Unreasonable

This is perhaps the shortest lesson in the book. And the hardest one to live. 📖 Lesson #15: Authenticity arises from what you do, not what you say you do. 🌿 In the 1990s, a new category of company emerged alongside us. Companies that talked beautifully about sustainability. 🗣️ That had the right language, the right packaging, the right messaging. That knew exactly what the conscious consumer wanted to hear — and said it, loudly and often. Most of them are gone now. 👻 Because consumers (especially passionate, educated consumers who actually care about what they're buying) are extraordinarily good at detecting the gap between a company's words and its actions. 🔍 And when they find it, they don't forgive easily. At Seventh Generation, we weren't perfect. But we were honest. ✅ We published what we didn't know alongside what we did. We admitted our failures in the same reports where we celebrated our wins. We invited scrutiny rather than managing it. That wasn't a marketing strategy. It was a survival strategy. 🎯 Because in a world where everyone is claiming to do good, the only real differentiator is actually doing it. The market has a long memory for hypocrisy. And an equally long memory for integrity. 💚 What are you doing — not saying — that defines who your company truly is? 🌱 More lessons from my new book, Built for a Better World. 📗 I'd love to hear how your organization lives its values in action — not just in language. 👇 #BuiltForABetterWorld #Authenticity #Leadership #PurposeDrivenBusiness #BusinessLessons #Founders

Getting fired from the company I co-founded is not a story I ever expected to tell publicly. But here we are. 😄 And honestly? It might be one of the most important stories in the book; because it gets at something most founders and sustainability leaders won't say out loud: the systems we're trying to change are often the same systems we're dependent on to survive. That tension doesn't go away. You manage it, navigate it, and sometimes it manages you. What I appreciated most about this conversation was the refusal to sand down the edges. The uncomfortable parts (investor misalignment, growth addiction, the slow erosion of purpose under pressure) those aren't footnotes. They're the story. Most businesses genuinely want to do the right thing. The problem isn't intention. It's architecture. Thank you to Grounded World for having me on their It Shouldn't Be This Hard podcast and creating a space where that conversation can actually happen. Part 2 is going to go even deeper...stay tuned. 🎙️ And if any of this resonates, check out my new book, Built for a Better World which has the full, unfiltered version. 📖 #BuiltForABetterWorld #ItShouldntBeThisHard #SustainableBusiness #Leadership #PurposeDrivenBusiness

There comes a moment in every founder's journey when the most important thing you can do is let go of the day-to-day. Lesson #12: The founder's ultimate role isn't to run the company. It's to lead the revolution the company was built to start. For years, I was deep in the operations of Seventh Generation. The products. The finances. The people. The endless, beautiful, exhausting details of building something from nothing. But over time, something shifted. The company had grown capable enough to run without me in every room. And I began to realize that my energy was needed somewhere else; not inside the building, but out in the world. My purpose evolved. From operator to instigator. From manager to movement builder. From running a business to trying to change the system that business operates within. That transition isn't easy for any founder. There's an identity wrapped up in being the one who keeps the engine running. Stepping back from that can feel like loss. But it isn't. It's graduation. The companies that change the world aren't just well-run. They're connected to something larger than themselves: a revolution of ideas, values, and possibilities that outlasts any single product, quarter, or leadership team. That's what Seventh Generation was always reaching for. And it's what I spent the better part of my career trying to help it become. 🌍 More lessons from my new book, Built for a Better World. At what point did your role evolve from operator to something bigger? 👇 #BuiltForABetterWorld #Entrepreneurship #Leadership #Founders #SystemsChange #PurposeDrivenBusiness