IT Naturally has ambitious plans to double its revenue in the next five years but will measure its success using a more meaningful set of metrics, said CEO Julie Bishop, taking to ITEuropa ahead of the upcoming High Growth 50: Sustainability report. Here, she explains how the MSP continues to underpin progress with purpose and details the advantages its sustainability focus brings across customer relationships, staff engagement, and value-driven collaboration.
IT Naturally has ambitious plans to double its £5m revenue in the next five years but will measure its success using a more meaningful set of metrics, says CEO Julie Bishop. Here, she explains how the MSP continues to underpin progress with purpose and details the advantages its sustainability focus brings across customer relationships, staff engagement, and value-driven collaboration.
Putting people and the planet ahead of profits was part of Peterborough-based IT Naturally’s mission statement when it was founded five years ago to serve German airline Condor. According to Julie, this stems from a mentality that business success surpasses financial metrics. “As an industry we are far too focused on profit, and to me, that is a very narrow view of success,” she said. “The most successful leaders can look themselves in the mirror at the end of the day and believe they are doing a good job for the planet and its people. That’s far more important to me than the bottom line.”
So, whilst IT Naturally has achieved significant growth and aims to double turnover again by 2030, it deliberately targets an operating margin target at the lower end of the industry. “I'm not denying profitability is important, but there are other achievements we value,” added Julie referring to IT Naturally’s carbon-neutral status and B Corp certification. “So, as we look to double growth, we are also doubling down on Scope 3 carbon reduction,” she added. Currently, 12% of the company’s procurement is with carbon-neutral organisations and IT Naturally is hoping to target 15% by the end of the year.
Julie highlighted that profit and purpose are not competing priorities. She spotlighted differentiation in a competitive industry as an advantage afforded by being a B Corp. “Not many other service providers are B Corps because finance departments are typically less value-driven decision-makers than individual consumers,” she said. “However, this is a strong differentiator for us among a swelling base of companies who are pushing for a positive future.”
This also serves as a value-add for customers worrying about their own carbon footprint, according to Julie “Outsourcing their IT to company that's carbon neutral means they don't have to offset the carbon that we use because we've already done it!” she added. Helping customers be more sustainable comes hand in hand with saving them money, increasing their loyalty and trust. Julie noted that companies can typically save at least 25% of their IT spend by turning off systems they don’t use. “This is a tick in the box for savings, IT security and sustainability,” she said. “Even if your customers don’t care about sustainability, they’ll be thrilled that you are saving them money.”
Power to the people
Although initiated by IT Naturally’s two CEOs, the company’s ecological strategy is led by an employee group named ‘Econuts’. This is part of the company’s wider strategy to give its 50-strong team more power. “Giving people ownership increases their pride in their job and flattens the hierarchy structure,” said Julie. She noted that this has led to the company having very low staff turnover due to the increased buy-in of its teams. “Having a static team means we can invest more in our people and promote from within,” she added. “From a cynical perspective, it is cheaper for us to grow a security engineer than recruit one.” This gives the company further advantage in an industry that has been suffering from a long-term skills shortage.
It also makes recruitment easier, according to Julie. “There are some people that are extremely motivated by purpose and have joined us primarily because we're a B Corp,” she said. She states that this is especially true among young people who can be more vocal about working for companies with a strong sense of purpose. She also confessed that not all employees are behind the sustainability drive and acknowledges that this is OK. “In every company there will be people who come in on time, do their day's work, and want to go home. That is fine and not everyone has to buy into every facet of the businesses’ mission statement.”
The B Corp community
IT Naturally chose to seek B Corp certification to affirm much of the work it had already done. “We looked at the requirements and it was like looking in the mirror,” said Julie. “We were a B Corp without knowing what a B Corp was, and we just needed to fine-tune a couple of things.” She cited the benefits as spotlighting its purpose-led work as well as providing access to a community of like-minded organisations.
“There is a values-based ecosystem created where B Corps would like to work with other B Corps,” she said. “We went to the B Corp festival in Oxford last year and it was affirming to be in a room full of businesses that are all putting people and the planet ahead of profits, that as a group we can drive forward business for good.
