One of the major goals small business owners generally have for their company is for it to be profitable. However, profits are far from the only thing a person may want for their company. There are other, non-monetary goals that may be very important to them. For example, an owner may want their company to make the world a better place.
There are a wide range of things a small business owner could do to try to have their company have a positive impact out in the world, including:
- Being aware of what social issues face the community the business is in and deciding how the company might want to get involved in the discussion on these issues.
- Keeping the business’ practices consistent with the social causes they care about.
- Having the business host charitable events.
- Encouraging volunteering among their employees. This could involve things like having company volunteer outings.
- Having the company donate to charitable causes.
For business owners, concerns about their non-monetary goals could come up in connection to all kinds of different aspects of their business’ operations. This includes in how their company responds when it gets into a business dispute. For business owners who put a high priority on things beyond profit, like having a positive societal impact, when it comes to their business, they may care about far more than their business’ bottom line when it comes to how a dispute is resolved. They might be very worried about how the dispute and how it is handled could impact the ability of their company to achieve the non-monetary goals they have for it.
Skilled business lawyers can help business owners with incorporating the goals they have regarding their company, including those not connected to profits, into their approach for handling business disputes that come up.
Source: Small Business Trends, “How Your Small Business Can Spread Positivity (Watch),” Annie Pilon, Nov. 10, 2016