What do these 5 UK B Corps have in common with Nous? Taking a closer look at B Corp certification

Here at Nous we’ve been busy learning about many of the other brilliant businesses in the B Corp community. (In case you missed the exciting news, Nous announced our B Corp certification this month – huzzah!) 

As anyone who’s undergone the process will tell you, becoming a B Corp is lengthy and time-consuming. Scored against five impact pillars, your business must prove it meets high standards of social and environmental performance, transparency and accountability. Companies need to gain at least 80 points from a possible 150. But since every business is unique, each one gets a different score, depending on which pillars they’ve chosen to focus on.

 Let’s take a look at those pillars:

‘Governance’ evaluates the overall mission, social and environmental impact, ethics, and transparency. It also evaluates a company’s corporate structure and ability to protect their mission and formally.

‘Workers’ looks at contributions to employees’ financial security, health & safety, wellness, career development, engagement and satisfaction. It also looks for business models which have been designed to benefit employees, and development programs supporting people who face barriers to employment.

‘Community’ evaluates how a business impacts and engages with communities it hires from, sources from, and operates in. This includes diversity, equity and inclusion, economic impact, civic engagement, charitable giving, and supply chain management. This pillar also recognizes business models designed to address specific community-oriented problems. 

‘Environment’ assesses overall environmental management practices as well as a company’s impact on the air, climate, water, land, and biodiversity through operations and its supply chain and distribution channels. This pillar also recognizes environmentally innovative production processes, and those with products or services with a positive environmental impact. 

Finally, ‘Customers’ looks at stewardship of customers through the quality of products and services, ethical marketing, data privacy and security, and feedback channels. This pillar recognizes products or services designed to address a particular social problem for or through its customers.

So, how did Nous do? 

We earned an overall score of 86.9, which we’re pretty pleased about. (The median score for ordinary businesses who complete the assessment is currently 50.9, and a business needs to earn at least 80 to certify as B Corp). 

Almost half our total points were earned for how well Nous treats its employees, AKA Nousmates. That includes the various ways Nous ensures financial wellbeing, such as fair wages, our share option program, and annual cost-of-living adjustments. Our additional healthcare cover and flexible working policy also notched a few. This didn’t come as a big surprise to us, as our team typically gives an 81-90% satisfaction rate when asked how they feel about working here. Sounds good to you? We’re hiring.

We picked up points in the Governance pillar for our business model. It was intentionally designed to create a specific positive outcome for customers (that is, helping people get a fairer deal on household bills to save them money and time). In the community pillar, we gained points for partnering with charitable organisations and setting time aside for employees to volunteer (shout outs to The Felix Project and Shelter) as well as evaluating the compliance and environmental impact of our outsourced service providers.

Being a service business where the teams primarily do office/desk-based work, Nous was never going to gain full points for the Environment pillar. But that said, we’re an eco-conscious bunch, and the points we earned were for our green efforts. We’ve got a solid office recycling system, environmentally preferred vendors for supplies, and policies and guidance for environmental stewardship of virtual offices too. 

And now that we’ve started saving real people many hundreds of pounds (when we completed our assessment, it was still a lofty ambition) we’ll be gunning for a full five-out-of-five on the Customer pillar when we come around to recertify in three years.

B Corps keep good company

As of October 2023, there are 7,630 Certified B Corps and counting, in 161 industries around the world. And did you know (we didn’t) that the UK has one of the biggest and fastest growing networks (there are over 1,500 of them trading here already) with no fewer than 1,000 in London alone. 

But wherever B Corps might be based, the B Corp Movement is famously united by one unifying goal: transforming the global economy to benefit all people, communities and the planet. It’s open to businesses of all kinds, provided they get certified by B Lab. 

Now you know a bit more about B Corps and our B Corp assessment, can you guess what these five UK B Corps have in common with Nous?

#1 The Barton Partnership is an award-winning executive recruitment and consultancy company providing permanent search and independent consulting services.

#2 Bates Wells Bates Wells is a truly purpose and impact driven law firm and the first UK law firm to be a B Corp.

#3 Futureheads is a majority female-owned, award-winning digital and tech recruitment business on a mission to be a force for good. 

#4 Thirdfort’s anti-money laundering (AML) and anti-fraud platform protects life’s big transactions so businesses and their clients can move fearlessly.

#5 Stand is a communications consultancy that challenges the way people think, feel and act to bring about real change.

Well, you could have answered correctly that, like Nous, they’re all based in London (which, by the way, was recently nicknamed the ‘B Capital’ with over 1,000 B Corps based in the city). But that’s not the answer.

You also could have guessed that, like Nous, they all scored most highly on the Workers pillar of their B Corp assessments. (Kudos goes to Thirdfort who earned a high score of 42.2!) But that’s not the answer, either. 

The answer we were actually looking for (and, with apologies, we’d be gobsmacked if you managed to guess) is that these five B Corps have all given Nous to their employees for free.

That’s right, Nous For Business is already proving popular among the B Corp community – and we’re sure it’s not a coincidence that those businesses were already leading the way on creating brilliant work environments for their employees.

We’re not sure if any of the fantastic five mentioned Nous for Business in their B Corp assessments, but we decided to ask our B Lab assessors what it might be worth in terms of B points. The answer is 0.44 points – which is not to be sniffed at! 

If you’re a B Corp (or even if you’re not) and you’d like us to make your whole team better off, you can give them Nous for free too. Just get in touch with jon@nous.co