Martin Whittaker

CEO of JUST Capital

“Leadership is about human emotion – thinking, desires, fears. People need to be shown the way…One thing we can do is really encourage leadership, no matter where it is within a company."

Summary

In this episode of Leadership Matters, Alan speaks with Martin Whittaker, CEO of JUST Capital, a nonprofit whose mission is to build an economy that works for all Americans by helping companies improve how they serve all their stakeholders, including workers, customers, communities, the environment, and shareholders.

Martin shares how he believes leadership comes in many forms and from across all levels, as well as his increasing expectations for social equity and worker wellbeing across businesses.

Martin developed an early passion for the environment through his education in chemistry at St. Andrews in Scotland and his work for oil company later in France, following which he earned a PhD. at Edinburgh University in Environmental Risk Assessment.

An early leader in the global sustainable ESG finance industry, Martin later transferred those skills and passion to JUST Capital where he has found that leading a company and leading a culture and movement are intertwined.

Mentions & Resources in this Episode

• United Nations Environment Programme Finance Initiative- click here to learn more about UNEP

• Matthew Kiernan- click here to learn more about Matthew Kiernan

• Deepak Chopra- click here to learn more about Deepak Chopra

• Ariana Huffington- click here to listen to Ariana’s episode of Leadership Matters

• Paul Tudor Jones- click here to listen to Paul’s episode of Leadership Matters

• Klaus Schwab- click here to listen to Klaus’ episode of Leadership Matters

• Bruce Broussard- click here to learn more about Bruce Broussard

• Hans Vestberg- click here to learn more about Hans Vestberg

• Dan Schulman- click here to listen to Dan’s episode of Leadership Matters

• Jesse Fink- click here to learn more about Jesse Fink

Guest Bio

Martin Whittaker is the founding CEO of JUST Capital and is responsible for the overall leadership of the organization. He is also co-founder and Board member of the CREO Syndicate, a family office investment network; a Board member of the Carbon Disclosure Project U.S.; and a member of the Forbes Finance Council and Forbes Contributor.

He was recently named to the 2020 NACD Directorship 100 – the annual list of the most influential people in the boardroom and on corporate governance – and to Business Insider’s 2020 List of 100 People Transforming Business.

Read stories by Martin on JustCapital.com, or follow him on Twitter @MWhittaker_.

Clips from This Episode

• "The Pregame Is Over!" stakeholder leadership matters, now!

• On the need for companies to connect with the public and JUST Capital’s efforts to encourage it

• On the results of JUST Capital’s positive receptivity from a multitude of significant corporations

Episode Transcription

Alan Fleischmann 

You are listening to Leadership Matters on Sirius XM Radio. I am your host Alan Fleischmann. Today I'm joined by Martin Whittaker, who has dedicated his professional life to helping encouraging corporate America to address the needs of the local community and the wider world. Mark is the CEO of JUST Capital, a nonprofit that focused on measuring and improving corporate performance, and ensuring that businesses practice values that benefit employees and society just as much as its shareholders. JUST Capital, where I serve on the board and I'm a founding board member, uses polling market research, convening, and corporate performance measurements to publish popular rankings that provide a benchmark for business behavior. Martin's work makes him a leading voice in stakeholder capitalism. Last year, he was named to the NACD Directorship 100 list of the most influential people in the boardroom and in corporate governance. And Business Insider's list of 100 people transforming business. Martin's a brilliant guy in full confession, I should say, he's also a very dear friend, a colleague. He has a great background in finance and private equity. He holds a PhD from the University of Edinburgh, an MBA from the University of London, and a Master of Science from McGill University. Martin, welcome to Leadership Matters.

Martin Whittaker 

Hello.

Alan Fleischmann 

I wanted to have you on the show for a long time.

Martin Whittaker 

Thank you, no, it's my great pleasure to be here.

Alan Fleischmann 

We're going to talk about some really exciting things, you know, I get to interview some extraordinary people as you know, in the show, but rarely do I get to talk to someone who I consider to be not only a very good friend but someone who I get to say that I know so well, that I can safely say I admire deeply. Because I can admire a lot of people from afar, as we all do. But the big test in life is when you get to know someone and you can admire them close up, and you're one of those few.

Martin Whittaker 

That's very kind. I will say to anybody who's listening, that when we first met, from the first second, we met when I started at JUST, you've been one of those people, you feel like you've known your whole life. You know what I mean? When we met in a restaurant, a sort of immediate connection. And I just felt great, and like safe in my new job and my new mission that I had somebody that I could talk to and turn to about anything, so I appreciate that.

Alan Fleischmann 

That means a lot to me. We feel—I feel the same way. I want to talk to you about a whole bunch of things that I wouldn't want to start without talking about your background. You're a scientist by training, which was not what one would expect, but it gives you such rigor and gravitas to what you're doing at JUST, so it makes sense. But I'm curious how you went from someone who was pursuing the sciences, literally, to getting into finance. I mean, was there something in the rigorous approach into research or the focus on the quantitative that made finance feel like a natural fit?

