Scaling With Sustainability: How Founders Protect the Downside While Growing Fast | Belen Benitez

Summary

Podcast Summary: The Entrepreneur DNA

Scaling With Sustainability: How Smart Founders Protect the Downside While Growing Fast

Host: Justin Colby
Guest: Belen Benitez (Founder & CEO, Baseline Sustainable Development)
Date: February 6, 2026

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Episode Overview

In this episode, Justin Colby sits down with Belen Benitez to unpack what it means to scale a business with sustainability at its core. The conversation centers on redefining sustainability beyond environmentalism—making it about long-term resilience, people, strategy, and culture. Belen shares hard-earned insights from her experience advising both small and large companies on how to grow fast without risking collapse, especially during times of economic or political uncertainty. The discussion is tactical, honest, and full of actionable advice for entrepreneurs at any stage.

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Key Discussion Points & Insights

1. Defining Sustainability in Business

[02:31]

• Belen expands sustainability beyond a “tree-hugger” concept, framing it as:
  • Longevity: "Sustainability is doing business in a way that lasts forever." (Belen, 02:31)
  • Holistic Impact: Considering environment, people, and governance
  • Purpose-Driven: Companies must stay connected to their original mission—disconnection erodes sustainability.
• Quote:

  “A lot of businesses begin with a purpose... and along the way they forget about it. When there’s this disconnection with purpose and shared value... your business is not going to be sustainable." (Belen, 02:31)

2. Why Businesses Fail at Sustainability

[03:48]

• Misalignment of Growth and Purpose: Growing in a direction that drifts from the founding value.
• Leadership & Cultural Failures: Examples include large-scale layoffs indicating business model flaws.
• Overreacting to External Pressures: Quick pivots due to political or financial changes destabilize organizations.
• Analogy:

  “Think of me like a doctor... we look at your business and diagnose which ‘organs’ need attention for lasting health.” (Belen, 05:40)

3. Risks from External Shocks

[06:21]

• Real-world example: Justin shares how political changes affected his construction crew through unexpected ICE raids, halting operations.
• Belen stresses the need for catastrophic scenario planning:

  “Sometimes you have to think catastrophically—what’s the worst case scenario and plan for it.” (Belen, 08:44)

4. Entrepreneurial Mindset vs. Sustainability Pacing

[08:48, 13:18]

• Justin highlights entrepreneurs’ bias toward rapid growth and revenue, versus planning for risk.
• Belen acknowledges it’s a tough sell but insists,

  “Anything that’s sustainable takes time. My fight with CEOs is: let’s put on the brakes—prepare and anticipate. Doing it at a different pace… guarantees you’ll be in business 30, 40, 50 years.” (Belen, 13:18)

• Quality-over-Quantity lesson: Cheap, fast growth undermines future referrals and resilience.

5. Supply Chains, Quality, and Workforce Strategy

[16:12]

• Overreliance on global, non-local supply chains and underinvestment in workforce development are serious risks.
• The move to cheap, foreign materials and labor creates vulnerabilities.

  “If you look not at the company, but the country, the country itself didn’t create a sustainable workforce.” (Belen, 17:03)

6. Money, Time, and True Long-Term Value

[18:50]

• Justin quotes Tony Robbins:

  “People overestimate what they can do in one year, and underestimate what they can do in ten.”

• Belen urges:

  “If you want real sustainability, if you want real growth, that happens over time. It doesn’t happen in 24 months.” (Belen, 20:15)

7. Protecting the Downside as a Foundational Practice

[21:02]

• Belen: “My job is to say, okay, let’s focus first on what you’re very good at. Then let’s fill in the gaps—what’s high risk? If you’re going to speed, let’s make sure you don’t crash and die.”
• She notes the rise of AI and fast innovation, cautioning that without governance, speed can amplify risks:

  “We can’t lose the human part of who is providing oversight... have the right governance in place.” (Belen, 22:58)

8. Tactical Risk Assessment for Founders

[26:08]

• Few founders regularly conduct risk assessments. Belen recommends a simple exercise:
  • List out worst case scenarios: "What if I lose all my people? What if the shipment is not on time?"
  • Identify for which ones you have no answer—these are your high-risk vulnerabilities.
• Policy and procedure are essential:

  “You can be in business for 30 years and not have one written policy. I’ve seen them lose a lot of money because of it, unnecessarily.” (Belen, 28:12)

9. Simple, Value-Linked Policies Matter

[29:56]

• Effective policies must be simple and anchored in company values—not just compliance for compliance’s sake.
• A hallmark of sustainability:

