Leadership Friday: Profile of Ben Cohen, Co-Founder of Ben & Jerry’s Ice Cream

What could be better...more on Leading with Ice Cream.

Our story comparing the Task Cycle® to ice cream was so successful, we decided to stick with the theme in writing our leader profile for the month of July. What other great American business leader would we profile besides one of the founders of the creamy classic Ben & Jerry’s ice cream company?  Read on for insight on how he became a leader in sustainable business practices.

Born March 18, 1951, in Brooklyn, New York, Ben Cohen was interested in ice cream from a young age.  His parents say that he would mix various flavors together and add candies, cookies, and other food items into the “custom flavors” he produced on a regular basis.

He attended Calhoun High School in Merrick, NJ, where he met his future business partner and fellow ice cream lover, Jerry Greenfield.  During his high school years, Cohen worked as an ice cream truck driver before he headed off to Colgate University.  Struggling with school, he dropped out a year-and-a-half after enrolling, and returned to what he knew: ice cream.  Cohen later re-enrolled in Skidmore College, the University Without Walls, and finally NYU to study art therapy, and paid for his education by doing odd jobs such as working as a McDonald’s cashier, mopping floors at a local store, taxi cab driver, and pediatric emergency room clerk.  After settling on a job working with emotionally disturbed students by using art therapy, Cohen began to again experiment with making his own ice cream. 

In 1978, Cohen and Greenfield invested $12,000 in a dilapidated gas station in Burlington, VT.  Originally wanting to start a bagel shop, they switched to ice cream because of the lower startup costs.  Cohen and Greenfield used a variety of non-traditional and recycled materials to renovate the building, including scrap aluminum from the local newspaper’s printing factory. 

College students loved the combination of fresh milk, creative flavors, and chunks of anything that meshed well with ice cream.  Cohen and Greenfield’s venture was so successful that they rented out an old spool-and-bobbin shop to begin distributing their unique flavors in pints.  They marketed to mom-and-pop stores around the area.  In 1981, Ben & Jerry’s expanded its distribution and opened its first franchise in Shelbourne, VT.

Soon, Ben & Jerry’s developed into a nationwide phenomenon.  As profits skyrocketed, Cohen looked for ways to give back to the community.  He helped create the Ben & Jerry’s foundation in 1985 as a way for the company to become involved with community projects. He believed that “"Business has a responsibility to give back to the community from which it draws its support.” Cohen allotted for 7.5% of all Ben & Jerry’s profits to go towards the Ben & Jerry’s foundation.  Today, the Ben & Jerry’s foundation donates to many causes, including scholarship foundations and playground builds, and especially to organizations focusing on environmental action.

Ben & Jerry’s continued to find ways to cut down on waste and to be more environmentally friendly.  Upon building their first ice cream manufacturing plant, environmental efforts were heightened (also as cost cutting measures) by measures like recycling cardboard, plastic, and paper, banning sticky notes, and allowing pencils to be thrown away only when deemed “stubby enough.”  Soon, all food waste from the ice cream plant was fed to pigs at a local farm rather than being thrown out.  Ben & Jerry’s began producing flavors especially for certain causes, such as to raise funds for rainforest reforestation, protest Alaskan drilling, and to use brownie chunks produced by a company employing disadvantaged workers in New York.

Cohen, a self proclaimed “hippie,” resigned from the position of CEO in 1995 after years of overseeing the now-massive ice cream chain.  He remained on the Ben & Jerry’s advisory board, and has chosen to dedicate himself to speaking out about causes that impassion him.  He currently promotes green business practices, small-scale farming, and children’s health care programs.  In 2000, he was honored by the New York Open Center for his “leadership in pioneering socially responsible business.”

Photo courtesy of Getty Images Via Daylife
Other Sources include:
Ben & Jerry's Corporate Website: History
Wikipedia
Evan Carmichael's Famous Entrepreneur

Post IV in the Task Cycle® Series: Maintaining and Adjusting the Process is like Ice Cream

We’re going to compare this phase of the Task Cycle® to something most people know and love:

Ice Cream.

