In 1992, the Rio Earth Summit declared “The right to development must be fulfilled so as to equitably meet developmental and environmental needs of present and future generations” and in order to create sustainable development the mindset of the individual would need to be changed (Jick & Peiperl, p. 473). When organizations are open to new ideas and welcome transformation it enables them to meet the demands of the current and future environment, (Abbas, 2014). Thus, in 1998, before the merger of PwC and Coopers and Lybrand an opportunity was given to two alums of AIESEC, Middelburg and Shaw to deliver the following initiatives.
There are several obstacles for manufacturers attempting to employ changes in their processes for more sustainable practices. One problem that manufacturers will run into is the lack of direction. Knowing that change is needed is the easy part of reaching sustainability. Knowing what changes to make is a much more complicated challenge. The idea of sustainability is discussed often, yet broad scope ideas are traded without specific details and applications. Team B Consultants Inc. (TBCI), is the
The Carpet Butler is a carpet cleaning service company that is located in Walnut Creek, California. The Carpet Butler is serving the Bay Area. The service areas they cover include Los Gatos, Monte Sereno, Campbell, San Jose, Morgan Hill, Cupertino, Saratoga, Santa Clara, Sunnyvale, Mountain View, and Los Altos. The Carpet Butler was founded in 2012. The services they provide for their customers include carpet cleaning, upholstery cleaning, area rug cleaning, pet urine spot removal, spot stain removal, and carpet protector. The Carpet Butler utilizes a state-of-the-art truck mounted carpet and upholstery cleaning equipment. Lynn, their technician is certified in carpet, upholstery, and area rug cleaning. Lynn is passionate with her job and
I decided to do my research at Lowe’s Home and Improvement. Lowe’s Home and Improvement is a hardware store that sales everything from your basic household appliances to minor cleaning supplies. Lowe’s believes that in order to maintain great customer service they feel that they must follow these simple rules: Provide customers with environmentally-responsible products, packaging and services at everyday low prices, educate and engage employees, customers and others on the importance of conserving resources, reducing waste and recycling, review and communicate progress made toward achieving established goals and objectives, and to engage on public policy issues related to sustainability. In this report I will discuss how I observed two
Sustainability is defined as the ability to endure.(1) Though the idea of sustainability can be applied to most anything from a sustainable ecosystem that has survived thousands of years to a sustainable workplace that uses green technologies. Paul Hawken captured today’s connotation of sustainability in saying “Sustainability is about stabilizing the currently disruptive relationship between earth’s two most complex systems—human culture and the living world.” (2) There are countless ways to live, work, and produce sustainably. Sustainability not only needs to be practiced by citizens, but businesses need to join the green movement as well. Without creating, following, and enforcing green policies, negative effects will be evident and innumerable
To a regular person, the global concern about ‘going green’ might appear as a result of speculation from nervous politicians and alarmed citizens. But the reality is totally different. In recent years, businesses have gained much knowledge about the impact of their activities on environment and in turns their customers. Businesses are successively venturing to earn greater revenues. In this process, they are trying out every best possibility to entice their contributors- from customers to investors. Regardless to say, stakeholders these days are more socially responsible than ever. So to keep up to their expectations, businesses are also trying to expand or limit their activities to save the environment- from doing relentless research on lowering waste to lean management and even trying out various eco-friendly activities. Despite of all these, the ultimate question remains unanswered if it is financially beneficial to adapt those initiatives that is going to serve the
| AbstractAn analysis of GE's sustainability efforts and missteps, from the years in which the company was under the leadership of Jack Welch to ongoing activities today.
IWiT’s initiatives to expose the tech hub that has relocated to Indianapolis has brought awareness to the environmental
We started our research by finding a bank (Bank of America) that is moving towards sustainability but has not started to apply these concepts into their financial institution. We decided that Bank of America should focus on all the aspects of sustainability meaning they should have a strong role in being environmentally friendly, they should be socially sustainable, and should be economically sustainable. In our research, we looked at two major things: the process of any company becoming sustainable and how a bank should become sustainable in the financial world. We then decided the exact tasks that we want Bank of America to do and began more research on each specific area.
The inspirations behind sustainability are frequently unpredictable, individual and assorted. It is unlikely to make a rundown of reasons why such a large number of people, gatherings and groups are working towards this objective. However, for most people, sustainability comes down to the kind of future we are leaving for the next generation. Sustainability as a value is shared by numerous people and associations who exhibit this incentive in their policies, everyday exercises and
According to his talk he explained how to be a successful entrepreneur by doing no harm to the biosphere and by leading his company and the entire industrial world to sustainability. For example: he used new cyclical technologies to produced and sold 85 million square yards of climate- neutral carpet since 2004, and it has no net contribution to global climate disruption in producing carpet throughout the supply chain (Anderson, 2009).
The case has interest learning point of how environmental factors can trigger dramatic innovation in the mature industries and its impact on new type of competitive advantages. To start off, Tennant is a company that holds history of more than one-hundred years in selling equipment for floor-cleaning business. However, Chris Killingstad made radical changes in the company’s value proposition. Broadened value proposition includes safety, health and environmental values. In other words, traditional value only accounted for tangible outcomes, but they have broadened their value spectrum to engage in holistic value creation with intangible outcomes.
Sustainability has become a great topic of interest in many arenas. Particularly, leading organizations are recognizing sustainability needs to be an essential aspect of their long term strategies. With this recognition, better business practices are being sought by investors as well as sustainability is becoming a driving force for better efficiencies and innovation. Two organizations, Wal-Mart and Starbucks, have both took on sustainability as long term initiatives to address their customer needs and affect how their suppliers operate.
Many firms are learning that being environmentally friendly and sustainable has numerous benefits. (O.C Ferrell, Fraedrich, Ferrell, 2015). This could enable them to increase goodwill from various stakeholders and also save money in the long term. This will mean that they are being more efficient and less wasteful of resources, which will enable them to be more competitive by satisfying stakeholders. The CEO of
The many benefits of social responsibility to an enterprise include the ability to transform their diverse processes and systems so they deliver the greatest value to the environment while reducing costs and emissions, in addition to streamlining new product development and introduction strategies. An added benefit of pursuing social responsibility is the ability to unify the entire value chain of an enterprise to the goals of reducing carbon footprint, increasing efficiencies that also reduce the impact of production and service operations on the environment, while also increasing supply chain compliance to government requirements (Schnietz, Epstein, 2005). There are also the many benefits to reverse logistics operations and the dramatic reduction in supply chain costs over the long-term (Bartol, Tein, Matthews , Sharma & Scott-Ladd, 2010). When all the benefits of social responsibility are taken together, it is common to see entire comp[anise changed in the process, as Hewlett-Packard has been able to achieve for example with their many sustainability and Design for Environment (DfE) initiatives (Foote, Gaffney, Evans, 2010). HP has struggled in strategic decision-making yet their greatest accomplishments this century continue to be in their sustainability, DfE and corporate social responsibility programs that include funding for local start-ups throughout the Bay Area to benefit from their expertise and