Are we finally thinking more about the true value of business?

In the current economic storms, there’s a lot of advice flying around for start-ups. Much of it is coming from investors (including venture capitalists). In what seems like a blink of a base rate, they have switched from the growth, growth, growth message that has dominated various theses. Now they advocate focusing on business fundamentals. Presentations, newsletters, blogs, social media posts, and ‘chats’ with founders, all recommend careful conservation of cash, customers and considered growth.

What a turn up for the books! For years, this cautious, thoughtful approach has been derided. It represented a lack of ambition, an innate conservatism that was both unappealing and often uninvestable. The most generous interpretation was that this type of business is ‘admirable’, but not remotely ‘sexy’.

This seems doubly so when talking about female-led business. It seems to be a common experience that investors firmly hold women founders to account with the ‘What if things don’t go as planned?’ questions, as conversations turn determinedly downbeat

The irony is, most women (as well as plenty of men) do look at things in the round. They are less likely to make wild assertions of presumed success. That doesn’t mean they aren’t dreamers; they have to be to have started a business in the first place! It’s just that the dreams they commonly have are of sustainable, purposeful activity leading to good growth and ways of making the world a better place. All the same, these change makers need support and backing, including with investment.

(Side note: The ‘One Earth’ platform is a pioneer in advocating the purposeful approach — and it’s founded and led by a woman — 👏 Linzi Boyd).

Perhaps then, the silver-lining in the stormy skies — full of talk of downturns and depressions — will be the consolidation of well-grounded values, less subject to the vagaries of markets. And that business will be built both wisely and well.

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