Newsletter masthead
September 2010                                                  Vol. 3 No. 9
In This Issue
Member Meeting
Orientation
Featured Article
Member Involvement
Upcoming ISSP Events
What's New at ISSP
Regional News
Book Reviews
Conference Listing
ISSP Member Meeting & Discussion Forum: Marketing Sustainability: Building the right communication strategies for different stakeholders
Member

September 15 at Noon Pacific Time
FULL

How do you sell sustainability? The September meeting invites you to discuss this idea with guest moderator Beth Bengtson.

To be put on a waiting list for this free conference call, send an email to Marsha Willard

Next meeting topic:
Eco-psychology. Watch for announcement of the date!
ISSP New Member Orientations
Member


September 9 at 9:00am PT
October 6 at 4:00pm PT
November 9 at 9:00am PT
December 8 at 4:00pm PT

New (and even old) members are welcome to join this free orientation conference call. Learn about the benefits of ISSP, the contents of our web site, and meet other new members. If you'd like to participate, send an email to Marsha Willard and indicate which session you'd like.

News

ISSP brings you the news two ways:

Just want the few critical news stories each month?
Join the News You Don't Want To Miss group.

Want a full news feed? Follow Us on Twitter
Twitter

Twitter account: sustainableprof.

You do not have to have an account to see our Twitter posts.
Find ISSP on

ISSP LinkedIn Group

Don't forget to link to the ISSP LinkedIn group.This is a great networking site for sustainability professionals. Click on the graphic to go to our group.

Maintaining Our Email List Reminder
ISSP Logo
Please note that the move to using Constant Contact for our emails, members will be updated every month to ensure we have an accurate list. When a member joins, they will be automatically subscribed. If a member does not renew, they will be automatically unsubscribed.

All non-members will be responsible for maintaining their contact info. This is done by clicking on the Update Profile/Email address link found at the bottom of every email. It is best for everyone to save our emails as a "safe sender" to ensure your emails get into your inbox.
Greetings!

September is the beginning of our fiscal year and we have a lot of exciting plans! Based on member feedback, we're planning a conference September 21-23, 2011! So add it to your calendar now. And our Education Program is starting the year with a host of wonderful programs. Check out the detailed descriptions below.

This issue includes the first of what we expect to be a series of Directories. Instead of an article, this month we are publishing a Directory of Sustainability Assessments. In electronic form, this is free to members and available to the public for a fee. The next directory, already in the works, will chronicle sustainability planning and reporting tools.

In this issue, we are also starting what we expect to be a periodic segment called Regional News. We invite our members from around the world to write a short article on what's happening in your region. This first one is from our esteemed faculty member from Stockholm, Alan AtKisson, who is dismayed by what he calls the Assault on Sustainability.

Sincerely,
The ISSP Management Team
  Executive Director: Marsha Willard
  Managing Editor: Darcy Hitchcock
  Education Director: Christy Nordstrom
  Marketing Director: Jessica Vreeswijk
  Board Liaison: Dorothy Atwood
Featured Article

2010 Directory of Sustainability Assessments

by Darcy Hitchcock
coverThis directory was assembled by ISSP to help you find the best sustainability performance assessment tool to meet your needs. It includes 14 high-level assessment tools for organizations and communities. The collection reveals a wide range of approaches to assessments. The electronic version is free to members. It is available in print (full color) and downloadable for a fee from Lulu.com.

Members: Click here to get your free copy.
Non-Members: Click here to order a print or electronic copy.
Member Involvement

Global Salary Survey

2010 Sustainability Professionals Careers and Salary Survey
 
What's the average salary for someone in your role? What are the job prospects for you and your peers in this difficult economic environment? What bonuses and pay increases are currently being awarded across the sustainability sectors?

ISSP is contributing to a survey being conducted by Environment Analyst - a market research firm dedicated to the sustainability industries. Because this is a global survey, Environment Analyst is seeking our help to distribute this to professionals around the world. Lend your  input to this study and we'll all benefit.

Participate in the salary survey here!

Upcoming ISSP Events

NewLogo_small
Fall classes
Sign up now for early registration price!
For a full list of the ISSP educational offerings, click here.


