understanding its importance for business success.
Why business sustainability is important: The 3 principles of sustainability
Business sustainability consists of three principles, also known as pillars:
- Pillar one: The environment
- Pillar two: The society
- Pillar three: The economy
The next part of this article explains the impacts these three pillars have on business when they are not managed sustainably. We will also consider how these pillars interact with each other in a business sustainability model.
Pillar one: The environment and its impacts on business
News reports suggesting that our planet is heading towards catastrophe aren’t rare occurrences. The Guardian tells us that glaciers are melting at a rapid pace. The New Yorker broadcasts that the state of Louisiana is losing a football field of land every ~1.5 hours due to rising sea-levels. The Atlantic informs us that the Brazilian Amazon burns under the weight of unsustainable agricultural practices.
The human impact on planet Earth – in addition to its animals and plants – is outlined in the quote below:
“Humans have caused the annihilation of 83% of all wild mammals and half of all plants, the authors of the report found. And it’s not just that humans are wiping out wildlife — they’re also determining the animals and plants that remain. Of the birds left in the world, 70% are poultry chickens and other farmed birds. And of the mammals left in the world, 60% are livestock, 36% are pigs, and a mere 4% are wild.” – Erica Sanchez, Jana Sepehr, and Joe McCarthy, Humanity Has Killed 83% of All Wild Mammals and Half of Plants: Study
As upsetting as such news is on a personal level, we stand back and ask ‘what does this mean for business?’
This is the question that pillar one, the environment, addresses.
According to reports from 2018, $125 trillion is the financial worth of nature.
All businesses utilize our planet’s resources to obtain a slice of the $125 trillion pie. Whether that is using materials for physical products or energy, or relying on important natural cycles for freshwater, pollination or seed dispersal. All in all, business profits ultimately rely on what our planet gives us.
It makes sense for businesses to ensure that $125 trillion is sustained into the future, and not squandered over a short time period.
By preserving natural resources, extinction in a business sense is prevented.
Business and environmentalism as concepts are, therefore, very compatible. By ensuring our natural world and its resources are sustained into the future, businesses are maintained by virtue.
Pillar two: The society and its impacts on business
Pillar two, social sustainability, is about understanding human needs.
From a business perspective, social sustainability is realizing the impacts corporations have on workers and society as a whole. This includes accounting for human rights, health and safety, community engagement, work-life-balance, philanthropy, diversity, and equality.
Professor of Accountability and CSR at the Middlesex University Business School, Adrian Henriques, states:
“Social impact includes anything that affects company-stakeholder relationships: from how much and how reliably suppliers are paid, to how a product affects lives. From how small shareholders may be treated to the impacts of alcohol on health and communities.” – Adrian Henriques, Understanding a company’s social impact is crucial to sustainability
One key element that’s certainly contributing to Google’s success is high employee satisfaction.
86% of Google employees state they are satisfied with their jobs. Providing flexible working hours, fun offices and encouraging collaboration and trust, Google integrates social responsibility into its business strategy and delivers a profitable company culture.
Walt Disney certainly practices what it preached in the childhood classic movie Winnie the Pooh. Take Disney’s voluntEARS program for instance. The program encourages employees to donate time to community service efforts. It’s a successful program, as 2.9 million hours of service have been pu