Hello, I'm Mary Portis and this is The Kindness Economy, a podcast that looks at the new values driving the businesses of tomorrow.

People, planet and profit.

In that order, it's the future.

Are you ready for better?

Of the many insight in Jim Collins's seminal business book, Good to Great. The Stockdale paradox is one that

really fascinates me. Collins coined the term after interviewing James Stockdale, a US naval officer

who'd been imprisoned and tortured for seven years during the Vietnam War. When asked how he survived,

Stockdale replied, You must never confuse faith that you will prevail in the end, which you can never afford to lose, with the discipline

to confront the most brutal facts of your current reality, whatever they might be.

In other words, Stockdale acknowledged the gravity of the situation he was in,

but his faith that he would move beyond it was unerring.

So, what can businesses of today learn from Stockdale? Well, we like him must accept the curious

paradoxical position we're now in. On one hand, being clear-eyed and realistic about where we are,

on the other, maintaining this unwavering faith that we can achieve whatever we set out to.

And it's true there are some really tough realities for us to face,

from the environmental impact of what we do to the human cost.

But we're not going to fix these problems overnight.

And right now, no one has all the answers.

But as we search for them, one thing that's certain is that ignoring problems or papering over their surface with glossy top-line initiatives

won't work. We have to be clear-eyed about what it is we need to fix. We have to have faith

that we will in time and be honest about

where we are right now. We live in an age of glass box brands after all and thanks to social

...