Betsy Jordyn (00:00.204)
Have you ever poured your heart into a leadership development engagement or culture change initiative and then watched it flop and then beat yourself up thinking, what did I do wrong? Well, what if I told you it's not you? It's that you're just advising in a system that's actually rigged against the very things that you're hired to influence and support. So discover why your consulting or coaching may be hidden a wall on today's episode of the Consulting Matters podcast.
Betsy Jordyn (00:27.98)
And welcome to the Consulting Matters podcast. This is the show for purpose-driven consultants and coaches who are ready to own the power of what they do and position themselves for greater impact and income. I'm your host, Betsy Jordyn, and I'm an ex-Disney consultant and consulting business owner turned business mentor and brand positioning and messaging strategist. You can find out about all the things I do to help my clients turn their expertise, their strengths, and their passions into a standout brand and a thriving business that they and their clients love.
on my website at www.betsuJordyn.com. So today I wanna get into a unique topic that you would not expect on the Consulting Matters podcast, which is all about the differences between stakeholder capitalism and shareholder capitalism. And it's gonna be clear soon why I'm gonna be talking about it. But let me back up and talk to you about what is the best thing about what I do as a brand positioning and messaging strategist is it gives me a very unique point of view
on the consulting and coaching industry. So I get this vantage point where I'm up close to my clients and I get to see the brilliance of each of them. I get to see where they all fit in and stand out in the market. But I also get this wider view on what all my clients have in common and what they're trying to create or achieve in the world, you know, the change that they see. And for many of them, it's about creating these workplaces that balance people alongside profits and global systems that support humanity first.
So they may have different disciplines, OD, lean, leadership development, change management, in a different language, coaches. They might have different words for it, but the vision is the same. And they also share many common struggles. Like they all struggle with, like, how do we get leaders to buy into people-centered leadership and operating practices where it makes really good business sense, really good ethical sense, but they just can't buy in for some reason. Or you have these change projects that sort of hit the dust. And why does that happen?
So I always wanna make sense of what's going on for my clients. I experienced this myself, but I'm also trying to make sense of what's going on in the United States that is really troubling to so many of us. And in my research, I stumbled upon something that really opened my eyes to the vision that we're all trying to create in our organizations and with our clients, the struggle that we have, and what is going on in the United States, which is we are operating from a stakeholder capitalism mindset in a world
Betsy Jordyn (02:53.442)
that has made a profound and committed shift to shareholder capitalism. And once I saw this, my gosh, my entire consulting career flashed before my eyes. Like I saw myself like delivering these assessment reports that had a lot of difficult feedback from my clients and that they resisted this information and they ignored it. And I could figure out why, like did I not convey the data clear enough? Did I not understand?
what they needed to hear so that they would buy in, but I didn't realize I was up against something bigger. And so what was happening over and over again is I was operating with the stakeholder mindset where I believed in my heart, and I still believe this, that organizations should invest in people, balance everyone's needs, and create long-term value. Like that is my worldview. That's how I operate. That's how I think organizations should work. But the reality is,
I was consulting inside a shareholder capitalism system that's literally designed to do the opposite. So this is a system where executives are legally required to prioritize shareholder profits above all else and where people are cost to minimize and where quarterly earnings matter more than long-term value. Like I knew that I was pushing up against those like 90 day numbers, but I did not realize like how entrenched it was. Like I just assumed like it was a handful of
of people who kind of believe that, but you know, on the whole, most of us kind of approached everything from the shareholder capitalism standpoint, but that's not accurate. And so this is what's happening for me or happened for me when I was a consultant that might be happening for you is that we're trying to plant these gardens in concrete and we're wondering like why nothing is growing. So if you can relate, today's episode is for you. So in this episode, I'm breaking down the differences and shifts from stakeholder
to shareholder capitalism, hopefully in plain English, hopefully without business school jargon, I promise I'm gonna do my best. And again, I get that this is not the typical topic that I get into on this show, but it's actually a reflection of the higher purpose behind what I do and why this show is even called Consulting Matters in the first place. So what you're gonna discover is we're gonna talk about the shift that happened in the late 1970s or 80s that changed how business works and why you need to know this.