Martin Whittaker 

I'll be honest with you, there's there was no design to it, I think like most people, you sort of—it's a mixture of luck and judgment. And you just sort of keep going till you find yourself, you know, doing things that you really love. And I did my bachelor's, you're right in chemistry at St. Andrews in Scotland. And I then did a Master's at McGill in Montreal. And, you know, I was on a journey trying to figure out what I wanted to do, I knew that I wanted to do something that I felt was important and meaningful. And something bigger, something, some sort of cause. I guess I wanted to try and have an impact on the world. And I got a job after my master's, I did a brief stint at an oil company an oil major, a French oil company called Elf in London, and my boss, who is like this massive six foot four oil guy who ran the environmental department, he, you know, he took me to these lunches, and he'd be like giving me all these life lessons, you know, as I was, I was still brand new. And he was really a visionary about the environment. And I just became really passionate about the environment. And that's the group that I work with. And he said, you know, Martin, if you really want to change the world, follow the money. And that's sort of like what—wise words indeed. His name was, his name is Tony Heelas. I think he's passed away now, but I did. I did a Ph.D. at Edinburgh University in environmental risk assessment, which was a really formative three years for me. And I'd love to sort of talk about that because I think it sort of helped really think through where I might go. And then I did an MBA in finance, and I—but it was all sort of like trying to drive towards making as big a mark as I could. And somewhere in that journey in the Ph.D., and then after, realizing that markets and business were massive levers of change. In my Ph.D., one of my peers went off to work in the nonprofit world. Another went off to work in government. And that was great, but I didn't have as much of a passion for that. I wanted to work in business. And that's what I did.

Alan Fleischmann 

But you know, I should do this. Why don't we take a step back for a second? Because we're gonna recognize you have an accent. It's a slight one. But you do have one for those who are in the American audience. Where are you from originally and tell us a little bit about like, Mom and Dad and siblings and then we can jump right in again. I just wanted to give a bit of context.

Martin Whittaker 

Absolutely.

Alan Fleischmann 

The early years of Martin Whittaker.

Martin Whittaker 

The early years. Yeah, yeah. A long time ago. So I was born in Blackpool in the north of England. I grew up there. My dad, you know, my mom and dad both came from the south of Manchester there. My dad's family, especially is a big family. And, you know, great sort of family gatherings and getting together and singing songs and drinking too much beer and all that kind of good stuff. Which, as a kid, you really need. And you know, it's really just a very normal upbringing. I was the first in my family on either side to go to college. I was lucky enough that you know, I had a couple of brain cells. My mom and dad sort of realized that and invested in that and that sort of put me on the path that I'm on. I have two sisters who are both in England right now. Both doing well, thankfully. My dad passed three years ago, my mum's still around. So I went from sort of England up to Scotland and you know, four years at St. Andrew's and then three years at Edinburgh. So in total about seven years in Scotland, but then my wife, who I met at St. Andrew's is Canadian. And so we moved to Canada after we graduated from St. Andrew's. So I spent two years at McGill. And then later on after a Ph.D., we moved back to Toronto permanently. And so that was in 1996. I haven't lived in the UK since then. So, you know, partly my accent is like an attempt to be understood. In this great country. We moved from Canada to the US in 2004. And, you know, my accent, you know, sometimes you're in a restaurant asking for a glass of water, and no one has a clue what you're asking for. You have to fake a little bit, and it becomes the norm. Plus my kids. You know, I have four kids and three of them were born in Toronto, one of them was born here in the States. And, you know, just for them, for me to understand them. And like, you know, your accent sort of fluctuates. If we were doing this interview in an English pub with two pints of Boddingtons in front of us, I might have a different accent.

Alan Fleischmann 

But it sounds like you have a big family still back in England?

Martin Whittaker 

Yeah, I have a big extended family. And we're still very much in touch. Obviously, COVID is making it very, very difficult. And I'm anxious to go back. My second son is actually at St. Andrews now. And so, you know, really looking forward to being able to go back and travel and see him.

Alan Fleischmann 

That's great. You know, we were just talking a moment ago about, you know, your background in science. And then you went to finance and you mentioned something. You said, you know, the environmental part, you know, I know that you worked at Innovest, which was a pioneer in ESG investing, which I talk about that a lot in this show. You know, the kind of stakeholder capitalism investing that's needed to protect the environment and do right by society and social needs. And then obviously, living by proper governance. You also worked at Swiss Re, as well. But the environment was never an easy market for investors ever. It's obviously an imperative today. You've been tempted, I suspect, knowing you really well, and I do, to really go after more mainstream forms of finance over the years and you chose not to do. So just a little bit about that background would be helpful. This goes back to that drive for betterment for society, that's been part of your journey, but doing it in the private sector.

Martin Whittaker 

Yeah, I met a guy in 1998. So here's sort of how I—it's very prosaic. I wish it was a more sort of exciting story. But I wanted a job in this sort of bigger area. When I was doing my Ph.D., one of the things that was happening in the world was, in the post-Rio Earth Summit, there was something called the United Nations Environment Programme Finance Initiative. And there was a parallel insurance initiative. And I, you know, I knew that, you know, Gro Harlem Brundtland had coined sustainable development. And you know, there was a whole push at the UN and globally, on global environmental issues, and in particular, on finance. That was a world that I thought, wow, I want to be in that world. That's what I want to do. And I was living in Toronto, as I mentioned, and I looked up who went to the New York conference, bringing this group together, the UNEP Finance Initiative, and there were three attendees. And I reached out to all three, and said, Hey, I really want to get into this field. Can I meet you for coffee, and one of them was a guy called Matthew Kiernan. He was the founder of Innovest. Was literally founding the company at the time. And he offered me a job. And, you know, I went to work for him. And he really is one of the founding fathers, I think of the whole sustainable finance movement. A brilliant guy, really well before his time. And the first director of the Business Council on sustainable development, which became the WBCSD. And really, you know, at Innovest, was fascinating. We were this small startup company doing research on corporate environmental impact, and then providing that to pension funds and asset managers. And I just, I found that fascinating that massive pension funds would be working with this tiny little startup to do research on, you know, the companies they are investing in and the projects that we're financing. And it's sort of—it really validated, you know, this thought that actually money can be a massive lever of change. And that was early days, you know, you could fit the entire sort of global sustainable ESG finance industry probably into my living room. And I don't have a very big living room. So, you know, it was, it was a really, really great time. And it sort of provided—and the research background, which you mentioned, was crucial because I always felt that there were a lot of opinions about this. But the data and the research had to support real progress and outcomes in order to make decisions. And I knew, having done a Ph.D., you know, what good research looks like. So, I felt like that has really stood me in good stead. You know, just to try and connect the dots between what's really happening, not just on environmental issues now, but of course, social issues. You know, what does the data tell you? And then how do you draw out the narrative? And how do you know you're making progress? That's always been a sort of a, you know, a through-line of the work that I've done since then.

