One of the key elements to driving the behavioural changes needed to preserve our environment and well being in the longer term, is aligning both sustainability and profitability agendas.
But how can you drive the sustainability agenda without driving down profits in the process?
Know your goals
Business owners should review sustainability policies alongside business objectives, ensuring not only compliance with applicable legislation but, wherever possible, convergence with overarching strategy, for example:
- considering cost savings from minimising waste, water or paper consumption
- considering what tax breaks are for energy saving solutions
- ensuring cashflow is carefully managed and you have good quality financial information
It is also important to consider other less realisable benefits, such as customer satisfaction and employee engagement.
Engage your employees
A Gallup meta-analysis showed that highly engaged workforces show 21 % greater profitability, with purpose considered a major driver of engagement.
Therefore, where employees feel they are significantly contributing to something that matters to them, this can be a real driver of growth and may also help attract top talent in very competitive current markets.
Enhance your business value
Put simply, business value is driven by increasing profits and decreasing risk. A crucial factor in reducing risk is the switch towards a greener economy, decreasing the risk of dependence on unsustainable resources. Reducing risk can also involve strategies to create an ethical and diverse business model, which promotes employee wellbeing and helps to retain key people.
The quality of our environment is an influencing factor on wellbeing and its ability to drive productivity and effectiveness. There is no doubt that sustainability and profitability really do go hand-in-hand and businesses should look to harness opportunities by aligning these two critical agendas.
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