Citizen Inc. Q&A: Shawn Askinosie

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Citizen Inc.: A show that explores how corporations and CEOs are taking ownership of our community in various ways. These stories about giving back are helping grow corporate citizenship and boost the bottom line.

Hosted by: SBJ Editorial Vice President Eric Olson and United Way Executive Director Greg Burris

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Citizen Inc. from SBJ Podcasts

Askinosie Chocolate founder Shawn Askinosie is the guest for the first episode of Citizen Inc. from SBJ Podcasts. The following Q&A is from the show, co-hosted by Springfield Business Journal’s Eric Olson and United Way of the Ozarks’ Greg Burris, and recorded at ADsmith Studio.

Eric Olson: You’ve been called a social entrepreneur and humanitarian chocolatier – was that part of your objective when you started Askinosie Chocolate?
Shawn Askinosie: One of the things I’ve tried to do in the last 10 years is remove the phrase social entrepreneurship from my website, we don’t put it in social media posts. I don’t like that phrase. And here’s why: When we call businesspeople social entrepreneurs, it tends to cast a sort of “eliteness” to that business and I don’t like that. What I try to say is, it’s not social entrepreneurship or social business, it’s just good business.

Greg Burris: When you talk about your model being just good business, do you find that there’s some generational aspects, that maybe younger generations are really drawn to the type of direct sourcing that you’re doing?
Askinosie: There is a specific appeal to young people about this way that we do business with farmers. Having worked with students now for so many years with our Chocolate University program, what I have found is this increasing awareness among young people of the world around them – by world, I mean Springfield and I also mean Africa. In our last Chocolate University class, I remember thinking, “We’re going to be OK. This world’s going to be OK.”

Olson: Those students coming out of Chocolate University, how do you see them fitting into the workforce? 
Askinosie: These are the top students. We give them an opportunity. It’s merely a catalyst for them to further accelerate their interest in the world around them. And our hope is they would come back home and let this experience wash over them and transform them and then use that to express what they’ve learned in whatever they choose to do – a doctor, a lawyer, in government or business. Often, when you ask why they want to be part of this business program, they say things like, “I want to help the people of Africa.” If they’re selected, I tell them, “Your job is not to help the people of Africa. Your job is to transform this [points to chest]. Can you change your heart? Can you let this experience change you? Your job isn’t to go over there and dig a foundation and pour concrete. This isn’t a mission trip. This is a mission trip for your heart.” This happens. I’m not saying this happens to every single student. But it’s just one of those pivotal moments that they’ll take with them the rest of their lives.

Olson: Shawn, can that happen in corporate America? This leadership of challenging people to look more internally, do you think that can happen in workplaces throughout Springfield, southwest Missouri, America?
Askinosie: One of the things I write about in my book [“Meaningful Work”] is a concept called reverse scale. Reverse scale says hey, let’s push against this North American, really Western, conditioned business model of grow and scale as fast as you can. I push against that and say we don’t have to grow for the sake of growth or because investors want us to grow. We need to really be mindful about this growth. Why? Because if we’re mindful about maybe not scaling so fast, it gives us an opportunity to remain tethered to the reason we started the business in the first place. It’s a discipline.

Olson: You’re making small-batch, award-winning chocolate with purpose – social responsibility as a benchmark and sharing profits with farmers around the world. But you’ve got to have profits to share. How has this structure influenced the bottom line, the mission affecting the numbers?
Askinosie: What students in business schools around the country are being taught is this notion that you can have it all. In fact, if you’re a good corporate citizen, you will be rich. And the better corporate citizen you are, the richer you will be; the bigger your heart, the newer your Gulfstream. I am here to say, in my own experience, that is not true. Unless you happen to own a very high-margin business. I think it’s a trick, and we should stop teaching our business students this myth. We should tell our students that if you’re a good corporate citizen, in all likelihood, you’re going to make less money. Or if you’re a good corporate citizen, it’s possible you will be making some sacrifices. And that’s OK, because the consequence of being a good corporate citizen is quite possibly immeasurable to your life and to those around you. In my experience, because I spend time building preschools in Tanzania and because we’ve just now surpassed a million school lunches that we’ve funded without donations to malnourished children in Tanzania and the Philippines, our company doesn’t make as much money. Maybe I was working on a nutrition school lunch program when I could have been working on a big order to the Whole Foods in San Francisco. How I now know that, in a very real way, is because it’s quite possible in the next three to five years that we’ll sell the company. People have kicked the tires for my company. I’ve seen that the valuation of my business is not as high as I thought it might be because of brand equity or the intangible value. Well, it’s a value to me. It has been and I wouldn’t trade it for the world.