SEPTEMBER WORKSHOP
 Sustaining Sustainability

Sustaining Sustainability: Organizational Assessments and Systems

DATES:
Wednesdays (September 8, 15, 22, 29) at 12:00PM Pacific Time-USA
Follow this link to the registration page.  Register here.

WORKSHOP DESCRIPTION:

Once initial sustainability projects have been completed, organizations are often at a loss as to how to maintain newly acquired practices and continue to move their sustainability efforts forward. 

Management systems are the key to ongoing progress.
A SMS (sustainability management system) allows for
  • systematic internal review
  • monitoring 
  • corrective actions for continual improvement
Discover practical methods to solidify and advance sustainability efforts.  Learn best practices. Apply proven management system tools and practices.  Customize a sustainability management system to fit your organization's needs.

You don't need a third-party certified ISO 14001 management system to benefit from the Plan-Do-Check-Act framework.
With an emphasis on using the Plan-Do-Check-Act framework, learn what level of sophistication works best for you and what elements to add as your system matures. 

LEARNING OBJECTIVES:

The Workshop will help you answer the following questions for your own sustainability program:
  • How do we move from ad hoc projects to an integrated program?
  • How do we go from a sustainability plan to a living sustainability system that is part of our core business?
  • How do we assess where we are and set priorities?
  • How often should we review goals, projects and the program as a whole?
  • How many people should be involved?
  • Do we have training, communication, and support systems in place for our program?
  • How can we keep the program alive if a key champion leaves?
INSTRUCTOR BIO:
Dorothy Fisher Atwood has over 25 years of environmental consulting experience with the last ten years focused management systems implementation for private and public organizations.  She is an independent consultant and also serves as the Management Systems program manager for Zero Waste Alliance (ZWA), a Portland-based non-profit organization.  ZWA is one of the eleven US Environmental Protection Agency-designated Local Resource Centers in their PEER center of management system excellence.  Her work includes development of implementation tools and procedures, training, and sustainability and environmental management system (including ISO 14001) integration into core business systems.  

Ms Atwood is an instructor for the University of Oregon's Sustainability Leadership Workshop Series and has co-authored two booklets on management systems: Developing Effective Systems for Managing Sustainability and Embedding Sustainability into Your EMS, which are part of the Axis Performance Sustainability Series.


September Workshop
RESPONSIBLE PURCHASING

Scot Case
Newsletter masthead
Responsible Purchasing: How Consumers, Retailers, and Manufacturers are buying a better future using the power of corporate/government purchasing to reduce costs and drive environmental and social innovation.
 
DATES:
Thursdays (September 9, 16, 23, 30) at 10:00-11:30 AM Pacific Time-USA
Follow this link to the registration page.  Register here.

WORKSHOP DESCRIPTION:
In this four-part series, Scot Case will provide an overview of the strategies government and corporate purchasers are using to buy more environmentally and socially responsible goods and services while balancing traditional supply chain concerns like price, performance, and availability.

LEARNING OBJECTIVES:
  • Learn how and why purchasers are incorporating human health, environmental, and social considerations into the routine purchasing process.
  • Identify some of the most successful green purchasing strategies.
  • Gain practical writing skills found in typical sustainable purchasing policies and practices. 
  • Differentiate among the several environmental standards and how to avoid greenwashing.
  • Understand how to integrate meaningful environmental considerations into the routine purchasing process while continuing to reduce costs.
WEEKLY OUTLINE:
Week 1:  Purchasers Save the World
Week 2:  Responsible Green Purchasing ~ Tricks of the Trade
Week 3:  Writing a Responsible Green Purchasing Policy
Week 4:  Avoiding the Greenwash Gremlins

INSTRUCTOR:
Scot Case is an internationally recognized expert on responsible sourcing, green supply chains, and environmental marketing with more than 15 years of professional experience. As Vice President of TerraChoice, Scot has helped connect purchasers seeking more environmentally and socially responsible products with the manufacturers supplying them.



OCTOBER WORKSHOP
Zero Waste Strategies

Wayne Rifer
Photo
Zero Waste Strategies

DATES:
Tuesdays (Oct 5, 12, 19, 26) at 12:00PM Pacific Time-USA 
Follow this link to the registration page.  Register here.

WORKSHOP DESCRIPTION:
Sustainability is a powerful tool for improving business foresight. It helps people foresee emerging threats and take advantage of new opportunities. In the solid waste field, sustainability is often framed as zero waste. Examine what this trend means for your organization.