Alan Fleischmann 

You know, when I think about the way you lead, and this is a show that really focuses on leadership and the way you manage, you do that in a way that, frankly, you did it actually already before it had become more the norm. But you lead in a way where you really can't tell whether you're running a non-profit or whether you're running a for-profit, you know, the way your mission was before you came to JUST. And then in 2013, you know, when we founded JUST with folks like Paul Tudor Jones, and Deepak Chopra, and Arianna Huffington. You came along and actually have been managing it where a lot of people walk away going, well must be for-profit. Because it's very efficient, you speak with a language that speaks clearly to the key stakeholders in private industry and private equity and hedge funds, and in corporate American business. But you have that ethos of bringing Main Street to Wall Street and Wall Street to Main Street, which I'd love to talk about with you a lot. So in a way, talking about your management and leadership, I wouldn't have said you would have had to adapt to come to JUST to come from the private sector to JUST Capital to go from a for-profit to a nonprofit world. But you didn't. You actually brought, I think my opinion, the bottom line, kind of focused language and thinking of private industry to JUST. And JUST was, you know, was ready for that job, if you know what I mean.

Martin Whittaker 

Yeah, I think the world that we inhabit, in this area of sort of corporate purpose and ESG and sustainable investing must be both, sort of, in many ways, business and impact. It must be both. It's an and, the genius of and. And I sort of feel like that's been a false dichotomy, a trade-off a sort of a, you know, the belief that you can't be both. It's interesting. And the name of JUST Capital, you know, we're JUST, we're all about equity and fairness and morality and humanity, and we're all about money, and capital and our decision making. And so that's a sort of reflection, I think of this convergence. I was really, you know, struck in two places in my career. You mentioned Swiss Re, you know. Here was a company that was very deeply motivated by environmental issues and did a lot of great leadership work, but it was also a real business issue, you know, as a reinsurer you're left holding the bag at the end of the day. So climate change, and all the health impacts it was having and impacts on agriculture and food like that, that was a financial risk. It was an unfunded liability in many ways. And so it was this sort of duality. And then I went to work for a guy called Jesse Fink here in Connecticut, where I live. And he was one of the cofounders of Priceline. He always was adamant that he wanted to have an impact with his capital and his family office. And you know, make money and protect wealth and invest wisely. And those two things were not antithetical and he, as a philanthropist, was very sort of disciplined about what he did. And I think I learned a lot from working with him and Mark Surili and all the folks at Admission Point about, you know, you don't have to—just because you're working on on profit, you don't have to trade in your sort of business skills and acumen and all the things that you have in business. Likewise, in business, you don't have to trade in your values and your sense of purpose and impact. Those two things can live together. And I think, you know, in a sort of, in a broader sense, the nonprofit world those businesses need more investment in people, in systems and processes, you can learn a lot from the private sector. And likewise, businesses can learn a lot from how good philanthropy works, and good nonprofit. So you're right, I haven't had to really alter the way I think about the world. But running a nonprofit is a little different. And, you know, I've only ever run one, which is JUST, so I only have that experience. But you know, the mission that underpins it, when you're really just in problem solving mode, you think about the world a little differently than when you're having to make a profit. And I think it's sort of balancing those two things together, which is, you know, the issue of the day, and probably the future of, you know, business more broadly.

Alan Fleischmann 

You're listening to Leadership Matters on Sirius XM. I'm your host, Alan Fleischmann. And I'm here today with Martin Whittaker, the CEO, JUST Capital, and we're talking about JUST. We're talking about making capitalism work, and how do we can do well, through stakeholder capitalism for greater society. Something that actually, Martin has been at the pinnacle of and a pioneer of for many years, walk our listeners through the founding of JUST Capital, Martin, you know, what were some of the early challenges? And, you know, before we started talking about shareholder capitalism, you know, 18 months ago, or whatever is was, basically, it was when the BRT came out with their thing in August, I guess, of 2019. I, you know, people weren't talking about that as much as they are now, you know. What were the challenges and how to how JUST set itself apart from others who are focused on this area? And what distinguishes it a bit? That'd be great to hear a little bit.

