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Greetings!
Many of us at this time of year, come to the end of our latest trading period where we draw up our accounts purely from a financial perspective. How long will it be before we have to put our planet and people into our balance sheet also?
What has this last 12 months cost the planet in terms of your business, and your people in terms of happiness too? Do you know? Or have you even considered this?
Movements are afoot where soon at least the former may well have to be considered equally within your business if not the latter. Certainly if we follow organizations like what the New Economics Foundation recommends and what David Cameron has mentioned in dispatches then looking at figures connected to GNH (Gross National Happiness) as opposed to solely GDP maybe the thing of the future and I for one would argue not before time. Countries such as Bhutan already operate like this.
For this is what true sustainability is all about either as an individual or a business, the balance between People, Planet and Profit, the 3P's of your triple bottom line. Today's inspirational video is from Ray Anderson CEO of Interface a pioneer, using sustainability as a positive strategy within business. You can witness his video here. If you have time I would thoroughly recommend that you watch this other video of his also for further enlightenment and inspiration, it all makes business sense.
For further reading on what true sustainability is all about please read on below.
Have a great weekend.
Kind regards
Simon
Set Your Spirit Free
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What Is True Sustainability?
Accounting for People and Planet as well as Profit!
Your first question might be aah well Simon but how much more is it going to cost me when I start accounting for people and planet as well as solely profit in my business?
When actually your question needs to be how much extra profit can I make when I start valuing my staff and our environment in the same way I do my finances?
It is all about your triple bottom line. For it is only when we overlap all 3 of our social, environmental and financial aims, that true sustainability is achieved.
By introducing more environmentally sustainable measures into your business you have every chance in reducing your costs. Saving on utility usage, fuel cost and how much of your business goes to waste, to name but 3.
To become ever more environmentally sustainable will mean becoming ever more creative and innovate within your business, where solutions to the problems we are all being faced with are only solvable through all party engagement. Where one person at the top of your organization just won't be able to come up with all the answers for your business.
The solutions lie within all your people and empowering them to put forward ideas and rewarding them accordingly. It is only this method that will ensure firstly your business resilience and then prosperity for the future. So environmental sustainability means firstly cutting costs.
When talking about social sustainability within your business, what are we talking about? We are talking about employee loyalty and longevity, more empowerment, energy, efficiency and productivity within your team. Only truly acquirable by making your business more inspiring and engaging. You do this by establishing a clear purpose, vision and set of values for your business. A common purpose.
One of the biggest growth sectors of the economy is that of the Social Enterprise. Why? Because they have a clearly defined social or higher purpose to their work, their business is not solely about generating profit, that comes as a by product and often when generated solely goes back into the business or is distributed to other social causes rather than to shareholders. So what can we learn from that model in order to benefit our more conventional businesses?
We can create an understanding of what it is to work for our organization, to know how each individual both contributes to and is valued within the whole, how their own unique talents, passions and what they want to see changed in the world combines with that of the rest of the company. Forming this common purpose where more of everybody's talents, passions and personal vision are embraced within the company.
It creates more inspired, engaged staff ready to lead the company forward who wish to operate more true to their own authentic leadership, because they can see how what they want to achieve out of life is mirrored by that of the company. And as productivity goes up because of this so does your income.
So social sustainability = more income, environmental sustainability = less costs, you don't have to be an accountant to work out that more income + less costs = more PROFIT!!!! For social sustainability + environmental sustainability = financial sustainability too. Add in the fact that a lot of environmental sustainability measures can actually start generating income for you when creating USP's in their own right for your business through more innovative products and services and suddenly you are looking at a Win / Win / Win situation. Enhancing the community, ensuring our environment and enlivening our spirits. Now isn't that something worth thinking about?
To see how you could start to address your true sustainability issues, by initially creating a common purpose within your own company why not contact me now.
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About Set Your Spirit Free
Set Your Spirit Free is a Life, Business and Leadership Coaching company that aims to inspire all of us towards a more authentic and sustainable way of living and working, that is more true to our nature, both inner and outer. Helping us all to find our life's purpose and then come together with others to form common purposes within more inspiring organisations. Enhancing our community, ensuring our environment and enlivening our spirits in the process. I believe we are entering unprecedented times where the combination of various economic, environmental and social crisis are forcing us to think very differently about how we exist more authentically and sustainably. The solutions to these problems lie with more and more of us being aware of how we can uniquely contribute through our own life's purpose. I wish to help as many people as I can through all of my skills, who are already attempting to embrace this new way of living and working, or would like to, and wish to discover how their own unique products and services can help. To find out more about my work, research my website here or to see how I might be able to help you in particular contact me now.
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Inspirational Video
 | | Ray Anderson on Sustainability |
Ray Anderson runs a company called Interface. 17 years ago he set out with his business to reach the summit of what he calls Mount Sustainability, he and his team have become inspirational leaders of industry in the process, examples for us all to follow, there is a better way, it can be done. This clip is from the film 'The Corporation' which is well worth a look in its own right at some point, to hear Ray's business case for sustainability click here.
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