When Business Meets the Doughnut

What does it take for business to help bring humanity into the Doughnut?

Posted by the DEAL Team September, 23, 2020 146 likes

Version 2.0 (January 2020)

DEAL HAS PUBLISHED A NEW TOOL TO GUIDE BUSINESSES IN ENGAGING WITH DOUGHNUT ECONOMICS. THE BELOW HAS BEEN REPLACED WITH THIS NEW TOOL.

PLEASE ACCESS THE DOUGHNUT DESIGN FOR BUSINESS TOOL VIA THIS LINK.

Please note: all businesses, business consultants, and for-profit organisations interested in engaging with the concepts of Doughnut Economics must first read the 'How can business engage with the Doughnut?' question on DEAL's Business & Enterprise page, and follow DEAL's conditions for business.

Overview

The Doughnut envisions a world that meets the needs of all people within the means of the living planet. It's a world that is regenerative, rather than degenerative. And it is far more distributive of value and opportunity than today’s economy. What, then, does it mean for the future of business?

In this 18 minute video Kate Raworth introduces the essential elements of Doughnut Economics for Enterprise, including:

Embracing the Doughnut as the 21st century goal
Creating a business that aims to be regenerative and distributive by design
Aligning the design traits of the business itself, through its Purpose, Networks, Governance, Ownership and Finance.

The aim of this tool is to facilitate a deep reflection on the internal organisational design of a business, and on what systemic changes are needed if it is to become regenerative and distributive by design, and so help bring humanity into the Doughnut.

Why use it?

To learn about the essential elements of Doughnut Economics for Enterprise.

Who is it for?

Anyone interested in transforming business so that it is in service of a regenerative and distributive future.

How long does it take?

18 minutes

Acknowledgements

The 18 minute video was recorded by Kate Raworth for DEAL.

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Contents

Stories of this tool in action

Page 2 of 2

Members using this tool

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8 comments

Philippe Camman about 3 years ago

Excellent tool for raising stakeholder awareness as part of CSR strategies.

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tom abeles over 3 years ago

Before the "Doughnut" we were using the basic ideas in a core curriculum for academia and business workshops. Currently applying the ideas in the arena of ESG's particularly in the finance arena

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Jennifer Brandsberg-Engelmann about 4 years ago

The Frankfurt Doughnut Coalition is starting to think about a variety of workshops that we could run for interested stakeholders in the city. Obviously, for-profit business (especially in the banking sector!) is an important target group. I was wondering how far along the DEAL team is in developing workshop materials that the various city coalitions may be able to use and adapt for this purpose?

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Torsten Sewing over 2 years ago

very interested to learn more about this question - and possible answers: donutberlin.de :)

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Polly Gibb over 4 years ago

I'm planning to use this in my work with businesses and student enterprise. I am aware that DEAL are developing the business interface and I do no wish to undermine this! I plan to use the resource here and concentrate on the design of the business (Vision, networks, governance, finance, ownership), rather than creating a doughnut dashboard for each business.(for example, I am developing a course for growing agri-tech business). I have long thought that they key to this subject is vision and ownership so it is reassuring to see the DEAL business design building blocks. I have read the FAQ and signed up to the terms of use. If the DEAL team have any concerns please do contact me - I don't want to overstep or undermine. I am based at a university and I run a social enterprise called WiRE (Women in Rural Enterprise). Thank you.

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Rosa Sommer over 4 years ago

Fantastic resource. Thank you.

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Yeu Wen Mak over 4 years ago

Has the DEAL team look into the connection between the need for business to be fundamentally a viable and sustainable such as the Cybernetics Viable System Model and the capability maturity of the same business to climb the Corporate To Do List of reaching the goal of Do the Doughnut?
A great example of a viable business as featured on this platform is Houdini just going by the following statements found in their planetary assessment report:
* "we look upon our own organization as an interconnected and interdependent system"
* "In order to reach our vision, systemic change will be required. We need to embrace complexity, acquire holistic, robust and in-depth understanding of the complex systems we are part of in order to understand how to engage in, contribute to or change them"
* "We have found our “common sense” to be especially valuable when navigating complex systems. “The goal is not to
crack the code but to catch the rhythm”, is a quote that comes to mind when attempting to describe our ways of navigating and staying on course. It is a quote from the essay “Practicality in Complexity” by Nora Bateson, the researcher, writer and founder of the International Bateson Institute who has devoted her life to systems thinking and patterns in living systems."
Does the DEAL team aware of any open data to validate my claim above that businesses must be fundamentally viable before it can embark on its journey to do the Doughnut? I have checked firms data on The World Bank database but to no avail. Please help!

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Jo Woods over 4 years ago

Two clear, simple introductions to applying the Doughnut to businesses. Made me want to find out more and think about how I can apply this to my own context.

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