LEARNING OBJECTIVES:

  • Engage in four interactive webinar discussions oriented to stimulate creative thinking and solutions.
  • Explore the themes causing the greatest controversy in our society that require the most creative solutions: waste to energy.
  • Gain an understanding of the major waste trends in the current system.
  • Critique the implications of those trends.  
  • Explore a new set of initiatives that can challenge our basic mental models of our thinking.  
  • Learn about organizations that have already achieved zero-waste-to-landfill. 
  • Grasp waste challenges: waste-to-energy and when to recycle / when to landfill. 
  • Discover the best strategies for sustainability, going forward.
WEEKLY OUTLINE:
Week 1: Zero Waste and Resource Conservation
Week 2: Product Stewardship
Week 3: Waste to Energy
Week 4: Dialog

INSTRUCTOR:
Wayne Rifer is a Zero Waste Alliance Product Stewardship Associate who has extensive experience working with public agency waste reduction and product stewardship. Mr. Rifer has been an environmental professional for 25 years, working in government, industry and consulting. His work has addressed integrated solid waste management planning, environmental management systems, product stewardship and industrial ecology.  He was instrumental in the development of the Oregon State Department of Environmental Quality Green Permits program and provides consultation to public agencies from Washington, D.C. to Hawaii.

NOVEMBER WORKSHOP
LEADERSHIP SKILLS FOR CHANGE AGENTS

Bob Willard
Newsletter masthead
LEADERSHIP SKILLS FOR CHANGE AGENTS
 
DATES:
This course meets on-line on Mondays (November 1, 8, 15, 22) at 5:00PM Pacific Time for 60 to 90 minutes. 
Follow this link to the registration page. Register here.
 
WORKSHOP DESCRIPTION:
This course prepares sustainability professionals at any level in the organizational hierarchy to lead an organizational change to a sustainable enterprise. It connects the dots between timeless leadership practices and how to transform an organization to a sustainability culture.  Bob teaches how to quantify the business case for sustainability strategies.
 
LEARNING OBJECTIVES:
At the end of this course, participants will be able to:
  • Lead the integration of sustainability into their organization, using a seven-step sustainability change process.
  • Build an effective, relevant business case to support their company's transformation to being a sustainable enterprise.
  • Be able to apply effective change leadership practices during the sustainability change process, capitalize on change paradoxes, and avoid potential derailers of their initiatives.
  • Help others be more effective sustainability champions.
INSTRUCTOR:
Bob is a leading expert on quantifying and selling the business value of corporate sustainability strategies. He has given hundreds of keynote presentations to corporate, government, university, and NGO audiences on the bottom-line benefits of sustainability strategies. Bob applies his business and leadership experience to engage the business community in proactively avoiding risks and capturing opportunities associated with environmental and social issues.
 
He has authored three books, The Sustainability Advantage, The Next Sustainability Wave, and The Sustainability Champion's Guidebook, plus created a DVD of his presentation, The Business Case for Sustainability. He worked 34 years with IBM Canada, is on the faculty of the Sustainable Enterprise Academy, and serves on the advisory board of the Natural Step Canada. He has a PhD in sustainability from the University of Toronto. See www.sustainabilityadvantage.com for more information about him and his resources for sustainability champions.

NOVEMBER WORKSHOP
Sustainability and Supply Chain Management

Sustainability and Supply Chain Management

DATES:
This course meets on-line on (November 2, 9, 16, 23) at 12:00PM Pacific Time for 60-90 minutes.  
Follow this link to the registration page.  Register here.
 
WORKSHOP DESCRIPTION:
Sustainability professionals have a new opportunity to create long-term business value while enhancing supply chain performance.  Learn how the supply chain is an integrated system.  Understand relationship building and aligning values.  Identify key levers within supply chain network.  Discover strengths and limitations of 3rd party certification.  Explore vendor qualification and selection tools. Survey a few formalized tools. Gain practical knowledge of internal and external reporting.
 
As supply chain management (SCM) evolves from a traditional focus on purchasing and logistics to a broader emphasis on value creation, supply chain managers seek new approaches to increasing profitability and efficiency. Applying sustainability principles within SCM processes represents the next stage in this evolution.  
 
