Vision & Values

3 March 2022

Walking the talk: being a B Corp

Lucy Larkman B Corporation, Vision & Values 0

Joining the B Corp community, and achieving certification in 2019, has probably been Wildwood’s most transformative decision to date. It’s provided clarity about the kind of business we want to be and how we want to conduct ourselves. It’s enabled us to establish a distinct identity, set out a vision and values, and, ultimately, distinguish what makes Wildwood different from the rest. But it’s one thing to adopt the B Corp code ‘using business as a force for good’, it’s another thing altogether to put it into practice.

Our Story

Wildwood Ecology is proud to have been conceived and born in Wales. Our founding director, Richard Crompton, was influenced by Oliver Rackham‘s conception of the “Wildwood” in the ‘History of the Countryside‘, which provides a fascinating account of the sometimes subtle and sometimes radical ways in which people, fauna, flora, climate, soils and other physical conditions have played their part in the shaping of the countryside. I personally have taken great inspiration from a book by the writer, broadcaster, and film-maker Roger Deakin, who died in 2006, after completing the manuscript for a book entitled ‘Wildwood – a journey through trees’. Published a year after his passing, Deakin’s tale describes sleeping under the stars in the open attic, or in an abandoned wooden railway carriage in the orchard, “listening to the cool oboe notes of owls and their shrewicides in the meadow and along the lane”. Wonderful words and a wonderful book. I believe that in those few lines carries an enormous sentiment of what the natural environment meant to both the author and to us all if we care to stand and stare.

Bookcover Wildwood a Journey through trees

“listening to the cool oboe of owls and their shrewicides in the meadow and along the lane”

Why ecology?

My career choice was a simple one: I am an ecologist because I love the natural environment. It gives me all I need; clean air, fresh water and wholesome food, spectacular natural landscapes and wildlife, seasonality, resources and opportunities to make my life comfortable and enjoyable.

After working for public and not-for-profit organisations since graduating from Cardiff University, I joined Richard Crompton as Co-Director of Wildwood Ecology in 2010. Working together to grow the company, focusing on both ecological consultancy and training, we parted company in 2016. Richard Crompton is now an established ecological projects advisor and trainer, where he assists ecologists and commercial clients with complex ecological projects, especially those involving bats and other protected species.

Vision and Values

It is easy for business owners to relate to the idea that their journey ultimately shapes the vision and values of their company. It would be incongruous to hold strong personal principles and yet contradict these in a working environment. It might be possible to do so for a short period of time, and it might even be possible to convince some employees and clients, but typically, this road inevitably leads to frustration, compromise, inconsistency, and often failure.
Wildwood Ecology understands its responsibility to both the environment and society, which may go beyond any legal or regulatory requirements by which a company must abide. My colleagues and I, Deakin and many others, believe that the protection and enjoyment of the natural environment is vital to the continued existence of us all. Our actions and advice in developing the built environment as ecological consultants must seek to halt and restore biodiversity loss, address our own impacts on human induced climate change and help create a better planet for the benefit of future generations.
Since Wildwood Ecology’s conception we have been on an evolving transformative journey. Of course, we have made many mistakes along the way, and will likely make many more, but we strive to learn. We want to be a better business tomorrow than we are today. Easy to say, harder to deliver. However, this is a marathon and not a sprint. We do not adopt cheap labels such as “the number one ecological experts” but we do have a strong vision and values that bind us, and, I believe, make us a better business.
We will not knowingly work on political vanity projects or any development where the natural environment is either side-lined or ignored.

A Force for Good

We use our vision and values as our rulebook. They remind us to recruit and reward our hard-working and principled ecologists, to deliver an outstanding level of service to our valued clients, and how we choose our suppliers. This approach enabled our discovery of sustainable and ethical business practice, and we began to notice a recurring pattern.

Many of the companies we sought to emulate were associated with the B Corp movement. Having never heard ‘B Corp’ before, this was a completely new and intriguing entity.

In late 2018, I attended the Homebuilding & Renovating Show in London, where I met ecological design company, Green&Blue, who were showcasing their beautiful bee bricks, bird, and bat boxes. What was most impressive was their passion, not only for creating a sustainable product, but a sustainable business. They share our commitment to the natural environment and believe that every new home built also needs to provide a home for wildlife. They had recently been certified as a B Corp, and as that discussion progressed, it re-enforced my own attitude that all businesses can, and should be, a force for good.

The B Corporation vision

On my return from the show, I began to research the B Corp movement in greater depth and began to see a real alignment with my own small ecological consultancy.

