This month is B Corp Month, a chance for all Certified B Corporations™ to celebrate their status, engage with the community, and encourage other companies and individuals to join the movement. Since TNB attends B Local meetings, we have had the opportunity to meet and work with other New England-based B Corps™ and learn from their experiences and insights. We wanted to highlight a few of those insights to give our community an idea of why B Corps™ get certified, how they engage their communities, and why their employees care.
This month we spoke to representatives from three local B Corps: Brittany Angelo from ReVision Energy, Molly Flynn from Dimagi, and Denise Thompson from Breckinridge Capital Advisors.
All three organizations are Certified B Corps who really value their place within the B Corp community. While the larger reasons for certification varied, everyone agreed that they, and their organizations, believe in the mission of the B Corp movement. Denise from Breckinridge mentioned that in addition to wanting to hold themselves accountable, they also appreciate having “a systematic framework to measure [Breckinridge’s] corporate sustainability performance.” This framework gives all B Corps verified standards to measure and report on their efforts.
Each organization is working on deepening the relationship between their teams and the B Corp mission through various company-wide initiatives including volunteer days, lunch and learns, and communication around the value of committing to the environmental, social, and governance practices all B Corps hold dear. This creates value not only for the organization but for the people who work there. Molly from Dimagi said: “I love working for a company that values their employees and is so focused on making an impact…our team thrives when they are collaborating together which I really enjoy.” By committing to their employee wellbeing in addition to their stakeholders, B Corps can create workplaces that value communication and collaboration. This helps attract employees who are not only talented but committed to the mission of an organization.
“I love feeling like every day I am working for a mission driven company helping to protect the future of the planet, not doing more harm than good” – Brittany Angelo, ReVision Energy
The Boston B Local group is also a huge benefit, since it provides a place for members of the B Corp community to meet, share best practices, and come up with ideas for collaborating and extending impact within the larger New England community. We at Tech Networks of Boston are very glad to be a part of the Boston B Local group, and our former Sustainability Coordinator Cissa Dieleman still serves on their board as Marketing Chair. These connections strengthen the impact that B Corps have within the community, creating a network of businesses and people who want to do better for people and the planet. Denise and Molly both serve on the B Local board as well, and they find a lot of benefit in learning more about how other B Corps work, implement benefits, and talk about their missions.
Tech Networks of Boston is proud to be a Certified B Corp and to develop relationships with other B Corps in the area. Speaking with other B Corps about their experiences reinforces the knowledge that we share a common mission: making business work for people. If you’re interested in learning more about the movement you can visit the B Labs website for certification requirements, a list of current B Corps, and more. To find out more about TNB’s experience as a B Corp, read our latest blog post.