LEARNING OBJECTIVES:
The workshop will be divided into two sections over four weeks.
Section 1) A macro examination of the core business processes and stakeholders within SCM, identifying strategic opportunities for the application of sustainability principles and discussion of the unique and largely untapped role that sustainability professionals can play in helping to improve supply chain performance.
 
Section 2) Focus is on specific application of tools at a tactical level to achieve sustainability objectives. This will include discussions related to measurement and metrics, supply chain partner identification, third-party certification programs and sustainability reporting.
 
INSTRUCTOR:
Rick Woodward is a graduate of Portland State University with a Bachelor of Science in Business Administration and Masters in Business Administration. He is active in various industry and business groups discussing the measurement and communication of the value of sustainability of both products and processes. He is a frequent guest lecturer at various colleges, universities, and business groups presenting sustainability as a critical success factor and corporate strategy for value creation.
 
Until recently, Mr. Woodward served as the Corporate Director of Operations and Sustainability for Coastwide Laboratories, a Staples Company, a leading chemical formulator and distributor of janitorial and sanitary maintenance products in the Pacific Northwest.
 
Mr. Woodward serves on the boards of the International Society of Sustainability Professionals and the Network for Business Innovation and Sustainability. He is a US Green Building Council LEED Accredited Professional and a member of the Institute of Management Accountants and the Responsible Purchasing Network.

Webinar
October 7, 2010

Connecting Corporate Sustainability and the Financial Services Sector
ISSP WEBINAR: Connecting Corporate Sustainability and the Financial Services Sector

Thursday Oct 7 at 12:00PM Pacific Time-USA
Free to ISSP Members.  $25 for Non-members. 
Follow this link to the registration page. Register here.

Join Peter Soyka, an environmental management and strategy consultant and founder and President of Soyka & Company, and Ira Feldman, founder, president and senior counsel of greentrack strategies and ISSP board member for a presentation on Connecting Corporate Sustainability and the Financial Services Sector. They will speak to the emerging trends and the relevance, changing landscape and implications of Environment, Social and Governance (ESG) role in sustainability plans.  Better integration of ESG into corporate and financial sector decision making seems highly likely, and understanding of this area will become increasingly important.

Relevance: 
-  How does ESG performance influence security risk and opportunity, insurance portfolios, and loan books?
-  Changing stakeholder expectations for corporate social responsibility.
-  Importance of and dramatic growth in SRI.
-  Bottom line-more people are using more corporate ESG data for more different purposes, especially in the financial services sector.
 
The Changing Landscape:
-  Advances in investor (SRI and other) sophistication concerning ESG issues.
-  Greater availability of ESG data.
-  Entry of large mainstream financial sector institutions into ESG space.
-  Evolving interpretations of fiduciary duty.
-  Activist investors.
-  Emerging trends and growing expertise in Europe and Asia.
Regulatory uncertainty.
 
Implications for Those Involved in Sustainability and/or Finance and who should attend:

Sustainability professionals who need to better understand how ESG information is used, by whom, and for what purposes within the financial community:
  • What endpoints, metrics, and indicators matter?
  • What types of analyses are performed using ESG data?
  • How can companies more effectively interact with financial sector entities and professionals?
Investment, insurance, and lending professionals who need to better understand the points of intersection between ESG issues, corporate sustainability management practices, and ESG performance and financial risk and opportunity:
  • What ESG issues pose the biggest risks and provide the greatest opportunities?
  • What types of corporate governance and management practices provide the best assurance that a company will outperform in the future?
  • What types of ESG information are most likely to be of value to analysts, investors, and their clients/beneficiaries?
 PRESENTERS:
Peter Soyka is an environmental management and strategy consultant and founder and President of Soyka & Company, LLC.  With 24 years of environmental management experience, he has served a wide variety of private- and public-sector clients focusing on improved, cost-effective environmental and sustainability performance. Mr. Soyka's recent work has been focused on identifying and capturing the financial and other organizational benefits of proactive environmental management and sustainability practices. 

Recently he provided expert research, facilitation, and guidance to a cross-Agency Steering Group within the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) formed to examine and leverage domestic capital markets to promote environmental/sustainability performance improvements. 