Skip forward a few months, and in July 2019 we became a proud member of the B Corp community. It puts us at the heart of a global network of more than 4,600 companies that are committed to acting in a sustainable and transparent way, whilst meeting the highest environmental and social standards.

To become a certified B Corp, businesses are required to complete a survey, Business Impact Assessment (BIA). It’s not just any survey, it’s one of the most comprehensive and challenging tools out there for assessing the real social and environmental impact of a business.

The BIA is operated by the independent non-profit B Lab. It allows businesses to measure the impact their business is having on the Environment, their Workers, Customers, and the Community, as well as looking at their Governance structure. Businesses must meet a minimum of 80 points out of 200 to certify, as well as make a legal change to their business to place impact on people and planet on the same level as profit.

On first certification we scored a mere 80.6 points, scraping in by the ‘skin of our teeth’, so we know we have a lot to do to make any real impact. You can compare our result with the likes of other great companies, including many instantly recognisable companies such as Patagonia, The Body Shop, Cook and Tridos Bank, and some industry specific companies including Kennedy Woods Architecture and Stride Treglown.

Since July 2019, we have made significant changes to the way we conduct our business. Here are a few things we have done:

Shifted our business account to The Co-operative Bank
Become a signatory as a Living Wage Employer
At the end of 2019 we committed at COP25 to achieve net zero carbon emissions by 2030
Chosen Fairphone as our dedicated mobile phone for employees and switched to Honest Mobile as our network provider
Integrated social and environmental performance into decision-making, including performance reviews that formally incorporate social and environmental issues
We offer a salary sacrifice scheme supporting employees to switch to an electric vehicle
We monitor and seek to reduce our greenhouse gas emissions using the Greenhouse Gas Protocol calculation tool for Scope 1, 2 & 3 emissions

This is a small list of the things we have changed and we recognise we still have a long way to go. There is a plan and strategy in place to get us there that will require real action; action that impacts the way we do business. B Corps are required to undergo the verification process every three years to recertify, ensuring standards continue to be met and promoting long-term resiliency. As such, we will go through our very first recertification programme in July 2022. I’m really looking forward to having these improvements validated and finding out what our new impact score will be.

Play your part

Why should you seek out purpose-led companies?

Every time you buy a product or service from a B Corp, you’re taking a small step towards a more sustainable world, and casting a vote for a new way of doing good business.

As a B Corp, we have changed the way we conduct our normal business activities that benefits all our stakeholders and not just our shareholder. We have chosen to monitor, review and, where necessary, change the way we operate and conduct the way we interact with our clients, customers, suppliers, employees, and our communities. It goes beyond giving money to a charitable cause, volunteering, or offsetting our carbon emissions.

We actively seek change in everything we do and live by our vision and values. Sometimes we may not get it right, but you can rest assured that we will never cease trying to do so and learn from our mistakes.

Also, perhaps consider that people want to work for companies and organisations that stand for something beyond just making money. Time and again, we see brilliant individuals wanting to join our team, and stay with us, because they believe in our vision and share our values. A business can make a positive change if they listen to and support the growth and development of their most important asset – their employees!

We’ve got a busy year ahead and we’ll face lots more challenges. But by collaborating with others, spreading the word about B Corp and focusing on our vision, we can prove that business truly can be a force for good. And that as we grow (and we are growing both our consultancy and training division, The Ecology Academy), we can play an even bigger role in sustainably building an environment that considers biodiversity loss, as much as the climate crisis we all face.

Richard Dodd, Managing Director

20 January 2022

Company culture counts in 2022

Lucy Larkman Careers, Vision & Values company culture, ecology, values, vision 0

The start of the New Year for many heralds a period of self-reflection; it signals the desire for new goals, new habits and sometimes includes a new chapter in the form of a new job. When considering a new job, what do you look out for? Are you swayed by a swanky salary, a bonus and bountiful benefits package or is it the job description, or maybe even the company culture? Over the years, I can genuinely say that company culture has never been at the top of my list, or actually even featured. After all, it only became more than just a buzzword during the ‘‘10s’, so it’s unlikely I would have ever appreciated the real significance of company culture to overall job satisfaction in the workplace, until I started at Wildwood Ecology.