  “For me, sustainability is a value. People need that mindset: is this sustainable? Is this going to last?” (Belen, 29:57)

10. Capacity Building: Teaching, Not Hoarding Knowledge

[33:13]

• Belen’s goal is to build sustainability literacy and processes into the organization, so the company can continue without her:

  “I’m not the type who has the know-how and wants to keep it to myself. For me, it’s about spreading and making everybody conscious about how you can sustainably grow.” (Belen, 33:13)

11. Actionable 3-Step Audit for Founders

[35:35] Belen’s practical audit for any founder:

1. Purpose & Values Check: Are you deeply connected to your company’s purpose and values? Write them down.
2. Shared Value Creation: How are you positively impacting people and the planet? Identify your business's “shared value.”
3. Worst-case Planning: If catastrophe hits tomorrow, do you have documented processes, policies, and answers? If not, start there.

12. Sustaining Scale – Same Fundamentals, Different Scale

[39:39]

• The core of the work is the same for companies of 20 employees or 500—values, risk, governance.
• The difference is the scale and sophistication of strategy, not the foundational principles.

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Notable Quotes & Moments

• “A lot of businesses begin with a purpose... and along the way they forget about it.” (Belen, 02:31)
• “Think of me like a doctor... we look at your business and diagnose which ‘organs’ need attention for lasting health.” (Belen, 05:40)
• “Anything that’s sustainable takes time... Doing it at a different pace guarantees you’ll be in business 30, 40, 50 years.” (Belen, 13:18)
• “We can’t lose the human part of who is providing oversight... have the right governance in place.” (Belen, 22:58)
• “For me, sustainability is a value... is this sustainable? Is this going to last?” (Belen, 29:57)
• “If you want real sustainability... it happens over time. It doesn’t happen in 24 months.” (Belen, 20:15)
• “You can be in business for 30 years and not have one written policy. I’ve seen them lose a lot of money because of it, unnecessarily.” (Belen, 28:12)
• "If you’re going to speed, let’s make sure you don’t crash and die." (Belen, 21:02)
• “The work that I do for a company that has 20 employees and the work that I do for a company with 500 employees is pretty much the same... it’s the scale that’s different.” (Belen, 39:40)

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Essential Timestamps

• 02:31 – Belen defines sustainable business and revisits the importance of purpose.
• 05:40 – Health check analogy for business sustainability assessment.
• 13:18 – Why fast growth without care leads to collapse.
• 21:02 – Protecting the downside and calculated risk-taking.
• 26:08 – Simple risk assessment exercise for founders.
• 28:12 – Why documented policies are crucial—even for established businesses.
• 29:57 – Sustainability as a value, not a buzzword.
• 35:35 – 3-step practical audit for business owners.
• 39:39 – Sustainability principles don’t change with company size, only scale and strategy do.

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Where to Find Belen Benitez

• LinkedIn: Belen Benitez
• Company Website: baselinesd.com
• Instagram: @baselineSD

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Final Takeaway

This episode challenges founders and CEOs to slow down just enough to put their businesses on a truly resilient path. Sustainable scaling isn’t about going slow—it’s about building to last by tying strategy to purpose, embedding robust policies, strengthening culture, and always planning for what could go wrong. Belen’s practical advice is a roadmap to not only survive uncertain times but to thrive—creating businesses that stand the test of time.

Transcript

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[A]

What is up the Entrepreneur DNA Family I am back with another incredible guest, another incredible episode. You aren't going to want to miss this if you are a fledgling company or have $100 million a year company. We are going to be talking about having a sustainable business no matter what kind of financial economy we're in. Who's in presidency? It doesn't matter. Belen Benitez is here talking all things sustainable within business growth.

[B]

Oh thank you for having me, Justin.

[A]

I'm excited. So you and I were just talking off camera about like this idea and concept of scaling with sustainability. I really like that as just like a it rolls off the tongue as someone who has multiple businesses all along the path of like kind of a startup all the way into 20 years in the business. Let's talk about the term sustainability. I think there's a lot of people like you just mentioned say oh Bolen is just a tree hugger. That's what sustainability means. It is so much different than that. So let's kind of define what you mean by sustainability.

[B]

Well, basically sustainability is doing business in a way that lasts forever. Hopefully it's doing good business. It's thinking about the environment and the planet. It's thinking about the people, putting people first, putting them at the heart of the organization. It's having good governance. And I think that most important is don't forgetting your purpose. You know, a lot of businesses begin with a purpose. They have a sense of purpose. I've met a lot of creators, inventors, entrepreneurs that say, oh, I want to do this business because I want to bring something good to society. And along the way they forget about it. So when there's this disconnection with purpose and with the shared value that you can create, you, your business is not going to be sustainable because the next big thing that happens to the world is going to crush it.

