How can companies contribute to a better world? Why are scarce resources an advantage? How do you build a remote business? Treasure 109 is all about scarce resources. But we should not bury our heads in the sand in view of the various crises. The three nuggets inspire us to break new ground and make something out of it.
Nugget #1 – How can companies contribute to a better world?
In his podcast “Philosophers of Work”, Frank Eilers deals with the question of how capitalism can be rethought. In the fifth episode on this question, Waldemar Zeiler was a guest. The founder of Einhorn (cool pun) is convinced that our planet is pretty fucked up. He is not completely wrong. Students and scientists have been checking this out for a while with the climate crisis. Beyond CO2, we’re also doing a lot of overexploitation. In 2019, Earth Overshoot Day was earlier than ever before. In Germany we overdrawn the resource account almost 3 months before the global deadline. In the “unfuck the world” Townhall Waldemar Zeiler recently gathered 2500 world rescuers in Berlin. Founders gathered under the name “Entrepreneurs for Future” to rescue the world, although they have limited resources:
If startups can do something, then the big company can do it even more.
Waldemar Zeiler at Minute 28
I asked myself what I could contribute in my daily work. With my team I enable cost savings and differentiating products through “Partner Enabled Innovation”. Some of them contribute to sustainability. Lower material consumption and weight savings for vehicle parts are just two of the many examples. But Waldemar Zeiler is right. Much more is possible. The next step will be to measure our contribution to the 17 Sustainable Development Goals of the UN and then expand it.
How do you contribute to “Unfuck the world”? (28 min, audio, German)
Unfuck the Economy and then the whole world!
Nugget #2 – Why are scarce resources an advantage?
One possible explanation why startups create more is provided by Förster & Kreuz: “Wealth paralyzes creativity”. From the five points I would like to pick up three points:
- Looking around in other industries – The automotive industry is currently the problem child of the Germans. Instead of setting up rescue funds for companies in trouble, you might want to ask your colleagues from the music industry. There are surely one or the other idea, how one comes to new business models.
- “If you can’t get any further by normal means, search in unknown areas.” – This is my mission as a CompanyPirate. I would like to inspire to leave the normal ways and to get involved with the surprises of the unknown areas. With this blog I contribute to the goal 8.3 of the UN Sustainable Development Goals: “Promote development-oriented policies that support […] entrepreneurship, creativity and innovation“
- Development Oriented is also point 5 – Experimental Learning. “What if…” questions are an excellent tool to look beyond the end of one’s nose. For example, last year I thought about the question “What if there was no competition“. Dear automotive industry, how about the thought game “What if nobody wants to buy a car anymore”?
So a crisis is not so bad. I’m looking forward to how the lack makes us more creative. And you? (6 min, text, German)
Five points on how lack makes us more creative
Nugget #3 – How to set up a remote company?
There was a lack of offices and company buildings in the world for Colin Nederkoorn. He made a virtue out of necessity and set up his company Customer IO remotely. In his article he describes the difficulties that this entails. From skeptical investors to the additional administrative work involved when employees are spread all over the world. But you can also clearly see the advantages of a remote company:
- For example, with the sales team distributed worldwide. A sales meeting in France is certainly different from a meeting in the USA.
- The disadvantage that an exit as a remote company is more difficult could also be seen as an advantage. As a globally distributed team, the risk that all critical employees are “bought away” at once is many times lower.
- The founder can live in his desired place Portland. If humans can live simply at their desire place, much shuttle traffic is void and thereby less CO2 is used.
The advantages are obvious. According to the graphic in the article, interest seems to be increasing steadily. So it is worthwhile to browse through the numerous nuggets and articles on the topic Remote Work here. (4 min, text, english)