Carol Cone:
I'm Carol Cone and welcome to Purpose 360, the podcast that unlocks the power of purpose to ignite business and social impact.
I'm so excited about today's conversation. It's going to be one of the best of the new year. Returning to the podcast is one of my favorite guests, Martin Whitaker, CEO of Just Capital, an extraordinary nonprofit with the mission to deliver what is Just Business and how does it deliver real value for all stakeholders.
Corporate leadership today is a challenge of the highest order. CEOs must navigate a deeply divided political landscape, rapidly shifting stakeholder demands, economic uncertainties, and myriad technological regulatory and environmental forces. Against this backdrop, there is one voice, and it may be surprising to you. It's one that provides business leaders with both reassurance and clear direction. Do you know who it is? Ah, it's the American public.
Today we're going to talk with Martin about Just Capital's 2024 American's Views on Business Survey, the longest-running longitudinal survey capturing the voice of Americans in all its rich and diverse detail. Its central message this year is striking. Despite being highly polarized on political issues, Americans are generally united in their expectations for corporations, particularly in the areas where positive societal impact aligns with positive business performance.
We're also going to unveil the 2025 Just 100 rankings that were announced recently with Just Capital's partner, CNBC. I'll talk with Martin about the characteristics of the leaders in this highly prestigious ranking that I know our clients and colleagues across industries, they would be so overjoyed to make it in the top 10. It's a powerful award because it recognizes companies embracing significant actions to serve all their stakeholders, employees, customers, communities, the planet, and shareholders.
So let's get started. I know you're going to love this conversation.
Carol Cone:
So first, welcome back to the show, Martin. I love to have conversations with you.
Martin Whittaker:
Thank you, Carol. It's always great to be here. These are really important topics and I love talking with you about them.
Carol Cone:
Well, thank you. Thank you. So why don't we just start a little bit, for those who don't know this amazing human, a little bit about your background and then JUST Capital is going to be 11 years old in 2025. So I want you to give to our listeners background on how to start and then you've evolved layering over layering to prove and listen to the public. What do they constitute as just business and then how is just business evolving? So first about you.
Martin Whittaker:
Well, there's a lot there. Yeah. I spent my career in this kind of intersection of business and investing and trying to do some good in the world and really started out looking at environmental issues and investing in environmental solutions, clean technology, things like that. I spent some time at Swiss Re in New York in the environmental markets group doing private equity investing and in the environmental markets, then moved into the family office space and worked for some incredible people who were investing to make money and to try and solve real problems in those areas and sustainable investing, and so I've grown up with that whole area. And then about just over a decade ago was approached to see if I was interested to be the CEO of JUST Capital, which is a non-for-profit founded by Paul Tudor Jones, the noted investor and philanthropist.
So I met with Paul and I met with some of the other founding board members about this idea, and fell in love with it, to be honest with you, and felt like it brought together everything that I cared about and everything that I believed in. I come at this from a very research kind of, I don't know, business-first angle, a big believer in business, big believer in capitalism, and I also feel very strongly that if we're going to tackle some of the world's biggest problems, you got to have business and especially large corporations and capital flowing in that direction to try and address some of those challenges. And that's the idea behind JUST Capital. Can we create a race to the top? Can we inspire businesses to be more just, and in doing so, can you create a sort of a leverage effect where a dollar of support for JUST Capital as a non-profit 501(c)(3) leverages hundreds of dollars, if not millions of dollars into the private sector to try and tackle our greatest priorities.
So we do that lots of different ways, which we can talk about. And you're right, this is now our 10th anniversary. Actually, we have our major event coming up next month to celebrate our 10th anniversary. And yeah, we look back on a lot of success working with big companies, building what I think is an important organization and it feels like things in the world are making our mission far more important, not less.
Carol Cone:
And more complicated.
Martin Whittaker:
Definitely more complicated.
Carol Cone:
And I'm fascinated about the massive amount of research you have done with American adults to really get feedback on what do they see as just business. Can you share how that started?
Martin Whittaker:
Now, we want to incentivize big publicly traded companies and hopefully in the future, any company to be more just. And so the question is how do you define that?
What does that mean? And the way we've chosen to do that is by asking the general public on a fully representative basis. We felt as though rather than come at this to say, "Companies should do this," or, "These are the issues that I care about or our board cares about or our team cares about," we would put our own views to one side and we would go to the American people and we would trust that the answer we got back made sense, and that's in fact exactly what happened.
