Good/bad clients vs. values vs. impact

By Nik Govier, CEO

There’s been much debate, industry-wide, in terms of representing fossil fuel clients, and Blurred partner Jeremy Cohen provided his two pennies worth in PR Week recently. Some of his choice words:

It should be simple. But exclusions can hurt as much as help. Just as in ESG investing, excluding entire industries means that many companies will not get the scrutiny – the push – that will help make them better businesses. So we need a different approach. Blacklist the work, not the client.

He’s referring, ultimately, to work that greenwashes or simply spins, which is bad and unacceptable, full stop. And it goes, of course, beyond comms.

At the consulting end of our ‘world-class consulting meets world-class creative’ proposition, we blur the line between management and comms consultancy. That means we actually get to address corporate action and behaviour, as well as craft the narrative that tells the story. And it’s what I love most about what we do.

So here’s the thing. The bigger the business, the tougher their specific industry issues are, the more opportunity we have to create meaningful change.

We could sleep well at night working only for B Corps (and we – BTW – are very proudly a B Corp), but would we create as much positive change? Helping the largest companies deal with planet-sized challenges isn’t easy – but it’s vital in a world where corporations are more powerful than governments.

So then you have to ask yourself, “but where are the boundaries?” At Blurred we will only work with companies actively working towards the UN Sustainable Development Goals – a pledge we made soon after launching. And we’d not work with, for example, climate deniers. That’s a hard no.

But we would work with businesses in industries that might not necessarily be on Santa’s ‘nice’ list. Why? It goes back to Jeremy’s point above. By refusing to work with whole industries – especially in the ESGP (ESG + Purpose) space where we solely operate - we essentially leave them without scrutiny, and without the required voice chipping away towards betterment.

There are plenty of FTSE 100 / Fortune 500 corporations in these ‘naughty’ industries - to extend my Santa metaphor - that cannot simply be ignored. Their power is too great. Their potential to do harm, as well as to do good.

So for us it’s all about where we can deliver IMPACT. Simple as that. We ask ourselves, “Would this business – and subsequently the world – be a better place for having us in it?” With all our scrutiny, our tough questions and belief in People, Planet & Profit? If the answer is yes, then we’re likely to engage. It’s at the very core of why are an ESGP business. No organisation can credibly talk about its Purpose (the good it does) until it understands its ESG impact (the harm it does) and has put a plan in place to mitigate it.

However, we simply don’t care what the motivation might be for businesses wanting to change. It could 100% be motivated by money and the threat of being ‘uninvestable’ when it comes to capital markets cash. Fine by us. As long as the work is real. No spin. No greenwashing. Genuine betterment.

Because we believe this is how capitalism will eventually save us, when governments have failed us all over and over again when it comes to environmental pledges or issues around social inequality and unrest. Big business will ultimately drive that change – and we definitely want to help them on their journey.

We’re not preachy – and we get how the world works – but we do want to create meaningful change and therefore we need to play in the industries and work with the businesses that have the greatest potential to do harm. Because – and here’s the thing - they’re also the industries and businesses with the most potential to do good.

Funny that.