We have recently blogged quite a bit on the topics of the current global recession. I want to share a comment today on sustainability, inspired in part by a recent white paper by Jason Busch on Redefining Sustainability that focuses on the theme that going green usually implies a lot of other benefits by reducing risk and ultimately leads to savings. Highly recommended read.
I agree on most parts of the white paper and the fact that the public relations part of going green should never be underestimated – I think you first and foremost need to look at sustainability as a goal you will achieve by having the right knowledge, processes and company culture/values in place. While company culture or values are not the easiest thing to change, focus should be on ‘doing your home work before going to class’.
Regardless of any green initiative, I am pretty confident that identical or bigger savings could have been realized if the home work had been done in the first case. Why do you need a global recession to reinvent your supply chain? In the words of former Bundeskanzler (‘74-’82) Mr. Helmut Schmidt at the recent BME Special Conference on China:
Everybody is talking about China but nobody really knows it
This is spot on I think – reinventing the wheel over and over again or rushing in because China was the ‘next big thing’. It is of course wrong to promote the idea that all failed initiatives should be blamed on lack of home work done, but it should be common sense that it minimizes the risks considerably.
So, do the home work and you might just find sustainability was not all that hard to achieve.