Martin Whittaker 

So JUST was, was founded, you know, you got to go back to Deepak Chopra and his course at Columbia, teaching a course on cause-based marketing, and he had been very focused on this idea of justice, this idea of, can a company be just. And he took the idea through, Rinaldo Brutoco, and Paul Shell, and a few others to Paul Jones. And you were there. So okay, so the whole sort of, like, I'm—by the way, I came in, like six months after this, so I'm like, picking this story up, you know, piecing together the elements of the story, but my—what I understand is that Paul immediately seized on the idea as being sort of like, a good one, because he felt that, you know, unless and until you got the private sector to do more heavy lifting, you know, philanthropy and government were just fighting an uphill battle, you know, the private sector had more resources, more, you know, was incredibly good at solving problems over the long term, incredibly good at scaling solutions. And so it sort of struck a chord with him as a philanthropist. And he also as a trader, you know, had an instinct, which his instincts have served him well, obviously, that this could be great for business, and, you know, conceives of an index of the most just companies. So that's what I was presented with, when I was contacted in early 2014 through a mutual friend, who said, JUST is looking for a CEO, are you interested? And the story was, Paul Tudor Jones, Deepak Chopra, are gonna poll the public to determine what JUST claims and then rank companies on justice. And, you know, that's going to change the world. They're looking for someone to run the nonprofit. You know, and I was a partner in a investment, impact investing firm called Sona and at the time, which I'd helped to build. So, you know, my initial reaction was, Wow, that's really interesting, but weird, to be honest. But let's find out more. So I met with Deepak; I met with Paul; I met with Arianna; I met with Michael Weinstein; I met with Ray Chambers, you know, all the founding board members. And I got sort of, like slightly different versions of what this thing was, which to me as an entrepreneur was great, because I thought, okay, these are serious people. They want to solve serious problems. They are well resourced. They know how to build organizations, and I know exactly what to do to build this thing. That was my, you know, If only I'd known then what I know now, which is actually very hard to do this, but I felt really confident that you could build a platform that could move the needle, not just do what was sort of in the mind's eye at that time, but build something much greater. Because I knew that the the entire sustainable investing world did not connect to Main Street. You know, I knew that the data that underpinned company performance measurement on ESG, and stakeholder performance was not great. You know, I had a lot of room for improvement. And I also felt like, that because these folks were not coming from that world, but actually coming from the point of view of the mission, as a nonprofit, that was really different, you know, that did not exist. And so the raw materials I felt were just incredible. And it was a real privilege and a pleasure. And I remember a weekend, I was mulling it over and I sent Paul, and Andrew Paul, you know, a 30 page PowerPoint on my sort of thoughts on what Josh should do. And as Andrew tells it, like, okay, we knew we've got our guy like this, this is who we need.

Alan Fleischmann 

I was there. You get the soul not only the mind.

Martin Whittaker 

Yeah, the rest is history.

Alan Fleischmann 

I'll tell you that one of the things I loved about this, and obviously being heavily been part of this journey from the beginning, is that it wasn't kind of, just hold corporations accountable, it was trying to encourage them to improve. And you know, and it wasn't like—it was both a carrot and a stick, actually, and the idea being that, you know, even if you're not high on the rankings, you can actually get higher in the rankings if you do the right thing. And in many ways, if you partner with the right things as well. So you know that is the elements of the great measuring, if you think about it. You don't want to just be a moment in time where you just say, this is a snapshot, you failed, or a snapshot, you succeeded, therefore you can just become complacent. It really is a way to encourage the better, where we want to head to get there and then do what we need to do.

Martin Whittaker 

I would say that is absolutely crucial. And one thing we've learned is that, you know, you can put the data out, and you can put rankings and build products and everything. And that's all really important, you must do that. But leadership is about human, you know, emotion, thinking, desires, fears, people need to be shown the way. And so the narrative, lifting up leadership, celebrating leadership, you know, stories of redemption, and change and leadership, like that—CEOs today are in an incredibly, you know, complex situation. And companies just can't turn on a dime. And I sort of feel as though one thing we can do is really encourage leadership, no matter where it is, within a company, no matter where companies do on issues, you could be, you know, the worst offender on something. In fact, I go back to, you know, major sort of moments in the environmental sort of crisis around climate and around, you know, major oil spills, they're often defining moments that change company culture, and change how companies, so to see the future, and so we're living through a moment, obviously, in 2020. We lived through that with COVID. Like it changed how companies thought about their role in society. And I do believe that the basic social contract is shifting. So I would say it, you're absolutely right, you know, the backdrop to JUST, just was well-timed, and is able to really create a North Star for corporations in America and hopefully, you know, one day, internationally. That's what we're really trying to do.

Alan Fleischmann 

That's basically what makes JUST Capital different. You know, when we talked about what the Business Roundtable did with their statement, that's what they do every day. You know, they're an advocacy group that really works on bringing a lot of the top business corporations, business leaders together, really in Washington. You know, you see what the World Economic Forum has been doing. And certainly, Klaus Schwab, the founder and executive chairman is given a lot of credit and should be given a lot of credit for talking about some of the groundbreaking issues around stakeholder capitalism 51 years ago, but no one is really addressing it from a quantitative and qualitative side, the way JUST Capital is. This idea of connecting the voices of those who are being affected with the voices who can affect, and then giving them a platform in a measurable type way to really speak up in ways that speak to the audience's—the stakeholders that they need to be speaking for and speaking to. And I think that's the difference is that—you know, there's a lot of things about JUST Capital, though I should say, that we can't measure. You know, it's not all measurable. It's not all about quantitative. And that's the combination, I think that makes it special.

Martin Whittaker 

Well, one of the one of the things you mentioned, which I think is brand new, which I think has been, you know, credit to Paul, actually, for insisting that the definition of corporate justice did not come from JUST itself. Did not come from the board members not come from me. It must come from the public. And I think that survey—that connection to the public, which had really been missing. You know, lifting up the public's voice—when we started JUST I would go around the, you know, my sort of circles, and, you know, some people were skeptical, quite honestly. Well, the public doesn't know anything about climate change, why ask them what matters? And I think we've learned since, certainly over the last couple of years, that if you don't connect with mainstream, if you don't connect with people, in sort of like the, you know, the marketplace, companies, people's sense of being able to put food on the table and build a better future for themselves. People feel disconnected from that. You know, you create massive divisions in society. You undermine the fabric of society. I hate to say it, but I think we've seen a lot of that over the last few years. You know, vast swaths of America just feel as though the system is not working for them. And certainly, you know, the markets and corporate America is not working for them. And with some justification, you know. Years of shareholder primacy have fed inequality, and made it very difficult for anybody to really feel as though they have skin in the game. And if you don't feel like ownership over something, you don't feel like it's working for you, you know, you can go down bad pathways. And I feel as though we have to reconnect with that. And I really believe that one of JUST's contributions will be that connection. Hardwiring the views, the priorities, the values of the public into the boardrooms and the investment committees of America.

