This means that not even meeting the basic needs. Because I wanted to have a cappuccino, unless you ask a cold cappuccino, should be hot and delivered on time. You can be in a rush. And the second company exceeding, this means that they were over-delivering. And I like this, you know which companies are more likely to be compassionate? The companies that under-promise and over-deliver. This is a concept coined by Tom Peters, the management guru. that it's better not to boast about your offerings. Obviously, the offering should be suitable for customer, but then you surprise customer with a generous attitude, with additional gift. I know a case of a company that, for example, a customer bought a mobile and then they sent free, free of charge, By mail, a case for the mobile, no charge. And this was explained, that was, and thanking this customer for the— this is a completely different approach because if companies adopt a general attitude toward customer, a grateful attitude toward customer, they tend to be grateful with us, they tend to be generous with us. How they can be generous with us? If you tell me what coffee shop You should go. I will tell you the name privately. It's the second company. So this means that customers were treated in a loving way. They become like invisible ambassadors for this company and they try to, for example, write positive reviews on social media or recommend to a friend. So this means that customers love this company, love the product. In the first case, I cannot say that I love this company and I never went back to this company. But this is a very simple example. And how can leaders, leaders, company leaders can apply this on a clear way? I feel that leaders have a very important responsibility. They have a vision, they are leading companies and obviously people working for this company. They have the big view of this company, but at the same time In many cases, they lose contact with the baseline, with the employees, with the different human beings that are working and contributing in the same way as the leader, but in different functions for this company to thrive. So leaders, when working for companies, are going to adopt a much more empathetic and more compassionate attitude, should connect more. much more on a continuous basis with different employees or different representatives of employees, but at the same time should be taking the lead to recognize achievement, not only citing the figures. For example, our company grew 8% this month. A good way to approach this news will be, our company grew 8% this month generous employees such as these, these named employees contributed to this project and we really appreciate this. So this means that you have to show not only figures to engage with people but the human face, the human being. So this is what is missing in many business reports. So I mean many business reports are very business-oriented, but what about Employees. What about customers? For the reason when companies are using advertising in a successful way, they include the face of a human being. You see many, for example, non-charitable organizations when they look for, for example, funds and from different organizations or from individuals in general, they show, for example, this lady, this little girl is suffering in Africa. Her name is this, this. So they try to show the human face. Then, well, if not, everything gets confused, like in a very blurry substance with no humanness, no humanity.

That's really interesting. Do you, do you think that technology can play a role in this engagement? Because You've got companies like ActiveCampaign. I can only— it's something that we use, and when we send out information to potential clients and clients alike, and I guess stakeholders across the field, we tailor what it is that we're sending people so that therefore they get what they want rather than what we want them to have because we're starting to learn them. And actually, a really good example of this is hotels. When you arrive at some of the larger chains now, you arrive and they recognize your name and where you're from. So therefore, you've stayed in New York, you've stayed in Singapore and in Madrid, and they know that you actually usually drink black coffee.

Right.

It's that personal touch and it's using technology for those personal touches.

I agree on this. Thank you for the example. I will say that technology helps us to customize our messages, but also because you have— many companies have big databases, so they can get lots of information about customers, about, for example, employees, and they obviously customize, they make this messages tailor-made. But also what I would say, technology is good, obviously makes things easier, quicker. But also let's give an example. If a company is only selling online, the company should always have a telephone line, a phone line, so that customer can contact and hear anyone's voice from people working for this company. And also very important Preferably, if the meeting can be held, for example, a video conference and the same meeting can be held in person, I would prefer that this meeting is held in person because even with video conference, in some cases you lose some gestures, body language, signs, so that we are not aware in, for example, video conferencing or even Moreover, email— many companies are very reliant on email. Well, email is completely out of context. You have to be very clear with the context, but in practice, email is sequential communication. This means that you send an email and then they give you the answer. So it's not interactive, it's not interactive at the moment, so at present. So I will say always use technology. If possible, use technology to customize your messages, but at the same time, don't forget to give the human touch to, for example, your communication. A meeting in person with all the employees or visiting, dropping by some suppliers if possible in their same location will be nice because this has a better connection as compared with the cold approach with technology. What I want to say also that technology can be useful to, for example, adapt products for a specific customer. So I agree on the concept of non-standardization means products should be adapted when possible, taking into account all the company structure according to specific needs. So all customers are different. So this means that we have customers that like this type of product. Another type of product. And in practice, you should offer options, not the ones that are convenient for your company, but convenient for customers. So I will summarize: standardization technology allows you to get away from a standardization of messages, but also standardization of product marketing. We have also the concept of a standardization of products. Generally, it obviously saves cost. You save cost when you standardize products. You sell all the products, the same product to everyone, but in practice you are not taking into account the specific needs of this human being. And at the same time, complement— if you are selling only online, complement this obviously approach, communication online, with for example chat on the phone or video conference or if possible a meeting when possible, so, so that customer doesn't feel that they are treated in an impersonal way. We want customers and also employees to be treated in a personalized way, in a very human-oriented way.

