Thank you for reading this issue of Insights For Founders. This one is focused on questions for founders. Why no answers? Because founders like you deal with unanswered questions every day, and are very good at it.

Rewriting the Rules of the American Economy is the title of the newest book (2016) from Joseph Stiglitz, the Nobel Prize-winning economist. It should be the mantra of all social partners. As he said in mid-March, "Social injustice on an unprecedented scale, massive inequities and loss of trust in elites define our political moment-and rightly so."

The Stiglitz agenda for taming the top and growing the middle should suit both right and left in politics, because the ultimate beneficiaries will be all of us, rather than the present system that favors a minute minority. "The vast majority of Americans-not just the poor-are deeply worried about the basics: getting their kids a decent education, bringing home a paycheck that can put food on the table or pay the bills, saving enough so that one day they can retire," he says.

So many of us abdicate responsibility and are leaving it up to politicians to 'fix' the problem. What's interesting to me is that a new breed of business founders are not waiting for 'them', understanding that we all have to make our own future. There is no battle between socialism and capitalism. There is no 'us' and 'them', we are all mutually interdependent.

This interdependence is something well-recognized by new entrepreneurs. When they build a business model they look at both the whole and the parts. They acknowledge that customers will not be delighted if they use inappropriate channels of distribution; if planned activities are not matched with available resources, the model will never become reality.

Outcomes not Output
So, if we burden our professional workforce with insurmountable student debt burdens and as employers we don't help pay for education of our people, or we fail to empower workers to participate in the decision that impact them, we all lose. And the measurement of success should not simply be about output, it should focus on outcomes as well. Piling up assets in the hands of few is a road to ruin.

New entrepreneurs tend to be much more aware of the downstream consequences of business actions that do not produce value for all stakeholders. They are better equipped to assess impact of their actions upon others. They also are aware that being concerned with mutual benefit is likely to produce better benefits for themselves, too.