By Mary Ellen Schaafsma and Coro Strandberg
In the face of the troubling issues we confront daily, including the climate emergency, systemic racism, rising inequality and the pandemic – to which we now add the devastation in Ukraine – there is a glimmer of hope. Society is discovering that businesses can be a force for good and their leaders are discovering this too. The Yale School of Management, for example, maintains a growing list of global brands curtailing operations in Russia because of that country’s war against Ukraine, over 750 and counting.
To harness and scale this trend to businesses adopting a social purpose as their reason to exist, and mobilize all their assets and resources to address the problems of people and the planet, the United Way Social Purpose Institute convened the first-ever national dialogue on social purpose business in Canada: Propelling Purpose Summit 2021. Over 300 thought leaders and leading thinkers, including 70 diverse panelists, gathered from across the country to design the roadmap for Canada’s Purpose Economy, and here it is: Propelling the Canadian Purpose Economy: A Framework for Action.
