Rethink Investment Strategies – What Can Nature Teach Us About Money?

Can you re imagine investment in a way that not only results in better profit but also is more sustainable?

Photo: Pixabay Traditionally, finance and nature have been regarded as opposites. Yet investors might learn from nature and this approach may lead to more socially responsible investing that may help society. In addition,  the investment strategies may also be beneficial for the investor. Connecting finance and investing to other types of goals such as sustainability is increasingly becoming more prevalent. While it makes sense to avoid certain stocks such as tobacco, and alcohol companies as well as companies with poor environmental policies, this approach may not be enough. Instead investors could actively search for companies that embrace sustainable practice. According to Katherine Collins investors are actively searching for approaches to investment that are integrated with their values and goals. After a career in traditional equity management Katherine turned into studying the natural world as a source of inspiration guide for investing in ways that are valuable and beneficial to our planet. She is the author of the book Nature of Investing: Resilient Investment Strategies Through Biomimicry and she has founded Honeybee Capitol where the aim is to “pollinating ideas across varied fields in pursuit of optimal investment decision-making”.
Investor? Who is an investor?

Well, in a sense we all are and every single day we invest our time, our energy, our money. Today, the primary beneficial function of investment has been transformed into a mechanized and repetitive way of investing. This approach can be seen in the way we have created funds of funds and the creation of firms where the business is based upon the profit that can be harvested after a couple of milliseconds of trading. In this book, Kathrine explores ways to transform the investment process and develop a new investment framework that is based upon principles that can be found in the natural world.

The core of biomimicry is that we embrace nature’s wisdom rather than harvest things from nature. We ask the question “What would nature do?”

The approach in this book offers a way to investment that are:

• effective instead of efficient
• resilient rather than rigid
• relational instead of transnational
• optimized rather than maximized

Below are a couple of videos that goes into more in deep how biomimicry can be used to transform investment. They are part of Katherine’s blog series Creature Feature.

Each video explores how a creature and its attributes can be see in the light of an investor question. The idea is to spark curiosity and creativity rather than offer a research study.

Can you use any of the insights in these videos to rethink and re-imagine your business? Can you rethink your approach to investment and money? And how would these changes make your life richer?