In order for your sustainability strategy to fit your organization, it must work in all pieces of your company. Your sustainability strategy must fit the internal vision of your organization and its external environment, which means your model has to work for the people and the company’s ambitions.
Basis For Strategic Development
When you begin developing your sustainability strategy you need to know where you stand today; i.e. what are your sustainability impacts, risks, opportunities, costs and potential benefits? Which aspects are material to your organization? What do your stakeholders find important? How do you engage with your stakeholders? An assessment of all these and other parameters along the entire value chain should be done to have a comprehensive understanding at the outset.
We support our clients at every level of the sustainability strategy development process. When taking these first steps (or revisiting this topic when revising your strategy). We cover all sustainability aspects, such as energy conservation, climate change, carbon emissions, water discharge, water conservation, wastewater treatment, waste management, hazardous waste, hazardous chemicals, air emissions, chemical storage, noise, contamination, need for soil and groundwater remediation; all business ethics aspects; social issues such as labor conditions, human rights, community engagement, health & safety. We can include additional aspects, such as consumer rights and other.
Do you need support in relation to understanding sustainability and how to create buy-in to start the process? Read more about Empowerment.
Preliminary, RAPID, and Comprehensive Assessments
We offer a RAPID assessment to kick-start your work. This allows managers or owners to take an assessment of the current level of sustainability in your organization. This initial survey will give you a preliminary glimpse into your corporate sustainability situation and pulse of your organization. In a RAPID assessment, we keep the scope comprehensive, but we work at a higher level to deliver an overview of your corporate situation. We may also include an overview of a potential strategy or an alternative strategy, depending on the focus you set.
In a comprehensive assessment, we delve into further detail so that we are able to provide more detail about your operations and procedures. By working top-down, we can ensure that a holistic sustainability picture is developed, without having details being missed or left from the equation. We work with you to understand your business, your managerial approach, business and support processes and how they interact with each other. We analyze your impacts, risks and opportunities along the value chain and develop a matrix within your critical areas, a materiality matrix.
Read also our blog article about Materiality.
Understanding your Assessment and Creating a Strategy
Once an assessment has led to a good understanding of the sustainability status and of the issues that are material to your organization, the exciting work to develop a strategy can be started. Your sustainability strategy should be unique to your assessment and your organization as well as your organizational capabilities and resources. We can work with you to develop your strategy with your internal partners and external stakeholders. We always encourage “strategists” to think ahead, to think of the implementation as well, and specifically to build a strong business case for the strategy as well as for the specific goals included in the strategy. You can read more about the business case here.
Foundational Corporate Sustainability Strategies
A sustainability strategy that is an integral part of an overall corporate or organizational strategy is extremely powerful and easier to implement than a sustainability strategy that is separate from the business strategy and goals. We have a deep understanding of managerial processes. We work with companies and their business partners to identify the best approach to solve any issue. We can also provide support through strategic sustainability decision-making processes. This can help with any level strategic planning. We can help choose which partnerships to promote or which collaborations to engage in and many other strategic decisions in between.
Strong Companies Begin With A Sustainability Program
A Sustainability program gives life to any strategy by breaking down the goals into targets and actions. These programs determine responsibilities and budgets and create guideline perimeters that will help you develop a strong program that lead to results that are timely and reliable.
We believe that strong programs need a good management approach and system. Leadership & Sustainability can guide you through the decision-making process that chooses which management system to select and build it for your organization. Regardless of the level of complexity, we can help create a business-oriented pragmatic system, be it ISO 14001, ISO 26000, OHSAS 18001 or ISO 50001, or a combination of these, even with ISO 9001. An advanced Sustainability Program would include a Sustainability or Environmental Management Accounting Approach as well.
Book a free consultation here.
Listen to our webinar about “Using Sustainability Strategy to Create Business Value” here.
Download the Strategy presentation here and listen to the recording here.
Read more about Sustainable Business Models.
Read more about our Corporate & Supply chain software offerings.
The Higg Index Solution
The Higg Index is an apparel and footwear industry self-assessment standard for assessing environmental and social sustainability throughout the supply chain as well as at brand and product level. Launched in 2012, it was developed by the Sustainable Apparel Coalition, a nonprofit organization founded by a group of fashion, sports, outdoor and retail companies.
The Higg Index can be implemented strategically into the apparel and footwear industry, but also be adapted to fit any consumer goods company or even companies in other sectors. We help you design the Higg Index to your company and supply chain.
Your benefits are for example reduced risks, reduced costs, decreased employee turnover, increased revenues, increased brand value and improved reputation.
Strategic Management and Implementation Consulting Services
- Rapid Assessment (SWOTs, Idea sketches for Strategies, etc.)
- Assessment (Materiality, Status Assessment & Research)
- Strategy, Business Value & Alignment
- Strategy Development, Business Case, Management Buy-in, Planning and Implementation
- Development of a business oriented and integrated Sustainability Strategy for the Corporation
- Strategic Decision Making
- Program & Strategy Implementation
- Development and Management of Sustainability Programmes
- Management Systems (Environmental and others; ISO 14001)
- Strategic and operational Implementation of the Higg Index
- Energy conservation, climate change, carbon emissions, water strategy, water discharge, water conservation, footprinting, wastewater treatment, waste management, hazardous waste, toxic chemical formulations, hazardous chemicals, risk assessments, air emissions, chemical storage, noise, contamination, remediation.
