Why Now Is Time for Business Artistry and Business as UNusual

From mom and pop shops to major corporations, business leaders are reevaluating their operations and realizing the rules – real or imagined – that held them back from advancing their values- and beliefs-based businesses aren’t as rigid as they thought. In fact, they’re recognizing that resilient businesses are driven by deep purpose and a commitment to serve their communities, not just their bottom line. 

They are doing business as unusual. 

Although I have been tracking the rise of mission-driven brands and businesses for the past several years, our collective monumental challenges have forced many of us to do business as unusual. Beneath the surface of recent social, economic, and political upheaval, there is a deeper cultural shift occurring among brands and businesses. 

Whether by choice or out of necessity, many of us have been doing business as unusual these past few months. Businesses, brands, entrepreneurs, and leaders around the world have been faced with monumental COVID-related challenges. But 

In the face of crisis and uncertainty, some of us are called to create solutions that are novel, useful, and healing in this time of great suffering. Now more than ever, consumers are looking to businesses and brands for solutions to the social, environmental, and moral problems we face. In response, a new kind of creative entrepreneur is emerging to challenge the status quo by putting purpose ahead of profit.

Enter Business Artistry. 

Independent professionals, creatives, entrepreneurs, and thought leaders around the globe yearn to bring integrity and creativity to the work they do. They stand in the authority of their ideas to contribute lasting value through their businesses and the conversations they lead. They approach their work as part of a creative problem-solving and skill-building endeavor that not only makes them a living, but makes a difference.

They build brands and lead conversations like business artists. 

Business artists create like artists, experiment like scientists, and earn like entrepreneurs.

Create like an artist – Trends show that leaders need what artists foster – emotional intelligence to attune to their people’s inner worlds and imaginational intelligence to conceive novel and useful solutions to pressing and long-term problems. 

Experiment like a scientist – Brand leaders cannot afford to over-think campaigns and initiatives. Amidst so much unpredictability, business artists fuel confusion with more curiosity, gather meaningful data, listen to the people they serve, and test low-scale trial runs of new projects. 

A new generation of leaders plus a new generation of consumers demand more business leaders invent radically new business models with new principles – and the integrity to uphold them. 

They want to change the way they do business because they  share certain core values

• Competitive collaboration over cutthroat competition
• Creative messiness over bottom-line efficiency
• Integrity over slick sales-speak and phony personas
• The pursuit of meaning and mastery as much as  profits and production

Maybe this short poem-film will resonate as it articulates the principles behind our manifesto.

If you like this video, please share it with colleagues, creative peers, or friends whom you think could benefit from bringing more artistry to their work.

If you want to learn more about The Rise of the Business Artist, fill out the form below to get the full report.

Now perhaps more than ever is the time to advance your most meaningful, impactful work.  

Thanks for running with me,

Jeffrey