Inclusive Support: Business Responsibility for Social Growth

Exploring the intersection of business social responsibility and inclusive support for personal and social growth.

Trickle-down economics continues to be touted as a solution to uplift financially disadvantaged individuals, but the reality tells a different story. As people gain organizational, economic, and political power, they become more isolated in their perspective. The more isolated they are, the more they lose their ability to listen and empathize with people of lower power. This position makes it easier to leave people behind for more possession and control.

The disparities in wage and class continue to widen, leaving underserved and underrepresented populations like women, BIPOC, LGBTQIA+, and people with disabilities disproportionately struggling to access the support they need for personal and social growth. Most social programs supporting these communities tend to stop after providing basic needs like food, water, and shelter. Few social programs are available to help people with more psychological needs; in addition to their rarity, the organizations in charge of these programs have a history of not researching or serving these populations fairly or effectively. Rarely, if ever, are the actualization needs of the communities addressed, as their individual and collective actualization often seems at odds with the motives of the Non-Profit Industrial Complex. 

Most coaching to help people through these challenges is expensive, often priced as a luxury item following the economics of the Actualization Escalator. The lack of financial resources for coaching or community programs for the 99% further exacerbates these inequalities, leading to stagnation in personal development and limited career and professional opportunities for people, extending our systemic oppression.

To create a more equitable society, businesses—especially emerging business and social leaders—must encourage and seek to provide inclusive support for all individuals, regardless of their financial situation, to access their products and services, especially those that support personal and professional growth. Only by actively working towards inclusivity and accessibility can we break the cycle of limited access to support and empower underrepresented populations to thrive and contribute to collective progress.

Challenges of Limited Access to Support for Personal Growth

People with financial limitations often face significant challenges when seeking access to support for their personal growth and actualization. Some examples of these challenges include:

• Limited financial resources to invest in coaching or community programs while also trying to address basic and psychological needs
• Difficulty finding affordable options for personal development
• Inability to access resources and tools that can aid in their growth journey
• Limited time available for the effort required to find, curate, and study suitable resources to support their actualization, with most effort going toward survival

These challenges can prevent individuals from reaching their full potential and hinder their personal and social growth.

Consequences of Diminished Support for Actualization

Diminished access to support for one's actualization can have profound personal and socio-economic consequences. When individuals are unable to receive the guidance and support they need to grow, it can result in:

• Stagnation and fixed mindsets, reducing personal resilience and amplifying intolerance
• Lack of personal development and fulfillment, leading to anxiety and depression
• Limited opportunities for career advancement turn into frustration and perpetuation of social disparities
• Stifling entrepreneurial development and new business development, limiting innovation in products and services, especially for underrepresented groups
• Increased inequality and social disparities by existing systems as they remain closed and inflexible

These consequences can further widen society's wage and power gaps, creating a vicious cycle of limited access to support and diminished opportunities for growth.

A Vision for Inclusive Actualization Support for All

Individual Impacts

Imagine a world where all individuals, regardless of their financial situation, have access to guidance and support for their actualization. In this vision, coaching and community programs are financially accessible to everyone, allowing them to:

• Discover their true potential and purpose
• Develop the necessary skills and mindset for personal growth
• Build strong relationships and networks for collective progress

Collective Impacts

Support for an individual's self-actualization also has a potential impact on collective actualization. 

By providing inclusive actualization support, we can empower individuals to thrive and contribute to the betterment of society.

Role of Business in Providing Access to Guidance and Support

Businesses play a crucial role in providing people of any financial situation with guidance and support for their personal growth. By embracing social responsibility, businesses can:

• Offer programs like No One Turned Away for Lack of Funds (NOTAFLOF) with pricing schemes that include hardship pricing, free trials, and sliding scale pricing options to make coaching and community programs more affordable.
• Partner with organizations that focus on providing support to individuals with financial limitations.
• Create initiatives and scholarships to ensure equal access to resources.
• Embrace organization design for employee actualization, meeting everyone in the company where they are and where they want to grow, whether or not it directly serves the business's immediate needs.
• Develop customer experience strategies with supporting product and service design for customer actualization, moving beyond transactional support toward enabling customers to reach their potential related to the industries and ecosystems the business supports.

By actively working towards inclusive actualization, businesses can contribute to individuals' personal and social growth and foster a more equitable society.

Integral Productivity's Commitment to Inclusive Support

Integral Productivity is committed to leading the charge in providing inclusive support for personal growth. We firmly believe everyone deserves the opportunity to actualize their most authentic selves and potential, regardless of their financial circumstances. As part of our commitment, we:

• Offer sliding scale pricing and hardship pricing for our coaching and community programs as part of our NOTAFLOF program.
• Donate a minimum of 1% of our profits and time as part of our Pledge 1% participation, collaborate with non-profit organizations, and seek to leverage grants to extend our reach to individuals with financial limitations.
• Design our community, coaching, and consulting services to support people across their own vertical development growth journey, including:
  • Skill acquisition and development for personal productivity and growth.
  • Achievement in their career, at work, launching their own business, fostering relationships, building their families, and supporting their community.
  • Individualization of their vision, progress, and platforms to meet their unique vision for the world.
  • Strategy development and deployment to broaden the impact our clients and community members want to make in their collectives—families, organizations, and communities—and through our Integrators Community's impact.
• Regularly review and improve our pricing and accessibility initiatives to ensure equitable access for all
• Started the process of Integral Productivity LLC becoming a B-Corp, beginning with a self-assessment

Our efforts aim to empower individuals to embark on a transformative journey of personal and social growth without worrying about how they'll get the money to support it.