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Dear (Contact First Name),
This month we offer a perspective on "peak oil," the impact it's having on one country's diplomatic and military strategy, the bold moves some companies are making to lead the sustainability revolution, and the implications this might have for your strategy.
Since many of you are in the midst of 4th Quarter planning, we suggest "Key Qs for Q4" -- and how Natural Logic can help you take Q4 to a whole new level. We also offer a sneak preview of our new "In Conversation" series, a video clip about "The Mysteriouly Elusive Sustainability Business Case," and, as always, news on projects, people and events.(PS: Be sure to check out 350.org's Global Work Party for climate action this weekend, 10/10/10.)
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Perspective: What the German Military, the DOD & 29 of the World's Largest Companies Have to Say About Peak Oil & the Sustainability Business Case
 You may not have seen this study from the German military think tank has analyzed how "peak oil" might change the global economy.
You should.
According to Spiegel Online: "The study... uses sometimes-dramatic language to depict the consequences of an irreversible depletion of raw materials. It warns of shifts in the global balance of power, of the formation of new relationships based on interdependency, of a decline in importance of the western industrial nations, of the "total collapse of the markets" and of serious political and economic crises." A defense department's response is, not surprisingly, defensive. But Germany is not alone. The US Department of Defense has declared a major commitment to renewable energy, for deeply practical reasons, and Navy Secretary Ray Maybus has set a renewable portfolio standard (RPS) for the Navy and Marines of 50% by 2020 -- higher than even the most aggressive state RPS program.
Companies are taking bold action too.
The Carbon Disclosure Project, for example, reports that more than 90% of the global 500 see business opportunities in climate change prevention, mitigation and adaptation.
The World Business Council on Sustainable Development convened 29 "old line manufacturing companies" to construct a 2050 plan for planetary success that details "what we must have" and "what we must not have" by 2050. Many of the companies recognized, in the words of Weyerhauser's Robert Ewing, that "energy and environmental futures are an important part of our business model -- and that if we don't deal with those issues well, we may not be around."
The 2050 plan offers a bold a specific vision, organized around the very simple but challenging question of "who must do what, by when?"
What attention is your organization giving to these issues?
Have you undertaken a disciplined effort to consider the potential impact on your business of drastic changes in business as usual -- from peak oil and climate to "merely" rising oil prices and supply chain disruptions?
Our advice:
If you haven't, you should -- or prepare for shareholder suits for dereliction of fiduciary duty.
How does your long-range strategy address a world in which China spends 12x the US on renewable energy in absolute spending, and more than 35x in proportion to GDP, while the US drifts without a coherent energy policy? Is your company waiting for policy and regulations, or going after the markets of the future?
Our advice:
Don't ignore "low risk" possibilities with high impact consequences. Your contingency planning could -- as it often does for our clients -- uncover near term, "no regrets" benefits.
Because if you're not careful, you might end up where you're headed.
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Key Qs for Q4 
How much will your business need to change in the coming years?
Will you be one of the many caught in a reactive, last-minute scramble to adapt? Or will you chart a strategic course that enables you to survive as an organization, profit your shareholders and employees, lead your industry and contribute to a better world?
4th Quarter presents important challenges and opportunities for business sustainability leaders, as it does for all executives and managers. It's often the time for planning (and sometimes reflection -- though often at high speed!), for budgeting for the coming year, and sometimes for spending remaining budget for this year.
Here are some specific questions for you to consider as you engage in that Q4 process-- and that we can help you address.
1. Where are you going?
What are your sustainability goals?
I'm sure they're SMART -- Specific, Measureable, Attainable, Relevant, and Time-Bound -- but are they integrally connected to your business goals? Even more importantly, are they sufficient to the challenges we all face -- as companies, communities and citizens?
Yes, building brand, share and profit, of course. Yes, flattening your footprint -- to build brand, share and profit, to engage the hearts of your employees and stakeholders, and to prevent climate change from being even worse than it will be.
But let's not pull punches. What we're really up to -- all of us dealing with "sustainability" -- is to transform the economy of a planet in one generation. It's to build, in Bucky Fuller's words, "a world that works for 100% of humanity, in the shortest possible time, through spontaneous cooperation, without ecological offense, or the disadvantage of anyone".
And that, by the way, is the biggest business opportunity of the century.