Alan Fleischmann 

It's so important. You know, I'm curious, though, also, you know, what makes us different is also the research that we do at JUST, that you do every day, not only focuses on what society demands of big business, but it's also polling the public really, you know. It's not just the corporations, right? Have you seen examples where corporations, business leaders, CEOs have responded to the data, the research, and adapted their priorities differently because of it? A direct correlation between, well, this is what JUST Capital is telling us and, frankly, how they're meeting the society's demands?

Martin Whittaker 

Oh, absolutely. I think one of the most gratifying things about JUST and the progress we've made is there was receptivity from the companies. When we started, you know, there was some skepticism because the world really didn't need just another company out there ranking companies on, you know, on sort of environmental and social issues. But because of the mission, the nonprofit, because of the people that were connected to JUST, yourself included, because of the connection to the public, who ultimately is, you know, the, you know, as a consumer, as workers as, as retail investors, as community members, you know, as a very powerful stakeholder whose voice has not been heard, you know, I think companies recognized that. So we built up over the years now, you know, a really strong base of relationships with leaders in large corporations, the companies that we're tracking. We have now over 500 companies in direct engagement with JUST Capital in one way, shape, or form. Either sharing data with us or working with us through our research process or like PayPal working with us on, you know, programmatic issues in their case, on worker financial wellness. So, it's really a gradation, you know, a sliding scale, we have some companies that are very, very engaged with us and really sort of very focused on shifting how they think about stakeholder performance. And other companies who are at the beginning of their journey and see us as you know, a guide to sort of where they might improve, what they might think about, how to think about things a little, you know, little differently, what data might they collect? What data might they disclose? So it's really been gratifying. And I think, you know, that sort of, you know, that comes from our, the neutrality, the objectivity that we bring, as researchers. We really are trying to, you know, we're really trying to drive positive change in companies, which is what many companies want too. So our objectives are aligned, even though we do it, obviously, independently and at arm's length.

Alan Fleischmann 

You know, it's really important, because, you know, when you think about, you know, you said earlier, you know, and I've begun talking about on this show, how we really have to make capitalism work, and it hasn't worked. I mean, it needs to work for more people, be more diverse, more inclusive, more serving others, but still be—have that, you know, the power that makes capitalism work versus others, other types of systems that have failed. I'm big on to making democracy work, we have work to do on that front as well. We were talking a lot before about, you know, before we got on the show, a little bit about the leadership challenges of running any organization or business during 2020. Let's talk about how you got JUST Capital through 2020, not that 2021 has started off and easier. But you wrote a very powerful article, about, you know, about catching COVID yourself, and what it taught you about leadership. The personal part of this as well. It would be good to hear some of those lessons, or some of those observations stemming from that experience as well.

Martin Whittaker 

Well, this time last year, you and I were in Davos, I think, and looking forward to an, you know, a year of really robust, you know, discussion and progress on stakeholder capitalism, which was, you know, the theme. And we came back, and, you know, a month later the world turned on its head. Yeah, I, you know, I can't speak highly enough of the JUST team in 2020, that, you know, I realized during the year, just what sort of, you know, everybody was going through their personal journey. And it was related, obviously, to COVID. But then we, you know, in June, George Floyd, just, you know, shone the glare onto racial inequities, and what we at JUST could do about that, what we at JUST should do internally. Like how do we change as an organization? What did it mean for us? And I felt like, the entire year was one that galvanized JUST Capital as an organization. You know, it was our best year, ever, in terms, you know, for many of our organizational KPIs, as you know, our profile, our partnerships, our mission. And we came together as a team in a new way, even though we were apart physically, you know, we haven't been in the office since March when we closed last year. So, you know, it was really a journey. I did have COVID. I got it early. My son came back from Scotland and promptly gave it to me, which is a story around the dinner table now. And I had it for maybe two to three weeks. And I got a pretty good dose of it. And thankfully, I overcame it. And we actually had a board meeting right in the middle of that, which I don't think I actually knew at that time, it's actually quite hard to get a test. I was sick, but and I was isolating upstairs in our top floor. And doing boardrooms and executive committee meetings. I did a podcast with Alan Murray, Fortune, you know, I kept going. And it was an incredible time, because, you know, my colleagues, at JUST, where everybody was stepping up. And everybody realized, wow, this is a massive opportunity for JUST's mission to come forward. And we put up the COVID-19 tracker where we were tracking companies who—so we did a whole bunch of things, which were just very, very sort of high impact for us as an organization. And so, I look back on it. Of course, we're still in, you know, very tumultuous times right now, but I think it has been a massive leadership test, not just for me as the CEO, but for everybody at JUST. Yourself included. Our board. You know, leadership comes in lots of different forms. And you and I have seen it in our organization. At the board, right the way down to the most junior employee. You know, partnerships, where you worry about, you know, is this going to sustain what is a massive shock to the system? You know, we've had partners step up and help us. Funders reach out to say, Hey, you guys need money? Don't worry, we're here for you. Like, that I think is one of my abiding memories when we look back a decade from now about this period. I hope we will remember, you know, those human interactions that were very challenging at the time, but ultimately, have made us better as people and better as a society.

Alan Fleischmann 

And the ingenuity and entrepreneurial thinking, because to adapt, as we all know, we had to do, and you certainly had to do as well, to adapt. Being on video, rather than being in person, when you're a convener, where you're building an organization that that's built on trust, you have to now adapt that to be on zoom.

