Table of Contents Page
1. Executive Summary2
2. Introduction3
3. Definition of Sustainability…….3
4. An Overview of Sustainability ………...……4
5. Shell’s Strategic Approach to Sustainability6
6. Literature focusing three sustainable issues9
7. Theory/Models used to evaluate Shell’s response to sustainability12
8. Recommendation on What Shell could do to become a sustainable business14
9. Conclusion15
10. References 17
Executive Summary
Sustainability in companies is a broad subject. In order
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Shell’s sustainable development strategy takes a long term and short term approach which ensures that economics, environment and social considerations are implemented within its decision making process (Report2010, 2010).
This report will define sustainability, give an overview of sustainability, discuss Shell’s strategic approach to sustainability, review three sustainable issues, discuss theories and models used to evaluate Shell’s response to sustainability, recommend what Shell could do to become a sustainable business and lastly will draw its conclusion.
Definition of Sustainability
The introduction of the term “sustainable” into the political language came about in a report titled “The limits to growth” in 1972 by the Club of Rome. Club of Rome was an international association which consisted of scientists, business executives, public officials and scholars. “Sustainable” is defined by the writers as a model of output that represents a sustainable world system which does not have a dynamic collapse. It is able to meet the basic material requirements that are needed by the environment (Meadows et al, 1972).
However, the term “sustainability” has several definitions. One, being the ability of people and organisations to preserve the remaining natural resources and use these resources wisely in order to sustain an environmentally healthy future. The
The concept of sustainability is about the capacity of the environment to continue to support our lives and the lives of other living creatures into the future. There are a number of programs to restore the river to maintain communities, fisheries and navigation, to ensure long-term sustainability.
The three pillars are environmental, social and economically sustainability. However in this report, environmental sustainability will be brought to light, the two other pillars will be trivial. In order for environmental sustainability to be defined, general sustainability must be defined. Sustainability is the ability to continue a defined behaviour indefinitely (Thwink.org, 2015). For the environment, there are three aspects which must be sustained for, renewable resources, non-renewable resources and pollution. Therefore, environmental sustainability is the degree of pollution emission, renewable resource production and non-renewable resource consumption that can be continued indefinitely for future use. CAROBN
There is no one best definition for sustainability. The simplest and most fundamental meaning would be “the ability to sustain” or otherwise “the capacity to endure”. It can also be defined as a need for our generation to manage the resources base efficiently so that the average quality of life that we ensure ourselves can potentially be shared by all future generations.
So what is sustainability? It is the quality of not being harmful to the environment or depleting natural resources, and thereby supporting long-term ecological balance.
The definition of sustainability is the ability to support a long term ecological balance while not harming the environment or depleting its natural resources. According to Robert Goodland and his essay “The Case that the world has reached limits” the world is currently being run unsustainably, “being fueled by inherited fossil fuels is the best single example” (Goodland 602). Fossil fuels are non renewable gases and oils and we are using them to provide 60 percent of the global energy, because of the extensive usage of these nonrenewable fossil fuels, we barely have fifteen years left of reserves. Goodland uses his essay to build on Brundtland’s leads to gain and maintain sustainability, claiming that we need a “new era of economic growth” to meet the needs of sustainability (Goodland 602). Goodland
The concept of “sustainability” is a vital part of our society. Herndl compares sustainability to the concept of freedom “As you might expect, it is not easy to define a concept that
New Belgium supports sustainable development, so they choose to form partnerships who support sustainability, create a high involvement corporate culture which values everyone’s contributions, look at the CO2 emissions, waste, toxic substances, and transportation to measure the environmental impact of their products. To get the basic idea of what builds sustainability in their company, they usually question the vendors. For instance, the policy regard of their waste management, the environmental organization they contributed, their method used to manage the transportation impact to their products.
The term sustainability is one that been conceptualized since the early civilizations of humans inhabited the earth. During those primative times, everything that allowed civilizations to thrive came from the earth. Humans during those times were more more in touch with their reliance on the environment. In today's society, the reliance on our natural environment seems much further away due to our insulation from modern conveniences. Nevertheless, this conception could not be further from the truth; we are more reliant now on the world's renewable resources than ever before.
Although there is no formal definition for the term, individuals have tried to define sustainability according to their function or area of study. The term “sustainability,” once an obscure ecological concept, has now been adopted by many in the business world to connote the principles of social and environmental responsibility (Joseph Fiksel, Jonathan Low and Jim Thomas). Further, sustainability can be seen through the eyes of business as a way to create value. More likely than not, the term sustainability can be linked to the ability of decreasing costs, wastes and inefficiencies. According to the vice president of General Electric,
I found this website online when I was searching for the meaning of sustainability. This source is reliable because it is the U.S. Environmental Protection
Sustainability from a strategic business perspective is the potential for the long-term well-being of the natural environment, including all biological entities, as mutually beneficial interactions among nature and individuals, organizations, and business strategies. (O.C Ferrell, Fraedrich, Ferrell, 2015). Business sustainably is often defined as managing the triple bottom line – a process by which companies manage their financial, social and environmental risks, obligations and opportunities. These three impacts are sometimes referred to as profits, people and planet. (Business sustainability definition from financial times lexicon, no date). This essay will discuss the idea of sustainability being an important element within a businesses and its core strategies and the importance of it within different businesses. Secondly, this study will look at how different stakeholders are affected and influenced by sustainability as this could be seen as a catalyst to improving the environment as a whole and. Then this study will look at how businesses not focusing
Sustainability is “development that meets the needs of the present without compromising the ability of future generations” (Report of the World Commission on Environment and Development: Our Common Future 1987). The concept of sustainability comprises of four pillars: environmental; economic; political and social; as can be seen in the image below. Environmental sustainability is the use and management of the environment in a way that it does not deplete our finite resources. Economic sustainability is a long term sustainable economy that supports its community and political sustainability is the collaboration of different bodies of government to achieve a sustainable future. Now social sustainability is hard to define as it encapsulates many different factors; however to be very broad it is to achieve social justice. The real objective for sustainability is that all four pillars work together equally in a precautionary principle;
We say that strategic managers within organisations must consider environmental influences before arriving at business decisions; discuss what these environmental forces are and how they would impact on the decisions made by strategic management on the future viability of the business.
Sustainability is a topic that has become very important in recent years. Sustainability is defined as, “the ability to continue a defined behavior indefinitely.” ("Finding and Resolving the Root Causes of the Sustainability Problem", 2014)
The analysis will focus on some key aspects such as; the overall plan, products/services sustainability, human resource relations, customer’s relations, environmental concerns, and the company social responsibility to the company. Descriptive analysis will help appraise of the company’s sustainability strategy. The critical analysis of the company’s sustainability will help in coming up with conclusions about sustainability of the strategy, and give insights on how the company can improve its sustainability strategy. There are also various recommendations based on these conclusions (Heslin and Ochoa 2008).