Betsy Jordyn (05:10.018)
I'm also gonna get into the invisible game that you're playing, know, what it really means to have a stakeholder mindset and how it meets the shareholder system. I'm gonna talk more explicitly around what I wish I knew beforehand. Like if I can go back in time and talk to myself 30 years ago when I was just getting started in consulting, I wish I knew this information, you know, because I would have managed my expectations differently. I would have guarded my heart differently. So I'm gonna get a little bit more into those like reflections on lessons learned.
And then I'm going to share with you this vision that I've had brewing for a while that I'm calling the Common Good Consulting and Coaching Consortium. And this is an idea for how we can work together to move that pendulum back, you know, from where it's moved to, to the shareholder capitalism back to stakeholder capitalism. So when you tune in, here's what my promise is and why it's worth your time.
is you're gonna fully understand why most transformation efforts, particularly around people center culture change, fail to launch or fail just period, and how it has nothing to do with you or your influence skills. And so once you see this reality, what we're working in and what we're up against, instead of taking away your hope, it will give you clarity and the power for the real change that you're trying to create, because you'll understand the system that you're operating in.
You know, as James Baldwin said, not everything that is faced can be changed, but nothing can be changed until it is faced. And if I piqued your curiosity about the Common Good Consulting and Coaching Consortium, I would love to have you participate in my, get it on my interest list and participate in some initial calls that I wanna bring together so that we can co-create what this looks like. So this is a cross-functional professional association for those who believe in people-centered organizations and
human centric world. if you would like to be one of those early voices, please head on over to www.Betsyjordyn.com/common-good to join the interest list. So without further ado, let's get into the show. So number one, let's talk about the shift that changed everything. I don't know if you know this about me, but before I was a brand positioning, a messaging strategist, you I was a consultant. was a consulting business owner. And before that,
Betsy Jordyn (07:23.006)
I was an HR leader. So I don't know if you know that about my background, but way before that, I was a history major. So you gotta forgive me for a little bit. I wanna give you a quick history lesson. I'm gonna do my best to make it painless, but the history really helps establish the context. So between World War II and somewhere around the late 1970s, companies operated on what was called stakeholder capitalism. So basically what this means is business leaders saw themselves as stewards.
that they felt like they had responsibilities to workers, communities, suppliers, not just investors. So the perspective was, is you took care of your people, you invested your community, and then the profits followed. Profits matter, but so did everything and everyone else. And then somewhere around the late 1970s, there's this guy, his name is Milton Friedman. He wrote this essay that basically said, the only responsibility of business is to make money for shareholders, and that's it.
Everything else is nice to have, but it's not the point. The point is to make money for shareholders. So this really validated a lot of people's thinking. It wasn't like he just wrote this essay and everyone's like, my gosh, this is great. But he put some sort of logic around the whole idea of greed is good. And now we're off to the races. And now we're in the 1980s and now everything's locked in and accelerating. So this became the dominant model. It got coded into corporate law. Executive pay got tied to stock prices. Wall Street started demanding
quarterly earning reports and the whole system shifted to maximize shareholder value above all else. So we all kind of know, you know, in general what this was like, but this has become the system. And then all of this accelerated even more. Like I noticed a huge difference when I was an internal consultant at Disney and then I started my consulting business in the 2008 recession period, things changed even more. You know, so whatever balance was left really just got obliterated.
So companies that had been holding on to these stakeholder values, even just a little got crushed. So the pressure to prioritize shareholders intensified. Cost cutting became survival and people became the easiest expense to cut. So when I left Disney, right before this, again, I saw the difference. But when I was at Disney in the 2000s, we had this performance excellence initiative that actually led to the role that I had even being created.
Betsy Jordyn (09:40.8)
My role was created specifically to support leaders in making decisions that balance the guest cast and the business results. All three mattered, you know, and it's not the norm anymore. Like even Disney, my beloved Disney, I don't think was immune to the shift. Like so many companies, the pressure of the system made it harder and harder to maintain that balance between people and profits. So today, where we're at today is we are living in that system.
