Category: Sustainability
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Bad Businesses Can Get Better
A lot of businesses have done bad things in their past. Andre Hoffman, Roche’s Vicechair and heir to the founding family, has a book, written with Peter Vanham, on a better approach to business. Amongst other things he notes how bad businesses can get better. (I doubt he would say that Roche was at the…
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Creating Social Impact
The reason why business exists is to make the world better. This purpose, making the world better, can be more often honored in the breach than the observance. (I am using the common meaning of the phrase — doing something less than it should — not whatever Shakespeare is supposed to have meant.) That said,…
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Being Part Of A Big Team
I have a confession to make. I think it is a bit odd when people click their fingers in appreciation of a comment. In some ways I get the basic notion — you don’t want to disrupt the speaker making the point. Still, making a meaningful show of support is what we have clapping for.…
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Strong States Help Markets To Thrive
Rebecca Henderson, a Harvard business professor, writes about the need for business to become better than it is currently. She has a great book from 2020 on this. (The book is well worth a read, apart from a strange metaphysical bit at the end which was badly in need of an editor to say, “no…
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Cliches About Disruption Aren’t Public Policy Advice
In my last post I noted that I worked at the Labour Party during Tony Blair’s time. He is easily the best UK prime minister of my lifetime, so I really wanted to be positive about his institute’s report on climate change. The approaches outlined are quite sensible, but the overall report is just plain…
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What To Do About Climate?
I was Finance Director of the Labour Party when Tony Blair was Prime Minister. At the risk of sounding like a grumpy old man, it was a more optimistic time. There were notable problems of course; but at the least the mood music was positive. The Labour Party was proudly European, it wasn’t trying to…
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It Isn’t Good Enough To Be Just Against Things
Ezra Klein‘s and Derek Thompson‘s Abundance tackles how those who believe that the world can be better have to achieve more. It isn’t good enough to be just against things, i.e., stopping things getting worse. To make the world better, you need to be for positive progress. What you want also needs to be deliverable on a…
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Recognizing Trade-offs Is Critical To Progress
Progress isn’t always without costs. It is great when it is, but sometimes it won’t be. You can’t be paralyzed by the presence of a downside when you see a much bigger upside. One of the major public policy books of 2025 has been Ezra Klein‘s and Derek Thompson‘s Abundance. This argues that liberals need to embrace…
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Unexpected Friends to Innovation
Businesspeople like to complain about things, a lot. To be fair they are people, and that is something we people like to do. As such, it is always interesting to see when things that may seem like complaints to some turn out to be boons to innovation. What then are a few unexpected friends to…
