Ranking: 101

Industry: Clean Technology

Mission: A clean technology company, the first in the world, that upcycles post-consumer and post-industrial recycled plastics. They convert plastics into synthetic polymers and additives that meet specific performance requirements for industrial applications. Endeavoring to close the loop on plastics to be a catalyst for sustainable impact. 

What 3 words best describe your company culture?

Gritty, Courageous, Trailblazing

What quote best exemplifies your company?

“Do not go where the path may lead, go instead where there is no path and leave a trail.” ― Ralph Waldo Emerson

How is your product or service having a positive social and/or environmental impact?

GreenMantra has an opportunity to significantly reduce the amount of plastic that ends up in landfills or oceans by transforming waste plastic into value-creating specialty polymers. GreenMantra’s impact stems from its unique advanced recycling technology, which converts post-use plastics such as bottles, plastic films and bags, carpet backing, and other plastic waste items into specialty polymer additives. These additives can be used back into plastic, creating a full circle. Additionally, they can be used in a variety of construction and infrastructure applications like asphalt roofing and roads ― thereby opening up new markets for this plastic waste that would otherwise end up in our environment.

For every 1 ton of GreenMantra products used, we allow our customers to reduce GHG emissions by 2 tons, diverting 1.1 tons of plastic waste from landfills while also reducing our dependency on crude oil. The materials also offset fossil-based polymers, creating a multiplier effect in their ability to drive sustainability and reduce dependency on crude oil.

What is your company’s vision for the future?

GreenMantra currently utilizes three of the six plastic streams as feedstocks on a commercial scale, and earlier this year, we commissioned a demonstration plan to expand our technology to a new stream of plastic waste ― discarded polystyrene (Styrofoam, foam cups, foam packaging, etc.). By redesigning the polystyrene plastic molecule, a novel product is created that can be used in new applications, expanding the addressable market for the resource while in parallel creating demand and value for its collection.

As we expand our technology platform to accommodate new feedstock streams and as we continue to develop demand in current and new end markets, we are expanding the addressable market for plastic waste-derived materials, while in parallel creating demand and value for its collection. In doing so, GreenMantra has a clear opportunity to impact the recycling rates of plastic.

We are quickly outgrowing our current facility and will build additional manufacturing facilities in the coming years. We envision a future where we ― along with other companies who are inspired by our story ― will create additional ways to extract value from waste plastic to enable a truly circular economy, where plastic is recirculated through the economy and our dependency on crude oil as a feedstock for petrochemicals will be greatly or totally diminished.

Back to the full list

Ranking: 42

Industry: Furniture

Mission: A furniture manufacturer that produces standing desks, chairs, and ergonomic furniture to keep people moving, engaged, and loving how they feel at work. Their furniture helps create a healthy, supportive workplace and incorporates sustainability into the design, manufacturing, packaging, and shipping of all products. Keeping people moving, minds engaged, and energy flowing.

What quote best exemplifies your company?

“When we feel better in our bodies, we feel more connected to ourselves, to our work, and to the people and world around us.” — David Kahl, Founder

How is your product or service having a positive social and/or environmental impact?

At Fully our work is about being better at being human. We know that the divide between “work” and “life” is an illusion, and that healthy living depends on a healthy workspace. We believe this should be available to every person, from the basement studio to the downtown office. We understand the connection between healthy body, healthy mind, healthy business and a healthy world.

Back to the full list

Ranking: 67

Industry: Mental Health Care

Mission: An in-patient recovery center for active military, veterans, and first responders. They provide private treatment for chemical dependencies and co-occurring psychological disorders relating to PTSD and/or MTBI. Through adapting recovery programs to individual needs, they aim to bring one million warriors home from addiction and PTSD. 

What 3 words best describe your company culture?

Strength through Healing

What quote best exemplifies your company?

“WARRIORS HEALING WARRIORS.”

How is your product or service having a positive social and/or environmental impact?

Lowering the national suicide rate amount our warrior population

What is your company’s vision for the future?

Bringing 1 million warriors home!

Back to the full list

Ranking: 77

Industry: Feminine Products

Mission: A menstrual care company offering an eco-friendly approach to feminine hygiene. They are helping create a world where menstruation is no longer a limitation, empowering through menstrual health education and supplying products that are safe and sustainable. Diva products are sold in 21 countries, and have diverted millions of disposables from ending up in landfills.

Back to the full list

Mentorship is foundational to business. One-on-one relationships between employees and mentors achieve a host of goals for all involved. CNBC recently reported that 91 percent of workers with career mentors are happy with their jobs.

Employee engagement and satisfaction hinge on mentorship, as does a company’s bottom line. Of course, it is impossible to overstate the role mentorship plays in helping employees and companies weather the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic challenges, including training hurdles, uncertainty, and downright loneliness.

Unfortunately, mentoring relationships are not guaranteed to succeed. Studies show that specific characteristics and strategies lead to success. Mentors that want to lead effectively and invest their time wisely should consider the following:

Seek Personal Synergies

In the business world, a significant amount of time is spent separating the personal from the professional. However, mentorship is one area where that strategy fails.

