Net Positive: How Courageous Companies Thrive by Giving More Than They Take

by Andrew S. Winston

All businesses now face a profound choice: continue pursuing the shareholder-first model that forces shortsighted decisions, hurts business, and endangers our collective well-being … or build businesses that grow and prosper over the long haul by serving the world—that is, by giving more than they take.

The ultimate question is this: Is the world better off because your business is in it?

Humanity’s consumption of resources can’t continue at this pace, unless we find another planet. In recent years, we’ve hit Earth Overshoot Day—an estimate of when we’ve used more resources that year than the earth can regenerate—by about August 22.21 Every day after that, we are stealing from future generations.

Yesterday I was clever, so I wanted to change the world. Today I am wise, so I am changing myself. —Rumi, thirteenth-century Iranian poet

passion is about finding yourself, but purpose is about losing yourself in something bigger than you.