The Most Powerful People in the World

When you think of who has the most power in society around you, to affect lives and change power dynamics, who do you think of?

I used to think of all kinds of folks in that role, but two years ago I had a gig covering a supply chain management conference for social media. Oh, Jesus, was I expecting to be bored.

But I came away inspired, with the realization that these people understand the power they have to change things, and it all comes down to whose products or businesses they contract for services.

Boring, right? Wrong.

Buying is political. Spending is political.

Every time a supply chain manager or procurement officer really looks at the companies bidding on products before them, and makes decisions that benefit local businesses, diverse businesses, they subvert the multinational power structure that’s strangling us all.

Every time a contract is awarded to a woman-owned company, or First Nations-owned company, or immigrant-owned businesses, it kicks at the door of capitalism, making that crack open a little wider so more folks come in.

Losing a contract doesn’t really hurt a multinational very much — they don’t want to lose any, because they’re so greedy and beholden to shareholders — but a single contract can make the difference between a local business shuttering or thriving.

Who have you denied that opportunity to over the years? How can you change that now?

Look at the blowback from people beginning to switch from Hellman’s Mayo, for instance, and that’s just ONE product.

If you do the ordering for a company, you have the opportunity to change the world.

You are power.

If you pay maybe 5% more for a contract, but then that money stays in your area, you’ve changed the equation that sends money out of your region to a major player, and instead you’re keeping 66% of every dollar spent in your area, for your people, not theirs.

This is how we end this monopoly culture we’ve all bought into.

Supporting small, local businesses can save the world and end oligarchies.

And no one has more power over ramping that process up than whoever’s ordering for the company you work for.

Isn’t it time you push for different choices?

That’s resistance too.

We need a mindset where we know there’s no one solution to fix what’s facing us: We need a million solutions, and every single one of them contributes one small bit toward us changing the world.

Order from a Black-owned company, some First Nations businesses, women-owned operations, and more. Support the immigrants who’ve made a go of life in your community.

Money talks.

Oligarchs think they can fuck us over? They still can’t control where we spend our money or who we financially empower.

You’re more powerful than you dreamed.

Start acting like your choices matter every fucking day. Because they do.