How To Make The World A Better Place

It’s been another harrowing week of political challenges to progressive action — from targeting of Harvard University to corporations pausing or silencing impact initiatives that are intended to make the world a better place.

Over the past two decades leading Impakt and, more recently, helping advance the Impakt Foundation for Social Change, I’ve seen the highs and lows of the social impact space first hand. This week I’ve been thinking a lot about what really matters in this work and thought I’d share ten principles that have informed my work. They’re more important than ever to me and I hope they’ll be helpful to you too.

1. Purpose is the North Star: In a volatile environment, staying anchored in why we exist beyond profit is essential. Check out Greater Purpose , an new initiative that is helping to shape the next generation of business and Chief Executives for Corporate Purpose.

2. Authenticity Over Optics: Real outcomes matter more than ever. Social impact takes more than just communications. That’s always been the case but is especially poignant today when many companies are opting to stay quiet about impact.

3. Co-Create Impact With Communities: Solutions designed with those we serve are the ones that succeed. As my colleague Fatemeh Alhosseini, PhD always says about the work she is doing to improve lives for refugees “by newcomers, for newcomers.”

4. Small impact is really big impact. Helping to solve social problems and achieve the SDGs always starts small and often remains at a scale that can seem insignificant. It isn’t.

5. Practice Resilient Optimism: Hope isn’t naïve — it’s a strategic opportunity that keeps me moving forward.

6. Impact Starts on the Inside: You can’t build external credibility without internal integrity. Too many corporations are performative and opportunistic – these are the ones that went dark fastest after the inauguration.

7. Take Risks: In every thing, progress requires courage, not comfort. Today, almost everyone in the impact space is way out of their comfort zone and should use this as a opportunity to be even more courageous.

8. Keep Moving Up: At the end of every week I make 2 lists: one of things that moved up and the other of disappointments. The moving up list is always longer.

9. Play the Long Game: Sustainable change isn’t fast — but everything that’s really valuable happens slowly. Hockey stick growth almost never happens and when it does it usually ends badly.

10. Believe in Collective Power: To quote Mitchell Cohen, President of Daniels Corporation, from his great book Rhythms of Change, “Building community is very much like playing music: jamming with eyes and ears wide open, listening deeply and being generous with every player, building bridges and friendships with every refrain.”

The work of making the world a better place has never been easy. But the only certainty is what will happen if you don’t take action. So follow these principles and take action.

By Paul Klein, Contributor