Mr. Soyka has been a featured invited speaker at a number of national and international environmental management conferences and symposia, and has participated in workshops and taught courses on such topics as corporate finance and governance, environmental accounting, pollution prevention, and environmental performance/sustainability indicators. Mr. Soyka holds Master of Environmental Management and Master of Business Administration degrees from Duke University and a B.A., in Zoology and Environmental Studies from the University of Vermont.
He also is a founder and serves as President of the recently formed Sustainable Enterprise Institute, a not-for-profit research and training organization dedicated to promoting sustainable business practices.
 
Ira Feldman is founder, president and senior counsel of greentrack strategies, a consultancy focusing on strategic environmental management and sustainable business practices. He is on the ISSP board and is a co-author for ISSP's The Sustainability Professional: 2010 Competency Survey Report.  He has cut an interdisciplinary swath across three usually distinct spheres: "big picture" environmental policy; environmental law and regulation; and environmental management. Today, he is widely recognized as a thought leader in linking the regulatory and non-regulatory trends that form the basis of a "greentrack" or dual track approach to environmental regulation and management; for championing the implementation of a new generation of environmental management tools; for creating voluntary environmental excellence initiatives, and for advancing the state of the art in environmental auditing and disclosure.

Mr. Feldman is perhaps best known for his leadership role in the development of the ISO 14000 series of standards in the US and at the international level, and for his early recognition of the public policy and regulatory implications of voluntary environmental management standards.  He is now one of the six US experts in the multi-stakeholder process developing ISO 26000 on social responsibility. Mr. Feldman also played a key role in the early development of the Global Reporting Initiative (GRI) and in the identification of sustainability metrics used in the GRI protocol.
 
Mr. Feldman has both a legal and a technical background in environmental issues. He completed an interdisciplinary B.A./M.S. program magna cum laude at the University of Pennsylvania in Philadelphia where he was a Benjamin Franklin Scholar. Mr. Feldman completed additional graduate work in environmental risk assessment and toxicology at the Johns Hopkins School of Public Health in Baltimore, and he received his doctorate in law from the Columbia Law School in New York where he was a Harlan Fiske Stone Scholar. Mr. Feldman has returned to Penn as a visiting professor to promote interdisciplinary approaches and sustainability concepts in environmental policy, law, and management. He also has an adjunct appointment at American University's Washington College of Law.
What's New @ ISSP

Hold the date! Sept 21-23, 2011 Portland, OR
ISSP is planning its first un-conference, a combination of traditional conference sessions plus skill building sessions and generative dialogs. Get this into your budget for 2011!

Regional News

View from Europe: Assault on Sustainability
Alan AtKisson
Photo
Our faculty member and author, Alan AtKisson, summarizes the state of sustainability in Europe and around the world.


"Reading the news has not been easy for champions of sustainability in recent weeks, at least in the Western World. That means the news has not been kind to the interests of future generations, to new economic thinking, to accelerated innovation, to long-term prosperity, or to life on Earth, for that matter." Read more....

Book Reviews
NOTE: We now have a relationship with Better World Books, a bookseller that shares our values. We will begin to provide links to purchase the books we review on the ISSP site, at least the books BWB carries). So if you want to purchase books and benefit ISSP at the same time, check for links at the top of book reviews on our website.

coverDarcy Hitchcock has new book reviews in the member resource section.

Glennon, Robert (2009) Unquenchable: America's water crisis and what to do about it. Washington CD: Island Press.


coverRobert, Karl-Henrik (2002) The Natural Step Story: Seeding a quiet revolution. Gabriola Island, BC: New Society Publishers. Order book.


Sustainability Conference Listing
Take at look at the upcoming conferences and trainings around the world.

See details on the ISSP site under
Education & Events - Non ISSP events
Special discounts for ISSP members.
  • Disaster Risk Reduction Certificate, Sept 6-17, Lusanne, Switzerland and November 8-19, Bangalore, India
  • Green Initiatives Conference, September 29-30, Atlanta, GA
  • GoGreen, October 5, 2010, Portland, Oregon, April , 2011, Austin, Texas, April 2011 TBD
  • Sustainable Building Advisory Program,  October, Portland, Oregon
  • Gaining Ground 2010, October 4-7, Victoria, BC
  • Integrating Life Cycle Thinking, October 26-27, Miami
  • Photovoltaic System & Grid Integration Forum 2010, November 9-10, Beijing
  • Mine Wastewater Management,  November 15-16, Perth, Australia