One of the most important aspects of the People and Planet First verification process is its focus on an enterprise’s structure. That focus exists because being an enterprise that puts people and the planet first is about far more than finding eco-efficiencies or some sustainable practices – it’s about the fundamental design of the organisation itself.

Business structure and enterprise design have been long-time fascinations for Erinch Sahan, business and enterprise lead at Doughnut Economics Action Lab and one of Social Enterprise World Forum’s Board Members. We recently spoke with Erinch about how he’s seen these concepts evolve throughout his career and the importance of recognising the limits of traditional business structures.

Can you tell us a bit about your career? What inspired your interest in alternative forms of business?

My career started in the legal sector, I then moved to the corporate world as a market strategy manager at Procter & Gamble. It was while I was in that world that I started asking some big questions around how we need to transform business and how we can do that.

I ended up moving into the aid sector, working specifically in the crossover between the business world and poverty issues. That took me to Oxford in the UK where I worked for Oxfam for seven years and eventually to being CEO of the World Fair Trade Organization (WFTO) for three and a half years. With the WFTO I had the honour of working with social enterprises across 80+ countries, all built around the principles of supporting workers, farmers and artisans through fair trade.

I’ve been with Doughnut Economics Action Lab for three years now, working to spread the ideas of Doughnut Economics and economic redesign. I also teach at Cambridge Institute for Sustainability Leadership and sit on a couple of boards, including the Social Enterprise World Forum.

For those that don’t know much about Doughnut Economics, can you summarise what it is and what you do there?

Imagine a doughnut where the outer boundary is the limits of the planet we occupy and the inner boundary is our social needs to make sure everyone has the essentials of life. The idea of Doughnut Economics is to find a way for us all to live harmoniously between those two boundaries – in the space that makes up the doughnut.

Within the Action Lab, we support a community of practice. We’re always asking how we can support changemakers around the world and designing creative commons tools to help them drive action.

A lot of what we do is also about decentering ourselves. We don’t want to be in the way of people trying to apply the ideas behind Doughnut Economics – as long as what they’re trying to do is truly values-aligned, ambitious and transformative, then we want to create the materials and tools that help that to happen.

How did you first get involved with SEWF, what does your position on the board involve and how does it link with Doughnut Economics?

I first engaged with SEWF at their 2019 Ethiopia summit when I was still CEO of the World Fair Trade Organization. It was a lightbulb moment to see the term “social enterprise” being used, because I was working with a community of fair trade entrepreneurs who fit that description but didn’t use that term to describe themselves.

We started shifting our language in the WFTO after that and worked with SEWF to bring the breadth of what was taking place in the WFTO movement into the community that SEWF stewards as well. I played a role in supporting that closer engagement and when I left WFTO in 2021 I was recommended for a board position that had just opened up at SEWF.

Being part of the SEWF board feels like a consistent part of what I’m also trying to achieve with Doughnut Economics Action Lab. I try to bring the new global economy perspective that Doughnut Economics focuses on as well as my interest in the way we organise companies and use that to support the SEWF community.

Erinch at Meaning Conference, 2019

Why do you feel we need verification processes like People and Planet First?

Firstly, because there are hundreds of thousands of enterprises around the world that don’t have an easy, accessible and affordable way to demonstrate that they’re a different kind of business. There might be no legal form available in their country, or some of the existing global verifications might be too expensive or complicated.

The second reason is it creates a global message that can be communicated in multiple markets. There are a lot of national-level verifications for values-led enterprises and People and Planet First can sit alongside those as an additional badge.

For instance, you might already be a B Corp but you’ve also gone beyond those requirements to reinvest the majority of your profits back into your social mission and structure your governance and ownership to prioritise your social mission. You can then apply for a People and Planet First badge as well and have both credentials alongside one another.

You also might not want to call yourself a social enterprise – especially if that’s not a term that people in your market use or recognise. This verification allows you to call yourself a People and Planet First verified enterprise instead and really make it clear what makes your organisation different.

What changes have you seen within the ethical business space over your career?

When I started teaching at Cambridge ten years ago, I noticed that the students coming to study sustainability leadership would be looking for efficiencies and “low-hanging fruit” – things they could do immediately in their day jobs. Most weren’t really willing to consider the bigger questions of economic transformation.

But now, people across the business world are more willing to question the fundamental structures they’re in. They’re looking at their companies and realising that the way things are structured make it difficult to design regenerative products or deploy circular economy concepts or pay suppliers enough for workers to escape poverty. Even if they can prove it’s going to pay off long-term, they can’t unlock the internal investment to make it happen.

It’s a belief system shift. They’re realising that something is broken with our current structures and that we have to reinvent finance and business in order to reach the fruit that’s further up the tree. To go beyond the easy to pick win-win solutions will require this deeper redesign of business, in particular its relationship with finance.

What do you hope that we will see in the future, what do you believe we need?

One of the most useful things we can all do is be honest about the limitations of the structures of business. The more we tell ourselves that “purpose pays dividends” and that “better returns make a better world”, the more we entrench the belief that the ship we’re in will get us where we need to go.

We need to recognise that actually, that ship has to be rebuilt. It’s not going to reach the right destination unless we’re prepared to ambitiously redesign it. It’s no accident that I’m excited about something like People and Planet First, because the five standards used for verification are all about enterprise design and business structure.