iMPACTiSSiMO! Podcast Episode 60: Navine Karim with Global Impact Law
Navine Karim spent 25 years at the intersection of law, media, and business — from BET and nearly a decade at Red Bull Media House, to General Counsel and Head of Impact at Guayaki Yerba Mate. He has seen how the biggest brands operate from the inside. That’s what makes his perspective worth hearing.
His take: the backlash isn’t the end of the movement. It’s the natural evolution from emotional reaction to rational integration — and the companies that figure that out first will have a serious competitive advantage. He’s now founder of Global Impact Law.
In this episode he breaks down how to move sustainability off the soapbox and onto the P&L, why intangible assets like reputation and climate resilience are becoming critical investment determinants, and how lawyers can be value creators, not just risk managers.
He’s actively looking for:
- Consumer and natural products companies ready to think about impact as a business strategy, not just marketing copy
- Investors and directors who want better data on the intangible assets that don’t show up on a balance sheet
- Impact organizations that want proactive legal counsel to unlock value, not just react to problems
If sustainability feels like a moving target in your organization right now, this conversation will help point you to solid ground. together..
Podcast Transcript
Jacob: [00:00:00] In an era where there’s an increasing pushback against sustainability, ESG, and DEI. Navine Karim actually sees impact as a competitive advantage.
Karim welcome.
Curious for you, so as a storyteller, I’m always interested in sort of origin stories or inciting incidents, you know, of like that moment of pivot. Tell me the story of sort of, what was that moment where you decided, in my career, I’m actually gonna focus on impact.
Navim: Yeah. I don’t know if it was a moment of pivot, it was, it feels quite evolutionary. Before I went to law school, I had the opportunity to work in South Asia as an intern with a nonprofit organization in a remote part of Pakistan. [00:01:00] And that inspired my interest in international development. I remember when I was at Red Bull, and I was in one of those sessions where consultants come in to talk about demographics and habits of consumers, and they were focused on this next generation, which was Generation Z, and my kids were part of that generation.
But there was this coalescence of what they were talking about, the prior stage of my life, which was in the world of international development, because they were presenting on the sustainable development goals, right?
And they were talking about poverty alleviation and water scarcity and carbon emissions, and these concepts that we talked about all the time, in sort of almost like a different world for me. But now we’re talking about it in the offices of Red Bull as a [00:02:00] key priority for this next generation in terms of how they think and what they care about.
And so, it felt like there were two worlds of mind that were finally feeling like they came together in a way.
And so, that’s what sort of inspired me to kind of say, okay, you know what, like there had already been businesses. I was a little bit late to the party, to be honest, because I know there were many, many businesses and founders and investors that were all already in this space of what the private sector can do. And why the private sector should be involved in these issues, because it matters to consumers, and it builds resilience within organizations. But you know, once the light bulb kind of clicked for me, then I just wanted to, I just wanted to then sort of spend the rest of my career trying to, trying to be in this, in [00:03:00] this, in this movement.
It’s an interesting time right now. It was John Elkington, right? There was a webcast that he was on, and he said something that stuck with me because we’re in a moment of transition, economically, politically, socially, globally. It’s hard to see what the opportunities are sometimes, um, kind of when you’re inundated with so much change and so much transition. And I feel like I’m, you know, inherently an optimist, so I usually can find that thing, that spot, but I was feeling a bit challenged at the time that I was listening to this webinar, and he said, he was actually very excited about this period, right? He came into this period with the, maybe the knowledge, the foresight to, to kind of embrace the moment in a way. It’s an interesting space to try and drive [00:04:00] transition through periods of immense change.
It’s an interesting moment. It feels like so much of what was driving action within the industry, within companies, was almost rooted in kind of a fear or morals-based place. Companies, CEOs, Organizations, and consumers still care about these issues. There was a report, The UN Global Compact with Accenture, just recently put out a report, polling 2000 CEOs globally. 88% of CEOs think sustainability is a bigger issue now than it was five years ago, so it’s not as though the issue is going away, or it’s not on people’s minds. I think our reaction on how to deal with it is changing, and frankly, I think it feels like a natural evolution, right? Like we had this emotional reaction about, what’s going on and what we’re [00:05:00] faced with. But now I think logic and the rational mind kicks in, how do we operationalize, how do we link what was rooted in fear and maybe morals, and integrate it into the P&L, and how we run the business.
I think that the sort of the stage that we’re in right now is to try and address that gap between what was reactivity to rational, logical thinking. I think the underlying issue is just trying to capture what the metrics are within an organization that isn’t necessarily showing up on the P&L. You know, I think maybe they’re referred to as intangible assets, right? These things that aren’t traditionally captured.
Jacob: What can you talk to about, as far as like this rise of the intangible economy? If someone hasn’t really heard about that, what is the intangible economy? How would you describe it?