[A]

So let's talk about that. Let's talk about what actually brings companies down, like through your experience. And your clients are small to medium sized companies. You do have a handful of larger companies, but really you're looking at small to medium sized companies. What hurts? Like where do these companies fall apart? Where do they misalign? Right, to your point, they had a purpose when they started and they lost it. What hurts the companies to, to that they go out of business or they can't sustain?

[B]

Well, there's a, first of all, there's a variety of reasons why businesses fail. But if we connect it to sustainability, there's so many different ways you can look at this. So usually what, what makes a, a business unsustainable is when they have this disconnection between how they grow, why they are growing, and the initial intention of their business. You know, and for example, I've seen very large organizations that I've supported that have huge furloughs. That's a failure in the business model itself. You have to let go of, of 50% of the people that work for you. That's a, that's a failure. You know, that can be connected to culture, a depletion in culture that can be connected to leadership. Changing the business model too much, too soon, too fast, based on political decisions, right? So sustainability takes us back to the foundation of the business. It helps us understand that no matter who is in the head of the government or the local or national organization, place, country, whatever, who's the CEO, who's in the financial aspect of the leading of the organization. It doesn't matter who's there when that person is replaced, the business sustains itself. The leadership within that organization sustains the whole group, the whole company and the people are at the core. So it's interesting because think of me like I'm a Doctor, when you go to a primary care physician, what do you do? You go and you tell them all your symptoms and that doctor is then going to send you to the specialist, right?

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

So basically that's what baseline my company does. We look at an organization and we say, okay, this is everything that you have, this is everything that you don't have. This is everything that can take you from point A to point B in terms of growth. Now we're going to focus on those specifics. Like you go to the specialist, right. Or like if, like if you have a heart issue, you're going to take care of the heart. Like if you have a sustainable procurement issue, then. And we're going to take care of that because tomorrow a pandemic comes, geopolitical situation comes. You know, whatever, whatever happens, immigration law changes, anything that can happen and you are out of supply chain. How is that sustainable for your business? How are you going to be resilient with your business?

[A]

That hits home for me right now because obviously ICE is a big topic politically. Right. And in the construction space, it affected me. Right. So I remodeled homes.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

And literally 1:45, 60 days ago, my head GC said, hey, more than a handful of our crew is gone and I gotta go find them. So that that sustainability point of like, no matter what happens politically, no matter what happens with the head of office or within the country or the financial sector, like, you need to be able to have, like, we literally have not been remodeling these homes because we don't have the people.

[B]

Exactly. And also another thing that's important is that unfortunately, sustainability is one of these hot topics that has been too politicized and considered too woke a word that I don't particularly, particularly like. But the issue with it is that people forget that being sustainable is having a good business. You know, having the right practices in place is having a good business is making a good business what you've experienced. It's an impact that's related directly to a political change that has impact not only you, but so many other businesses. But we couldn't anticipate something like that happening. Right. However, if there was a larger vision on sustainable development, there would be a lot of people available to work under the right conditions, you know, for construction. But there isn't, because we don't have sustainable business. We don't have businesses that have thought about what's the worst crisis that can happen socially, globally, how can that impact us? How can I project myself in the future if something like this happens the same Thing happened with the pandemic. The pandemic is an excellent example. I was at that time working with an organization that thankfully within two days, 95% of the organization, 500,000 employees were able to work remotely. That was not the case or the scenario of a lot of companies, a lot of companies that went back bankrupt that now they're out of operation. So that is why you have to think sometimes catastrophically about like, what's the worst scenario and plan for it.

[A]

What would be a. You know, because that's hard for us. We're visionaries as entrepreneurs.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

Hard for us to go. Like, here's the worst case scenario, plan for that. First, we like to go, here's how we can go make more money, here's how we can grow, here's how we can get top line revenue. Right? So when you come into a business and talk to the CEO or the president, whoever. Right, the founder, what are you trying to lay out for them? Like my example right now? I'll ask your advice, but how do you. In the construction space, I got hurt because ice came by and took I think almost 10 people from our cruise. How? And maybe you'll have an answer, maybe you won't. But like, how do you protect from that? Because obviously I did not see that coming. No one saw the pain.

[B]

No, I mean like the country.

