The Blue Ear is here to save the day! No? Never heard of him? Well Anthony Smith has. As a matter of fact, he IS the Blue Ear.
This past week I read a touching article about a little boy named Anthony Smith who was born with several chromosomal abnormalities, and thus needs a hearing aid. Unfortunately, he wasn’t very fond of the device that he dubbed his blue ear. His mother, desperate to resolve Anthony’s disdain for his blue ear, emailed Marvel explaining the situation and asking if there are any hearing-aid wearing super-heroes.
Marvel sent the boy a copy of the comic Hawkeye, a character who uses a hearing aid. Then the company went a step further and created the Blue Ear (AKA Anthony Smith), a superhero who uses his listening device to hear when someone is in trouble. Apparently Smith reportedly is now proud of his own blue ear and wants to help people.
I find something to be appreciated about a company that does such things out of a sense of social stewardship. It makes me wonder what simple things I could do that would have a big impact on others.
Whether big or small, what skills and talents do you have that you use to help others?
Here’s a cool example of a young girl who turned her own misfortune into a blessing.
I think mindset has a lot to do with social stewardship. We all have the ability to chose whether we’re going to do something well enough to get the job done, or well enough to get the job done AND create value in other people’s lives.
I think you’ve raised an important issue here, Corey. A focus on creating value instead of profit for profit’s sake or just doing enough to get by is, I believe, the business model of the future. We will all have to start pitching in and helping others if we are going to weather the storms to come.
Very cool example, David. I think of companies like Starbucks trying to do their best to maintain an overall positive impact. There’s definitely a draw to companies that, though their main business model is selling something which isn’t helpful in itself, tries to do it in a way that helps people.