It's time to stop demonising business

It is easy for business to disengage in the current geopolitical and national political environment. Corporates and the private sector are all too often painted as the pantomime villain that is ripe for blame, additional taxation or stringent regulation.
 
The vibe is that without sticks to guide socially beneficial behaviour, business will surely stray and add to the cost of living pressures facing the country.
 
It is striking that in the midst of another war, started by politicians, that is pushing energy and raw material costs sky high, some of the most powerful calls for action focus on windfall taxes for business and policy levers to ensure supply chains keep operating.
 
The barely disguised message being that without intervention business will surely put a good crisis to use as an agent to boost profits and capitalise on consumer discomfort.
 
While there is little doubt that a minority of businesses do behave badly, I strongly believe that this is a small proportion of the wider corporate sector. In a world of all encompassing scrutiny and connected activism, there are few hiding places for corporates. You will always be called to account in the end. It’s also worth remembering that politicians and regulators equally do not have an unblemished record for noble behaviour.
 
I should reiterate that this article is not anti-regulation or anti politicians, both have a critical role to play and most businesses will say they welcome good regulation and policy guardrails.
 
However, history does not back up the lazy rhetoric that business is generally ‘bad’ and profiteering is rife. The fact this view is wide-spread and often treated as uncontroversial is one of the most immediate threats to corporate reputation. It is a threat that is universal across business size and sector and it’s one that many businesses are afraid to challenge. 

Covid as an example of an alternative reality showed many businesses striving to keep people, maintain services and protect their communities.
 
The headlines scream of businesses abusing the furlough scheme yet rarely point out that 40% of business didn’t take any furlough payments (despite Covid being the greatest economic crisis for a generation). Additionally, around 3% of businesses paid back furlough payments, and the rest took up the scheme not in an orgy of profiteering but as the last resort option they had available to save their operations, the economy and avoid mass unemployment.
 
Many businesses strove to keep the lights on so we could recover from lockdown yet rarely get credit for it.
 
In almost any crisis business emerges as a scapegoat, gets thrown under a political bus and is tapped up like a national piggy bank ripe for reparation payments on the basis of confected fury against profiteering, which often does not have roots in reality.
 
Yet the role business plays in society and the economy is rarely celebrated.
 
After spending a few days in Cornwall, at Anthropy, it has been great to get a different perspective. There is hope, business has a critical role to play and is playing it. 

Against a backdrop of a world in which business is frequently called out, cancelled and criticised, it is a welcome message.
 
Despite this, many businesses are responding to the current geopolitical climate by sticking to their plans but not talking publicly about it or setting out a bold agenda for the future for fear of being cancelled.
 
While this can seem like a pragmatic decision, silence is not a strategy.
 
The narrative void is filled, very quickly, by other voices. The loudest of which are frequently not nuanced, pragmatic and very rarely pro-business.
 
So business has to step up in this world of criticism and conflict, it has to be brave and it has to set out a bold vision for what it stands for, what its role is (making money and driving positive impact for society and the planet). Corporates have to stop apologising for existing and make the case for the key role business plays in the economy and society. We need to adopt corporate diplomacy as a strategy, engaging with politicians, civic society and one another to create space for business to drive positive change and profit as a key part of our global community. 
 
I’ll finish with an excellent quote from Anthropy, from Sharon Thompson, Deputy Leader for Birmingham City Council, someone who has lived through a series of tough organisational challenges. Her message for times of crisis was: “we need to stop just making difficult decisions and start making calculated brave decisions.” Ones that are rooted in long-term thinking and a clear vision for the future.
 
If business is to regain trust and avoid being used as the pantomime villain for the ills of the world it needs to step up, stand tall, set out a clear vision and mission and stand by that and defend it. 

Most businesses play a critical part in national life and it’s time we set the record straight.