[A]

I didn't. I was like, oh, okay, well, so now my, my general contractor, who's basically the project manager, he's got to go replace them. Was not easy to get good labor. Right? I mean, you can just get anyone who knows how to swing a hammer, but like to get someone who's going to be good. So how do you take a CEO or founder who wants to think, how do I buy 10 more homes? I want to go make more money. And you're like, okay, but Justin, what happens if all your people are gone?

[B]

Exactly.

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[B]

It'S difficult because I know that companies usually want to grow very quickly. They want revenue right away. Anything that's sustainable takes time. And that's usually my. I know that's usually my fight with CEOs with the executives. It's like hold on, let's put some brakes here because we have to prepare, we have to anticipate and we can keep growing, but we need to keep Growing sustainably. That's what happened with all the furloughs in the organizations. They've grown too soon, too fast. Now something happens. They have to cut off 50% of their people. And that's not fair to the people, that's not fair to the company, and that's not fair to growth. So doing it at a different pace will not hurt the business. It will guarantee that you will be in business not 10 years, but maybe 30, 40, 50. So that's the way you have to start thinking about it. Also, for example, in construction, a good example is people. People tend to find cheap materials. You know, I've seen it in Florida way too many times when, when trying to find a home, for example, like I go and it's like, I'm going to buy cardboard. I'm surprised about the things that I'm. That they want to sell.

[A]

That's right.

[B]

What if the thought about buying better materials, thinking about having something that's done locally, you know, to create wealth, to create shared value, thinking about, okay, I'm going to use the best in quality just because I want to offer something that's a little better. Okay, I might even be able to compromise a little bit of revenue, But I'll be selling something that the next time will give me not only two clients, but maybe 20 clients because the quality is better. People forget about the quality that they want to give in their products or their services because they want quicker revenue. So that's where I come in. It's kind of like I, I tell companies and different types of organizations, this is what you're very good at, connected to your purpose. Don't forget your purpose. Don't forget why you started your business. That's very important because a lot of people lose sight along the way. And then we'll work around it so you can have the most positive impact to the environment. Create the biggest shared value to society, to your employees, to your communities, the places that you're working in. And you have the right governance around it. You know exactly what to do. You're being compliant. You don't have high risk. Right. Sometimes you have to evaluate that risk and people forget about the risk. They just go and do it because it's a good business and I want the quick money. And then that can even take you to bankruptcy in a few years for sure. And you have to rebuild again. And that's really tough and that's really hard. And you never know the state of the economy. You also have to think about the externalities in geopolitical scenarios. Think about the supply chain. A lot of our products here in the US came from China.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

Think about China and the tariffs and everything right now. And think. Well, think about the tariffs is something that drives me crazy because how they have tried to give us the idea that that's going to be beneficial for us and it's not. At the end of the day, we're the ones paying higher rates. But think about how China has develop, developed their economy throughout the years. They invested in engineering. Right. They started to becoming the ones that were better at engineering, at producing, at generating services and products to the world at a better price. I'm not going to go into quality, but sometimes they have good quality, they have better quality. And we moved our whole supply chain and our whole process to become dependent on, on them.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

Okay. Now you have a big issue, right. Probably in construction. You cannot get materials when you need them. They're more expensive because of the tariffs. You can't get whatever you need. It's not locally made. And also you don't have the workforce because we didn't create that within the organization. So if you look not at the company, but if you look at the country, the country itself didn't create a sustainable workforce. So that's what I'm trying to avoid for smaller companies or for medium sized companies. I work with companies that on average have between 50 to 150 million on revenue and they are growing and they want to be the big players and they want to be part of the supply chain of the largest corporations and organizations in the world. And for that you have to meet a lot of specific requirements and you have to make sure that you have the right group of people that you don't want people moving to another job and leaving your company just because there's a better pay there.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

And it's, and it's not always about the money.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

You know, so I think it's, it's interesting how sustainability can explore so many aspects and not just the environmental aspect of, of measuring your carbon emissions, your carbon footprint, how do you impact negatively the planet? But sustainability goes to how do I make my financial profitability. Everything that I create, the wealth that I'm creating last longer. And also how can that be shared to more people or with more people.

[A]

Something you said really struck me which was like we as the entrepreneurs, the founders, we want to drive fast and go fast and do more. What you said really like even for the smaller million dollar companies like you will actually make more money in a longer Runway. If you slow down in. Tony Robbins says it great, right? It's. People overestimate what they can do in one year, and they underestimate what they can do in 10. It sounds like in. What was the comp. What's your company's name?

[B]

Baseline.

[A]

Baseline, yeah. Where can they find it?

