News Sustainability and Green DesignMaking it Sexy, Smart and Profitable: An Interview with
Bob Willard
Willard is a renowned international expert and Author of The Sustainability Advantage and The Next Sustainability Wave: Building Boardroom Buy-in
Both books are available on Amazon.com Q. Can businesses and corporations truly create a sustainable future? If so, how? A. The corporate community has an enormous influence on the possibility of a sustainable future. It cannot do it by itself, however. A sustainable future requires the combined and aligned efforts governments, non-governmental organizations (NGOs), educational institutions, the media, and global citizens. We need them to continuously put pressure on each other to go further, faster, on their sustainability efforts. Q. Do businesses or corporations have the reach, ability, or incentive to foster biodiversity (which many experts think is the key to a sustainable future)? A. Biodiversity is a critical component of a sustainable future but it I’m not sure I would agree that it is the key component of sustainability. A sustainable future requires economic, environmental, and social responsibility. Biodiversity relates primarily to the environmental aspect, with implications for the economic and social dimensions. I agree, though, that corporations have the reach and ability to foster biodiversity and other critical aspects of sustainability. The trick is to ensure they have appropriate incentives to do so. Q. What frameworks are available for quantifying success in a Triple Bottom Line organization? A. The most convincing argument for a corporation to pay attention to sustainability is that it will be more successful if it does. Traditionally, business success has been measured by profit and share price. The Triple Bottom Line – a phrase coined by John Elkington, founder of the SustainAbility consulting firm – acknowledges that both profit and share price can be positively impacted by paying attention to a company’s environmental and social impacts as well it’s economic / financial impacts. Unfortunately, accountants have yet to provide standard metrics for environmental and especially social impacts. It is encouraging, though, that the Balanced Scorecard provided more holistic measures of success and organizations like Innovest are leading the way on how to assess and rank leaders in sustainability in each industry sector. As mainstream institutional investment companies incorporate these considerations into their risk analysis models, better frameworks and metrics will emerge. Q. How can design consultancies like Continuum drive sustainability in their business? A. We need to make being “green” sexy and smart. We need to blow up the myth that environmentally responsible products and designs are inferior quality, dull, and uncomfortable. We need to gather better quantified evidence that people are more productive working in buildings with more daylight, better air quality, better heating and air conditioning controls, more ergonomically designed jazzy furniture, and built with LEED-standard designs and materials. Businesses are increasingly aware that their reputations can be positively impacted when they wear LEED-standard buildings and furnishings as a badge of honor, just as printing annual reports on FSC-certified 100% post-consumer fiber paper says “we care.” As design consultancies “walk the talk” and use their businesses as learning labs for smart and sexy eco-friendly and people- friendly designs, they will be more credible as they propose similar solutions for clients. Q. How can we communicate better the value of sustainability to consumers? How can we communicate the aesthetic possibilities? (i.e. that green doesn’t equal ugly brown products) A. The best way to communicate the value of sustainability is to demonstrate its relevance. Don’t play the guilt card. Play the better-solution card. Q. How can the goals of sustainability and the goals of profitability co-exist? A. That’s another myth – that sustainability and profit are trade-offs. In fact, it is the opposite. My research on business benefits realized by hundreds of real companies working on environmental and social responsibility showed that large companies can make at least 38% more profit from sustainability initiatives over five years, fully costed. The goals of sustainability and the goals of profitability can not only co-exist, they can thrive together. Q. Why do you think sustainability and environmental efforts have come up against such opposition by consumers and businesses alike? A. It is a mind set issue. The legacy of sustainability and environmental efforts is not helpful. Green products are associated with bureaucracy, inferior quality, sacrifice, discomfort, and high cost. Few normal businesses and people are attracted by such attributes. When I bought my first Civic Hybrid, I paid a $7,000 premium for a more environmentally friendly car. After government rebates, the Civic Hybrid I bought this year was less expensive that a comparably featured non-hybrid Civic and more powerful, while still being more environmentally friendly. Buying it was not a sacrifice; it was a bargain for a better car. That’s the kind of consumer experience we need to change the false mind set about environmentally–responsible products. Q. What industries can have the most impact on changing the trends in terms of sustainability? A. Historically, the high impact industries – oil and gas, mining, chemical, and heavy manufacturing – have paid the most attention to sustainability, mostly as a reaction to criticism that they weren’t. Now high-tech, communications, and financial services are becoming proactive on sustainability to mitigate potential risks to their reputations. Building on this base, the industries that can have the most impact on accelerating trends toward the public’s demand for sustainable solutions are the media and marketing / advertising industries. They influence the public’s mindset and awareness about the issues, as does the entertainment industry with movies like “An Inconvenient Truth.” Public / consumer interest in sustainable products and designs will partner with the investment sector’s push for less risky sustainable companies to get the attention of the business community. Finally, UNESCO’s global Decade of Education for Sustainable Development is helping the education sector unleash a wave of unstoppable young change agents on parents, who often are business leaders. Q. What industries can financially benefit the most? A. All will. Within each industry sector, the early adopters will reap the greatest benefits from using sustainability as a differentiator from the laggards. Energy-intensive heavy manufacturing industries will have the toughest struggle to survive as energy prices continue to rise along with climate change / GHG concerns. Q. How can companies like Wal-Mart do better? A. Wal-Mart deserves credit for its environmental initiatives and for using its influence on it enormous supply chain of 61,000 global suppliers, many of which are SMEs. It still has a long way to go on its social impacts – the wages and benefits paid to its employees, its pay for overtime, and especially the destructive social impact of its big-box stores parachuted into small communities. To address that, it may have to rethink its business philosophy and I’m not sure it’s ready to do that – yet. Q. What can educational institutions do (MBA programs) to prepare our next generation of thinkers and leaders to grasp the economic possibilities in green efforts? A. MBA schools need to integrate sustainability considerations into all their core and elective courses. They need to treat sustainability as a business issue, not a philanthropic issue. It is encouraging that the American College & University Presidents representing 284 U.S. colleges and universities in 45 states have signed a Climate Commitment to eliminate campus GHG emissions, use LEED Silver+ for new campus construction, purchase only Energy Star-certified products, offset GHGs from school- funded air travel, encourage public transit use, purchase renewable energy, and support shareholder sustainability resolutions in endowment companies. Plus Net Impact, a group of 10,000 MBA students and professional members with chapters in 100 universities in 80 cities on 6 continents is encouraging MBA schools to reframe businesses as a force for good as well as engines of profit. Three new MBA schools were designed from the ground up with sustainability integrated into all courses: Bainbridge Graduate Institute (BGI): MBA in Sustainable Business (2002) Presidio World College: MBA program in Sustainable Management (2003) Spurred on by the “Beyond Grey Pinstripes” world-wide biannual assessment of accredited MBA schools using a sustainability lens on their courses, community involvement, and reach, several other green MBAs have sprung up: New College: Green MBA (2005) Marlboro College Graduate Center: MBA in Managing for Sustainability (2007) Dominican University: MBA in Sustainable Enterprise (2007) Antioch University: Green MBA (2007) Green Mountain College: 1st accredited distance education MBA program in sustainable business (2007 So MBA schools are waking up. Their influence on the mindsets of future business leaders gives me hope. More: Curious about green design and profitable sustainability? www.treehugger.com www.core77.com www.inhabitat.com |