So even though companies say that they care about stakeholders, employees, communities, and the planet, the legal and financial structures say, shareholders first, everyone else maybe. And this is what kills me. It's not just publicly traded companies that operate like this. This mindset has carried over into other businesses, family-owned businesses, nonprofits everywhere. Shareholder capitalism isn't just a legal structure, it's become a way that we think about how business works.
So even though there's outliers like Zappos or Ben and Jerry's, they try to do things differently, but they're fighting an uphill battle in a system that is designed to resist them. And why this matters to you is when you walk into a client organization as a consultant or a leadership coach, you think you're dealing with leaders who can choose to do the right thing all the time, like that they have all the power. But the reality is, is they are operating in a system that legally and financially pressures them to prioritize shareholder returns.
So without understanding where they're at, you're gonna get blindsided over and over and over again. And so when you coach a CEO, let's say on servant leadership, and then they turn around and lay off 500 people and hit quarterly numbers, it's not that they didn't get it, or they didn't appreciate all that servant leadership should be, it's just the system demanded it. And you, and.
I don't think any executive wakes up and says, I wonder what I could do. I mean, I guess there's a few, but most of them don't wake up and say, what can I do to make employees lives a living hell? Like that's not their goal, but they are compensated for something very different than what we think is right for the business and right for the long-term value. So I want you to take a moment and I want you to think about your current clients, you know, or past clients or past experiences, because this really helped me put context into my past experiences.
Betsy Jordyn (11:48.618)
and really look at your struggles to convince them to create these more people-centered cultures, leadership and operating practices. And can you see why even the best intention leaders struggle to prioritize people over quarterly numbers? Like, do you really fully appreciate it? Like, I think in our head, we kind of understand like, okay, 90 day numbers are important, but if we could just convince them, show them a better way that they're gonna balance it out, like they have all the power.
And I want you to really connect a little bit more about like where your leaders might be at and all of the priorities and the pressures that they might be juggling that might make it difficult for them to just give you the full-throated yes, the buy-in that you're looking for. Now just want you to see it from their perspective. So did you got that? Awesome. Let's move on to the next point. Point number two, the game you didn't know you were playing. So here's where it gets personal. So I wanna go from the generic of like, okay, here's the differences between
stakeholder capitalism and shareholder capitalism and bring it down to us and how this impacts us. So from our standpoint, most of us consultants and coaches were idealists. And when I say idealists, it means that we believe in a better world and we are motivated to make it happen. Like we believe in our hearts. This is not just a, just an intellectual belief. Like we believe in our hearts that investing in people, balancing stakeholder needs,
creating cultures where people thrive, like we believe that everywhere in our bodies, know, our hearts, minds, our beings, like that's why we do this work. Our fields that we dedicate our careers to, the education that we get, the special certifications, everything that we do is born either from these stakeholder values or were created as a counterbalance to the shareholder capitalism. So everything we do.
everything we advocate for emerges out of our stakeholder mindset that we're bringing into organizations that operate on a shareholder mindset. And that's where the roadblock is. That's what we hit in our work. So we are brought into help with people or process problems like low engagement, high turnover, resistance to change, lack of innovation and more. And we are in a system that is incentivized to not address the real root causes. Think about it realistically. When people are treated as cost to minimize,
Betsy Jordyn (14:03.818)
Are they going to be engaged? Like, are you gonna really get their hearts and minds, you know, when people can get laid off at random, you know, like depending on like how the quarterly earnings are that they could just get laid off. If short-term profits trump everything, why would people innovate? You know, how do you do innovation? Because innovation is about the long game. When employees know that the company will cut them the second it helps the stock price, of course they're gonna resist change.