Martin Whittaker 

Right? And people's mental well being right like that. That is—we sort of—we all learned, because everybody was isolated, it wasn't like anybody had lived through a global pandemic before. It wasn't like anybody had been through, you know, months and months of being physically, you know, remote and isolated. And yet, here, we at JUST, we had our best year ever. So how's it possible? And I said, I think it's testament to human resiliency, I think it's sort of, you know, I think it's sort of like, you know, none of us really had a choice about that. So we sort of just, we did the best we could, it turned out, I was pretty darn good. So I just feel as though we've been through multiple layers of change and everybody went through it together. It was a great leverer. And in terms of the experience, not in terms of the impact of COVID. Now, one of the things that I will say is, you know, I, you know, it became apparent, as I'm sure you know, that, you know, black and brown communities—first of all, are getting much more heavily impacted by COVID. Now, it was affecting members of my team, and everybody was sort of showing up on zoom. But behind the camera, everybody was living through their own level of distress. And having real empathy for that, I think was something that was absolutely a prerequisite, you had to really feel like, Okay, how are people not just feeling, but what are they experiencing? And put yourself in their shoes. And forgive you, you know, for not knowing that, forgive them. Like, it had to be a real process of sort of communal learning about how to deal with this. All these personal journeys people were on and trying to do work and look after kids or look after sick parents, or if they were sick themselves, like everybody was going through a sort of an individual journey. And yet here we were all together experiencing this on a sort of a global level. So really incredible circumstance. And yeah, I think sort of empathy and understanding really, sort of, you know, came to the fore.

Alan Fleischmann 

Yeah, you're going a little bit out. Every once in a while you freeze. But yeah, which is the nature of what we have to live with through being on zoom. It's a good example. But I'll say the other good example is the leading with humility, you know, there's, you know, the stress of not only—everyone should feel responsible when they're CEO of any organization or business of the people that work with them, their teams, but I think if you take that seriously, during normal times, during a pandemic, you lead with a much more vulnerability, probably a lot more stress. And I know that for a fact more stress. And then also, you know, that vulnerability, humility combination makes you a better leader in many ways. I think we saw not only in what you do every day and what I get to do every day, but we saw that in some of our colleagues and associates and in certainly the greater corporate America, that leadership started to change. You know, you started to talk to people in their homes, you started to all of a sudden see, you know, a young CEO having kids walk in on them, and, you know, and you saw, we saw more and more of accessible CEOs where they would be on planes all the time traveling to the next meeting, but somehow they had to run the world from their homes. And I think that's created or maybe it's advanced, that kind of just leadership, they were looking for. Leadership that actually is more in touch with their employees, with their stakeholders, with their customers with better society. You couldn't avoid it if you're trying to be a good CEO in 2020. And I'm curious, you know, and you did this COVID-19, you mentioned, corporate response tracker. You've also done other very innovative things at JUST Capital to really get a sense of what corporations are doing, but also what their leadership is doing, and where their strengths and obviously, where we still fall short. Any insights there? We'd love to hear about them.

Martin Whittaker 

You mentioned vulnerability. Absolutely. We've seen many CEOs experience that and showcase that within their companies. You know, I interviewed Bruce Brossard at Humana. Talked a lot about the mental health of his employees. And they're obviously an insurance company, they deal with people's, you know, life and health. And he talked very openly and candidly about that. I think of Hans Vestberg at Verizon, you know, really just being, you know, their leadership, the speed with which they moved was incredible. I mentioned Pay Pal. Dan Schulman, I think has just been a rock in terms of his commitment to his own workers. Again, they're sort of commitment to actually do things that are tangibly helping frontline employees. But leadership, as you say, is a privilege. I think it's made people more human. I think it's reminded us and reminded leaders of the human element of business. We talked about, you know, we never used to talk about our frontline workers as being heroes. You know, we never really thought about cashiers being the foot soldiers in this battle against COVID. And yet, hey, we were society was sort of relying on them.

Alan Fleischmann 

Yeah, it was amazing. Yeah. Relying on and respecting, you know, the whole idea of respecting all those who are working together or individually did kind of make a better place and make things happen for us. Who would have thought that e-commerce would have been a, you know, a godsend? Technology seen through different lenses. You know, now, we couldn't do what we're doing. You couldn't have gone through 2020 if we hadn't had technology. But it also showed the inequality and the inaccessibility to so many. One of the most striking moments in 2020 for me, and we were very involved in it with you, was when we did this JUST Capital-CNBC partnership. Where we had Andrew Ross Sorkin from the New York Times and Squawk Box and CNBC interview our chairman to the JUST Capital, Paul Tudor Jones, with Edina Friedman from NASDAQ and Robert Smith of VISTA Equity Partners. And it was just after the killing of George Floyd, Briana Taylor, and Ahmaud Aubrey. And it was very telling to talk about what just capitalism looks like and what the society needs to be. And what we need to strive for so that it is actually taking on, you know, racial injustice, inequality, systemic racism. Those are conversations one should have had before when you look back, but we hadn't as a society. But I really felt very proud that JUST Capital was leading the way in having some of those more difficult discussions. And it wasn't just that. It was also talking about what COVID, the pandemic, unearthed. And it was also applauding, some of the folks you've just mentioned, leaders who are stepping up and in partnership with our communities. But any insights from that would be interesting to hear, because that's something I don't think you would have probably thought would have been—when we were back in Davos, as you said, in early 2020, you probably hadn't thought that as one agenda item but became one.

Martin Whittaker 

Well, what's interesting was the companies—You know, when we look back at companies that did well on stakeholder leadership, going into the pandemic, in every sector, financially outperformed those that scored poorly in our stakeholder rankings, and came out of the pandemic stronger and have been taking steps to invest in their people, to invest in the communities where they work, to be leaders on diversity, equity, and inclusion in the workplace. So companies that did well on those things were much more resilient during the crisis, and have done better competitively and financially coming out the other side. So there's a context to all of this. There's a lesson here and I think all the things you mentioned Alan, the trick now is just to sort of embed that as the norm. We need to not just sort of have these be moments but now become embedded into the way we do business, and the way the economy works. So that's what we're taking forward out of this. Our work, for example, on racial equity with FSG, which is gathering huge amount of interest, is really about, okay, what does racial equity look like in the workplace? How do we actually make concrete progress on that? How do we build that into the, you know, the day-to-day of company performance operations, and how we think about success? There's obviously a very strong business case for that. And obviously, a very strong moral case. So it's sort of like I would say, carrying forward what we've learned about the importance of employees, the importance of human capital, the importance of the communities, the importance of our relationships around the business, which make us resilient. All of those things, carrying that forward more systematically, is now the key.

