Empathy and Social Purpose Have a Special Place in Financial Decision-Making

Should nonprofit organizations make room for social justice, empathy, and compassion in the workplace? The answer is an absolute yes. Can financial decision-making benefit from a workplace culture that includes “social purposing”? Again, the answer is yes if you can link operational planning and allocation of financial resources with a broader set of perspectives that can surface from active “job purposing.”

The workplace occupies a large portion of our daily lives. We cannot and should not turn off our feelings of empathy and promoting social justice when working. What we can do is help our senior management and staff to promote social purpose by establishing a work culture that includes job purposing. In the Harvard Business Review article titled “Why Your Values Belong at Work” (January 21, 2021), Bea Boccalandro defines job purposing as “adjusting how we work so that we engage in social purpose, or a meaningful contribution to a societal cause, during the work week.”

There is an opportunity to increase staff engagement through job purposing. Encouraging staff to share new job purposing ideas is another entry point to active engagement. Financial planning, analysis and modeling will benefit from expanded input and new perspectives stimulated by job purposing.

A universal downside in financial planning is that financial information traditionally originates from a narrow set of sources (historical financial records, economic reporting and outlooks, and market forecasts). Many financial decisions are very black and red driven (surplus and deficit) without consideration of the social impact from budget “cuts” and other financially driven maneuvers. We need to do a better job of communicating the “domino effect” of budget choices based solely on financial implications.

Increased staff engagement from job purposing initiatives can lead to diverse and fresh points of view being pumped into the decision-making processes. There will be two direct benefits. First, expanded inclusion and diversity of views will feed more information into analysis and planning. Second, increased staff engagement, if managed properly, can lead to a better sense of staff ownership, job satisfaction, and performance. In her article, Boccalandro comments “Research finds that, compared to colleagues who don’t job purpose, those who do likely have higher job satisfaction and performance.” Her new book, Do Good at Work: How Simple Acts of Social Purpose Drive Success and Wellbeing, has dozens of references to the studies proving this statement.

Planning Tip – Implement social purposing into your organization’s culture statements, workplace training programs, and community outreach initiatives. Be inclusive and encouraging with staff to engage through social purposing. Let them know that the organization respects their points of view and appreciates and supports sharing of ideas.

Nonprofits should sit down with their finance team and discuss how empathy and social justice are not just for others to consider. Instruct the finance team to incorporate job purposing considerations into interactions with others in the organization. There are many opportunities from simple to complex.

For example, from a budget perspective some simple initiatives could include purchasing environmentally sustainable products, using services from minority owned business, and reinvesting in the community through the sharing of proceeds. Steps like these can generally be implemented quickly and easily, and just need the awareness and support of senior management. More complex examples requiring extra planning and resources include cooperative joint ventures with other nonprofit organizations to advocate for workforce development, promote and deliver expanded access to medical care, or message and expand awareness to correct the unbalanced allocation of public funding to better support marginalized populations.

Make sure to point out that financial planning, forecasts, and analysis will be better and more accepted when delivered with a message that social purposing and job purposing have been considered and factored into financial resource allocations and developing the best planning solutions possible.