So there's a lot of stuff in the system, the real root cause of a lot of the things that we are trying to address and change in the organization are really butting up against this shareholder capitalism. And so then we get blindsided and we're brought in, like, okay, but I'm trying to achieve these goals of what you say, but they're not really motivated to address the real root causes. So it's not that change in general fails. Like everybody says like, and majority of change fails. Change happens all the time.
and it gets executed just fine when it serves short-term profitability. Layoffs, they get executed just fine. Cost cutting, no problem. Process improvements that increase efficiency, done and done. What fails all the time is the transformational change, the things that support the long-term success in people-centered cultures. So sure, everyone gets excited at first. You facilitate cultural transformation workshops and other things that inspire the organization. You work with
process teams and other collaborators to create this beautiful vision of collaboration and empowerment, and then nothing changes. And that's because the economic model still says people are cost to minimize. So now your culture work has become theater. It's something nice that you do while the real business is happening elsewhere. Or you coach a leader on empathy and inclusion. They love it, they're all in. And then their bonus structure rewards them for quarterly earnings, not employee well-being.
Guess which one wins when there is a conflict. But the shareholder mindset requires control and extraction. So this system of collaboration empowerment gets undermined or they go through the motions. And when this happens, we fall into two predictable traps. One trap is we blame ourselves. It's like, my gosh, I just don't have the right influence skills or I'm not strategically positioned. My techniques are off. So we think we need better change management, better communication skills.
Betsy Jordyn (16:25.038)
all consultants and coaches need to develop their influence skills and their relationship skills because at the end of the day, you know, the delivery mechanism of our expertise is through relationships. That is Peter Block 101. We have to do that. But the reason why things fail isn't because your influence skills. Like think about it. Is that if you really understood what you were up against, you know, would you even need to influence if the organization was operating according to the stakeholder values that you have?
You know, so that is one of the traps. So the number one thing that you need to step away from, hopefully from this episode is like, it's not your fault. But the other trap is we blame the leaders and it's not always their fault. Like yes, for sure. There are bad leaders who consciously choose to harm employees and customers for the sake of short-term profits and executive bonuses. I have been in those boardrooms. It is not pretty. And it does happen. But I really believe in all of my 30 years of consulting.
that would be an anomaly. Most leaders aren't that evil. Most are well-intentioned people caught in a system that punishes them for doing the right thing. I have seen that just as much as I've seen the evil ones. Actually, I've seen the evil ones much more rare. The ones that are doing the right thing and get punished for it is more the norm. So the real problem is it's the system. One thing I learned from the lean practitioners that I work with is this principle about respect for people. And I love this principle.
And the assumption is if mistakes are made, the assumption isn't to blame employees, but to look at the process and assume that something is wrong with the way processes are defined and taught. Like to me, that is a huge benefit of lean. This is what I love about lean is that respect for people, respect for the adulthood and assuming that employees are well-meaning. So that's a good assumption, but this principle holds true on a much bigger level.
You if you can't get leaders to shift their thinking, don't blame your influence skills and don't even blame the leaders. Blame the system. The system that is legally designed to prioritize shareholder profits. That's what they're designed for. The incentive structures are designed to reward short-term gains over long-term value. And they are structured with power imbalances where capital matters more than labor. So I want you to think for a moment.
Betsy Jordyn (18:42.22)
You know, just like getting real about your own experience, about being a stick holder mindset person in a shareholder prioritized mindset world. You know, have you ever blamed yourself for work that didn't stick, you know, or blame leaders for just not getting it? You know, or what shift would happen if you saw the system was working exactly as it's designed and your advice, your guidance, your project plans, influence skills, or the lack of influence skills were never really the core of the problem. Again, I want you to think about this.
If the organizations that you're supporting actually had a bias for stakeholder mindset, how much would you even need to influence? You would be doing a lot more coaching, a lot more support because the mindset already exists. So that's the second point is understanding the game we're playing. Now I'm gonna get into what I wish I had known 30 years ago that I wanna encourage you with. I'm sharing all this information not to bum you out, but to manage your expectations.
I really wish 30 years ago, like if I can go on a time machine and I talked to myself 30 years ago when I got my start in OD, I would have shared this information because I would have known when I poured my heart into reports that summarize the hours I spent listening to employees and customers and where they share what they needed and the leaders were like nodding along and not really 100 % in there, I wish I would have known what I was up against. I would have known that short-term results would win the day so much more often than I realize.
