Leadership Journeys [02] – Kate Daniels – “I want to live in a world where all companies are B corporations”

This is the Leadership Journey series on the Choosing Leadership Podcast.

I believe we all have a lot to learn from each other’s stories – of where we started, where we are now, and our successes and struggles on the way. With this series of interviews, my attempt is to give leaders an opportunity to share their stories and for all of us to learn from their generous sharing.

Kate opens up about growing up in a very isolated town with a population of only 432, and how that created a hunger to go out and experience the world. She talks about studying in Italy and later Ireland and then working in South Africa and Dubai on international aid programs. She talks about how leaving her country taught her the value of empathy and seeing the different ways people do things in different places.

You can find Kate at the below links

• https://www.linkedin.com/in/kate-sharum/

In the interview, we talk about

• the experience that helped her realize that there were a lot of exciting things going on outside of the US and she wanted to be part of it.
• “I would argue that companies that have a responsible orientation and strong ESG standards and sort of an impact orientation into their DNA from the beginning are companies who are going to do better financially as well.”
• “Environmental, social and governance information makes for more robust investment decision-making. And I also think that ESG kind of serves as a proxy indicator for leadership”
• “I want to live in a world where all companies are B corporations and all investments are impact investments.”
• “I think one of the most important things I ever did was leave my country. There’s something very powerful and beautiful about studying abroad. There’s something very powerful about being a foreigner in a foreign lens and having to negotiate and figure that out.”
• “there’s real value in exposing ourselves to ways of thinking or to worldviews that don’t reflect our own.”
• “the more that one can slow down and ask questions and listen and engage in informal connection with other human beings, the more effective he or she is going to be at getting it done, whatever it is that they want to get done”
• “As I work with people in companies and organizations across the world is that we have so much more in common than we do not in common. And I think that’s perhaps a bit trite and perhaps a bit, bit of a, you know, sort of aphorism, but it’s also true”