How to Save the World

John Abrams' The Company We Keep is the story of a Natural Enterprise, with all of the qualities necessary to be a sustainable, responsible, joyful business (in stark contrast to most traditional corporations):

It's egalitarian, not hierarchical.
It adapts to circumstances and lets solutions to problems emerge, rather than 'imposing' prescribed solutions.
It's collaborative, not competitive.
It buys respectfully. and finances purchases organically, rather than by beating suppliers down to the lowest price and then depending on low interest rates and government subsidies and 'incentives' to stay afloat.
It communicates its products virally, not through propagandist advertising and marketing.
It strives for responsibility, effectiveness and zero waste, rather than externalizing its costs and wastes for short-term profit.
It evolves through innovation rather than through growth.
It identifies and satisfies needs, rather than trying to create them.
Its strategies are improvisational, not preemptive.

Abrams' story is detailed and refreshingly candid -- he admits to the bad decisions, false starts, missteps and the continuing work in progress that his enterprise is. This makes his insights utterly credible, and his story immensely educational. Most of the corporate profiles in business management books and MBA 'case studies' are whitewashed and self-serving. Abrams, by contrast, gives us the unvarnished truth -- what really works, and what doesn't.

The book is divided into eight parts, each addressing one of the "building blocks" of Abrams' South Mountain Company, a homebuilding enterprise on Martha's Vineyard:

Workplace democracy: Every employee is an owner, and control of the enterprise is vested collectively in its thirty partners.
Sustainability without growth: "We think about 'enough' rather than 'more'", he writes. South Mountain adopts Thomas Princen's principles of sufficiency, and vows never to grow beyond Malcolm Gladwell's 'rule of 150' (the maximum number of people anyone can sustain deep, healthy social relationships with).
Goals of well-being not wealth: Profit is merely one means to achieving meaningful goals that benefit all the partners and the community in which they work.
Commitment to place and community: The island is a place South Mountain's people live in, know intimately, care about, and strive to make a better place for all.
Everyone doing what they do best: The idea of craftsmanship, of pride in excellence, of doing what its people do well and are passionate about, imbues everything the company does.
Conserving communities: Building community in an age of restlessness and forced transience is a great challenge. Conserving what matters -- love, deep relationships, local economies, the natural environment and all its inextricably intertwined elements -- depends on people being there, for a lifetime, who care, conserving the community.
Being an integral part of the community: This means taking an active part in community activities and investing time, energy and resources in problem-solving that extends far beyond the immediate interests of the company.
Thinking long term: Abrams calls this "cathedral building", citing Charles Handy. It is all about imagining inspiring possibilities and then working towards their realization, with the knowledge that this will benefit future generations, not today's, and that that is a good thing.

He explains, in a painstakingly careful and detailed narrative, how South Mountain learned of the importance of these building blocks, and applied them, ultimately with remarkable and delightful (and still evolving) success. He cites many of the same influences I have written about in my articles on Natural Enterprise: Charles Handy, Herman Daly, the Mondragon Co-op, Bill McKibbon, Patagonia, Seventh Generation, Bucky Fuller, Michael Shuman, WL Gore. He writes:

If we are lucky in life, work becomes an expression of who we are and one of our most important anchors of meaning.

What most impresses me about him is his modesty and humility (reminiscent of the qualities of another great natural entrepreneur, Dave Smith), and how these qualities have guided him and his partners through the uncharted struggles of entrepreneurship. They made South Mountain intensively attuned to their customers and their community, attentive, observant, adaptive, never reckless or arrogant. He expresses this caution about generalizing his own success story to some larger truth magnificently:

Is it a stretch to say that the more fully we are fulfilled in our work, the more fully we can love both our children and our community? And that the more fulfilled we are, the more we can help build a future that's sane and just? If I overreach, it is only my enthusiasm for the possibility that is at fault. Here then is one small business on one small island. Its lessons emerge from its story, but it is only one of many stories of small-business experimentation that are unfolding today in the wealthiest nation the world has ever known...Perhaps, combined [with others' stories] they might together alter, in some small way, the chemistry of our culture....[citing Lee Halprin] "All truth knows only a little of what it is...Certainly a lot of writing does not show that it knows the slightness of its knowledge"...I'll be trying to remember the slightness of my own knowledge...and trying to separate what I think I know from what I'm certain I don't.

Read this book, and discover the important message Abrams conveys when he says "At South Mountain, we are struggling to get the dog part right."

. . . . .

I am delighted to report that Chelsea Green, who are the publishers of Abrams' book, have contracted to publish my book about Natural Enterprise and 'working naturally'. I am blown away that my book has been accepted by the publisher of the works of extraordinary writers like Derrick Jensen, George Lakoff, Hazel Henderson and John Abrams. I second Abrams when he writes, in his acknowledgements, "I'm grateful for Margo Baldwin's confidence -- she's been with it all the way from the start, and I look forward to a long association with her and Chelsea Green". I also thank my agent, John Willig, for his confidence and perseverance in helping me evolve this book into one worth publishing.

The objective of my book will be to draw upon the stories of over a hundred companies that I have worked with or studied that are, or are becoming, Natural Enterprises, and relay their learnings, war stories, and their secrets of achieving success on their own terms. The book will offer a suggested roadmap for those looking to find or create what Dave Smith calls "meaningful work", but I will endeavour to follow Abrams' example and advice and provide the unvarnished truth about what works and what doesn't, and what I'm not at all sure about, in acknowledgement of the "slightness of my own knowledge".

And I'll try to get the dog part right.

. . . . .

I am also pleased to report that I have been asked, as a result of my recent article about the possibility of making Downsview Park a model community -- car-free, sustainable, self-sufficient -- to meet with the Downsview Lands Community Voice Association, the "watchdog" on the Park's development. I hope to connect them with John Abrams, Cradle to Cradle architect Bill McDonough, and others who can help them, and all of us, imagine what a community (in the middle of the city) could be.

Category: Creating Natural Enterprises