Too many business owners are focused on the financial bottom line to the exclusion of everything else. Often this isn’t even by choice—they’d like to do something more, incorporate their values into their business, but they just don’t know how. While some books on socially responsible business practices have been published, for the most part these have been aimed at major corporations.
But small businesses are far more receptive to the “triple bottom line” of people, planet, and profits because so many of them are started by people determined to bring their personal values to the workplace. And small businesses collectively are huge—they employ half the workforce. Of the more than 5 million businesses in the U.S, only 17,000 have 500 or more workers.
To serve this large and growing market, Berrett-Koehler Publishers is partnering with Social Venture Network (SVN) to publish a series of low-priced, down-to-earth paperback guides that will walk readers through the practical steps of starting and growing a socially responsible business. This series represents the merger of the Berrett-Koehler mission of “Creating a World That Works for All” and Social Venture Network’s commitment to building a
just and sustainable world through business.
We know from our own experience that a new bottom line for business is possible, one that values healthy communities and the human spirit as well as high returns. Drawing on the expertise of SVN members, the Social Venture Network Series will show the owners and managers of small companies how easy—and how profitable—running a values-based business can be.
Find out more about the books in the series... |
