Atlassian Foundation head Mark Reading described the Pledge 1% movement as a “simple framework for baking social impact into the DNA of an organisation,” but said until now, the movement has lacked “real incentives” to get founders to follow through on donating their equity.
Atlassian co-founder Scott Farquhar hired Mr Reading to lead the philanthropic branch of his company about five years ago.
Mr Reading said his passion for corporate social responsibility was not motivated by any particular faith or philosophy, but rather, his early experiences growing up in a lower middle-class Sydney household and seeing the power of education and opportunity to change lives for the better.
“I personally think all businesses have a responsibility to be positive contributors to society,” he said.
“If all you’re focused on is returns to shareholders – with all due respect to Milton Friedman – I think you’re failing as a company.
“But clearly there are all sorts of business benefits as well – these are secondary – but there are other benefits in having a very clear, positive purpose underpinning what you do as an organisation.”
Cangler steps forward
Andrew Herbert, founder of data analytics and artificial intelligence start-up Cangler, is the first to execute the deed. (Arsineh Houspian)
Andrew Herbert, who is the founder of data analytics and artificial intelligence start-up Cangler, is the first to execute the deed.“I found the Pledge 1% movement from doing some Googling, and I thought it was awesome,” he said.“I really wanted Cangler to be a ‘giving’ company, the idea being that we don’t exist as a traditional company to generate profit for shareholders, but rather, I wanted the community to be shareholders, so that our success is everyones’ success.”
Mr Herbert said he had a privileged upbringing, but that various volunteering efforts and losing a close friend to suicide exposed him to social issues that he could not ignore.
He said he found too much cognitive dissonance between focusing on profit margins in his corporate day jobs, and finding sleeping bags for people in his volunteering work by night.
He decided to find a way of merging his work and interests closer together.
Three years ago, Mr Herbert quit his job in Melbourne and moved to Germany. He wanted to develop a way of applying his technology skills to help solve problems like poverty, disease, and climate change.
On Cangler, one example of this in action is an open platform community for health scientists to progress their research by enabling them to better collaborate and share data sets, kind of like how Wikipedia works, but for treatments and cures to tough diseases.
Myra Beal and Elizabeth Henderson of Herbert Smith Freehills, Jonathan Malone of PwC, Mark Reading from the Atlassian Foundation, Sonia Kew from PwC and Peter Dunne from Herbert Smith Freehills have all been instrumental in developing the legal deed to enforce payment of corporate charitable pledges. (James Brickwood)Until now, such pledges were not legally enforceable in Australia, but this new deed of equity changes this, and if implemented gives such promises greater weight.
