The JUST Report: Hurricane Helene Gives Corporations A Chance To Lead

Moving the needle on corporate justness often requires a patient, deliberate, hands-on approach. This was evident recently, when the JUST team – in conjunction with the Gates Foundation and several partners – brought together 14 executives from big companies for a groundbreaking 4-day summit to advance workforce innovation and well-being.  

Occasionally, though, external events compel companies to move swiftly to help their stakeholders, whether that means their employees, their customers, the communities they operate in, or society at large. Hurricane Helene is such an event.  

It starts with financial support. Many companies we track – including Bank of America, Lockheed Martin, Wells Fargo, Truist, Target, and others – have made sizable donations to local charities, the American Red Cross, and other organizations to help provide essential needs and resources to those most affected. 

Others also deploy their corporate capabilities. AirBnB, for example, is providing free temporary housing to displaced families. Amazon’s Disaster Relief and Response Team is leveraging the firm’s logistics, cloud computing and transportation assets to support organizations on the ground and to ensure critical help and supplies get to those in need. Walmart, Kroger, Home Depot, and Lowes, all of which have employees directly in harm’s way, are using their stores and warehouses as distribution centers for food, water, charging stations, generators, chainsaws, portable AC units, and more. 

As the saying goes, crisis doesn’t create character, it reveals it. For many business leaders, Hurricane Helene has given them the chance to show what they’re made of.  

Be well, 

Martin

Quote of the Week

“I love trying to add purpose to the things I do because it gives me meaning. But I never advocate for people to insert purpose into their own businesses. It can end up as performative. A business can be a great social good on its own, and I don’t like adding gimmicky, fake missions. If you care about an issue, and you find a way to use market forces to channel that impact, it can do good. But often corporate communications departments are like, how do we add these as a feature? And it can be fake and doesn’t help.” 

• Daniel Lubetzky, the newest member of “Shark Tank” and founder/former CEO of Kind, speaking to Barron’s on how he believes companies should integrate purpose into their businesses, but only when it’s a natural fit. 

Take Part in the CRE Alliance’s Final Public Comment Period of 2024

The Corporate Racial Equity Alliance, comprised of JUST Capital, PolicyLink, and FSG, have developed Business Standards for 21st Century Leadership to define business leadership that values people, planet, and the bottom line. Following our May 2024 release of draft standards 1-8, we have now released standards 9-14 for public feedback. The newly released draft standards focus on corporate impact on communities and society. 

To lend your perspective on the topics of corporate impact on communities and society at large, please take our online survey by October 31. Stakeholder engagement in the development of these standards is key to our success. We hope you’ll join us and share your feedback. 

JUST AI

It’s official: OpenAI is planning to become a for-profit business, causing several other executives to leave, and putting up more legal and logistical roadblocks. Mashable has the story. Meanwhile, Axios looks at some of the underlying causes of this shift. 

Must Reads

Fortune reveals that shareholder proposals on diversity, pay equity, and plastic pollution got less support this season, but anti-ESG proposals also got less support. Learn more. 

Board Member Peter Georgescu writes how, with a hollowing middle class, stakeholder capitalism is the best hope for a brighter future in his latest Forbes piece.

The Washington Post looks at the longshoreman strike, and the impact it could have on goods moving into the U.S. 

The Wall Street Journal takes a look at the slow migration from salary-based pay to incentivized-bonus pay for many jobs, and how now, a majority of Americans work in positions where a chunk of their pay isn’t guaranteed.

Reuters examines the fallout that occurs when a Dollar Store closes in a low-income community.