So it starts with that. We take the pulse of America, that defines the issues, we then go and gather data to track and measure and rank, and now increasingly, work with large companies to help them improve performance.
And the incentive for those companies to do that is really the recognition that comes with leadership on things that matter to the public and their stakeholders, their workforce, their investors, their consumers, and also is a very powerful business case. We've launched indices, we've launched funds, and all of our research on the investment case for being just shows that there's a very, very strong case there that companies that create value for their stakeholders do better in the market.
Martin Whittaker:
Now, over the years we've seen kind of other things rise and fall. So I remember initially when we started it out in 2014, 2015, actually the first poll we did was in 2015, we saw human rights issues. We've seen job creation rise and fall. It's actually down a little bit in this year's results. It's always important, but it's not quite at the top of the list. Obviously, during COVID we saw health and safety issues, how companies were tracking those become very important. We've seen DEI rise and fall over the years, and this year this issue of ethical moral leadership surprised us all and is now the number two issue.
Carol Cone:
And I was fascinated by that because that in our research, which was post the election, that ethical leadership and transparency and communication was also really high, and it was really high about all parties, especially on the Republican side, which I thought was interesting.
Martin Whittaker:
Yeah, I think at JUST Capital we feel as though our mission now is important and inspiring corporate leadership is really one of the most important things that we can contribute right now to this sort of next era in American politics and American way of life.
Carol Cone:
So that's a wonderful segue into your announcement of the 2025 JUST 100. So I would love you to talk about who was the winner and then we'll talk about a few in the top five, but the winner was a repeat.
Martin Whittaker:
Yeah, yeah. Hewlett Packard Enterprise. Number one company this year, was the number one company last year. We know the company well. The CEO, Antonio Neri, is just phenomenal leader and to do well in our rankings, you have to do well across all the stakeholders. You have to be a great employer, you have to do well in worker issues, you have to do well in customer issues, you have to do right by the communities where you operate, you got to be positive on environmental matters, and you got to be well-governed and be good for your shareholders, and Hewlett Packard Enterprise does all those things and the stories that they tell and the data that supports that, we feel very good about that. So that's number one.
Number two is Hewlett-Packard, HP, just by coincidence. Yeah, that's just the way it shook out. HP itself has always been in and around the top 10 over the last decade. Enrique Lores is, again, fantastic leader, been with the firm for, I don't know, over 30 years, started as an intern just like Antonio did at HPE. Phenomenal leadership, both those companies, and we see commitment across the stakeholders by both those leaders and both those companies and it translates into real performance. And then number three is Bank of America, and B of A was a number one company two years ago. And again, a good story across the board. And Brian Moynihan, the CEO, also kind of personifies just leadership. So we feel very good about the top three.
We feel very good about the top 10. There's some incredible companies, diverse companies, different sectors. We've got a rail company there, Union Pacific, we've got professional services technology companies, we've got engineering companies, a utility financial services. So it's a good mix. And then if you had broadened out to the full JUST 100, you've got pretty much every industry in there and some great names and some great stories behind those names.
Carol Cone:
You talk a lot about leadership and leaders and I think that that... Brian Moynihan or Antonio, so what is it about those individuals? And I love the fact that the number one and two were interns. It says a lot about a company's culture where someone is going to start at the bottom and stay for decades and earn their way to the top spot. That's pretty amazing. That says a lot about the culture in a just company.
Martin Whittaker:
You definitely have leadership at these companies defined by their leaders, a commitment to being a great employer, commitment to providing great customer service, listening to employees, responding to that, and really having a strong culture that a company sticks to and really believes in. We've seen that companies have been tested on what they believe in over the last six to 12 months. Many companies have been criticized for, I don't know, DEI programs or their climate goals or their ESG work, and some companies have pulled back, some companies have stuck to what they believe in, and I think it's interesting to me, that's kind of centering around their principles, their values, what do they believe in, how does that translate into how they operate?
Those are the kind of things that create, I think, enduring value and a company knowing its identity and having a clear sense of that purpose and having that translated into genuine operations, those are the kinds of things that we see across these companies. HPE, I always remember Antonio telling me about how their sort commitment to energy efficiency and to climate solutions was winning them hundreds of millions of dollars of contracts around the world because builders of infrastructure, their clients, in other words, wanted that climate resilience energy technology, the cutting edge of that embedded into their infrastructure, and they felt that was the way that they were going to compete and win. It was translating into real contracts for them. I think, again, each of the companies do it in their own way, but ultimately it translates into firms that believe that they're going to create value and competitive advantage by focusing on stakeholder value creation, not just simply focusing on, let's say, maximizing short-term profit.
