The Power of One

 Our market is growing. According to the U.S. Census Bureau, the population of the world on February 19 totaled 6,761,616,432. By 2025, we’re supposed to hit 8 billion; by 2040, 9 billion. That’s a whole lot of loving going on.

However, the marketplace is not growing. This planet is not getting bigger to accommodate more people. Its girth is fixed. And Mother Nature is not interested in expanding her waistline. Take a hard look at the level of efficiency at which she operates – 96%. Something’s got to change. Moving to Mars or Venus isn’t really an option. So we had better think about improving our current ratio of inputs and outputs. We’re teetering on a change in how we view our productivity.

Historically, productivity was defined as a measure of success. People see it as a positive concept. Yet, it’s also an indicator of inefficiency. Productivity is above all a state of mind. It’s time to evolve our state of mind to embrace environmental quality by mimicking the efficiency of Mother Nature.

My particular interest is to connect with small business owners. Why? They are the idea generators in our economies. They are the source of innovations that will literally enable our future. We desperately need innovation to weather today’s economic storm, for innovation is a driver of economic growth. We also need innovators to rise to the market needs of 2025 and beyond.

So what small business does now matters, a lot.
It is highly unlikely that any small business will be the cause of an event like Exxon Valdez. However, the real challenge is the cumulative impact of seemingly trivial contributions of individual actions. It’s the day-to-day inefficiencies in our businesses that add up. Let’s do the math. There are 143 million small businesses (give or take 10%) operating around the world. They represent over 95% of the businesses on the planet. Innovation can be as simple as each small company doing one thing differently. Let’s walk though an example with chemicals. If over a year each small business spilled the equivalent of one cup of oil, this could contaminate groundwater equal to 143 million Olympic-sized pools. The impact is literally oceanic.

Now, let’s apply this new state of mind. For every ounce of chemical (oil is a petro-chemical) not spilled or misused, two kinds of benefits emerge. One, there is a quantitative benefit to the company at least 8-times greater than the spill because the oil is used productively. Two, this generates value to others because there is that much less chemical out there, and chemicals reactions do not respect property lines or political boundaries.

So, we need small business to treat chemicals with more respect as an innovation. One really low cost action every small business owner can do that would have a profound effect – read the instructions BEFORE using the chemical. You can save yourself a lot of grief if you adopt this one behaviour change and convince your peers to do the same. We will all gain value from better chemical management for pennies of effort. This is a ‘no brainer’.

But small business is capable of so much more genius. This is why we need to support them with the right-sized tools designed for their needs. We need to fuel the natural tendencies in every small business owner on the planet to think beyond the mess we’re in. We need to inspire them to green their productivity. This will create solutions that will improve their businesses and generate value to many others as they are the foundation of our economies and communities. Greening productivity is a better business proposition. It’s a smart idea. And it’s simple. A successful outcome means we meet the needs of a growth market by doing better with less. When small business figures this out, everybody

will benefit. And it will put green where it belongs; money in their pocket and a smile on Mother Nature. For the power of one is not a sum.

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