Yeah, I couldn't agree with you more. We use our telephone all the time, and one of the criticisms I have from friends who— they're like, well, what happens if too many people phone? Well, then you bring more people on because obviously you need We give our telephone out to everyone because I think that's what it's about, isn't it? It's about talking to people and actually getting to know your customer, getting to know the people that you are working with, be it selling to, working with on your team, or in the community around you. And by not knowing people, you get much more out of talking to people than a one-way dialogue. And so I totally, totally agree. I mean, finishing up, what would you say the top actions you would like to see people take on the back of this podcast?

Well, thank you for this question. The 5, like, let's say 5 top actions will be We have to bear in mind that businesses are always based on relationships. If we only focus on economic parameters— productivity, profitability, competitiveness, and others— and you do not focus on building mutually beneficial relationship, long-term relationship with different stakeholders like suppliers, employees, customer, community, this business activity will dwindle over time. You won't— why? Because you cannot prosper, you cannot thrive on your own. You need all these people. You are interdependent regarding them. So this is a very important concept. So take into account, always bear in mind, and also connected to this concept, when you connect to stakeholders, Is this a win-win approach or trying to get something from them and they will be losing something because of this exchange? So when a company, for example, want to sell a new product, should consider this from the customer perspective, from the community perspective, from the employee perspective, because all these stakeholders will be affected even in any business decision. So all Stakeholders should be considered at first, later on, because they will be affected directly or indirectly. Second point is many companies are focusing on getting. I want to get more sales, I want to get more customers, I want to get more— less costs, and I want to get like more market share. I want to get more competitive. Getting. Getting means I want to obtain, receive, generate. What about giving? The concept of gratitude was researched a lot by scientists, and what they say that when people are generous toward others, they generate a positive cycle because people tend to reciprocate. They feel recognized, they feel acknowledged as human beings. So I would say company leaders and people working for companies, think about ways that you can be more generous with other stakeholders. Could be if you are an employee working for a colleague, how you can be more generous? Can you be more supportive? Can you give some advice to this employee? If you are, if you are a company leader, well, how you can be more generous with the people working for your company? And how you can be more generous with customers and also suppliers? So generosity is not only about giving material things like, for example, bonuses to employees. Also, it's giving recognition, it's giving support, it's giving an ear when someone, for example, an employee wants to hear some comment from the manager and is not always available. Well, if the manager adopts a compassionate attitude toward this employee, will be available once in a while. This means that will be willing to listen to this employee with no business purpose, only to acknowledge the human being with specific needs. So this will be generosity, will be the second one. The third one will be gratitude. There is a lot of research on gratitude, and research states that gratitude allows people not only to make others feel Better because you are recognizing, you are focusing on the positive. Gratitude means appreciating others, focusing on the positive, appreciating things. Most people tend to by default look for the opposite to gratitude— moaning, or for example complaining, or harshly criticizing. This is not gratitude at all. This is the opposite. And there is some research that implies that the interaction should have a ratio of positive 3 to 1, or some authors would say 5 to 1, means you should have— when you interact with people, you should have them feeling in a positive way 5 to 1. Means that one time that you relate to these people won't be feeling so well. So this means that you, by being gratitude— grateful, you are more likely to engage with these employees and stakeholders in a much more meaningful way. What I was saying, how you can be grateful with employees, write thank you notes, for example, when they have some achievement. With suppliers, thanking them for the delivering of products on time. Customers, thanking for their custom, but also even thanking when they visit your company, because some companies only thank customers when they buy products. What about thanking when they visit your company, do not buy any product? They took the time to come here, so even they didn't choose your product, they took the time to— so thanking stakeholders help companies to develop a much more compassionate attitude. And this will be— and the 4th one will be try to engage different stakeholders in a non-business way. This means that what we call natural conversation. How we can engage and talk about topics that are not necessarily related to, for example, business or business deals or objective, business objective. An example could be when, for example, a company is visiting their supplier. The first part of the conversation could be about completely informal topics. For example, For example, this supplier have some problems, a personal problem. They can discuss on a personal level how they are, how they are feeling now. Obviously allow business environment