Carol Cone:
So let's now pivot to today, and it's amazing just to look in the last, what, four months or so, what has happened in this country and the world from the California, the devastating California fires, the hopeful truce that will last in Gaza, return to work, some layoffs, changes in country leadership such as Justin Trudeau resigning, Jimmy Carter unfortunately passing but remembered with incredible servant leadership, and then we have a new president and such. There's a lot of complexity there that a company has to lead with. Why do you feel a just company will be able to navigate those boiling waters?
Martin Whittaker:
Because I think there's a lot of agreement actually on a lot of issues, and a just company is able to tap that agreement to its advantage. What do I mean by that? When you look down the issues of just business behaviors, and you look at the numbers by political ideology, we see a lot of agreement, and those things map to just company leadership. So for example, equal pay for equal work, 95% liberals, 94% of conservatives agree that that's the top priority for a just business. Retaining, promoting workers from within 93% liberals, 92% conservatives. Considering the interests of communities where they operate, you might think that's a divisive issue. 93% of liberals, 87% of conservatives. So there's a lot of agreement. Here's another one: Providing stock options or employee ownership programs. 83% of liberals, 79% conservatives. Even this one, Carol, this might surprise you. Expanding childcare benefits. 94% of liberals, 77% of conservatives.
So just businesses capture those things where there's a lot of agreement. And I think most people, certainly the people that we poll, and I like to think we do this on a very representative basis, would agree that we want to have work that we can feel proud about, we want to be treated decently and with respect, we want to be able to pay our bills, put a roof over our heads, support our kids and feel like they're going to have a better life than we are, and those are the things most people care about and most people worry about, and a lot of those economic issues are what decided the election. And so if business can start to provide some tangible solutions to those things, which we know the public wants from our polling, actually begin to move the needle on these things, give more people a sense of hope and a sense of prosperity, a lot of things happen.
Carol Cone:
I know in your predictions blog, the five predictions for 2025, one of the things that you said was that messaging is going to go much more internal, messaging about DEI, ESG climate and such, and that it will be more that any of the efforts in those areas are going to be laser-focused on business value and a business return.
Martin Whittaker:
Yeah, I think I said to you that the companies have to hit the gym.
Carol Cone:
Right. You did. And hit the gym means they got to work out hard. What are they going to be doing in the gym?
Martin Whittaker:
They're going to be, "Okay, what's our purpose here? This is not about looking good. This is about actually being good, putting the hard work in, being disciplined and committed about that, and what is it that we do that makes us a better company? How does our investment in human capital translate into better business performance? How does our view on climate, to the extent that our company has a view on climate change, how does that translate into tangible business leadership for us? What does that really mean?" So we're looking at these issues as business issues. We know that that's what the public want companies to do. And so hitting the gym really means getting more disciplined about the business case or focused on what data do I need in order to understand and pursue that? How do I actually execute? What's the rotation in the gym? What pieces of equipment should I be using? How do I measure my progress?
Those are all the things that require work, require a long-term commitment. They don't happen overnight. And so the truth is, I think a lot of these issues are changing, they are evolving, not just how companies talk about them, but what you actually have to do to improve, and so it's right that companies should be focused on this. Yeah, I stand by those predictions. I really feel as though we're entering into a new world. I feel like a lot of these issues that just sort of moved along, ESG, wasn't really solving underlying problems. And if you really care about businesses tackling environmental and social issues, then they have to have an incentive. That business incentive has to be there. It has to be about business performance. So that's where we're going now. That's the year we're moving into, and we'll see who does that well.
Carol Cone:
I'm also curious about, you said that flows of investor capital into sustainability and stakeholder-oriented strategies will be surprisingly robust. Why?
Martin Whittaker:
Well, because it translates into better investor returns. Carol, as you know, investors always want to make more money. They always want to generate strong competitive return on capital, and that's not going to change. So if companies being more just helps investors make more money, those capital flows will be strong.
Carol Cone:
So towards that end, how many years ago did you create the justETF and then you also have some other just financial products that is proving the superior value of just companies?
Martin Whittaker:
The ETF was launched in 2018, June 2018. It tracks the top companies in every sector that we cover, every industrial sector. So it has no sector bias, it's just the most just companies market cap weighted in every sector. So it's a broad basket. It's outperformed the Russell 1000 benchmark on a consistent basis. Now it's up, I don't know, nine, 10%. It's the JUST 100, which is what you referred to earlier, which is more of an idiosyncratic groups, just the top 100 companies every year in our ranking, that basket of stocks has significantly outperformed the Russell Benchmark. That's our other major index. And so those now have a lengthy track record. And we have other indexes that we've launched that are more thematic. So all of that data is on our website, justcapital.com. If you just go to the investing tab, you'll see it all laid out.
