Most organisations swear by “growth”. Few ever ask the more mature question: growth towards what?
Nathalie Venis-Randabel
The Economy of Enough isn’t anti-growth. It’s anti-nonsense. It asks leaders to stop confusing more with meaningful.
Here’s what “enough” looks like in practice. Not as a slogan, but as a discipline:
1. Enough profit to stay healthy. Not so much that you sacrifice people or integrity.
If margins depend on burnout or supplier pressure, you’re not building value. You’re cannibalising it.
2. Enough productivity to deliver good work. Not so much that humans become performance dashboards.
Over-optimisation kills the creativity that generates real innovation.
3. Enough ambition to improve. Not so much that you chase shiny projects while your foundations crack.
Most “transformation failures” are root-level failures. The soil was ignored.
4. Enough speed to stay relevant. Not so much that decisions are rushed and called agility.
Most corporate crises come from fast, shallow thinking. Not slow thinking.
5. Enough data to be informed. Not so much that dashboards replace conversations.
Blind spots are overwhelmingly relational, not technical.
6. Last but not least, the argument no one wants to touch: shareholder value
The obsession with endless growth is always defended with the same line: “shareholder value”. But here’s the uncomfortable truth:
The pursuit of endless growth is now a risk multiplier, not a value creator.
Growth at all costs produces:
- over-leveraged business models
- fragile supply chains
- exhausted teams
- costly rebranding cycles of “transformation” that never transform anything
Shareholders don’t need more of that. What they actually need (though few will admit it) is capital efficiency, resilience, and longevity.
The Economy of Enough delivers all three.
It may reduce short-term dividend highs, yes. But in return, it gives shareholders something far more valuable: a business that stays alive, adaptable, and compounding over decades.
Long-term value comes from companies that endure — not those that sprint into collapse.
Sophisticated investors know this. The rest are still addicted to quarterly dopamine.
Why this matters now? Every systemic crisis we face — ecological, organisational, human — is fuelled by excess, not scarcity. The path forward isn’t about reducing ambition. It’s about redirecting it.
Enough is not mediocrity. Enough is discernment. Enough is the line between sustainable leadership and self-destructive ambition.