Archive for the ‘ Corporate Responsibility ’ Category

The Continuity of Sustainability

The Network for Business Sustainability recently articulated their “Top 10” sustainability challenges for Canadian business in 2013.  I think many readers will probably agree these challenges face businesses around the globe as well.

One challenge in particular caught my attention, in light of some of the challenges I‘ve encountered myself, working with public and private sector companies in Canada and internationally:  How can companies keep their long-term sustainability agenda on track despite leadership changes?

I have witnessed several examples of disrupted sustainability agendas, even among organizations that had done a phenomenal amount of work to advance sustainability.  In my experience, it is typically the departure of a committed CEO or Board chair that leads to gradual erosion and sidelining – sometimes intentional, sometimes inadvertent – of corporate responsibility and sustainability initiatives over time, often accompanied by a sense of frustration among team members and stakeholders.

In my view, this challenge highlights the critical need to differentiate between operational and cultural integration of sustainability. Most discussion papers and guidance pertaining to sustainability integration deal mainly with the integration of sustainability into business processes:  this is operational integration.  However, operational integration must not be mistaken for cultural integration.  Cultural integration involves the integration of sustainability into corporate vision and values, and the embodiment of those values in the behaviour of individuals within the organization. Both are critical success factors to advance a sustainability agenda over the long term, and indeed they are complementary.

Can you have cultural integration without operational integration?  Sure, but there’s a good chance the sustainability agenda will not be fully realized.  We’ve probably all seen examples of organizations populated by well-meaning individuals who share a belief in the need to be more sustainable, but whose efforts are stymied by the lack of effective integration of sustainability considerations into routine business processes.

Conversely, you can have operational integration without cultural integration, although this is usually more difficult to recognize.  In this situation too, the sustainability agenda is unlikely to be fully achieved.  Operational integration without cultural integration can happen when an organization reactively pursues a sustainability agenda – perhaps in response to stakeholder pressure or a perceived reputational risk – without taking the time to understand why, and to develop a clear, thoughtful, and shared vision.  A committed leader may also achieve a degree of operational integration through sheer strength of character, but may overlook the importance of ensuring their executive colleagues and the Board, not to mention the employees at large, share their vision.

It is where cultural integration is lagging that the sustainability agenda is most at risk of become derailed during and after a change in leadership.

Organizational vision and values are fundamentals that will guide an organization through times of change.  It is therefore worth taking the time to carefully consider the reasons for pursuing sustainability and crafting a sustainability agenda that is aligned with and supportive of the organization’s vision and values.  An organization that values sustainability leadership as part of its culture, and considers sustainability to be a core part of its strategic vision is more likely to enjoy continuity in its sustainability agenda, even through a change in leadership.

One way to enhance cultural integration is to have broad engagement with the Board, the executive/management team, and employees during development of the long-term sustainability agenda, particularly with respect to ensuring alignment of the sustainability agenda with the organization’s vision.  This increases not only understanding and buy-in across the organization, but improves operational integration as well.

The greater the degree of cultural integration, particularly among the Board and executive, the more likely it will be that commitment to sustainability will be a factor in the consideration of new leadership candidates.  This, too, will do much to assure the continuity of sustainability in the midst of change.

 

What do you think?  I invite you to share your experiences and ideas here, by clicking on the Write Comment tab, or join the discussion in the Canadian CSR and SD Practitioners Network on LinkedIn by clicking here.

Check out the Network for Business Sustainability here: http://nbs.net

Read about the Top 10 Challenges for Canadian Business in 2013 here: http://nbs.net/knowledge/top-10-sustainability-challenges-for-canadian-business-in-2013/ 

Follow the Network for Business Sustainability on Twitter: https://twitter.com/NBSnet

2013
01/15
CATEGORY
Corporate Responsibility
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A Good Sign?

My daughter’s love of Playmobil is unabated, and she recently used her spending money to order some new sets.  This time, I’m pleased to report, I’m much happier with the packaging! (See my previous post The Red Flag over Playmobil’s Castle.)

Playmobil’s packaging

Not only was the outer box appropriately sized for the contents, but they used Automated Packaging Systems’ “EarthAware” recycled film air pillows to fill the empty space.  This packaging contains at least 95% pre-consumer recycled material, and I can recycle it where I live.  Of course, the cardboard boxes themselves are recyclable.

Areas for improvement?  They could probably make the set boxes themselves smaller, and use recycled-content plastic packaging for the pieces inside.  There’s also no indication that the semi-glossy paper used for the assembly instructions has any recycled content.  And I still can’t find any corporate responsibility or sustainability information on their website.  But I’ll flag a good thing when I see it.

2012
08/20
CATEGORY
Corporate Responsibility
Sustainability
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Too Little for Too Long

At the end of September, the Institute of International Finance held its annual meeting in Washington.  The IIF is a global association of financial institutions, whose mission is to “support the financial industry in prudently managing risks, including sovereign risk; in developing best practices and standards; and in advocating regulatory, financial, and economic policies that are in the broad interest of [its] members and foster global financial stability.”

