Kristy O’Leary is leaving Nova Scotia, and her departure means more than the loss of another talented Bluenoser.
A few years ago, O’Leary co-founded Scout & Burrow, a Halifax consulting firm dedicated to helping businesses improve their social and environmental standards. She found it a tough slog. Scout & Burrow has folded, and O’Leary is moving to Vancouver to become a senior consult with Junxion Strategy, an international consultancy that promotes social and environmental sustainability.
She’s frustrated because she’s found it so hard to gain traction in Halifax in helping businesses create benefits to society and the environment while making money.
“I’m embracing a life where I can thrive in Canada's mecca of sustainability, where my tribe of change-makers are united and listened to, where I am surrounded by people that ask ‘how’ rather than offer ‘no’ as the first and last response,” she wrote in a Facebook post announcing her departure. “Or even worse: ‘next quarter’ or ‘next year.’”
O’Leary is part of a growing international movement for ethical businesses, or impact businesses, which assess success through the “triple bottom line,” that is, a focus on profits, people and the planet. The movement is embodied by B Corporations, which certify ethical businesses. O’Leary is an ambassador for B Corps and helped 10 East Coast companies gain B Corp certification. She had been working on broadening that mandate, especially in Halifax, but found little enthusiasm for the work.
“We simply aren’t moving fast enough,” said O’Leary. “The Ivany Commission said we have 10 years to turn it around. Climate scientists are saying we have 10 years to turn it around. We need speed now – every day matters.”
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There are two schools of thought on ethical businesses within the East Coast startup community. Some believe launching a business is so difficult that founders, while acting ethically, have to focus exclusively on making money.
A second group—concentrated in New Brunswick— considers ethical businesses a key component in the new economy. It’s a point-of-view championed superbly by Karina LeBlanc of the Pond-Deshpande Centre for Entrepreneurship and David Alston, Chief Innovation Officer at Fredericton startup Introhive.
They believe the region can best attract and retain young people by establishing not just a digital economy based on entrepreneurship, but also an economy whose businesses espouse the values of young people. O’Leary also believes the day will come (sooner than we think) when consumers and corporations will boycott products made using carbon-based energy. Our region should be getting ahead of the game by reducing our carbon footprint.
The Ivany Commission called for a change in attitudes but too many of us—yep, I include myself—have been too slow to join the ethical business movement.
The new federal government has identified ethical businesses as one of its economic priorities, so it’s a fair bet it will soon unveil programs that back these enterprises. Again, Atlantic Canada should develop the ecosystem to support these businesses in anticipation of these programs. O’Leary hopes to continue working with Atlantic Canadian businesses in her new position.
Whether you buy into the B Corp model, it’s easy to agree any entrepreneurial community needs a range of talents, products and points of view. Social entrepreneurship has to be part of the fabric of the East Coast community. And we’re a lot poorer without Kristy O’Leary on the ground here to help move it forward.