[B]

LinkedIn, my website, baselinesd.com Baseline S. Yeah. SD. SD for sustainable development.

[A]

There you go. Baselinesd.com Also, Belen, can everyone go find you? Where should they go find you? Should they go Instagram? LinkedIn, where?

[B]

I think the best place would be LinkedIn.

[A]

Okay.

[B]

They can find. They can find our company site, or they can find me, Belen Benitez in my.

[A]

Belen Benitez or Baseline SD on LinkedIn. Get to know her. Um, I think it's really imperative for you to echo this a little bit deeper or go a little bit more into this slower, steadier pace. I know I'm a victim of it. I can run really fast. I can create a lot of great things, but it can also get me in trouble. Right. And so I know what you're saying is if you want real sustainability, if you want real growth, that happens over time. It doesn't happen in 24 months, right?

[B]

Yeah, it doesn't happen.

[A]

How do you bring that to someone's table? What are you focusing on when you're talking about slowing it down? Is it the people? Is it. It's probably all these things, but, like, let's walk it through. For. For people listening to this is like, it's not in our nature to slow down. No, it's not in my nature to slow down. So you would have to put me in a headlock and like. Justin, stop. Hold on. What happens if this. What happens if, like, is. Are you focusing on. And I'll try to be positive, but you're like, you're. You're focusing on protecting the downside. Make sense? You're not focusing on just negative, but you're saying, listen, you're not looking at what the downside could be if you do this. You're only looking at what the upside would be. Right. So you're not here to be Mrs. Negative, but you're here to say you can't only focus on upside. You also have to be aware of downside. Right.

[B]

And it's funny that you say that. Actually, my husband called me Mrs. Brightside because I'm always looking at the bright side. And that's true. And I also want to go fast. I also want to grow quickly. Everybody wants that. You know. But my job precisely is to say, okay, Justin, this is your business, right? Let's focus first on what you are very good at, then let's focus on what you're not, okay? And we have to kind of like fill in the gaps, figure out what is a higher risk. Okay? If this that you want to do represents a very high risk, let's do it. But let's do it with the right measurements in place. I'll put that for you. So when you are speeding and you crash, you don't die, you know, and that's pretty much it. So I'm always going to look for the bright side. I'm always going to help you grow. I'm always going to help you, going to help you make money. I'm always going to allow you to have more people working for you and have more impact. But do it positively, okay? Do it the right way. Have the right governance, Create authority in your business, have the right communication, create the right culture, okay? You, when you start growing or when you start creating a team, right? You want people that will work with you for 10 years, for 20 years. You don't want to be that type of company where people just leave every six months and you have to find someone else to fill in the role, right? That is based on culture. You have to create the right culture because you're the CEO. People forget about that. That is a component of sustainability. I help you build that, okay? For example, right now with artificial intelligence, everybody's obsessed about that. Everybody wants to use Copilot, Claude chatgpt. Let's do this, let's do that. They forget about the governance piece around it, okay? How do we protect data? How do we protect proprietary information from other organizations? How do we have the right governance in place so people can use it in a way that's safe for them and that's safe for other customers that you're serving. So that's incredible because right now I'm working with companies that want to go very fast and it's like, let's do. Let's do this, let's do that. I have innovation here. I have this great idea to build a product and they want to use AI, but they have to kind of like hold their horses because at the end of the day, we can't lose the human part of who is providing that oversight on the use of AI and that governance around it. So I'm not going to tell you. Hey, stop. Don't do it. Don't do the product, okay? Don't create that Innovation. I'm going to say, okay, go ahead and do it, but just make sure that you're doing it safely.

[A]

Working across teams is tough, but Asana helps you handle it. Asana AI can spot roadblocks and assign work to keep everything on track. That's how work gets handled. Visit [e-mail] that is so right on. I think it's what the world needs to hear right now in the business space. I think in general, what you have to offer is why we're here is like, I think the world needs to hear all of it, right? Because there is the geopolitical, there is the just political, there's the financial, Right. There's what's going on in the financial markets with, like, whether it's the stock market, whether it's the interest rates, there's all these different things that I don't believe most founders really account for. I think some are obvious, right? If you're in lending, then you pay attention to the financial world. Sure. But do you pay attention to other things that can protect your downside? This idea of protecting your downside and going slower? I am a victim of not doing it. And that's why, like, when we were talking before, I was like, you need to be on. Because I would argue Most founders, most CEOs, presidents, they're more like me than not. And they don't pay attention to the downside. They say, you just used an analogy. I want you to go fast, I want you to speed, but I don't want you to get in a car crash and die. So how do you protect yourself from that? Because honestly, if you go going fast enough financially, you might cripple yourself. You might, you know, financially go bk. You might go through these things that aren't necessary if you just protect your downside. And those are things that, I mean, every industry is a little different. So it's hard for you to, on this episode, at least say, like, here's the things you need to look for. But do your best to try to say, hey, if you're a founder, if you're listening to this and you're starting a company or, or you're trying to scale with sustainability without getting hurt. What are things that you look at or you would suggest people to be looking at? And again, contact Belen herself, right? Go to LinkedIn. What's your. Do you have like an Instagram or do you want them?

