Article date:26 January 2012
Written by:Tobias Parker
Sustain's CEO Tobias Parker gives his take from the day
There were a number of themes emerging from the 2Degrees Summit. One of the most challenging was whether it's time to fold sustainability in to business as a specialism, as it has so obviously become the new business reality we need the 'traditional' disciplines to drive it through as one of the new business-as-usual in HR, marketing, operations, strategy etc. If sustainability is about resource efficiency, so the argument goes, then it's a no brainer! It'll happen with some solid tinkering to the existing business model.
And that's well and good up to a point. You can drive environmental (and economic) improvements from efficiency gains to a certain level (and we most certainly agree that this is place to start). But once these gains are had, we know things get more expensive at the margin. Suddenly paybacks are pushed out beyond the two year horizon. Slowly the uneasy realisation dawns that the business depends on a model that can no longer support the additional billions who aspire to high consumption levels. Linear efficiency improvements versus year-on-year sales growth targets (for that read exponential) - do the maths. The net position is for more resource depletion.
Yet it is clear that considerable shifts in thinking have occurred by large companies that do have significant influence on society. Hope springs from our ingenuity. There is much that can be done through efficiency gains. But it doesn't stop there, which is the danger by narrowly defining 'sustainability' as resource efficiency.
It feels like slow evolution - we know systems can adapt gradually over time, yet often they go through rapid shifts to a new 'equilibrium'. If our debt fuelled, consumption hungry, future eating system is starting to creak, you've got to ask yourself which type of systems shift are we living through?
Another issue was clearly around engagement. But what is that, exactly? Is it solely persuasion? Or does it a pay to speak softly and carry a big stick, too? Marketers have been using "hidden persuaders" to shape demand for decades, to make us believe we have totally rational free will while inexplicably acting upon a desire to buy stuff. Businesses shape demand in the consumer, and behaviour in their staff. It's about time we came clean about this and applied these business-as-usual principles to shifting staff and customer behaviour. The case of the employee who hit their financial target, yet missed their environmental one and thus lost their job was presented.
We applaud Chris Shearlock from Co-op and Helen Fleming from Tesco, in particular, who both gave very frank personal perspectives of having to deal with serious challenges in driving changes through and hitting incredibly tough targets. And Philips who campaigned for the phasing out of incandescent light bulbs. We know it's a blood and guts issue, and not just about everyone politely agreeing and moving in lock steps towards sustainable, sunlit uplands. Difficult decisions do have to be made (once the 'easy' stuff is done).
It will take more and more acts of personal and corporate bravery for us to truly change the system. In this story, there are heroes and heroines who will be remembered in the years to come.
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