Navim: I think there’s a number of assets that [00:06:00] don’t show up on the balance sheet. Like brand equity, what’s the value of your name? What’s the value of consumer sentiment, reputation, the net promoter scorer, right? These concepts have real value. Certainly, when investors and shareholders are thinking about making investments in companies, these intangible assets are key determinants in terms of both the valuation as well as the decision to invest. I think as I’ve learned more in this whole industry, I think a big gap in Intangibility is what sustainability represents, and I think because these issues of climate change are not going away, they’re only going to get amplified.
It will cause investors, leadership teams, and consumers to be paying more [00:07:00] attention to sustainability as an intangible asset of a company to help understand whether investments should be made, what the value is of those investments, what the long-term kind of resiliency is of those investments.
Is it in the long-term interest of an organization that’s based on crops being grown in sort of regenerative systems to not pay attention to how those crops are being sourced, what the soil quality is where those crops are being grown, what is happening with the larger sort of weather systems and environmental issues in those areas? Determinants of whether or not a company is at significant risk or potentially has a significant advantage, comparative advantage to its competitors. The more [00:08:00] data, the better you know investors; they want to know what the levers are in an organization, in a portfolio company, in order to help it succeed.
Directors have fiduciary duties to ensure that they are, they are making decisions with the broadest base and most informed position that they possibly can, and leadership needs to be able to both report to the investors and the directors, as well as their consumers and their constituents, but also make decisions. At the end of the day, it’s all about decision-making. How do we enhance the ability of the decision makers to be able to make the best decisions for an organization?
Jacob: What would you say are the three biggest mistakes Impact organizations make from a legal standpoint? Like, what are the things that you, you [00:09:00] see coming up or like blind spots they might have?
Navim: I think that, if I think about what are the core areas of impact to an organization in my mind, it has to do with climate, inequality, and I would say governance in a way. And so governance being like sort of institutional framework for decision making. I would say lawyers have a role to play in all of those areas.
And I think traditionally lawyers are plugged in, have been plugged in to when there’s a problem. When the lawsuit comes in, when there’s a violation of some regulatory standard. My view is that, obviously, lawyers are necessary, you know, in certain instances, but as value drivers to [00:10:00] mitigate risk ahead of time to potentially unlock value within an organization, and thinking about these sort of three buckets in terms of how to build for the future,
I think lawyers have an important role to play. One of the things that I learned earlier in my career, right? Like when you bring a lawyer in early on, like the deal-making stage in terms of how you structure any kind of commercial relationship, before you actually get to actually the contract and negotiating on an indemnity or a limit on liability or insurance provision, that involvement early stage can actually make the deal better. It can, it can structure the relationship in a way that I think is in the best interest of the organization. So I, I do think lawyers have a role to play that maybe, uh, doesn’t always get, um, utilized [00:11:00] within organizations.
Jacob: For your law firm, like what does an ideal client look like for you?
Navim: I’m providing fractional general counsel. So basically, I’m like an outside in-house lawyer that really has functioned as a business partner my entire career. And so I wanna take that sentiment to clients.
I tend to work with, just based on my experience, within consumer products, natural products, supplements, companies where they’re sourcing ingredients in a certain way, that are marketing themselves in a certain way. And they’ve got commercial needs, they’ve got supply chains, they’ve got distribution networks. I do all of that type of work. I also have worked within the media industry, within a lot of marketing, within some tech and music, and so I like trying to bring all that [00:12:00] together. And really, work with companies that are either well on their way to thinking about impact and thinking about kind of the broader picture about what they’re doing, or at earlier stages. And they wanna start thinking in that way. And, you know, lawyers provide this interesting vantage point because, you know, we’re very cross-functional within organizations to begin with. And so, we don’t necessarily own the outcomes, but we are the advisors to try and help find solutions to challenges or to mitigate risk, or ideally, if we do it the right way, to unlock value and find opportunity. And so that’s what I try to bring with the clients that I work with.
Jacob: Any last words before I let you go?
Navim: I try not to focus too much on all the things that are wrong or all the things, [00:13:00] all the reasons why things could get worse. Whether it’s in the current day or whether it was 20 years ago. I mean, honestly, it’s not; there’s always that feeling. Right. And just to continue thinking about, like, where are the opportunities? Where are the unlocks? Where are the, where are the spaces that exist where there’s real innovation happening? Where there’s just interesting things going on. So that’s I think what gives me hope, that’s what keeps me engaged. That’s where I’m constantly trying to figure out what’s happening. Not just here in the US or in California, but around the world.
Jacob: Navine appreciate like learning more from you and their rich experience and also just, probably for me, like I’ve probably seen lawyers in more of the light of reactionary versus proactive and unlocking value and I think the more folks in the impact space need to [00:14:00] embrace sort of the positive potential of what you do and seeing like the big picture systems thinking and like where the global trends are moving. So kudos for what you’re doing, and keep up the good work.
Navim: Thanks. Appreciate it, Jacob. Uh, thanks again for having me on.
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