JUST Capital, the platform for measuring corporate performance in the stakeholder economy, featured Business & Democracy Initiative founding partners Daniella Ballou-Aares, CEO & Co-Founder of the Leadership Now Project, and Rhett Buttle, Founder & Principal of Public Private Strategies, discussing why businesses have a vested interest in a stable democracy and why leadership matters.
JUST Capital: 2 Key Ways CEOs Can Navigate Today’s Politically Fraught Environment
In this piece, Buttle and Ballou-Aares explained the important role CEOs play in making change and why business leaders should continue to take meaningful action on issues that are important to them.
1) CEOs can’t forget the role they play in today’s society. As trust in the government, media, and other institutions remains low worldwide, business leaders have emerged as relatively more trusted to be transparent and put the interests of their stakeholders first.
“People don’t feel that the government is responsive to their interests and needs and are looking for leadership elsewhere,” Buttle and Ballou-Aares said. “That’s part of why CEOs are in the hot seat.”
2) Executives must get more comfortable speaking out. Media bias, cancel culture, and the challenge of navigating different stakeholders can make speaking out a difficult decision for CEOs. But Buttle and Ballou-Aares underscored that the American public wants to hear from its business leaders.
“Business leaders should be confident that their voices matter and that the people they interact with – from employees to customers to communities – want to hear from them on critical issues,” they wrote.
“Freedom of speech is fundamental to our democracy and our economic stability. Rather than standing down in the face of retaliation, companies have a vested interest in working together to uphold our democratic values.”
Learn more about the Business and Democracy Initiative and explore additional steps the Leadership Now Project recommends business leaders take to protect democracy.