It's also what Natural Logic is up to. We do that by helping our clients succeed by designing, implementing and measuring profitable sustainable strategies that connect your deepest commitments -- what you're really here to do -- to your business goals to build brand, share and profit.
Your starting point can be a strategic briefing for your executives, goals workshop for your sustainability team, an Innovation Charrette™ with both those groups and stakeholders. Call us for details.
2. Where are you now?
What's the unvarnished, look-yourself-in-the-mirror truth about your company's sustainability profile -- from carbon and energy, to water and waste, to capacity and engagement -- and its impact on your business, its risks and opportunities?
Are you prepared to deal with both the "inevitable surprises" and the unpredictable changes your business will face in the coming years?
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Would you like some of the most experienced eyes in the sustainability business to help you make an honest and powerful assessment of your present reality and future prospects? Natural Logic's Rapid Diagnostics services can give you those grounded assessments -- in a fraction of the time and cost you might expect.
3. What resources can you muster to bridge the gap between where you are now and where you want -- need -- to be?
"Resources" means "budget", of course, and part of your job is to get the budget you need for 2011. But resources is not only budget. It is also the organizational, culture and creative capacity that you can bring to bear.
How well are you formulating the requests, the offers and the promises that will mobilize the resources -- financial and otherwise -- to engage your organization to bridge that gap? Do your sustainability programs have visibility with your C-suite as mission critical business initiatives, not just a nice thing to do.
We can help you make the strategic business case for aggressive, pragmatic sustainability initiatives, build the case for the resources you need, and engage and mobilize your people to get the job done.
4. What will you do?
It's not just a matter of business plans, strategic plans, marcom plans, branding plans, CSR reports and the like. It's also a matter of the fundamental commitments that you, your colleagues and your company are prepared to make. And that's a matter of some fundamental questions:
- What are you really here to do?
- What business are you really in?
- What promises will you make to your shareholders, boss, family, and to yourself?
- Who will do what? By when?
That's a lot to think about in three months at the end of the year. It's late. You can't do it all at once. But you can make major leaps -- that can transform your company -- if you are willing to. Call or email us today to explore how.
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How Natural Logic Can Help You Make These Moves
Natural Logic's team can help you make good use of Q4 in several very specific ways:
- Assess your Sustainability Plan, and help you refine it to achieve greater real world impact and greater executive buy-in.
- Provide frank, "Rapid Diagnostic" assessments of your gaps and opportunities in relation to Risk, Carbon, Metrics, Operations, Capacity -- and prioritized recommendations of how you can move against them.
- Develop -- and help you sell -- a 2011 plan and budget
that will catapult your sustainability initiatives to a new level. - Provide strategic briefings to help your executive leadership understand "The Mysteriously Elusive Sustainability Business Case."
- Coach your sustainability team -- and company leadership -- in the personal and business practices that are essential to fulfilling the commitments that you've made -- to your board and your boss, your family, and to yourself.
Action on these measures is of course its own reward. AND -- since we love effective action -- we'll provide an additional reward to people who take action this week. Please contact us today to discuss which of these programs is right for you. |
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News of People, Projects and Events 
Events
Watch for your invitation to Natural Logic's new "In Conversation" series, starting later this month. First up: Gil Friend and Bryan Franklin - In Conversation. (See sidebar.)
Other upcoming events include:
- Print vs Pixels, CRO Conference, Chicago, Nov4
- Sustainability = Design = Innovation, Green Festival, Nov 7, San Francisco
- Visiting Scholar, University of Oregon, Nov 8/9, Eugene OR
- Extended Producer Responsibility, Nov 16-17, UC Berkeley
- Presidio Executive Program, Dec 3, San Francisco
You can find a complete list of recent presentationson our web site -- including my keynote on "The mysteriously elusive sustainability business case (and where to find it)" and seminar on "The Three Key Barriers to Building a Sustainable Economy". As always, check our complete speaking schedule regularly; we update the page as events break.
Contact us any time for speakers for your next event. (Need some persuasion? Check out these videos of CEO Gil Friend's recent speeches to the Commonwealth Club and the Clean Tech Open. You'll find many others on our video pages at YouTube, FaceBook and Natural Logic.)