Like instead of wasting time, like wondering what I did wrong or if I didn't communicate well enough, I would have known I was operating with a stakeholder mindset and a shareholder system and I would have managed my expectations. I would have right-sized my hopes of what I could and couldn't influence and chosen my battles a lot more wisely. I would have right-sized it. I would have taken the wins when I had them instead of pushing for more. I would have celebrated when I had that one leader who was really on board.
You know, and what that meant, and that even if the entire initiative did not go to the level that I thought it could, but that one leader made a shift, I would have taken that win, I would have celebrated it. I would have guarded my heart more when I was delivering recommendations that conflicted with short-term profitability. I would have known in advance what type of resistance I was gonna get. You know, and I would have managed my idealist heart better. I would care, but just not too much. You know, that's the balance. If you can relate, let me know.
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Because what I wanna say is like, I don't want you to give up. Like it's not about giving up. It's not about like saying, okay, this idea of this people-centered organization is too much of a pipe dream. It's really just right sizing your expectations and knowing you can influence what you can, take the wins and getting smarter about how you position your advice in the context of what's really driving the profit priorities. So if you're one of those lucky consultants or coaches have found yourself in an organization that truly values and lives stakeholder capitalism, celebrate it, savor it,
I would love to hear all your best practices. You have found yourself a true needle in the haystack client opportunity and that is great. And for the rest of your client opportunities, don't give up. Just manage your expectations and get more savvy. What this looks like. So I want you to think about this if you're in that place and just consider, for example, if you're coaching a leader to transform from command and control to more of an empowering leadership style, how can you become more aware of the other influences that impact that leader's performance?
You know, what they're being taught elsewhere, what they're rewarded for. You know, if you're presenting data that demonstrates the long-term value of an initiative, as you build the business case, how can you become more aware of and accommodate impacts on quarterly targets? You know, can you make it more explicit? Like, okay, so here's the impact. Or can you add things in that is going to have some short-term bumps? You know, when you're making recommendations that you know is in the best interest of your client's long-term health and success, how can you guard your heart
that when decisions are made that the long term is sacrificed for the sake of the short term, how can you guard your heart from the disappointment? And the one last thing I wanna talk about before I move away from my manage your expectations and guard your heart section of this podcast is I wanna talk about the reality of what gets us to consulting or coaching. So for over 10 years, I've worked with consultants and coaches on leaving how profile well established leadership careers.
I've only had one consultant that I worked with or coach who left that type of security and status and that type of career for the unknown of starting a consulting or coaching business from pure vision. Everyone else was pushed into it in some way, know, a layoff, some sort of intolerable job redefinition burnout, and all of these things are consequences of the shareholder capitalism kind of system. So if that is you,
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getting this information about the differences between stakeholder and shareholder can help you depersonalize the experience. Like while it's personal because it happened to you, it's not because of you or anything that you did. It's the feature, not the bug of a shareholder capitalism system. So I just want you to think for a minute, have you ever been devastated by the change that you advocated for that didn't stick or failed?
or has your heart ever been broken by toxic work environments, toxic leaders, unreasonable workloads, random job changes, elimination? And what difference does it make to manage your expectations and depersonalize the experience? So now we got that down. So we got clarity on what the differences between the stakeholder and shareholder capitalism is. We got into like the real game that we're playing. We talked about the personal impacts to us and how we're feeling about
about our work and our influence. And now I wanna get into my vision for this Common Good Consulting and Coaching Consortium. So that's where all of this is leading. So last year I did a podcast with author and speaker and my client of three years, Katie Anderson. So she is a lean expert and she does a lot on people-centered learning organizations. And on the podcast, I'm used about this idea that it would be great to bring together like people-centered practitioners of all kinds.
just bringing them together for at least the purposes of shared understanding of what each other does. Because truth is, before I worked with Katie, my understanding of Lean, that it was just about process improvement, cost cutting, and I'm somebody with 30 years in the consulting industry, I never associated Lean with even continuous improvement. And I had for sure no idea it was about empowering problem solving, coaching management.
and respect for people. Like I had no idea that it was like this management system. had all of this stuff. I had no idea about the Toyota production system and all the roots that it goes to the Japanese culture. And there's just so much beauty in the lean profession. And I had no idea about it. It drives me crazy now that I did not know about it. And then I went to work with Katie on a brand positioning and messaging. We worked on a website, copy your design. I did a deep type into her testimonials from her Japan study trip.
