A Comparative Set of Book Reviews of Two Related Books
Screw Business As Usual by Sir Richard Branson, and Good Company Business Success in the Worthiness Era by Laurie J. Bassi, Ph.D, Ed Frauenheim, Dan McMurrer, with Larry Costello
A Review of Two Books by Herb Rubenstein
Introduction
The book, Screw Business As Usual, is actually a kinder and gentler book that its title suggests. Sir Richard Branson, of Virgin fame, has a portfolio of over 200 companies under his belt and knows a thing or two about how business has operated around the globe for the past fifty years. He uses this book to paint a contrast of how business used to be done and how really good business is done today.
No book can reach its mark just by saying here is the old way and here is the new way. Branson’s book shows how the old way of doing business has caused far more harm, and continues to cause more harm than it ever needed to, and shows how the new way can create more good than the old way of doing business ever could at a far lesser cost to the environment and people’s lives.
It is no accident that this book was written and published at the same time as the book, Good Company: Business Success in the Worthiness Era (Bassi, Frauenheim, McMurrer and Costello) since the message of both books is exactly the same. To take a quote from the Branson book and compare it to a quote from the Bassi book shows how similar these books are in their message.
Branson: “…doing good really is good for business.” (p.1)
“…doing good can help improve your prospects, your profits and your business, and it can change the world. (p. 2)
“Ordinary people have enormous power – let them unleash it.” (p. 7)
“…we are not at the top of a little hill called Corporate Social Responsibility, we are at the bottom of this big mountain called sustainability.” (p. 41)
Bassi: “Social Responsibility is not good enough.” (p. 9) “…Today companies embrace corporate sustainability as a key source of competitive advantage.” (p. 10)
“…companies that have behaved better – had outperformed their peers in the stock market.” (p. x)
“A growing body of evidence shows that companies can do well by doing good.” (p. 41)
“A convergence of forces – economic, social, and political – is pushing businesses to be better to their employees, customers and communities. In effect, people are demanding that companies in their lives be good company. (p. ix)
“We call this new chapter in our economic history the Worthiness Era.” (p. ix)
The Good Company - Bassi’s Thesis
Bassi’s thesis further documents that “There is another benefit of being a good company [as measured by achieving a high score on the Good Company Index which measures how good a company is to its employees, its customers, and as stewards of the environment and their communities]: it increases the probability of long-term survival.” (p. 78)
The Bassi approach amasses substantial evidence and makes a compelling argument that to be successful, you have to play by the new rules of the “worthiness era.” Rating the Fortune 100 on a scale of A to F based on objective data on the criteria of “good seller,” “good steward of communities and the environment,” and “good employer,” Bassi’s book shows that companies that rank higher on these scales outperform their lower-ranked competitors on their stock price performance over the 2008 – 2010 period. A continuing analysis of the data, now evaluating over 300 large companies shows that this improved stock performance ranking not only holds but was even stronger in 2011.
The distinction between these two books is that Richard Branson has compiled substantial evidence and related great stories regarding how the new way of business is actually taking hold around the world. The book is fascinating because it gives the reader an excellent sample of real businesses “doing good and doing well.” Branson, by example after example, shows the reader that new era businesses focus on maximizing value for their customers, communities, the world, and their employees, and can make a huge difference in the world and make a significant profit doing so.
Both books together now make the irrefutable argument that the future of business is well within their sights and the Branson book, through its case studies, and the Bassi book through its statistical analysis shows the path toward future business success consistent with the sustainability of the planet, the fair and equitable treatment of employees, and the value of great customer relationship strategies.
Branson’s Thesis
Sir Richard Branson states “I happen to believe in business because I believe that business can be a force for good. By that I mean that going good is good for business.”
Branson describes a new form of capitalism “Capitalism 24902” which will reshape the business world. He believes in business and he believes in people and their power “to make a difference every day, no matter how small the scale.”
He gives example after example of businesses doing well and doing good throughout the book. I urge you to buy the book and use this book review merely as an introduction to the thesis and body of Branson’s work laid out carefully and movingly in this book.
Branson also lays out his claim that business as usual is not working. He states that business as usual is companies that, in the name of maximizing shareholder value “…discard employees (at the drop of a hat, pollute our air and waters, or create short-term gains that are unsustainable.” Referring to Paul Hawken’s work in the book The Ecology of Commerce, Branson writes: “The biosphere is in decline. Industry is the major culprit because of the way it extracts resources and uses them to make products that, sooner or later, end up in landfill.”
From free universities to the Energy Future Coalition convened by Tim Worth, to the Virgin Green Fund, the Global Commission on Drug Policy, to small companies that recycle the clothing they sell when it is worn out, all of these and a hundred other examples in the book create the new paradigm that Branson calls “Capitalism 20492” and that Bassi calls “the worthiness era.” Branson says, and Bassi agrees, “People all over the world now have the power to share others’ perception of brands, including promoting those that are doing good things.” Bassi calls this “technology-fueled people power.”
Conclusion
These books are both a call to action and a statement that action is already being taken to change all economies in the world. Both books have the message if you don’t get on the train, you and your business will be left in the dust. Branson says, “…we are on the brink of a significant transformation in the world.” Bassi states it more succinctly. She states we are entering the “worthiness era.”
Both Branson and Bassi’s thesis in Good Company: Business Success in the Worthiness Era meld together into one thesis. Technology is changing the way business can and will serve the world. People have more power than ever even as multinational corporations grow larger than ever. The Bassi-Branson thesis is both hopeful and instructive. Without saying as much, each author makes it clear that there is no turning back, no bad, polluting behavior, no poor treatment or endangerment of employees, no large-scale bribery or treatment of consumers as second-class citizens that will be tolerated in the future. Screw Business As Usual should probably have had a subtitle: Business Will Do Better Starting NOW or ELSE!
Bassi concludes the book Good Company with this statement that could easily have come right out of Sir Richard Branson’s book: “Bad companies won’t be invited to the new world taking shape. They will wither. Good companies, though, will find themselves welcome. They will flourish.”
The Bassi-Branson thesis came about without the two authors and their teams ever knowing what the other group was going to write in their books. These two books present a clear statement supported by qualitative evidence in the form of Branson’s stories of good companies and the quantitative evidence of Bassi’s solid “Good Company Index” and conclusively prove that the path forward in 2013 and beyond is clear for companies to survive and flourish in this new era.