What does sustainability mean to your business? It’s an interesting question and one that is top of mind for many of our clients. Across a number of different market studies that we have conducted over the past 12 months, it is surprising to see how many respondents (often in senior positions within their company) did not have a clear idea of what sustainability meant for their company and how little has actually been formally put in place. There seems to be a lot of talk but little action. The term sustainability is broad and also does not always immediately imply environmental sustainability issues – eg. for some it may focus solely on the sustainability of their business. Examples of what some of our research respondents have said about sustainability in their business: “We are adopting lean management principles, and using structured problem solving techniques.” “We are looking at schemes that would make products more ecologically sustainable – modified in terms of carbon emissions or environmental impact.” “Like everyone, looking at the carbon footprint, looking at environmental compliance and looking to maintain our skill and capability in the core business activities.” “Improve our reliability. Remain competitive.” “Sustainability of the product range and manufacturing processes: to do with a variety of issues, eg. amount of energy used with raw materials, disposal of waste.” Specifically for environmental sustainability some of the key challenges currently being raised from a product/service standpoint are: – How can new technologies extend our product life cycle or improve production processes – How do we sustain our core products into the future when we are dependent on finite resources – How do we reduce/offset the company’s carbon footprint – What is the impact and relevance of emissions trading schemes on our business. But also, we are seeing a lot of questions being raised in relation to the value/benefit of being perceived as an organisation that is addressing (environmental) sustainability, for example: – Is it a real differentiator in supplier/product selection if we are perceived to be addressing sustainability issues? – How is my company positioned on sustainability against key competitors or against competitor products or materials? – What do my customers/prospective customers expect from their suppliers in relation to sustainability? – Are there penalties against companies that are not deemed to be addressing sustainability? While we have seen that some companies and government bodies have put in place 5 year plans to address these issues (eg. budgets for infrastructure spending, etc.), there is a real opportunity for the rest of the business community to stop talking about it, identify the value/benefit to their organisation, and put some of these thoughts into actions. Targeted research, (whether it is looking into the feasibility of new products/ technologies, or just getting a better understanding of the value of sustainability within your market), is a great starting place to get clarification/better definition of what your business needs to do to address their sustainability issues. Also, we liked this description of sustainability – we think it reflects well what we are seeing in the business community today. What do you think? “It appears to me that as the subject of “sustainability” is gaining popularity, the definition of sustainability is becoming less focused; although there is a myriad of projects whose concern is professedly “sustainability”, “sustainability” is becoming progressively less likely achievable, because it is hard to achieve something that we don’t know what it actually is”. Mr. Jan Hearthstone (http://www.modelearth.org/defin.html)
