Notice that our tag line isn’t “the Science of Conscious Capitalism”, but rather the “the Art of…”.
I like the Wikipedia entry for art that says, “There is no general agreed-upon definition of art, since defining the boundaries of ‘art’ is subjective, but the impetus for art is often called human creativity.”
There is certainly no agreed-upon definition for Conscious Capitalism, let alone a standards and practices model. This stuff is so new we can’t even all agree what to call it! Yesterday the New York Times ran an article on for-benefit corporations…which are also called “fourth sector” companies and “B corporations”…which are related concepts to “sustainable enterprise,” “social entrepreneurship,” “conscious business,” “good business,” etc.
Here at The Chief Good, we are working on inventing some of the standards and practices for this new thing, no matter what you call it. The good news is that if you are reading this blog post and feeling both excited and confused, then you are in good company!
We envision a day soon when the most important list of companies will be the “For Benefit 100″—a list of companies that are engaging in the Art of Conscious Capitalism and helping create the practices and measurements that we can all use. If you know of companies like this drop us an email and let us know. We are starting to build the list.