Motivational factors

Of course, different generations will have different motivational factors for being attracted to certain organisations and certain types of careers. The youngest generations of workforce, Gen Z, are clear to recognise the values they seek in an ideal employer. They tend to be attracted to companies with a vision and values similar to their own, where employee wellbeing is a consideration and personal development is actively supported. Financial stability is obviously up there in importance but finding a balance between work and personal life is equally important, and the freedom to explore their creativity with a high degree of autonomy is desirable. We also know older generations, Gen Y and Xers, are more open to career switching beyond 50 (read my interview with Ian Weller here), and value jobs that might enable them to learn a new skill or perhaps align work with hobbies and interests. But whatever age you are, at whatever point you are in your career, one thing that’s clear – company culture counts in 2022.

According to HR software giant, Breathe, company culture is everything to a flourishing business.

“We know that good company culture involves trust, respect, and the opportunity for employees to participate in shared values and love what they do.

It’s something that develops organically from the top down. It isn’t something a business can buy in, though there are many means that can help, such as systems and consultants. In our opinion, company culture is like an ecosystem that needs to be nurtured in order to thrive.”

It’s no wonder that Wildwood are quietly so very good at this company culture thing, when it clearly involves growing organically and nurturing ecosystems to support flourishing!

“Great company culture sets the foundations for real, tangible business growth. It’s based on honest, productive conservations and helps companies to identify issues and collectively form resolutions”. Aimee O Callaghan, Breathe HR

So, what does great company culture actually look like?

Company culture creates expectations, a set of standards and behaviours to which it wants its employees to adhere. Of course, you can’t truly understand the company culture until you work there for a period of time, although you can gain a fairly decent idea from the job description and person specification, the website and from meeting others who work there. It may be the difference between running yourself ragged working hours that may not fit with the rest of your life, to being able to do the school run, take a walk at lunchtime or work from home, and achieve a work-life balance that makes you feel in control. It’s the difference between feeling invisible and feeling valued or feeling like an imposter and feeling like a respected member of a team. It’s the difference between feeling you are contributing to something worthy of contributing to, rather than feeling you are just contributing.

What’s the point of great company culture?

In recent research carried out by Breathe HR, whereby 500 SME senior decision makers in the UK were asked if they believed workplace culture impacts positively on company performance, 72% believed company culture does have a positive impact.

The positive impacts were as follows:

Increased morale, atmosphere and relationships (69%)
Employees willing to go the extra mile (61%)
Better customer service, customer satisfaction and customer retention (60%)
Improved individual performance and productivity (55%)
Reduced employee turnover (49%)
More people contribute ideas and support innovation (49%)
Reduced absenteeism (45%)

Great company culture breeds loyalty and trust. Trust is granted, not earnt – once granted it’s then up to us, as employees, to demonstrate we’re worthy of that trust. By granting trust, it’s an effective way of the company demonstrating it has confidence it in its employees, it believes in them: it believes they will follow through and deliver. Furthermore, it has the ability to instil good habits across the team and create a powerful motivational force for good.

If there is an expectation to perform a certain task in a certain way, even though it may seem unnecessarily arduous, or just unnecessary, if everyone in the organisation is doing it that way, it becomes the only accepted way to do it. If the company can create this kind of environment, a culture can enhance not only the way you work, but possibly how you manage other aspects of your life too.

Certainly, Wildwood’s mantra is about finding a way and doing the right thing, by its clients, by the planet and by its employees.

In our end of year staff survey, again an opportunity to have a voice, we were asked to come up with three words that best describe Wildwood’s culture. It’s not a difficult ask; it’s very clear to me and I came up with the following.

Different – Wildwood is most certainly different, it’s different to anywhere I’ve worked; the main difference being the culture!

Positive – Being surrounded by individuals who share a ‘glass half-full’ outlook on life is infectious as omicron in the workplace. There are always challenges to overcome, no matter where you are, whatever your position, whether you find yourself in the midst of a global pandemic or you arrive at work to find no milk in the fridge. A ‘can-do’ culture and a shared commitment to finding solutions collectively is incredibly refreshing.

Empowering – A new word for me for 2022, but yes Wildwood culture empowers people, whether it’s empowering clients by educating them in the best approach to a sustainable project or empowering its employees to take responsibility for their personal development and accountability within the company. People are empowered when they are trusted to do their job and when they are allowed to take risks and learn from mistakes. Feedback and praise are super important too, we’re human after all. Wildwood nurtures its people to help them grow, to do the right thing and create positive outcomes that in turn benefit others.

If by reading this, you think there has been some form of coercion or there is a hidden marketing objective here, you’d be mistaken. Wildwood is genuinely a little bit different; a small (ish) consultancy that punches well above its weight, big B Corp ideas to boot, and one that lives so true to its values it’s impossible not to be inspired.

