Voice from the Mountains
I long to have role models, but I’m one of those for who a business icon is not Elon Musk. Instead, I’m looking for a more down-to-earth yet innovative figure to inspire me, one who is less surrounded by scandals. A business icon beyond admiration, one who exerts a powerful influence and shapes business values, style, and vision. In recent weeks, it has been headlines that the founder of the sports brand Patagonia, Yvon Chouinard (I wonder how many people know his name compared to Musk’s), has left his entire $3 billion company to a non-profit organization and a charitable trust. All of it. It, for example, is a move of such magnitude that makes my eyes light up, my senses go sharp, and I echo to myself, “Is this real? Is this happening? Hooray!” While the way he’s built his company has always been a feast for the eyes and the soul, he’s been able to do something even more thought-provoking and exemplary. It’s not by chance that fans around the world respect his company as a hero of sustainable consumption. As it’s fashionable to say, it’s a ‘statement’ to own and wear his objects. I have followed him since I was looking for evidence that what is good for the world can be good for Business as well; the quality can be a consideration alongside quantity, and beyond individual interests and the dominance of profit, there are community interests that, if taken into account, do not make for a bad deal. All the more so! It may not be the biggest deal, and our company may not be in the top 100, only in the top 100,000, but it would be much larger than what may be sufficient for future generations (read: our grandchildren).
Chouinard leaves a lot behind him and will certainly not be in need for the rest of his life, despite his decision. With his retirement, at 83, he could have sold his company and donated all his money, but he felt he needed to be sure that a new owner would keep all his employees and preserve the values he had created. So, he is using his profits of around $100 million a year to fight climate change and other social causes through an organization called Holdfast Collective. And that this is not just an old-age or, if you like, a 21st-century fad is amply demonstrated by the fact that the American founder of the company made some unconventional decisions back in the 1950s and has continued to prove that it is possible to make decisions differently from the way we are used to and from the way our business interests seem to dictate. They have no priority because Chouinard knows that if we do ourselves and our environment, Business and life will be unsustainable.
He bought a blacksmith’s workshop, where he initially made mountaineering equipment from steel. He had been selling these for years, but as an active climber and conservationist, in addition to being a surfer, kayaker, and falconer, he noticed that steel gear was damaging the cracks in the mountains. By then, 70 % of his company’s revenue had come from steel equipment. Yet he said that was it and finished. He developed and found aluminum, which is less damaging to nature. And while he was selling more and more of his products, he was also shaping culture. He created the concept of “clean climbing”. It is a form of climbing that causes as minor environmental damage as possible. He even advertised his jackets on the pages of The New York Times, on the consumer-inspired holy day of Black Friday, with the sentence “Don’t buy this jacket!”. In this way, he tried to raise awareness about responsible consumption. You could say these are just gestures, but Chouinard has demonstrably made several unusual choices throughout his decades in Business. He changed a thriving business because it was harming the environment, and he devoted his company’s profits to the fight against climate change. How many will follow suit (even in Hungary)? When will news like this not make big headlines because it’s so common it’s not newsworthy anymore? I’m afraid we will have to wait a long time before masses of business leaders take similar steps to settle their legacies in their lifetime, with a clear mind and as proof of their firm commitment to future generations. And not just at the end, of course, but also during their life journey.
It would require that the Business be seen as an end and widely accepted as a “pure” means to an end. It can also be beneficial to realize that it is not an option for business operators to evade social influences as if they were taking place in a hermetically sealed-off segregation, utterly independent of us. We should accept that how we run and build our companies and treat our partners and employees impacts our lives and can lead to terrible crises. Not only as a responsibility of the decisions of business operators but also, and not independently of them, as a consequence of them. As long as prestige, power, and position are crucial, it is hard to believe it is predictable when and how much is enough. That the meaning of Business can also be to create a liveable, meaningful community, to have something to leave behind for future generations; as Chouinard does, business decisions that are outside the box should be made today on a routine basis. The more people who follow Chouinard’s example, the more they can be left behind. Today, when the world and the challenges are so complex that 40 years of experience is not enough to know the “right” answers, why not finally risk taking such steps? What is familiar often becomes invalid anyway. But the chances of this are small unless we give up greed. Our heads are spinning now, but if the focus is finally not just on business interests but also on our interests, it may be easier to see some sense in the uncertainty. And that is a gain in the tense treadmill of everyday life. Thus, alongside Musk, Bezos, or Gates, it’s time to note the name of Chouinard in the row of role models. You can innovate not only by heading for space but also by staying on the ground. Let’s hear Chouinard’s voice from the mountains. The more people dare take such bold steps; the more will be left for future generations. And what else could be the value we can agree on today and which can help us to leave anything behind at all?
