New B Corp Standards Webinar Series: Session 2, Human Rights — Due Diligence and Impact Prevention

What this series is about

The B Corp standards have changed. Significantly. The old 80-point scoring system is gone. In its place, every organisation now has to meet mandatory requirements across seven Impact Topics. No more offsetting a weak area with a strong one. You have to show up across the board.

That sounds like a lot. And honestly, some of it is new ground. But here’s the thing — a lot of it builds on what you’re probably already doing. You just need to know where the bar is now, and what’s actually expected of a small business versus a multinational.

This series is designed to help you get to grips with each of the seven Impact Topics in a way that feels manageable. No death by PowerPoint. No consultants lecturing you. Instead, we’re bringing in fellow small business owners from the Scottish B Corp community who’ve been through it. They’ll share what they found straightforward, what caught them off guard, and what they’d do differently next time.

B Local Scotland be hosting each session and asking the questions we think matter most — the practical ones, the slightly awkward ones, and the ones nobody seems to answer in the official guidance.

Speakers

Lily Rice

Changing the teamwear game, one eco-friendly kit at a time. 🏃‍♂️🚴‍♀️
I’m incredibly proud to be the Co-Founder of The Long Run Club, The Ethical Teamwear Brand.
Our mission? To help teams and events rep their identity while keeping things ethical, eco-friendly and socially conscious. We’re talking high-performance, sustainable apparel that’s as good for the environment as it is for your next race, club meet or event.

We’ve partnered with cool events like Dreiländergiro (one of Europe’s biggest cycling marathons—no biggie) and our gear is crafted in Europe with the latest tech using recycled fabrics, minimal trims and a sustainably powered production line, so you can look good, feel good, and do good all at the same time.

Joao Magalhaes

Planet art and wellbeing. Particular interest on public health, political economy and foreign policy

Who is this for?

• Small business owners in Scotland who are already B Corp certified and facing recertification under the new standards

• Businesses thinking about going for B Corp certification from 2026 onwards

• Anyone in the Scottish B Corp community who wants to understand what’s actually changed and what it means in practice

You don’t need to be an expert. You don’t need to have read every page of the new standards. That’s what this series is for.

How it works

• Duration: 60 minutes per session — roughly 30 minutes of conversation, 30 minutes of your questions

• Format: Virtual, interactive, informal. Come as you are.

Each session focuses on one Impact Topic. I’ll have a conversation with a fellow small business owner who’s navigated that particular area. Then we open it up to you. The best sessions are the ones where you lot ask the hard questions.

Human rights is the Impact Topic that catches people off guard. For a lot of small businesses, the instinct is ‘we’re a ten-person company in Edinburgh, this doesn’t apply to us.’ But the new standards ask every business to think about how their operations and supply chain might involve human rights risks — and to take steps to understand and address them. It’s not about being perfect. It’s about being aware.

What You’ll Take Away

• An understanding of what human rights due diligence means for a small business — not a multinational

• How to think about your supply chain without pretending you have the resources of Unilever

• What a proportionate approach looks like and what B Lab actually expects at Year 0

What We’ll Cover

• Identifying your salient human rights risks — what this means in plain English

• Supply chain awareness — practical steps you can take without a dedicated procurement team

• The UN Guiding Principles — a quick overview of the framework the standards reference

• What ‘remediation’ looks like for a small business

What You’ll Walk Away With

• A realistic framework for assessing human rights risks in your own context

• A few practical steps you can take immediately, even with limited resources

• Less anxiety about this topic — it’s more achievable than it sounds