There’s a paradox at the heart of every values-driven business movement: the more it scales, the harder it becomes to stay true to what made it meaningful in the first place. So what does that mean for B Corps, a movement built around accountability, credibility, and using business as a force for good?
Professors Todd Schifeling and Suntae Kim have spent years studying the B Corp movement. Todd’s research focuses on the organizational and strategic dimensions of sustainability, while Suntae studies how entrepreneurship and innovation emerge in contexts of adversity. In this episode, Ryan Honeyman and Emmy Allison talk with Todd and Suntae about their Harvard Business Review article, The Paradox of Growing as a Values-Driven Company, and the research behind it.
They explore why some companies join the B Corp movement to help transform capitalism, while others join to demonstrate authenticity and distinguish themselves from greenwashing. Those motivations can pull in different directions: one pushes toward expansion, while the other pushes toward rigor, credibility, and protection from co-optation.
The conversation compares the B Corp movement with other market-based movements, including organic, fair trade, and microbreweries, and examines how values-driven movements can either become diluted through growth or remain too small to shape the broader economy. Todd and Suntae argue that B Lab’s distinctive approach has been to hold both goals at once: expanding the movement while tightening expectations, especially for larger and more complex companies.
They also discuss the inclusion of multinationals, the certification of subsidiaries like Ben & Jerry’s, the controversy around companies such as Nespresso, and why the new B Corp standards may be a critical test of whether larger companies can remain in the movement. Ultimately, this is a conversation about growth, authenticity, accountability, and the unresolved tensions that may define the next era of the B Corp movement.
What You’ll Learn:
- Learn why values-driven movements often face a tension between growth and authenticity.
- Understand why some B Corps join to transform capitalism, while others join to prove their credibility as responsible businesses.
- Explore how movements like fair trade, organic, and microbreweries offer cautionary examples of co-optation or marginalization.
- Recognize why B Lab’s approach has involved both relaxing and strengthening standards over time.
- Understand why the certification of subsidiaries and multinationals has created both opportunity and controversy.
- Learn why the question may not only be which companies are allowed into the movement, but which companies are allowed to stay.
- Explore how the new B Corp standards may test the movement’s ability to scale while maintaining rigor.
- Hear why B Academics and university partnerships may play a growing role in supporting B Corp learning, research, and collective action.
“It’s having a diverse movement and being responsive to the diversity of opinions that’s enabled B Lab to effectively manage these tensions.” — Todd Schifeling [0:33:55]
“The B Corp movement is really a reflection of the time when they were born – [when] corporations were strategically multi-faceted. They were still pursuing shareholder maximization, but also they were spending money on CSR.” — Suntae Kim [0:46:29]
“[The B Corp] is always unfolding. The story is never complete, the story is never finished. You can pause and say, ‘Oh, they’ve moved too far in this direction in this moment,’ but then if you come back, you can see they’ve moved in the other direction. It looks different from moment to moment.” — Todd Schifeling [0:49:38]
Links Mentioned in Today’s Episode:
- Todd Schifeling — LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/todd-schifeling-984b84130/
- Todd Schifeling — Fox School of Business: https://www.fox.temple.edu/directory/todd-schifeling-tuh48159
- Todd Schifeling — Email: todd.schifeling@temple.edu
- Suntae Kim — LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/suntae-kim-b68536124/
- Johns Hopkins Carey Business School — https://carey.jhu.edu/
- The Paradox of Growing as a Values-Driven Company — https://hbr.org/2024/03/the-paradox-of-growing-as-a-values-driven-company
- Wendy K. Smith — LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/wendykimsmith/
- B Local — https://usca.bcorporation.net/b-local-communities/
- B Academics — https://bacademics.org/
We want to hear from you! Email us at beyond@lifteconomy.com with requests for content, suggestions for future guests, and feedback about our episodes.
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Gratitude
Thank you to Corey Lien, Nozomii Torii, and Kirsten G. Bryant for being our monthly contributors at Beyond the B!