Lucy Larkman, Marketing Manager

www.wildwoodecology.com/about-us

https://www.breathehr.com/en-gb/resources/culture-economy-report-2021

24 March 2021

What it means to us to be a B Corp

Lucy Larkman Ecology, Vision & Values B Corporation, Certification 0

Certifying as a B Corp in 2019, and becoming the first ecological consultancy in Europe to do so, meant the world to Wildwood. It is something of which we are exceptionally proud. But why the big deal? What does it mean and why were we so keen to be a part of this global movement?

What are B Corporations?

Certified B Corporations are businesses that meet the highest standards of verified social and environmental performance, public transparency, and legal accountability to balance profit and purpose. We believe that profit should not be the sole driving force behind our business. We have the power to use business to create a healthier environment, stronger communities, equal opportunities and better working relationships.

Assessment

The movement’s philosophy aligns with our own vision and values, and by certifying, we have a means to effectively score our progress. As a Certified B Corp, we are rigorously assessed on how we are delivering on our social and environmental performance. As such, all B Corps need to recertify every three years. In the two years between certification, all B Corps must write an annual impact report on their progress to create positive impact. This report is, in part, fulfilment of that commitment.

Our baseline score

As a relatively new B Corp, we had our initial baseline impact assessment completed in early 2019. We were immensely pleased to have recorded a score of 80.6 out of 200. The median score for non-B Corp businesses is 50.9. As the minimum impact score for certification is set at 80.0, we clearly just about scraped in. But that’s not uncommon as a first score. It provides us with a great baseline to improve upon, and one we will relish in doing so.

Our progress since certification

Since certification we have made a number of changes and shifted the dial a little in some of the core areas (see Table below). One area we have made significant efforts to improve was for our customers.

We recognise that our latest score is unverified (verification is scheduled for June 2022), but we are confident that significant progress has been made through some of the following changes:

Governance

We treat our social and environmental impact as a primary measure of success for our business and prioritize it even in cases where it may not drive profitability.
Our vision, values and objectives include a commitment to a specific positive social impact (sustainable economic development) and a specific environmental impact (restore biodiversity loss and climate change)

Workers

Changes to job descriptions and performance reviews that include training in and advocacy for social and environmental change.
Volunteer days for employees each month.
As a certified Living Wage employer, we pay a real living wage. Our lowest paid employees therefore earn above the national living wage in the UK.
All employees receive an annual bonus, based on company performance.
All employees have access to formal skills based training.
All employees have access to external professional development training.
All employees enjoy a minimum of 25 paid annual leave.

Community

1% of company profits are donated to charitable causes each year, as well as other resources including equipment and labour.
Over 50% of senior staff are women.
We create new jobs each year.
We use local suppliers.
We have changed our bank account, from global bank, HSBC, to purpose-led banking provided by The Co-operative.

Environment

We provide services that seek and contribute towards halting biodiversity loss and halt the negative impacts of climate change.
We promote discussion of environmental issues.
At our Cirencester premises, we have influenced our landlord to seek a greener energy supplier.
We use technology that reduces the impact on the environment. We re-use technology and purchase fairtrade equipment.
We recycle waste in all offices.

Customer

Our services have a positive impact on our customers.
We manage the data provided by our customers sensitively and comply with GDPR.
We are verified to meet third-party standards for impact (Registered Ecological Practice).
We address a social or environmental impact for our customers.

What next?

The great thing about the three year assessment is that we have a clear timeline upon which to plan our objectives. We have committed to achieving Carbon Net Zero by 2030 and plans are already in place to:

Replace our existing vehicles to an electric fleet. Given the amount of time our team spend on the road visiting sites, this is a significant priority for us. Watch this space!
We recognise that we need to reduce our carbon footprint whilst delivering our services. With our aim to ensure that each service is carbon net zero, we are now embarking on the process of monitoring and evaluation.
We want to work with like-minded individuals and organisations who share our vision and values. We believe we can achieve great things if we work together, so forging new partnerships is something we are actively pursuing. If you’re interested in having a conversation, do get in touch!

In great company

We are just one of more than 3000 companies in the UK certified as B Corporations, across 150 industries. Big names include Abel & Cole, Cook, Ella’s Kitchen, Patagonia, TOMS to name just a few. It’s a simple philosophy – we share the same vision, we share the same goals and we’re prepared to work together as a force for good. Interested to find out more?