Christine Elliott
Marketing Director of Pacific Pulp Molding
We are building an incredible community of conscious students, thought leaders and business leaders. Each month, we will profile a different member to shine a spotlight on the diversity of our membership, and give each of you an opportunity to share what attracted you to the Conscious Capitalist Movement, and how you model purposeful business practices in your own lives. First up is Christine Elliott, Marketing Director of Pacific Pulp Molding and tremendous supporter of CCSD.
Tell me a little bit about your professional background.
I come from the old-school, traditional business model, having spent the first twelve years of my career as in-house attorney in three multinational oil and mining corporations. Having “been there, done that”, I moved into the entrepreneur world, first as a systems analyst for a venture capitalized legal software company, and then completely away from the law into sales and marketing roles with management training and organizational development companies. By this point, I was deeply disturbed by the short term, narrow values being pursued in business generally, so a partner and I started a small, “romantic music” production company, then I was an executive business coach for small law firms, wrote a book, and now do part time marketing for my husband’s environmentally-friendly packaging business.
What is most appealing to you about Conscious Capitalism?
I’ve been aware of the topic of consciousness in the business context since the late ’80s. However, I only recently learned how organizations using the conscious business model are so dramatically out-performing their traditional competitors. To me, it’s thrilling that there are finally solid data demonstrating the huge rewards that can flow from higher and broader corporate values.
How have you modeled conscious business practices in your own professional career?
It seems to me that conscious business practices means, “The consistent alignment of an organization’s behaviors with values that enhance all of its relationships”. Personally, my top two values are respect and integrity. So in my various business positions, I’ve tried to demonstrate and embody those values with peers, support staff, bosses, customers, suppliers and also in selecting employers and clients. I’ll admit it was a little easier to stick to my values after I stopped working in “Big Oil”!
What do you hope to achieve from your membership with CCSD? What are your goals and how do you hope to be involved?
I want to learn everything I can about how an organization transitions into the “conscious” mode. I want to help get the conscious capitalism word out to our local business community by writing some of these blog posts. When I think about how many folks are stressed, depressed and unhappy in their work, and how evolving into a more aware and meaningful set of corporate values can make all the stakeholders in the organization happier (including profit driven shareholders), I am delighted with the prospect of contributing to that evolution.
Is there a particular business company or business leader whom you particularly admire? Why?
It would have to be John Mackey and Whole Foods Markets. Mackey initiated the Conscious Capitalism organization, and I literally love shopping at Whole Foods. When we lived in La Jolla I shopped there weekly and now that we live in Scripps Ranch, I still make my weekly pilgrimage to the UTC Whole Foods store because I love the healthy produce and meats, the energy of the staff and the “vales on their sleeve” tenor of the place.
How do you see our professional community evolving in San Diego? How will conscious business practices impact the evolution?
After over 30 years in a wide variety of corporate settings, I had become disenchanted with the short- term, narrow business goals I saw, and saddened by the dissatisfaction and frustration of the folks working there, from the entry level support people to the leadership. When San Diego’s business community makes the investment to elevate their workplaces to the kind of bigger, higher, deeper values expressed in the CC model, every stakeholder in those enterprises will benefit, both materially and psychologically: employees, leaders, shareholders, customers, suppliers, the community and environment – and consequently, the planet itself. This is, for me, a tremendously exciting time to be alive and to have the chance to participate in this fundamental transformation in our world.