Personal connection and shared values help mentors and mentees create a relationship based on trust, mutual respect, and reciprocity. Collaborating in an environment of honesty, marked by open communication and constructive dialogue, is what allows a mentee to risk the personal exposure of opening up about her priorities, weaknesses, and fears.

It is possible to establish a good working relationship without a personal connection, as some mentorships are based on professional overlap alone. However, most successful mentorships are built upon a personal and professional synergy that makes communication, trust, and respect natural.

Mentors who seek to establish this level of connection should consider modeling the behavior themselves. Those that show vulnerability inspire the same from those around them. 

Clearly Establish Ground Rules

A mentoring relationship is only as strong as its communication, and the successful exchange of information begins with establishing expectations. This includes agreeing upon the relationship’s scope, the type of assistance provided, and a thorough discussion of boundaries.

As a mentor, your job is to establish your availability, scheduling constraints, preferred methods of communication, and expectations. You should also clearly delineate your role. Will you primarily serve as a teacher, friend, advocate, coach, business development partner, advisor, or a combination of these functions?   

Listen Carefully

Great mentors listen first and advise later. Yes, you are the expert and possess a wealth of knowledge in your field, but mentorship works best when information flows in both directions. Active listening helps mentors assess a mentee’s learning style and sets the stage for you to offer relevant and actionable suggestions.

You will want to ask your mentee to determine his goals, priorities, and roadblocks, as well as strengths, weaknesses, and long-term aspirations. Reconcile your understanding of what your mentee needs with his to create a professional development roadmap. This can be improved further by soliciting feedback from other relevant parties like your trainee’s boss, colleagues, or partners.

By thoroughly engaging your mentee in their development plan, you will devise a meaningful mentorship plan and make room for your mentee to take ownership of their learning and career path. 

Mutually Set and Measure Goals

We know that learning by doing is the most effective way to grow. Therefore, the best mentors offer advice and help their mentees navigate issues until they reach an appropriate solution. This ensures she will have the skills at her disposal to solve similar problems down the line. Your mentee needs to mostly drive her own development as this is what will keep her engaged and give her the skills necessary to meet her future goals. 

However, you can guide this process by clearly establishing what needs to be accomplished between each meeting and then hold your mentee accountable for her progress during check-ins. Additionally, it is wholly appropriate for you to make introductions and open doors. Part of the benefit of mentorship is the networking and relationships both parties bring to the table. 

Of professionals with a business mentor, 97 percent say they are valuable. Yet only 37 percent of professionals are lucky enough to have one. If you are not yet mentoring someone, know that your services are sorely needed.

Acting as a mentor can be incredibly fulfilling. While it requires valuable, limited resources, like time, mentors generally feel that they receive more than they give. Watching someone excel under your tutelage is both motivating and satisfying. As long as you pledge to collaborate with your mentee, respectfully delivering honest feedback, knowledge, advice, and inspiration, you will make the experience just as gratifying for him as it is for you.

Ranking: 59

Industry: Body Care

Mission: Manufactures and supplies organic and natural skin care products. Family-owned, family-run, and family-friendly, they blend the finest organic ingredients to make the safest, most effective products possible for both people and the planet. They are championing sustainable agriculture and workplace health in a 100% solar-powered facility. 

What 3 words best describe your company culture?

Inclusive. Family Friendly. Caring.

What quote best exemplifies your company?

“Family-run and family-friendly since 1995, we see our business as a vehicle for making positive change in the world. For us, running a healthy business is about how we treat our employees and the impact we have on our community and the planet. Becoming a certified B Corp and NH Benefit Corporation allows us to keep our mission and values close and to do so in a purposeful way.”

How is your product or service having a positive social and/or environmental impact?

We believe that business can be a force for good. And that includes addressing one of humanity’s most widespread and pressing challenges: climate change. At the 2019 United Nations Climate Change Conference (COP25) in Madrid, we joined a group of over 500 other B corporations in committing to Net Zero by 2030. That means reaching a perfect equilibrium with the earth—drawing all of our energy from renewable sources, and releasing zero carbon into the atmosphere. To achieve that goal, we needed to produce enough renewable energy onsite to power all of our manufacturing processes. Solar panels were a perfect choice. They produce enough clean energy for all our operations, eliminating about 636,000 pounds of carbon pollution every year. That’s what we call a brighter future.

What is your company’s vision for the future?

Everything we do, we strive for green. We’re proud to show that a small, rural manufacturer can set a big climate goal and achieve it. That our products aren’t just good for the planet; they’re made by the planet. And with the support of a community, anything is possible, including reaching our goal of NET-ZERO by 2030.

Back to the full list

Ranking: 121

Industry: eco-fashion

Company Mission: An eco-friendly fashion accessory producer that re-purposes and upcycles abandoned, pre-consumer, and post-consumer materials into limited edition products. They are working toward closed-loop solutions in manufacturing and paving the way for zero-waste solutions in retail. They conserve water, reduce carbon emissions, and divert waste from landfills in the process.

Back to the full list