It’s in the moments of your decission that you shape your futue.

Emotions are all-important in choices made by every human being, including directors , executives and performers. This is how it works biologically in our brains. Give people lists, reports etc. These are always facts, data, etc. People use emotions to interpret that data and so choose.

This means that “Emotion is power” instead of “Knowledge is power”. That humanity is embedded in impact entrepreneurship.

Among other things, with “emotional contagion”, emotions arise (it happens that way). This is how we are infected with our economic thinking. When you are 2-3 years old you learn how to buy more with different choices. Or schools teach 4-5 year olds that 4 marbles is more than three and that makes you happier. Emotional contagion is automatic and beyond our awareness at a roaring pace. They are not tested rationally (especially by children).

Our economic thinking is also emotions. After all, engage with organisations with “something”. Then listen politely, find it interesting. Only point-blank you get told that it costs too much, or you are too expensive or there is no budget. You may also have to demonstrate that it delivers something “below the line”. If you then give sound examples, the response is often “that’s not how it works with us”. Financial-economic thinking is often the criterion for a decision.

In promoting impact entrepreneurship, among other things, these are my experiences. On the one hand, the way of working with the one-size-fits-all approaches and, on the other hand, the decisions obv financial-economic thinking. Impact entrepreneurship calls this a cart track. In one track, acting according to the approach in the other the decision-making obv the financial-economic. Both involve emotion.

In organisations, madness reigns behind the front door because of the chaotic amount of work. The reason is that in the business-as-usual, work-doing according to the delusion of the day prevails. Add to that the mountain of change processes in organisations. In that madness, people do their work. Then it is important to know that in that work-doing the human element is 80% big. And only 20% content.

In that madness, managers have to make decisions and feel comfortable doing so. It is logical that they fall back on the familiar. The content of the work is then basic, not the human element. Then it is only logical that people feel unhappy, walk around irritated by the failure of yet another project. That they come to work with long faces, get sick, suffer burn-outs etc? Yet you see that and it reinforces the craziness. And that makes sense. Lapping tools like an extra bonus, or an incentive or otherwise to appease people does not solve the problem. A different approach to managing and performing work-doing in organisations is needed.

Impact entrepreneurship answers. ‘Meaning economy’ in it is alternative to economic thinking. Cochin-approach way to manage work-doing.

50 years ago in 1972, the Club of Rome predicted the current miserable situation of our living world (incl. ourselves because we are nature). Unfortunately, organisations do NOTHING with it.By their inaction, they are certainly responsible for seriously threatening the well-being of people in an ecologically healthy living world. That is why they advised setting limits to unbridled growth as we then AND still do. That advice touches the roots of our economic thinking.

Organisations seem to be east-indoor deaf to this. They say they are doing a lot. That is just window dressing and green washing, as they insulate, put solar panels on the roof, save energy ed. Only with the real cause, i.e. unbridled growth, they do nothing. Managing on the basis of the one-size-fits-all approach and economic thinking remains common despite the sustainability actions. It is mopping up with the tap running. Organisations do not want to address their OWN behaviour!

Kaj Morel’s book “Time for Meaning Economy” describes how to start thinking economically. He describes 10 principles to enhance human well-being in economic terms. In addition, Kees Klomp, a friend of Kaj’s, is a well-known source of inspiration.To make that different economic thinking concrete, Aldo van Duivenboden, among others, wrote the book “Better business models, a better world”. With this input, I am working to get an “Impactondernemen” movement off the ground in Limburg. The aim is to transform today’s business communities. That they develop well-run organisations focused on having impact. I.e. that they are focused on improving people’s well-being in an ecologically healthy living environment. In that transformation, I use cochin-approach.