[B]

Yeah, it's also baseline.

[A]

Baseline sd. But you obviously contact Belen herself. But what would you advise? Right? Like if I was listening to this. The thing I'm thinking right now is like, all right, what's one or two things? Like, right now I can go audit my business and say, am I, am I protected or not? Like, what would you suggest?

[B]

Like, for example, I don't know how often. And I. And I've. And I've seen this a lot, especially here in Florida, that people don't conduct risk assessments on anything. They don't do a risk assessment. They don't. They don't even understand how to start doing one. Right. How to evaluate.

[A]

I always don't know how to do that at all.

[B]

Exactly. So the first thing I would do is like, try to evaluate what the things. What, what are your risks? Okay. And be a little, I don't know, negative. Try to have a negative mind.

[A]

Okay, well, that's what I was trying to say is you're not. This is negative. No, but you're just saying, hey, there's the other side. The pro is great and it's big and it's money. But then you can't ignore what happens if.

[B]

Exactly. So if you want to do this type of exercise, you need to have the worst case scenario possible in your mind. That's how you evaluate or assess your business. Okay. What if this goes wrong? What if this doesn't happen? What if I don't get the materials? What if the. The shipment is not on time? What if I lose all my people? How will I save my business? If you have the answers, then that's good for you. Probably you won't have them. Yeah, okay. For the things that you don't have them and. Or that you don't have an answer right away. That's where you have to focus on because that's where your high risk is. So just make that exercise.

[A]

What would be the exercise? Do you. Do you take out a sheet of paper, put a line down the middle? Or what would you suggest to do, like tactically? What can someone start doing tactically?

[B]

That's what I do. But usually what. Basically what I do is I evaluate your organization like a doctor. Okay. I go in and start looking at leadership policies, procedures, programs.

[A]

Do you come across company that don't have any policies or procedures? Absolutely. Yeah, absolutely. I said, it's funny to me because I almost guarantee you walk into a company and be like, I don't know, we just say, this is the rule.

[B]

Yeah, exactly.

[A]

That's not a policy.

[B]

And it's. And it's just because we've said it.

[A]

That's right. It's not on paper. There's no one signing off on it. Nothing.

[B]

Nothing. You don't have a policy, you don't have a procedure, you don't have nothing.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

Tomorrow you want to be the supplier of a big organization and you're not going to be able to because they come and audit you and you don't have a paper to show you don't have anything to track your record. And you can be on business for 20, 25 years, 30 years. I've seen companies that have been that long in business and they don't have one written policy. So it doesn't mean that you cannot do business. But I've seen them lose a lot of money because of it, unnecessarily. It's, it's a two minute thing that you can do.

[A]

So let me ask you there, I don't mean to interrupt you but like.

[B]

No, go ahead.

[A]

We just kind of said, hey, don't just over utilize AI and ChatGPT and all these like. But couldn't you just go to ChatGPT and say, can you write me a policy on X?

[B]

Exactly. But for example, I'm going to ask you, how many policies do you think your company needs? Do you know in what areas? Why? Policies need to make sense for the company and they need to make sense for who they are protecting. How many times have people worked in companies?

[A]

How long are we in? Keep going. How long are we in? Okay.

[B]

For example, how many times have people worked in companies or organizations where they have this big code of conduct or employee handbook that they haven't read, that they haven't used and that they don't know how to use? Policies need to be simple and they also need to be connected to the company values. That's another thing. That's another important thing in sustainability. You need to have values. Your organization needs to have values. For me, sustainability is a value.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

For me, everything that people do should be sustainable. They need to have that mindset when they're working, like, is this sustainable? Is this going to last? Is this beneficial? Is this creating shared value? And my goal at the end of the day is for me to be able to work with a company for a year, two, maybe three years and then be out of there because the value is already embedded in the organizational growth strategy. Okay. So that's how you're going to be able to protect yourself, to take care of yourself as an organization and grow.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

And keep, and keep bringing the dollars at the end of the day.

