How B Work Connects Purpose-Driven Businesses with Purpose-Minded People
The statement: The vast majority of B Corp employees are highly satisfied with where they work, according to B Impact Assessment results.
The issue: On-the-job engagement contributes to worker performance and business success. When employees have an opportunity to use their strongest skills, build their abilities and offer input on company strategy and practices, they are more likely to be engaged and their businesses see better customer engagement, higher productivity and profitability, and fewer accidents. Engaged workers also report better health outcomes.
By considering workers among their stakeholders, Certified B Corporations value employee satisfaction and build stronger relationships. On the B Impact Assessment used for certification, B Corps can report formal worker engagement survey results. Almost all of these B Corps — about 98 percent — say workers report they are satisfied or engaged.
Sure, engaged employees boost business results, but they also lead happier and healthier lives and are more likely to stay with a company rather than seek a job elsewhere — holistic benefits that are a bonus beyond a paycheck. At B Corps, workers know they contribute to a business that values planet and people as well as profit, and feel a connection to a greater purpose on the job.
These connections are at the heart of the B Work platform, which hosts the world’s largest impact job site and offers an array of tools and services that help B Corps connect with purpose-driven jobseekers. B Lab launched B Work in 2016 with Fitzii, a division of the B Corp the Ian Martin Group.
Tim Masson, CEO of Ian Martin Group, says B Work is a natural project for the family-owned recruitment services company, which has nearly 400 employees in the U.S., Canada and India and has been a B Corp since 2012.
“Our company’s purpose is to connect people in meaningful work. The B Work job site and hiring services do this by linking mission-driven businesses with candidates who want to help them change the world,” he says. “The solution evolved over several years of going to Champions Retreats and understanding the needs of the B Corp community, and we have now helped the majority of B Corps to improve their hiring success.”
Read on for a few examples of how B Work is building that B Corp community by making strong matches between purpose-minded workers and purpose-driven businesses.
Looking for a job where you can put your talents to work making the world a better place? Search for a meaningful job on B Work, the largest impact-only job search platform.
Communicating Culture at Ramp
As a values-driven marketing and communications agency that partners with “brands for good,” Toronto-based B Corp Ramp Communications works to create and support a vibrant “social profit” sector that includes clients from nonprofit, health care and education organizations.
To find workers that fit Ramp Communications’ “ambitious transformation” mission, Founder and President Shelley Mayer says the agency initially decided use B Work to recruit for two roles.
“We provided B Work an overview of both our open roles, and our B Work consultant was able to quickly provide a position advertisement that was engaging, dynamic and really reflected who we were,” she says. “As a fellow B Corp, we felt confident that the B Work team really understood our culture.”
Additional benefits: The B Work team handled posting, online application collecting, candidate screening and reference checking.
“All we had to do was review their recommendations, provide feedback and interview the top candidates,” Mayer says. “They were very responsive to our feedback. In the end, all the candidates we interviewed were exceptionally high quality. We’d definitely use B Work again.”
The person on the other side of the process was Ratsamy Pathammavong, now working as a business development and partnership manager at Ramp Communications.
While Pathammavong was seeking a switch to the private sector from a 20-plus-year career working with nonprofits on social justice, equity and inclusion, she wasn’t specifically looking to work at a B Corp.
“For many reasons I was very nervous about the likelihood I could make a successful transition to the for-profit sector,” Pathammavong says. “One of my biggest concerns centered on my visible difference.” As an Asian woman with a disability who uses a mobility device, Pathammavong says she requires some workplace accommodations.
“I was skeptical hiring managers would see beyond my disability and my ‘extra needs.’ Or if they did, it would be to tokenize me as the visible diversity hire they thought they needed,” she says. “When I saw the posting for the role at Ramp, the B Corp certification immediately alleviated some of my concerns. … The certification gave me confidence to believe the likelihood this team, mission and ethos would align with my values was much higher.”
After settling into her role at Ramp Communications, Pathammavong says she is ecstatic that she made the change to a private-sector job that still provides benefits of nonprofit work.
“Being at a B Corp give me the best of both sectors,” she says. “I continue to do ‘good.’ I continue to work on big societal challenges, and there are no compromises to my values or ethics. Everyone around me shares those values and vision for positive transformative change. But I also get to work in a nimble, entrepreneurial, innovative workplace.”
That’s no accident: Ramp Communications is a two-time Best For The World honoree in the workers category, which recognizes the B Corp as a global leader creating the future of business.
“Everyone here is pushing to be more progressive, do more, give more,” Pathammavong says. “I am valued for the difference I bring to the table; my interests and specialization in inclusion and equity is seen as a bonus to the organization.”
Values-Driven at Gladstone Hotel
While the Gladstone Hotel has a long history as Toronto’s oldest continually operating hotel, it follows forward-thinking business practices as a B Corp through environmental performance, social responsibility and innovative food and drink.
As human resource manager, Sarena Sairan uses her experience and skills in social work to build and develop the team at Gladstone Hotel, where it’s crucial to have the right people on staff to keep visitors happy.
The B Work job platform was introduced about the time that Gladstone Hotel gained B Corp certification in 2018, and the hotel was an early participant. B Work has been a useful tool when Gladstone Hotel looks to fill leadership positions, she says, where the hotel wants to “attract the right mind and heart.”
“It attracts a caliber of candidates who are willing to go through the assessment and understand the value of it,” she says. “It brings the right candidate toward us.”
With potential hires, the hotel can clarify the importance of its mission and operations as a B Corp from the outset.
“We are introducing ourselves as much as the candidates are introducing themselves,” Sairan says. “The whole B Work and B Corp structure is a great platform for us to articulate who we are in a concrete way. It’s been interesting to see who notices the logo and knows what a B Corp is.”
While Gladstone Hotel has filled six of its top jobs thanks to B Work, Sairan is working with the hotel’s B Work representative on strategy for effective hiring of entry-level positions that tend to have a higher turnover rate.
“We’re working to figure out how to get B Work to work best for us,” she says.
B Work makes the hiring process more efficient for Gladstone Hotel, Sairan says, because information from all applicants comes through one platform that she describes as “one-stop shopping.”
“When I’m working with B Work, I’m in the hands of professionals,” she says. “It’s a remarkable difference.”
B the Change gathers and shares the voices from within the movement of people using business as a force for good and the community of Certified B Corporations. The opinions expressed do not necessarily reflect those of the nonprofit B Lab.
Find Your Dream Job at a B Corp was originally published in B the Change on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.
