Hello

Sam Roberts, the owner of the Boston Tea Party chain of coffee shops has revealed that the company has lost £250,000 in sales since the introduction of non-disposable coffee cups.  Customers now have the choice of using a reusable cup, or putting a deposit down on a cup that they can hand back to any of the chain’s coffee shops.

This is to be applauded, this is great, this is the kind of company and leader that we should rally around and celebrate, because so many organisations are simply paying lip service to the global problem of pollution. They make the right noises, but often they are simply shuffling the deck, and employing a considerable amount of legerdemain.

We need to not only support the companies who do take action, but also to disengage from those who do not. Apart from the tangible and damaging impact of adopting a poor or nonexistent approach to protecting the environment, such short term thinking is also exceptionally stupid.

We have to ask ourselves, do we want to support, or indeed be employed by a company which is being run by the feeble-minded? I believe that Sam Roberts was quoted as saying that some organisations are putting profit before planet. That’s a great phrase, partly because it’s very profound, and also partly because it is really quite chilling. It reminds me of something that I have been saying for a few years now, ‘profit by all means, but not by any means’.

When a company, or a leader, or a group of leaders thinks ‘short term’, not only is it not wise, it is ultimately damaging. I believe that it was Andy Haldane, the Chief Economist at the Bank of England who said that we have to be careful of the primacy effect in relation to shareholders. In other words, the reflexive approach of blindly seeking to appease shareholders without more careful consideration of the wider implications of decisions taken e.g. the impact on stakeholders, customers, employees, the wider community and the environment, can lead to a severe diminution in true corporate governance. 

Organisations and individuals are essentially faced with a version of the marshmallow test, except that there is much more at stake. The marshmallow test is where children are given the choice of being able to eat one of three available marshmallows (at which point, if they do, the other two are taken away) or, they are told, that if they wait twenty minutes, they can have all three. 

Those children who practise this particular form of delayed gratification apparently enjoy much more fulfilled and rewarding lives as they grow up. 

We need wise leaders, wise businesses who think longer term, and we must expect that of them, and applaud them when they demonstrate real wisdom. The stakes of the existential marshmallow test are high, but so are the rewards. 

Best wishes 

Mike