Betsy Jordyn (25:47.864)
which is what she called at the time that we wound up up leveling later. And I just was so moved by the power of this field. And again, super annoyed that I did not know that I had partners like this when I was a consultant. So this is what got me to think, you know what, I need to bring more people together. You know, like, and this reinforced for me the power of the work that I do as a brand messaging expert, because I wish...
that people could get outside of even our labels and our titles and just get to the plain language of our expertise so we would understand a little bit more about what each other's doing. And so that is part of the idea of bringing everyone together is people who are creating these people-centered organizational societal system, like just get together, learn what each other's doing. Plain language, no industry speak, no lingo. Let's just get on the same page. Like, what are you doing? What are you doing? How are you approaching the organization? What's your vision? When you say people-centered, what do you mean?
When you say human centered, what do you mean? What are some of your best practices that you're doing that's working as what's not, what's our common challenges and how can we more intentionally partner together? To me, that's part of this basic vision for this consortium. If we wanna break down silos in organizations that stand in the way of the types of cultures we're trying to create, I think the first step is to break down our own silos, yes? So when I did all this research though to...
that led me to a better understanding of the differences and shifts from stakeholder, shareholder, capitalism, a bigger idea started to form. So there's like the good part is I want everybody to come together. There's so much that we can learn from one another. I want that. But then with this information about the stakeholder versus shareholder capitalism, this bigger idea started to form, which is how we can work together to create that pendulum swing back to stakeholder capitalism. So that's when I started looking at this group as beyond this networking type of thing.
to this common good consulting and coaching consortium, which is partially a professional association, but also I would love to see it to be a movement of expert practitioners reclaiming capitalism's original promise that yes, that business exists to serve people, communities, and the planet, not just shareholders. And who belongs in this consortium? If you're a human-centered, people-centered, however you want to phrase it, practitioner with a heart towards socially and economically just organizational societal systems,
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You belong here. know, people in OD, leadership development, DEI, lean, continuous improvement, change management, coaching, anyone who supports equity, respect, appreciation, and valuing of everyone. I have no idea exactly what this group can be or achieve. At minimum, we get out of our silos and learn who else shares our vision for people, cultures. We educate each other. We share best practices. We build relationships intentionally, not with people who share our same background, but with people who don't.
I know I would have been a better OD consultant if I knew then what I know about Lean. And I also know from working with Lean people that they would be even better if they knew more about OD, L &D, HR, and coaches and all of that type of thing. Like we could be better when we learn what each other does. So that's like the good. The even better level is that we find ways to collaborate intentionally for influence within our client work. Like if we knew what each other does and the strengths that we bring to the table,
we can partner more effectively and strategically to strengthen our ability to influence the client systems that we operate in. So instead of going into a transformation engagement alone, you bring in your cross-functional team. You know, like the OD consultant, the lean practitioner, the leadership coach, you're all working together because you understand the common goal and how you need to bring your unique perspectives and your vantage points in the organizations together. So that's the better. Here's the best. Maybe, just maybe,
we find a way to start advocating together for the systemic change in terms of how wealth and opportunity are distributed. Maybe we become a think tank. Maybe we become the consulting and coaching arm for the for-benefit conscious capitalism movement. In the past, if you've been listening to my show for a while, I have told the story about the basics, this initiative that I spearheaded when I was at Disney that transformed the guest cast and cast leader experience that is now currently taught at the Disney Institute around the world.
