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Step One - Understand
The Challenge
An old Kenyan proverb states that we should “Treat the Earth well. It is not inherited from your parents, it is borrowed from your children”
Why Do It?
There is a growing body of evidence suggesting a positive correlation between sustainability and long-term financial performance - organisations that pro-actively manage sustainability issues tend to outperform their less sustainably minded peers. Not only are there sound business arguments, there are also strong value-based reasons for becoming more sustainable.
Building a Business Case
A well-written business case will clearly lay out where sustainability will help your organisation’s long-term performance and make good use of the growing body of evidence to support the case.
Your Vision
Want to do something about the challenge of sustainability? What does it mean for our organisation? A useful starting point is to consider what your organisation would look like if it operated in a sustainable way.
Guiding
Principles
How you can develop principles that complement your vision and underpin your path to a more sustainable future.
“What’s interesting is that they [visionary companies] didn’t set out to maximize profits and shareholder value. Instead, it happened as a result of their focus on core values and on knowing their enduring purpose as an organization. They realized that if they live their values, they will succeed.”
Jerry I. Porras co-author of, Built to Last: Successful Habits of Visionary Companies (HarperBusiness, 1994). Quoted from IQ magazine, November/December 2002.
For example, the research report ‘Do socially responsible equity portfolios perform differently from conventional portfolios? If so: how and why?’ by ABN AMRO Asset Management’s Global Consulting Group (2003), reviewed 18 major studies over a 20 year period which examined this issue. It concluded that there is a positive relationship between sustainable development and financial performance although causality is still difficult to determine.
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