[A]

And there's always a new so do you, Are you with a company long enough for them to like. Let's just say there's level one, level two, level three level. But all these new levels are new.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

Do you find yourself having to work with companies and create new policy? Because every level is something new. Right. So you can't just have a. Right. The, the policy for level one, I don't believe would be the same policy for level three. It might get you through level two, but you probably have to have new policies and procedures and processes on level three than you do on level one.

[B]

Exactly. And it depends on how you grow. So, yes, I've worked with companies for five, six, seven years. And then, then I, I do specific projects for other, other organizations with smaller budgets also. Because that's important.

[A]

Right.

[B]

When I do. That's why my company is called baseline. We do a baseline. Okay. We do an initial assessment and let you know, hey, these are going to be your pain points. But we can create a roadmap, a three to five year roadmap where you can start working on certain things first. Maybe because that's your capacity.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

Okay. Or that's what you can afford at the moment. And start working on this because this is a high risk. Okay. So it's quite interesting because at the end of the day, you help these companies evolve. Okay. On all the many different aspects. Initially, they might, might be hiring me because they want to do policies and procedures or because they have to do compliance or they have to report to a supplier questionnaire on carbon emissions. Maybe those are very specific things. But eventually when I provide this roadmap and I kind of tell you, hey, this is the health status of your organization. You want to become healthier.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

Okay. So that's how my engagements end up lasting longer and because I keep adding value.

[A]

Well, you're helping us grow as business owners. And if you can help me grow sustainably, I would keep you on forever. Right. Like you're, you're a company, so it's like you're not an internal. Well, maybe someone could. But like you're not going to internally be my employee. But if you do what your business is set out to do, why would anyone ever not have you there?

[B]

Yeah. And I kind of like work like I'm an employee on.

[A]

Yeah, I'm part of everything. That's right.

[B]

And it's very interesting because I deal with all these many different aspects. Even I tried not to meddle too much in the financial. Because the financial aspects of the organization end up being a result of the work that I do, but I end up working with everyone else.

[A]

Sure.

[B]

Operations, hr, legal. Legal. I work a lot with legal, procurement, health, safety, everything.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

So it's interesting because they, they continue to use me or to use our services for many years and it depends. Sometimes they're going to need me more, sometimes they're going to need me less depending on their growth, depending on how they're also trying to do their things. And another thing that I want to kind of like highlight. I am a company that believes in sustainability so I want to be sustainable. So one of my big goals is also to create like have this capacity building within the organization. It's not that I, I'm the type of person that has the know how and I want to keep it to myself. So they keep hiring me. That's not it. Yeah. Okay. For me it's about spreading and making everybody conscious about it, about how you can sustainably grow. So I like to install capacity within an organization. It makes it easier for me, it makes it easier for everybody. And then you start getting, that's how you start getting. Recommended by others.

[A]

Yeah. Packages by Expedia. You were made to occasionally take the.

[B]

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[A]

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[A]

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[B]

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[A]

For the ones who get it done. So that's incredible. So what would be like what I would ask to kind of wrap this up? What would be one to three things that you can offer the listener, the viewer? Like here's one to three things I would go home and audit your business on upside, downside or here's a, here's a practice, here's an exercise I would tell you to go do immediately because I want someone to be able to say okay, have I taken like if I had Belen right now to call, which you could, if you want you.

[B]

Can call her.

[A]

What would she be looking at? What would she be telling me I need to go do? What would be the One to three things, potentially.

[B]

Okay. I'm going to use you as an example. Okay? So first you're going to go and look at your organization and you're going to see if you're connected to your values and your purpose. Okay? When you created, when you founded these organizations, and maybe, maybe you were not the founder, maybe you're just a CEO, okay? You're hired for it. But make sure that you have values that help you lead the organization, okay. And that those values stick when you deliver services and products, okay? You have to be very connected to those values and to the purpose.

[A]

So write those out. Like that would be one thing. Right? Now. Go write those values and purpose out.

[B]

Exactly. Make sure you have them. If you don't have them, then you have a big question mark there, what to do. Right?

[A]

Right. Do you keep going or do you let it go?

[B]

Exactly. The other thing that I will ask you to do, whether you're delivering services or products, it doesn't matter what services is a little different. Think about how you're positively impacting the planet, okay? And what I mean by that is not only nature, but also people. How are you impacting people?

[A]

How are you making it better?

[B]

How you're making it better, exactly? With your services and your products. And the third thing, and well, on that note, how are you creating shared value?

