What successful tech companies and movements have in common
As someone who has pivoted from working from the technology and business world into the world of climate action, specifically at an environmental nonprofit, I’ve been pondering how to translate what I’m learning about successful movements to what I know about tech and business. From the StartingBloc Institute for Social Innovation I attended in 2011, I learned that lasting change happens when we connect individuals, communities, and institutions. The following is also inspired by the Greenlining Institute’s Just Future Summit, held in Oakland, CA in October 2023.
It's easy to point out where tech companies and nonprofits or environmental movements have different approaches, such as top-down vs. consensus-driven or collaborative decision making and management styles.
However, I think it’s interesting to explore the similarities. What can we learn when we think about building a better world across sectors?
What successful tech companies and social/environmental movements have in common:
1. Have a powerful platform, not just a limited point solution
A “point solution” is something that solves one specific problem. In the business world, this is something like an app that does one thing. A platform in the business world is something that solves multiple business problems. For example, an example of a platform would be a technology or set of technologies hat address contact records management, marketing, sales, customer service, and business process automation. A point solution would be software that does one of those things. Large organizations tend to have lots of kinds of technology, making the job of the IT department (and workers) more complex. So there is an incentive for the IT departments of large organizations that buy software, such as large companies and government, tend to want more powerful platform-type solutions (and fewer logins for employees to manage) than a lot of point solutions that are hard to keep track of and integrate.
In the social or environmental movement context, a “point solution” would be a solution for one issue: a law that addresses pollution in an area, a policy that protects women’s rights, or one focused on job creation. A successful platform would do all of these things: an example is the Green New Deal, which combines solutions for reducing greenhouse gas emissions, social justice, creating jobs, improving people’s health, and more, all in one. By getting people who care about different aspects of similar problems to support a specific platform, movements can win and benefit more than just one constituency. (While Green New Deal policies aren’t yet passed, the environmental justice movement behind the GND has influenced legislation that has passed, like the Inflation Reduction Act, and its Justice40 goal that 40% of the overall benefits of the legislation go to disadvantaged communities that are marginalized, underserved, and overburdened by pollution.
2. Focus on constituent success
In business terms, if you don’t make your customers successful, your business won’t be successful. Customers tell each other what they think about products and services they use, and a business that doesn’t care about how its customers are doing, won’t last long in a competitive market.
If you’re trying to engage people in building a movement, such as organizing a union, you won’t have a movement if you don’t get successes over time. People want to be part of a winning team. This also helps with building a platform that is more inclusive of multiple goals, such as both helping the environment, social justice, and creating jobs.
3. Have a strong community
While some tech companies think that having the best technology alone will get lots of customers, successful companies know that having a community of users who can give each other advice reduces the costs for customer service AND helps people feel like they’re part of something. This is partly why you see tech companies hosting large events to connect their customers to each other, and why they host discussion forums for customers to answer each other’s’ questions.
Similarly, successful social movements necessarily involve building community. Solidarity Economics is a framework that addresses flaws in neoliberal and liberal economics that focus on market and government solutions to issues. Rather, Solidarity Economics posits that people often make decisions for mutual benefit, and that an approach based on mutuality is necessary to address widening income inequality, rising economic insecurities, and growing social and racial fragmentation while also promoting innovation and economic growth.
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Want to #workonclimate? Check out this amazing Google Sheet of resources by Nicole Kelner here.