Alan Fleischmann 

You know, it's amazing, you know, we're in the eve of an administration changing here in this country, the waning days of the last days of the Trump administration and the Biden administration are coming on board. And we don't even have to talk politics here, but it's a major trend. One of the challenges I think we're ending, or starting, I guess, this 2021 with and is the challenges are to our democracy as well. And you know, there was a time where you were, there was a real almost thick wall between conversations around democracy or public policy, and conversations around markets and business and you know, and frankly, corporations, that's not happening anymore. In fact, more study after studies coming out to show that employees and the average person look to their business CEO, and their leaders and companies in which they purchase products from for their public policy, and they're thinking about society as much, if not more, so and trust them more than they do a lot of government officials. And I've been writing a lot as you know, about CEO statesmanship for a long time. And well before a lot of the challenges we're talking about, because I saw that need and I also saw that change. You know, what do you trust? And who do you trust in society? And who has the voice? And who should speak? There's a lot in 2020. It's probably more needed than ever, in 2021. It's really the center of what JUST Capital does, you know, is by bringing together that uncommon table of leadership. But it also is about creating a climate for conversation and establishing further trust. But we're seeing, you know, partners with JUST Capital, CEOs speak up about big issues, not only national issues in this country but also global issues. And they're trusted more. And I know that there are some great articles that were recently written. Written about, you know, how businesses responded to the major attacks on our democracy as well as our capitalism, and how it's really the business leaders who need to speak up more. And are the trusted ones. Talk about that trust. I can't hear you all of a sudden, actually. You may be on mute. There you are. I don't think you can go through a day, during the pandemic without saying, Are you on mute?

Martin Whittaker 

Can you hear me now? Is that Okay? Okay, good. So, we've done a lot of polling and survey work on this. And, you know, a couple of things shines through. Number one, the public across all demographic groups and ideologies, expect companies to do more to address societal issues, including protecting democracy, including around the election, you know, ensuring a smooth transition of power. So we felt like, there was a role for companies to look to, you know, something bigger than simply, you know, making money and doing the ordinary course of business. So, a lot of public support for that. We have seen, as you mentioned, with Alan Murray's column. And saw that in the Edelman trust results, just recently, trust in corporations is increasing. And it doesn't surprise me when you look at how much companies have sort of—how much impact they've had in terms of providing, you know, hazard pay, and extended sick leave and extended dependent care benefits and all sorts of other things. Like people are very reliant on companies to, you know, help them, help them get through, you know, the very trying times that we've been through. So I think, in sort of like a very, very concrete way, you've seen, I think, more people have seen what companies can do to help them. And that has reinforced this sense that, yes, we expect you to do more, we expect CEOs to speak up, even if it's not directly related to your business. We expect leadership of companies. And that's—I go back to what I said right at the beginning. Society's expectations of business and of business leaders is changing. And that has accelerated on social issues in 2020. And it's accelerated on-base sort of foundations of democracy, you can't have a just economy without a strong democracy.

Alan Fleischmann 

Perfect. You know, and then certainly 2021 has gotten off to a rather challenging start when it comes to the issues of democracy, and certainly, I would say the, you know, the economy, in general. I mean, I'm optimistic that we can do well in 2021 if we all come together, but the recovery presents a lot of new challenges, and probably we even expected in late 2020. How do we recover? How do we rebuild? And how we rebuild society from a business point of view, or from a capitalism point of view, making it do right by people, but also from that democracy point of view as well? How do we make it more and more fair society that speaks to the voices of—allows for the voices of people who are normally voiceless? What can corporations do to ensure that we build a better society than we had before? How do we make 2021 a better country, and certainly not only this country, but others are dealing with the same challenges but globally, than where we were in 2020?

Martin Whittaker 

Well, I wrote a piece at the beginning of the year in Forbes, which basically said that this is the year where stakeholder performance, it's—the pre-game is over. This is it now. Companies can embrace stakeholder leadership, they can make good on their statements of purpose, the Business Roundtable. They can begin to take concrete steps to invest in and measure progress on stakeholder performance. And that requires data disclosure, I think companies are will be going through sort of internal assessments. Okay, what is their data telling us? How are we doing? You know, how are we doing relative to our competitors? What more could we be doing? What does that look like? So there's a whole process of sort of research data gathering collection analysis there. I think we need to lift up leaders, show examples of what companies can and should be doing. We're trying to do that at JUST Capital with our worker financial wellness initiative with PayPal and others and our work on racial equity, which I mentioned. So I think I think what companies can do is get serious about this. I really begin to make progress on this concept of stakeholder capitalism, as we and World Economic Forum and Business Roundtable, and others, because if we don't, then, you know, you wonder, what—where do we go from here? Like, if it's just business as usual and it doesn't actually mean anything, doesn't actually require change, then, you know, we can't build back better. We can even know if more people are benefiting from the economic system. You know, if one of the things that I hold very dear, which I know, you know, you support, is this idea of sort of measuring our, whether or not in fact, we're building a more just economy? What does that look like? You know, we have to start really getting serious about properly measuring progress. You know, how many people work at large, publicly traded companies that don't make a living wage? That number is going up. That's a good thing. If was going down—Sorry, who don't make a living wage, if that's going down, that's good. So we need to measure that. We need to measure the upward economic mobility of companies. We need to measure the progress of our black and brown employees.