Soft, creamy, chunky ice cream in any flavor your imagination desires.  Think chocolate chip cookie dough, mint chocolate chip, strawberry, moose tracks, triple caramel chunk, rocky road, toffee—and my newest strange discovery, chocolate bacon (I know, bizarre, right?).  So visualize your favorite ice cream and hold it in your mind, because we’re going to spend the next few paragraphs enjoying it.

Granted, there are some of us who don’t like the effects that ice cream has on us, i.e. those of us who are lactose intolerant.  So for our friends who can’t eat ice cream, imagine this analogy with a nice cone full of sherbet or sorbet.  I prefer rainbow sherbet, but you may prefer a nice peach-mango sorbet.  It’s up to you.

We are going to explore the idea of Phase V of the Task Cycle®, which is “Monitoring and Adjusting the Process.”  We’ve talked a lot about setting up your development process, and stressed the importance of establishing a strong purpose and setting up a strong foundation.  In “ice cream terms,” establishing your purpose was determining your hunger and deciding on your flavor.  We’re at an old-fashioned ice cream shop—none of that soft serve stuff.  There are many flavors and topping choices, so determining your  best combination takes time and careful thought (and possibly some input from a friend!).  Your “foundation” is your ice cream cone (my favorite kind is a waffle cone).  When you received your cone, both you and the ice cream scooper probably checked to make sure that it was in one piece, and that no chunks were taken out of it.  You needed to make sure there was a strong foundation on which to place your ice cream.  With no apparent problems, you head out the door and into the outdoors, completely satisfied and ready to munch away. 

It is extremely hot outside.  Your ice cream begins to slowly melt, and you quickly move to lick around the cone where the melting is fiercest.  As you enjoy your ice cream, you must constantly monitor the cone for drips and adjust your hold to attack rogue melts.  Suddenly, your friend/mentor (who recommended the treat and helped decide your flavor) points out a problem with your cone—there is a hole in the bottom, and precious ice cream is dripping out of the cone and onto the street (and your new pants). 

Luckily, you have only made it one block from the ice cream shop.  You quickly head back, hoping for a solution that can save your ice cream.  After consulting with the girl behind the counter, she offers an effective tweak to the cone’s structure:  she offers you an M&M to place in the bottom of the cone to act as a stopper, preventing ice cream leakage.  You adjust your cone by taking off the ice cream, inserting the M&M, and replacing the ice cream on top.  After wiping off the several drops of melted ice cream from your pant leg, you are as good as new (even better, because now you have an M&M to look forward to at the end of your cone).  Happily, you head off down the street to your next destination with your friend/mentor with time to spare.

This extended metaphor is to explain in simple terms the reason for and importance behind monitoring and adjusting your development process.  If we had just ignored the drip in our cone, we would have ended up covered in melted ice cream and we would have lost about half of our sweet treat to our pants.  By the time we got to our intended destination, we would look a mess and have to spend time valuable time cleaning the sugary treat off of our pants.  And everyone knows that no matter how much friends may deny it to make you feel better, wet spots on your pants do make you look like you wet yourself.

By taking our friend/mentor’s observation seriously, we circumvented a major crisis and avoided personal embarrassment in the process.  A small adjustment ensured that we were able to continue to our next destination while enjoying our ice cream cone, now fully functioning. 

Apply this to your personal development process.  Continually monitor and adjust your hold on your development progress in order to catch any slip-ups or weak areas.  Let your mentor or another outside source make observations to help you.  Listen to them, and in the case of a foundational error, turn to an expert: an HR professional, a superior, a mentor, a co-worker, or a personal development coach.  They will have the experience to tweak your issue in a way you may not have considered.  Their help will allow you to stay on track without losing face or valuable time.  Remember, this is their job—they’ve probably handled something like this before.

And remember: after all of your hard work when you do achieve your personal development goals, reward yourself with a nice, cold, refreshing cone of ice cream.  Get two scoops if you want.  We won’t tell anyone.