Carol Cone:
Because we were talking about it, before you launched that, that you felt that that was a missing proof point and measurement to tell your story. So kudos to you that you've done it and that you're proving with metrics, the performance of just companies.
Martin Whittaker:
Well, yeah. I mean, thank you. I feel like it's interesting. We didn't set out to create an index that would outperform. We set out to, as best we could, identify the most just companies. Now, we had a thesis or we had a hope, I suppose, that the companies that did right by their stakeholders would also do better in the market, and it turned out that that is the case, but if you've ever run a business, which you do, you know that the way to compete and win is you got to have the best people, you got to keep the best people, you got to have them aligned and engaged, you got to treat your customers well, you got to look out for all of your stakeholders, and that's going to make you a successful business. Anyone who's built a business knows those things. So in a sense, it's not surprising.
In a sense, it's yeah, we're just looking at what makes business success through a different lens, and I think the unique thing about JUST is it's always fascinated me. You start with a focus group in, I don't know, Albuquerque, New Mexico, asking people, "What does the just company mean to you?" And you end up with a basket of stocks that is outperforming most active managers on a consistent basis. Isn't that interesting? The wisdom of the public have created an investment algorithm that not only creates a win for investors, but a win for businesses and a win for America. A win for America, because these are the companies that are doing right by this country. So I feel that win-win-win is sort of baked into our mission, and I feel like we need more wins in this country, hopefully. That's what President Trump has said, right, we're going to get tired of winning? So this is a win. Let's look for more just wins.
Carol Cone:
That's fantastic. So I always love to give the... You're doing great and very optimistic in our complex world that we're all navigating through. So I love to give the last word to you. So what haven't we covered or do you want to talk about just the last word to companies who haven't really understood what you're analyzing and how to be a just business and what can we say to them, but as well, whatever you'd like to close with.
Martin Whittaker:
I mean, I come back to the big picture. The big picture right now is when you look at what made America great, it is in large part due to a private sector that is able to provide these pathways to prosperity for as many people as possible. It's always been a land of opportunity. That's the brand. And so that is more important now than ever, and I think business has a great opportunity. We're going through a snow globe moment where the world has been turned upside down, the snowflakes are still settling, we can't really see clearly, we don't know how it's going to shake out, but out of those kind of transitional moments, great opportunity arises.
And I think big business, when you look at other major transitional forces, and I don't just mean political, I'm talking about AI, technology, just a lot of that ordinary people have around healthcare, there's a lot of opportunity for business in the long term is in human problems. There's going to be a major need for that, and that is the opportunity that businesses have, and we hope to inspire that. We hope to show companies how to do that, and as long as that will and that desire is there, then there's grounds for optimism. So that's what I would leave your listeners with, a sense of hope that that can happen, that business is well-placed to do that, and people like you on this podcast and Purpose 360 are part of making that happen.
Carol Cone:
Well, I appreciate that. So your recommendation is hit the gym, but know that you're not going to have an instant result, that you need to be-
Martin Whittaker:
No Ozempic. There's no Ozempic for being just.
Carol Cone:
Look at this line. There's no Ozempic for being just. That's wonderful.
Martin Whittaker:
You've been an amazing supporter of ours and I'm grateful for it. We all are. And yeah, I'm excited by the next decade, we have a new chairman, as you know. Dan Schulman, former PayPal CEO. Paul Jones is still very much involved, very committed. We've got a great board, great team. So yeah, we're excited. We're looking for partners. Anybody listening to this, wants to partner with JUST Capital, use our data, help us, donate to us, please just reach out to me and we'll make that happen.
Carol Cone:
There you go. Well, you have been an exceptional leader for JUST Capital. So thank you for coming back on the show.
Martin Whittaker:
Thanks, Carol. Really appreciate it.
Carol Cone:
This podcast was brought to you by some amazing people, and I'd love to thank them. Anne Hundertmark and Kristin Kenney and Carol Cone ON PURPOSE, Pete Wright and Andy Nelson, our crack production team at TruStory FM, and you, our listener, please rate and rank us because we really want to be as high as possible as one of the top business podcasts available so that we can continue exploring together the importance and the activation of authentic purpose. Thanks so much for listening.
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