You have been digging for golden ideas to start Creating Shared Value (CSV) and are excited to begin creating profits with purpose that simultaneously drive sustainability, economic growth and social progress. You are ready to select an innovative project that will integrate social progress into your business strategies as a means of creating long term, sustainable profitability that benefits your stakeholders; employees, customers, stockholders, partners and the communities in which your company operates.
So far in this article series, we have explored the important questions to ‘ASK’, the ‘DIALOG’ needed to fire up awareness and provoke revolutionary change within your organization, and how to secure ‘SPONSORS’ to fund your journey. Finally we began to ‘DIG’ for ideas and opportunities to make profits with purpose. Today we will examine 3-5 ideas that surfaced during your ideation exercises.
You will want to engage in a structured prioritization exercise to select your first CSV project. It is helpful to invite participants that can effectively reflect the perspectives of each of your CSV stakeholders. As a group, you will be discussing and scoring each idea based on the follow criteria:
- The perceived value for each stakeholder. Each stakeholder may have a different overall weight based on your company’s strategic perspective. The defaults are provided but you can adjust them to reflect your viewpoint (be sure to adjust the maximum totals to reflect any changes you make).
- The variables related to the complexity, resources, risks and costs for each idea. Again here, you can adjust the weight of each as well as the variables themselves. For example, you may want to add time or measurability as variables and the weight for each variable should reflect your company’s viewpoint.
This exercise is far from a science, but it will help to abstract your collective personal biases to any particular idea and clearly reveal any ideas that are not ideal candidates at this time. Do not follow the results blindly; use them as further insight to your selection process. And do not ignore your passion or excitement for a particular idea, this is powerful fuel; use it to normalize your selection once the exercise is complete. Now, it’s time to choose and then celebrate this milestone!
In the next article we are finally ready to roll up our sleeves and ‘EXECUTE’ your chosen idea; your passage to create profits with purpose is officially underway! It is vital to be adaptive to what you learn as we move forward. Without question your idea as it is envisioned today will evolve and take new shape in ways you cannot yet anticipate, plan for this and embrace it as it comes. Remain mindful not to change with the wind but rather to continually rethink your idea as you discover new insights.
For additional advice and examples please contact me directly at dawna@dawnamaclean.com.