Recent Projects
- For a $2B manufacturing company: Developed a "train the trainer" program to train 70 facility managers to conduct ecoaudits of their facilities. Next step: we'll turn this into a pubilcly available handbook or Web site. Please contact us if you'd be interested in sponsoring that handbook, or in bringing the training to your company.
- For a $0.5B food products company: Designed and conducted a day long strategy retreat for 60 executives and managers, focused on how whether and how to position the company and its products for potential resource, regulatory and market changes
- For a very large retail organization: Developed a robust green product rating scheme that can scale to guide customer purchases across a very wide range of product types.
- For a new food product manufacturer: Provided design guidance for dramatically improving the enivonrmental footprint and performance economic of their new manufacturing plant
- For the Climate Savers Computing Initiative: Assessed the progress and impact of computer manfuacturers against their declared energy efficiency goals.
- We're building a consumer decision tool based on our recent Print vs Pixels white paper. Please let us know if your company might be interested in sponsoring it.
- The eLearning version of The Truth About Green Business, -- on demand, role-based, at-your-desktop sustainability training for your employees -- should be ready to roll before the end of the year. Please contact us if you'd be interested in evaluating this program for licensing by your company -- or in ordering custom versions of the book for your staff or supply chain.
People
Welcome to Elaine Shusterman, who has joined our Business Development team; you may be hearing from her soon!
Farewell to Benjamin Privitt, who has moved on to other ventures, with our huge gratitude and best wishes.
Thank you to our many wonderful and able interns this summer, including: Gomathi Sadhasivan for work on green product rating systems; Mark Evers, Marcela Karpuj, Julia Harnad for subsidies research; Chirag Amin, Kate Drane and Marie Perriard for bioenergy research; Risa di Ferrari, Gregory Lake, Leif Noble and Kelly Vickers for market analysis; Dianne Connolly, Magali Goirand, Jordan King and Jennifer Riboli for marketing strategy.
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Natural Logic designs, implements and measures profitable sustainability strategies.
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The Mysteriously Elusive Sustainability
Business Case
In this video excerpt from my recent keynote at Applied Materials, I talk about the business case and opportunity for aggressive sustainability programs and ask: - What if companies approached this opportunity with real urgency? - How innovative would we be? - What worlds could we speak into being? |
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Sneak Preview:
Gil Friend & Bryan Franklin - In Conversation
Gil is CEO of Natural Logic, author of the acclaimed Truth About Green Business, and widely acknowledged as one of the fathers of the sustainability movement. Bryan is one of the world's most successful executive coaches.Gil and Bryan have been exploring the intersection of their worlds, and are ready to invite you into that exploration. This is the first in Natural Logic's new "In Conversation" series, which will bring you frank, unscripted, personal dialogs with people who are making a remarkable difference.Watch for details in an email in the next few days.
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Strategic Coaching Special!
Natural Logic's strategic coaching service - confidential conversations directly with CEO Gil Friend (or the Senior Associate of your choosing) - helps sustainability executives and managers clarify and advance both your company and career sustainability goals.
You'll get a couple of substantive conversations per month, plus on-call access throughout the month by phone or email - and the benefit of Gil's nearly 40 years of experience in this field - for less than the cost of one day's consulting. Satisfaction guaranteed.
Call this week for a special year-end bonus!
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If you've appreciated this newsletter, please:
- Consider that your colleagues might find it valuable too. Just use the link at the bottom of this email to forward it to them, and invite them to subscribe.
- Keep us posted about your organization's sustainability initiatives (and conserve electrons by not including this entire newsletter in your reply)
- Read -- and subscribe to -- my (more or less weekly) blog. And follow me (more or less daily) on Twitter!
We'd love to hear from you, about both your successes and your challenges. And please give us a shout if there is any way we can help your organization with:
Strategy -- Charting your course,
Feedback -- Reading the signs, and
Implementation -- Making it go.
With best wishes, on behalf of the entire Natural Logic team.
Gil Friend, President & CEO
Natural Logic
Email: gfriend@natlogic.com
Phone: 1-510-248-4940
Web: http://www.natlogic.com
PS: And that "Mysteriously Elusive Sustainability Business Case"? It's really simple:
- Do the right thing.
- Organize your business to prosper by doing the right thing.
- Resist the squeeze -- the familiar but wrong assumption that these are at odds. (As I say on the cover of The Truth About Green Business, "You don't have to choose between making money and making sense.")
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