Alan Fleischmann 

And create the pressure and frankly, the urgency because too many of these conversations are people kind of treat it like it's a task force or a committee meeting to discuss it for the future rather than understanding that we've got some pretty amazing, urgent matters, whether it's climate change, which you talked about earlier, or we're talking about how do you create a better culture? How do we deal with some of the risks and challenges and certainly how do we create opportunity where people feel that they can have the dignity of a good livelihood. All these things they know we deal with at JUST? I just want to mention that you're listening to Leadership Matters on Sirius XM. I'm your host Alan Fleischmann. I'm here with Martin Whittaker, my good friend, who is the CEO of JUST Capital. I get to be on the board and a founding board member of this incredible organization and to watch closely, Martin Whittaker's leadership. Before we close on this show, it's been an amazing hour so far, I'd love you to mention two things. Any initiatives that you want to mention that you're planning to kind of guide us through. When I say guidance, I mean, private sector, and frankly, public and civil society sector due to just leadership in 2021 thing that we should mention. And then I want to end on a personal level, I know you as being a very optimistic person, and pragmatically optimistic person. But any resolutions personal and otherwise, that you have, that you may want to share in your closing couple of minutes. I'd love you to do that as well.

Martin Whittaker 

Well, thanks, Alan. And I could talk all day. To you. You said it. It's a lot of fun. Well, you know, at JUST we have a couple of major priorities I mentioned, really lifting up company leadership. And, you know, we have two massive priorities for this year beyond our rankings and all our usual course of business. And the first is the worker financial wellness initiative with Pay Pal and others. We are trying to get companies to really just know what their employee's level of sort of economic hardship is. We learned from Dan at PayPal and Mark Bertolini at Aetna have actually done the same thing. That, you know, they survey their employees. They thought, Okay, this is gonna be a good news story. You know, we're wealthy company, we're in tech. Everyone's gonna be well, you know, no one's gonna be experiencing, sort of financial distress. And in fact, that wasn't the case. There were many employees who were not feeling that way. And so, you know, they did something about it. So when you know about a problem, you can act on it. But, you know, finding out about whether a problem exists doesn't actually create the problem. So what we're asking company leaders to do is—

Alan Fleischmann 

It helps you get to a solution—

Martin Whittaker 

It helps you get to a solution, right? So it's just to conduct an assessment of their employee base to just to know. Just to know, you know, how many employees are going through, you know, financially distressing time. And there's a playbook, you know, to our point earlier about what to do. There's a playbook on how companies can act to address worker financial wellness. And we have that playbook. And we want to work with companies to achieve that. So that's a major priority. And then we have our initiative, as I mentioned, with policy linked with FSG. There are companies joining that now, which is really focused on racial equity in the workplace, and how can we create a blueprint for leadership on that. So those are two major initiatives. As you know, we are working furiously to build sort of our investor products, you know, business, you know. We already have this great partnership with Goldman Sachs, there are other asset managers, we're working with. SmartTrust is one, you know, to really build investment products based on the JUST data. The more assets we influence, the more influence we'll have in the boardrooms and the C suites. So that's a big area of our business, I expect to see, you know, some major breakthroughs there. So that's exciting. In terms of me, personally, you know, I sort of feel as though one of the things that I would love to do, is really trying to help everybody at JUST Capital individually become, you know, their own leader. And I'm really working hard to try and take the lessons that I've learned in 2020. And sort of empower my team all the way through the organization, because I've learned what a small organization like us—we're only 35, hopefully going to 40 people. Not including the board because we have 28 board members, which is you know, which is also a challenge. I have four kids. I love them all equally. It's like 28 board members, I love them all equally. And so we are a small but mighty organization, but that only works when people feel empowered, and have the space to be leaders. So that's what I want to try and do in 2020 for this organization.

Alan Fleischmann 

I was gonna say, I think when you're under 10 people you can call yourself small when you're over 10 people, you're building a culture and you can be part of a movement, whether in the private sector or nonprofit world. And I think you're big enough and robust enough around your 40 people or 35 plus people to build a culture and building a culture, I should say. And it's distinct. And you know, we're living in a world where we're looking for values propositions as well as value propositions. I've now known you for several years, Martin Whittaker, and I know your journey before you came to JUST. The transformational work that I get to see on the frontlines has been quite impressive, and the need and calling for your leadership, and that for the colleagues that we know are stepping up at JUST Capitol is probably more profound today than ever. So on behalf of Leadership Matters, and all the folks who are listening today, and all the people who are really, I guess, not only speaking up for the things that you're speaking out for, I'd ask them to join JUST Capital, if there are CEOs and leaders, partners, even folks from main street who want to be part of the conversations we're having on Wall Street, to come and join us at JUST Capital and join you and the team so that we can make this a much more robust discussion as we go forward and to get to the impact that we need. So on behalf of the viewers of Leadership Matters, thank you, Martin, really, for all the work you'd be doing.

Martin Whittaker 

Alan, thank you. The pleasure is all mine. I couldn't agree with you more. If anybody wants to get involved in what we're doing, there's so many ways to do that. I'd just be grateful for anyone's support and what we're doing. So thank you. Thanks for the opportunity. Alan, it's a real pleasure.

Alan Fleischmann 

As you said, I could have gone off for another hour. And I wish we did. But let's have you back on. And let's continue this conversation because I'm certain that we're going to have a lot more insight and a lot more evidence that the work that you're doing in 2021 is as important as the years before so looking forward to the next. Thank you, my friend.

Martin Whittaker 

I'd love to come back. Thank you.

Alan Fleischmann 

Thank you.