What Patagonia Can Teach Us About Ethical Leadership

"Earth is now our only stakeholder." That was written by Yvon Chouinard on September 14th as Patagonia's billionaire founder gave away his company to Mother Earth. Instead of selling Patagonia and taking the company public, Chouinard has given the 3 billion outdoor brand to a family trust and a not-for-profit called the Holdfast Collective. The goal with the creation of these entities is to put any profit not reinvested back into Patagonia towards fighting climate change, and at its best, it'll look like something like a hundred million dollars a year donated directly to saving our planet.

Now, at a time when more and more billionaires are getting on board with "doing the right thing", at first glance, this action might not seem extraordinary. But after digging in and investigating the differences between the sale of Patagonia in this instance and the sale of so many other organizations, we see a difference here. In this episode Allison and Ren talk about an organization's role in doing the right thing, the kind of leaders it takes to do the right thing, some of the spaces in between and lead with that.

Related Resources:

How to Make Servant Leadership More Sustainable? Balance Self & Others: https://www.ccl.org/articles/leading-effectively-articles/how-to-make-servant-leadership-more-sustainable-by-balancing-self-others/

How to Practice Holistic Leadership: https://www.ccl.org/articles/leading-effectively-articles/how-to-practice-holistic-leadership-even-during-uncertain-times/

Beyond Doing Good: 6 Mindset Shifts for Purposeful Leadership: https://www.ccl.org/articles/white-papers/beyond-doing-good-6-mindset-shifts-for-purposeful-leadership/

Your Employees Care About Social Responsibility – You Should Too: https://www.ccl.org/articles/leading-effectively-articles/your-workers-care-about-social-responsibility-you-should-too/

Organizational Culture Solutions: https://www.ccl.org/leadership-challenges/organizational-culture/

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About the Center for Creative Leadership:

Leadership is all we do. But our approach is distinct. We work with you to discover your priorities and customize our unique leadership solutions to best fit your needs. We create leaders who move their worlds. Our innovative solutions are steeped in extensive research and experience gained from tens of thousands of organizations, a million+ leaders at all levels, and leaders in more than 130 countries, across 6 continents. We deliver results that matter – sustained impact for you, your business and the world. www.ccl.org