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

Okay. How is your business, your services, your products creating share value? How are they expanding into society and making it better? Okay? So have that in mind. Okay? And the third thing is like the risk assessment. If you have the right processes, procedures, policies in place, if the worst case scenario happens to you tomorrow, think about the worst thing. Think about Miami flooding entirely. We all lose our homes. What is going to happen to business? Okay. How are you going to continue working? That's catastrophic.

[A]

Yeah, that is catastrophic.

[B]

It's very catastrophic. Try to put your mindset there and start thinking about, do I have plans in place? Do I know what to do, how to do it? How do I survive from something like this? How do I survive from something catastrophic? If you have the answers, good for you. If you don't, you can call me and we can figure it out. Because that's the idea.

[A]

I think everyone needs to reach out to you. I mean, genuinely saying that, because there's so much I want to say, chaos right now in the world, right? Like just uncertainty. Maybe not chaos, but uncertainty. Like I'm in the real estate space, I have no idea what's going to happen with the interest rates. Like, I have a gut feeling of in the next six to 12. But I. It's very uncertain, right?

[B]

It is.

[A]

Look at, you know, the stock market. I'm not in that space. But like, oh, my God, like, when is it going to fall? It's not like, it's insane. So is there uncertainty there? Is it, like, or not? Look at crypto. Look at all these different services that, like, we just talked about ice coming in, taking 10 of my contract. Like, there's uncertainty in the world. And if people aren't looking at their downside, I mean, I'm taking as much from this podcast as probably anybody, because I don't look at my downside often. And it has for sure gotten me in trouble because I just, I kept going. I kept my head down, kept going. So I tell all of you out there listening to this, first of all, go to belen or baselinesd.com go find Belen Benitez on LinkedIn social media. Like, she's there to help you guys. Because I'll tell you, like, this is of massive value. I think we all need to look at it. Here's the last question. We'll wrap up. When you're working with really large clients, the ones that have kind of gotten there and now they're trying to sustain that position, okay, there's sustainability and scale, but then when they have scaled, they need to sustain the scale. How are they any different? Like, what are they focusing on? Once they got to scale, how would they utilize someone like yourself? Is it just culture? Is it. I mean, there's probably all these things, but, like, culture, people, processes. Right. In making sure that they don't have huge furloughs. Like, what is a company at that level looking at?

[B]

Well, you know, it's not that different.

[A]

Okay.

[B]

And that's, and that's interesting. That's very interesting. Yeah, interesting that the, the work that I do for a company that has 20 employees and the work that I do for a company with 500 employees is pretty much the same.

[A]

Wow. I wouldn't have thought that.

[B]

Yeah, it's, it's, it's, it's the same work, but at the same time, I think, like you said, it's the scale that's different.

[A]

Right.

[B]

So you have to, like, for example, with a smaller company, we have. I don't know, I'm going to give a number of 25 RFPs that we have to respond to in a year. With a larger company, we have probably 200. So we have to think about different strategies.

[A]

What's RFP?

[B]

And our request for proposal so that's what you do when, when you want to be part of the supply chain of larger players.

[A]

Sure.

[B]

Okay. So for example, smaller companies receive, like, they probably get the chance to write 20 of these a year.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

Okay. Medium sized companies, larger companies, they do 200 a year. Okay. But it's interesting because then you need to have a strategy, then you need to have a larger team, then you need to have. You need to have something written down, a specific report that will tell people exactly what. What are the answers? What are we doing? How are we doing? These are our metrics, this is our data. You know, so strategies become different, but at the end of the day, the work, the foundation of the work is the same. I'm going to do carbon footprint for an organization that has 10 ton, 10 metric tons of carbon emission the same way I'm going to do it for one that has 300 or 400 or a thousand. Okay. The work is the same how you sustain it, and the strategy that helps you lower that down, for example, might be different. That's where the difference comes. So the work, the base of the work is the same because the sustainability principles are the same. They're intact. Okay. How we scale the work, that's how it shifts. So that's kind of like the big difference.

[A]

And that's the word scale. Again, you know, scaling with sustainability is just really big. Belen, this has been great. I think every entrepreneur has to listen to this episode, so I'm excited to get this out everywhere.

[B]

Well, thank you so much. I'm really excited. And yes, I'm always there.

[A]

Available baselinesd.com yes, Belen Benitez, I am Justin Colby. This is the entrepreneur DNA. And if you think someone you know needs to listen to Belen in this episode, please share this with at least two of your friends. See you on the next episode. Peace.