to be pervaded by emotion. There is a lot of research on emotional intelligence, and emotional intelligence is called a soft skill. I don't believe that is soft skill at all. It's necessary for any business strategy, business environment. So when you engage in much more informal conversation with stakeholders, you allow them to be full human beings, not only a role, not a business role, not only a supplier, not only an employee, not only a customer. So this means that you consider the, the whole aspect of this stakeholder. And we can say that another point will be Taking into account the aspect of respect, you can say most companies are respecting customers and employees. Well, respect implies not manipulating stakeholders. And what will be the best example of a company that is manipulating stakeholders? For example, if a company is trying to— and this happened with lots of airline companies. If a company is telling me that they're selling a ticket at, let's say, £90, and then when I check on the website, I check on the website and I add all the ancillary items, charges, and this ends up being £200. Myself as a customer, I feel cheated on. So I feel that this was a manipulation strategy. This means that The company was not being transparent. So for the reason companies can avoid manipulation strategy when they are transparent, but also when they're trustworthy. But the best way to simplify this is when they look for mutually beneficial relationship with every single stakeholder, not only as specific activity. For example, corporations whole framework that the company should use. Are we developing mutually profitable or mutually beneficial relationship with these stakeholders? If not, how we can improve? Are we getting all the gains at the expense of other stakeholders? Is it fair? So a company should ask always this, this question: is it fair? Is it benefiting everyone involved? So And lastly, try to take into account that all feedback is to be welcome. And we can say, what is the feedback to be welcome? An example will be that some companies, for example, the decisions are made by the top level. They do not allow employees that are obviously in the battlefield with the customer and also all the day-in-day-out activities to give any opinion. They don't allow employees to express their voice. So this means that many leaders, they believe that they know each other. However, employees might have a lot of tacit knowledge from their day-in-day-out activity that could be useful to improve the company's activities to meet the objective in a better way. This means that for this reason, a much more participative approach. Can we engage employees if possible in certain decisions that are important, that can contribute with their own value? Can we engage with customers also? Can we engage— can we listen to customers what we are doing wrong? A cooperative approach with customers will be not only delivering good services that are suitable for them, but also listening to their complaints. Can we take on board their complaints? Because my— this complaint might help us develop much more innovative, much more innovative. They are the one using the product and buying the product. If we don't take into account, competitors will do. And I don't like the word competitor. I would say other companies will do. And also try to take the— and the last, and this is the golden tip— try to take out of your mind the concept of competition. I know that sounds a bit crazy when I said this, but in practice, competitors, or other companies I would like to call, in your sector could be considered in a much more positive perspective. How we can consider this? You consider if they're doing things correctly, you can consider them as a model to emulate. You can see then, okay, what they're doing, and also even this could be the basis for future improvements. But also, if they're doing things not so good, this is a model not to emulate. So you should be doing things differently. This means that, for example, if they're delivering a product late, your company should look for better delivery, quicker delivery, because they're not doing things correctly. And also very important, taking into account that companies are always human-oriented.

Wonderful, thank you very much. That's really, really useful, and it's fascinating listening to you. I could listen to you all day on this subject. It's something that I think is incredibly important and really beneficial to understand more, and anyone listening to the Podcasts can buy your book on Amazon, and it's called *The Compassion of Business*.

*The Art of Compassionate Business*.

*The Art of Compassionate Business*. And it's you'd be able to learn about what it is and the roadmap through and how to grow your business in the way that, in my opinion, should be grown.

Thank you very much. Yes, you can find the book, The Art of Compassionate Business, in any bookshop offline or online. And also you can check if you want my website, that is www.humanorientedenterprise.com. Thank you very much. Thank you for your invite.

No problem. We'll put all the links on the website, um, at the end of the show. But thank you very much for your time today.

Thank you.

Thank you so much for listening to the end of this episode of the Green Element Podcast. Do take a moment and share this with your friends and colleagues and rate and review the podcast wherever you get your podcasts. I'd love to know what has been your biggest takeaway from this conversation. What are you going to do differently? Please share your thoughts across social media and tag us so we can see them too, @GE_podcast. For links and show notes for this episode, visit our website, greenelement.com. Thank you again. I hope you will join me on the next episode, and together we can help create a better world.

Thank you.