And for years, I thought my claim to fame with this project was the power of my stakeholder management and how I convinced this massive executive team to give up on what they were doing individually around the guest cast and the cast leader experience to work together around a common objective. And I got this done within a week or two, which is really unheard of in general, but especially at Disney. But I really think a big part of the strength of the project that I led was the project structure I created and advocated for, which was I made the core group a cross-functional
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technical expert team versus usually what project teams were, a subset of executives. And on my team, had experts in guest and cast research, OD, L &D, HR, industrial engineering and more. And so I brought together the people who knew how to operationalize stuff, you know, and that they created the work and then we went and shopped it, you know, with the other stakeholders, but we created the work because we know how to operationalize engagement. I think the same principle could hold true in terms of trying to restore the shift back to
stakeholder capitalism, there's a lane for us because we have a unique ability collectively to operationalize purpose and equitable systems. You know, we have the skillsets to come up with the ideas that we might need to be able to implement to create this change. And we also have access to the leaders that we want to influence when it comes to testing it out. So who knows what's possible and what type of collective influence we can have. But I know this for sure. None of us can do much on our own.
Even if we just got together for the sake of best practice sharing, I think it would be worth it. But I would love to explore what is more for us. Because I think there's a lane for us as an organized resistance for the common good. And I think that we can start by organizing around the values that unite us. It doesn't really matter where you sit on the political spectrum. I think we can all agree that organizations do exist for more than making executives and investors wealthy.
that servant leadership is better than command and control, and that every person is worthy of respect and opportunities to use their gifts to make a decent living and have a positive quality of life. So that's all I have for my emerging vision of the Consulting or Coaching Consortium. If this resonates with you, I would love for you to be an early thinker with me. Help me co-create what this can become. Like all of these are general ideas. I don't have anything baked in, I don't have anything set in stone. I have no idea.
what could come out of it. I'm just generating an interest list now and plan on organizing a live Zoom call with the people who sign up and wanna be early voices in this group. So just think for a second, are you ready to step outside your silo and find ways to partner with others who share your vision for workplaces that honor people alongside results and systems that put humanity before short-term gain? If yes, please join my interest list at www.Betsyjordyn.com/commmon-good.
Betsy Jordyn (32:51.086)
So that is it on my not so typical consulting matters podcast episode, but one is probably the best reflection of the name. So what we went over is that we are actually operating with a stakeholder mindset, believing organizations should invest in people, balance needs and create long-term value, but we're doing it inside of a shareholder system that's legally designed to prioritize profits above all else. It's not a bug, it's a feature.
This mismatch is why your best transformation work may be hitting some walls and it's not you, it's not the system. And once you see this, you can start right sizing your expectations. You can guard your heart, take your wins, stop blaming yourself and stop blaming the well-intentioned leaders whose hands are tied and start working the system. And maybe, just maybe, we can organize across our silos and become a force for shifting things back to stakeholder capitalism. That is the vision for the consortium.
So here's what to do next. I would love for you to just embrace and celebrate your stakeholder mindset. Honor these values that you hold dear. And then of course, right size your expectations, but really honor those values that you hold. And just recognize that you're just swimming in a different type of environment that does not share your values so that you can care, but not too much. Recognize the environment that is outside of even the clients that you're working with. So you could approach this work with more awareness, more empathy for the
conundrum that maybe your clients are finding themselves in and you can go into it with more of a power, position, and more open eyes. The second thing to do next is consider being a founding member of the Common Good Consulting and Coaching Consortium. Again, go to my website, Betsyjordyn.com/common-good to get on the interest list. And the other thing that you could do is just start partnering now. Like just reach out to people who you know share your values, but have a different discipline and figure out like,
Who might be your partner? Start a conversation. And of course, if you need help positioning or consulting and coaching more strategically for greater impact, influence and income, I'd love to help. Go to my website and book a call with me. I'd love to talk with you about how we can get you positioned for greater impact, greater influence, and really just own the power of what you do. That is what it's all about. And part of the power of what you do is to influence this change, to help your leaders.
Betsy Jordyn (35:18.198)
and the clients that you serve and the people that you work with help them really create that balance. if you are working with individuals as private clients, you're helping them create balance in their life, we wanna create that same kind of balance in an organization. So that is it for today's episode. If this landed for you, hit subscribe so you don't miss what's coming next. Send this to a consultant or coach who might need to hear it. And please leave a review on Apple Podcasts. It helps more people find the show.
And until next time, thanks for listening and let's go change the world together.
