Sustainability: business, life, environment

As global expectation for ‘sustainable’ businesses practices continue to intensify, many organizations are beginning to view business sustainability as a key component to their long-term business planning process  With companies now adopting a more comprehensive definition of business sustainability, the traditionally large gap between business planning and corporate action continues to close. 

Discussed extensively in recent posts, the key to initiating and maintaining company action is defining the unique value that sustainability concepts have to your organization.  A common, yet limiting strategy, is to look internally for this value tie.  Our sustainability consulting stresses to combine a healthy balance of internal and external stakeholder engagement.

Successful sustainable organizations understand the value in managing their key business relationships and leverage feedback as a idea generator.  Our professional consulting resources embrace two models of stakeholder engagement: 

•    Stakeholder Consultation – Involves a transparent exchange of information among project sponsors, regulators, affected communities, and other key stakeholders.

•    Stakeholder Consent - Involves sharing or transferring decision-making authority to those key stakeholders who will be directly affected.

Finding a balance between ‘consult and consent’ is an important step in determining the right engagement model with stakeholders.  To ensure all value avenues are addressed, we work with clients to build a focused business sustainability plan which engages key stakeholders early in the development and implementation of business sustainability strategies that promote both company and business partner success.