Becoming a B Corp: what it means for Hedgehog

We kicked off this year with some exciting news — Hedgehog was officially certified as a B Corp by non-profit network, B Lab.

Finance might not spring to mind when you think of B Corp. This well-known label is primarily associated with organic and fair trade consumer products. However, analysts at B Lab UK saw a 123% increase in the number of annual B Corp applications from companies in the financial industry specifically, towards the end of the pandemic. With the likes of Octopus, CrowdCube and Coutts already having joined the community, we’re pretty proud that Hedgehog is part of that line up now, too.

Sustainability is something we’ve built into our brand from its inception. As we’re creating a digital infrastructure for the investment industry, we know demand for more sustainable opportunities is only going to increase. PWC estimated assets under management (AUM) for ESG-related products to grow from $18.4trn in 2021 to nearly $34trn by 2026, while Bloomberg is even more bullish, forecasting that ESG AUM will top $53trn by 2025.

But sustainability takes more than just a stated intention. We can’t simply tell the world what our company stands for, we have to show it. We need to deliver products and services that have a positive impact on the lives of our end users and the wider global community — and that takes time.

Strong foundations

From the moment Hedgehog was founded in 2021, we knew what that positive impact had to look like for us. We wanted people to have more opportunities to invest in the world around them, to be able to choose investments that aligned with their personal values, whether environmental or social, and that meant improving access.

We started by developing brand foundations that worked for us from the beginning, and would continue to guide our work today, tomorrow and in 10 years time. Our brand mission (our objective for the present) is to make it easy for more people to invest in the world around us. Our brand vision (our focus for the future) is to help build a world where we all have opportunities to invest in what we care about.

Neither of these things will happen overnight. We need a network of like-minded asset managers and distribution partners to help us provide access to investments that work for people and the planet. Finding the right partners takes time, and we can’t afford to get distracted along the way.

That’s where our brand beliefs come in. These guide our everyday choices and codify what our brand stands for, including the belief in the transition to a sustainable future.

All of our foundational brand work really paid off. Not only does it give our team guardrails to their everyday work, but we didn’t need to change any of our brand foundations to comply with B Corp.

Consistency is better than perfection

We’re not unrealistic dreamers. As a young, small company, we know it is nearly impossible to have profit and purpose coexist at the same level. To survive in an industry that hasn’t fully managed to navigate sustainability yet, some purpose is naturally trumped by the need for growth and profit.

What we can and should do, however, is stay true to our core beliefs, our brand mission and vision. That means seizing any opportunity to move our industry towards a more sustainable future, constantly reassessing budgets and priorities, and having a road map and action plan at the ready so we don’t miss an opportunity to walk the walk.

As helpful as B Lab’s service is, we don’t intend to live and die by it. We need to constantly keep asking ourselves if it still works for us and our brand, otherwise we risk turning B Corp certification into nothing more than a box ticking exercise. This is true for every brand considering B Corp status, you need your own stance and strategy on sustainability, one that aligns with your brand’s personality.

This approach might not result in a top rating by B Lab, but being a B Corp should be viewed as one of many steps in a larger sustainability strategy, not the silver bullet to a sustainable world. To us, becoming a B Corp per se was never the goal, but having checks and balances was. As B Lab continues to put in the work to refine its standards, we recognise that its service can help us to cement the groundworks for a more sustainable business.

Holding each other accountable

Our approach is to do the best we can, regardless of our role within the team, and we believe sustainability is not something that should fall just to our senior management. Everyone in the Hedgehog team should be aware of our stance and our sustainability strategy, as well as how they can each contribute to it.

That means that, as a team, we’re accountable to each other and we have some guidelines in place to help us understand what that looks like day-to-day:

• Be the advocate
  Always remind yourself and each other of our mission and vision.
• Be proactive
  Joining Hedgehog means you support our stance, are keen to voice any ambitions, and willing to always reassess what we can do today, and want to do tomorrow.
• Set the right expectations
  We like to voice our excitement for the future, but we don’t over promise on what we can do for our clients today. We communicate clearly what is actionable versus what is desired. This is why we commit to building in public as much as we can. Right now, for us that means any team member can write articles and share insights about what they are working on, any challenges or achievements they’ve been through, or what excites them about where we’re headed.

With simple rules like these in place, and services like B Lab’s, Hedgehog will play its part in accelerating the transition to sustainable finance.