Products and services—The Framework for Sustainability Conversations, part 5/7
Sustainability approaches and strategies #5
Products and services—The Framework for Sustainability Conversations, part 5/7
1—The Framework for Sustainability Conversations
The Framework for Sustainability Conversations considers different programming intervention levels and models, the upstream enabling environment, and the importance of meaningful interaction with communities to ensure better access to sustainability solutions. [+Please read part 1 here].
There are six dynamics in moving toward a sustainable enterprise. We will explore each one of them during the following weeks:
Products and services, part 5/7—this publication.
2—Products and services
There is no such thing as a one-size-fits-all approach to climate change. Each company's policy will be determined by its specific products, services, and business processes and consistent with its overall strategy.
Every company's network must include initiatives to reduce climate-related costs and risks throughout the value chain:
Business leaders must treat carbon emissions as a cost, as they are or will be shortly, and must assess and reduce their vulnerability to climate-related environmental and economic shocks.
Leaders must attentively explore every point of the value chain to understand the inside-out impact.
Companies that have seized significant opportunities in changing economic landscapes have been those with bold future visions, not necessarily those whose hard assets appeared to position them best for success. Success in a carbon-constrained world will be determined by innovation, management insight, and leadership rather than short-term balance-sheet effects or efficiency initiatives:
Emissions can be generated by any value-chain activity, including inbound logistics, operations, outbound logistics, marketing, sales, and after-sales service.
Profits to total emissions in the value chain can be a telling indicator of potential climate impact.
Many carbon-cutting investments will not provide shareholder value until governments act to make emissions more expensive:
Alternative-fuel vehicles require refueling infrastructure. Specialized facilities for liquefying natural gas for transoceanic shipment are only useful if there are terminals for offloading the cargo and converting it back to gas at the other end.
Business leaders must be bold in betting on the long-term future that will benefit their companies the most—that is, on a future in which governments limit human impact on the climate in transparent and reasonable ways.
More and more companies have started applying the ten principles of circularity to their products, services, and business models. Those that persist in treating climate change solely as a corporate social responsibility issue rather than a business problem will risk the most significant consequences. While leaders can disagree about how immediate and significant the impact of climate change will be, companies need to take action now.
Some already initiated the efforts towards new models (more details in next week’s review): businesses can now invest in voluntary interfirm trading systems to gain expertise and demonstrate to governments, regulators, and the business community how resilient such systems can be. Companies can also lobby governments to implement sensible systems that tax or cap carbon emissions and encourage carbon credit trading. Corporations will increase the likelihood of their desired future by betting on it.
We know that climate extremes can destroy thriving business environments and even societies. Climate change is now a fact of political life and plays a growing role in business competition. Greenhouse gas emissions will be increasingly scrutinized, regulated, and priced. Furthermore, restoring trust and fostering cooperation within and between institutions, countries, and networks will be crucial to addressing these challenges and preventing the world from drifting further apart.
3—Practice with the Framework for Sustainability Conversations in PDF
We believe sustainability should be at the core of every business. The Framework for Sustainability Conversation has been conceived to empower creators and leading modern teams to build purpose-driven projects and create value for the world’s most exciting companies.
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