Prominent on the agenda was international financial regulatory reform, over which considerable debate is ongoing. On the one hand, the G20 plan tougher financial regulatory requirements.  The IIF, on the other hand, while acknowledging the need for reform, calls for a cautious approach, arguing that stricter rules could compromise a fragile economic recovery.  In his speech to the IIF’s annual meeting, Bank of Canada Governor Mark Carney was critical of the IFF’s position, in part because it fails to assume any economic benefit from reducing the risk of future financial crises and because banks already have until 2019 to adapt to the changes. The contrasting viewpoints are summarized succinctly in this Globe and Mail article by Kevin Carmichael, titled “Carney, Waugh spar over new banking rules” (September 26, 2011).

Bank of Canada Governor Mark Carney

What jumped out at me from Mr. Carney’s remarks is this gem of a quote:  ”If some institutions feel pressure today, it is because they have done too little for too long, rather than because they are being asked to do too much, too soon.“

This statement reflects the reality that increasing demands for transparency, accountability, ethical behaviour, and consideration of non-financial material issues (like environmental, social, and governance issues) have been apparent for some time, and there is diminishing justification – and tolerance – for delayed action.  This is relevant not only to financial institutions, but to other corporate sectors as well.

The pressure to which Mr. Carney alluded will only increase with prolonged inaction, as the gap between corporate behaviour and performance and emerging stakeholder expectations and regulatory requirements continues to grow.

 

Click here for Governor Mark Carney’s full remarks to the IIF.

Click here to link to the IIF’s paper, “The Cumulative Impact on the Global Economy of Changes in the Financial Regulatory Framework” (September 2011).

Click here to link to the IIF’s latest paper on cumulative economic impact of regulatory reform, addressing revisions (October 2011).

2011
10/18
CATEGORY
Corporate Responsibility
Ethics
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The Changing Currency of a Modern Licence to Operate

Following up on my prior writing and speaking engagements on the topic of social media and corporate responsibility, the Canadian Institute of Mining, Metallurgy and Petroleum asked me to write a piece for their journal, CIM Magazine, focused on the extractive sector.
An edited version of what I wrote appears in the September/October issue here.
I was also asked to write a sidebar piece highlighting Suncor‘s social media experience that I referenced in the main story. The sidebar piece, entitled “Going Where the Conversations Are“, appears after the main story at the link above.
Comments welcome on either piece; click on the “Write Comment” option in the menu on the left side of this page.

2011
10/01
CATEGORY
Corporate Responsibility
Social Media
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The Red Flag over Playmobil’s Castle

My daughter loves Playmobil.  She spends hours constructing and then animating complex scenes and she’s a master at combining parts from different sets to create new structures that aren’t in the well-thumbed Playmobil catalogue.  Except for the unpleasantness of stepping on a rogue piece in the dark or sifting through the dust of the vacuum cleaner bag to recover some special plastic bit, I quite like the stuff myself.  It’s the sort of toy I wish I had when I was a kid.

However, I must admit I’m disappointed by the company’s apparent inattention to sustainability.

A set my daughter bought was missing a piece – a rare occurrence – so I ordered a replacement part through the company’s website.   Here’s what I received in the mail a couple of weeks later:

The piece

The packaging

The piece itself is about 3 x 2 x 2 cm!  You could fit  hundreds of them in that box!  (At least the box was not also filled with those hard-to-recycle (and annoyingly clingy) styrofoam chips.)

This experience prompted me to go to Playmobil’s website to find out where they stand on sustainable packaging.  Much to my chagrin, I was unable to find any information about any aspect of sustainability at Playmobil and its maker, Geobra Brandstätter gmbH.

I went out to the shed to check the original packaging; a few boxes have Der Grüne Punkt, indicating the company participates in the Green Dot program in Germany, but there is no other mark to indicate recycled content or recyclability of the packaging.

There are so many resources out there now to support manufacturers in adopting sustainable packaging materials and systems, there really is no excuse for a consumer products manufacturer to ignore this aspect of corporate responsibility.  For example, the Sustainable Packaging Coalition is an industry working group that offers courses, briefs, design guidelines and other resources for sustainable packaging.  The Sustainable Packaging Alliance provides tools and delivers workshops and events.  Or check out the annual Sustainable Packaging Forum, coming up in September in Texas.

Sustainable packaging minimizes material waste, both in manufacturing and end-of-use disposal.  It also reduces energy and emissions associated with transportation from factory to distribution centre to retail store.  And, of course, it saves money in material costs, transportation, and warehousing.

Playmobil red flagAny way you look at it, the clearly unsustainable packaging used to send me this replacement part is a red flag.  It shows that Playmobil either isn’t doing anything about sustainable packaging or, if it is, the company has overlooked certain customer transactions that involve packaging.

That there is no publicly available information about Playmobil’s corporate responsibility programs, too, is a red flag.  Does it mean that Playmobil and Geobra are doing nothing about sustainability?  Or does it mean, simply, they aren’t communicating what they’re doing?  Either way, it’s leaving me and every other interested consumer in the dark.  And that’s no way to build confidence and trust.

Click here to access Playmobil’s Facts and Figures page (over 2 billion figures manufactured to date!)

Image of Playmobil part from this eBay listing.

2011
08/26
CATEGORY
Corporate Responsibility
Sustainability
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