Integrating sustainability into regular business operations and employee behavior requires a high level of commitment from everyone in the organization. Everyone from staff to executives to external stakeholders such as subcontractors and suppliers must participate. Companies that have been successful in greening their operations frequently cite visioning and goal-setting as the most important steps in achieving buy-in and strategically prioritizing diverse efforts.
The best sustainability goals are those that tie into an organization’s overall strategic vision and culture. Rather than beginning with numeric targets such as reducing greenhouse gas emissions by a certain percentage, it can be more effective to first consider the organization’s mission. What products and services does the organization hope to provide in the future and how can sustainability play a role in providing them? What does your commitment say about your company? Strive to establish an overall vision for the “brand” of your company’s sustainability efforts. Once this is established, draw on the vision in everything you do; from conversations with potential clients to ongoing communications with your employees.
Establishing your organization’s vision and obtaining a commitment from leadership is an important first step in the sustainability process; this step lays the groundwork for everything that comes after, and creates a foundation of support and guidance from the top-down. Because this is a top-down process, the first step involves primarily organization leadership. It’s important to include individuals in your organization that are responsible for strategic direction and decisions. Depending on your organization size and structure this could include an executive council, directors, or managers.
Create your Vision by Obtaining Commitments: Task by Task
- Create a charter document.
A charter document communicates your business case and mission statement for the sustainability program, and will provide the Green Team with high level buy-in and guidance on their efforts. The table below outlines the components of a charter document and the details behind each component.
- Formally identify a leadership-level sustainability champion.
Just as you would assign management oversight to an IT project, you should have someone at the leadership level providing meaningful support and guidance to your Green Team. This person will be responsible for providing progress reports to leadership, keeping the sustainability efforts on leadership’s list of priorities, and winning resources when necessary. The champion will also hold the Green Team responsible for progress and reporting.
- Identify ideal participants or attributes to include on the Green Team.
The goal here is to make sure your Green Team is a balance of people who are passionate about the effort and who have the ability to make decisions and drive change within the organization. Your Team should include decision makers from appropriate departments and people with the necessary skills and expertise to create and implement your sustainability program. For example, if you are trying to get your office manager to buy green office products but the office manager has to adhere to the procurement office’s pre-approved vendor list, it would make sense to have someone from the procurement office on the Green Team so policies are properly vetted before going too far down the implementation path. A common frustration among Green Team members is that they don’t have control over the processes they are trying to change. Make sure you have the right people at the table from the start. This section provides an example Green Team checklist that you can use as a start.
- Communicate the value of your vision to stakeholders including staff, customers and investors, and challenge them to participate.
Numerous stakeholders impact the sustainability of corporate operations, including executives, staff in various departments, subcontractors and vendors, facility managers and staff, and customers. Since you’ll be relying on them to make your plan successful, it’s important to get stakeholders excited about the program. Start by raising awareness of your commitment to sustainability, and challenge everyone to make the commitment a priority alongside leadership.
Tools and Considerations
- Conduct a survey of leadership to gather input on why sustainability is important to the organization.
Asking for input from leadership will establish buy-in and will help ensure that your sustainability program is founded on principles that make sense for your organization. Leadership’s reasons for pursuing sustainability could include public relations benefits (our customers want us to be green), resource conservation, and employee morale. This input should be incorporated into the vision charter.
- Create a skills/expertise checklist before identifying Green Team members.
Before you start to select Green Team members, compile a list of member attributes and expertise you want to strive for. Once you have a checklist, you can select people that fit the needs. For example; include checklist attributes such as passion for sustainability, project management expertise, public relations skills, building operations knowledge, and procurement experience. Think of the checklist as a job description for the Green Team. What skills do they need to be successful? Which specific individuals do you need to include? The table below provides an example checklist that you can use as a start.
- Make a big deal out of the commitment.
Once the charter is adopted by leadership, make it a priority to let stakeholders know and challenge them to participate in a very public way, such as a company-wide kick-off event or a mandatory meeting. At this point in the process, you won’t have your detailed strategies determined, but simply communicating your overall vision will do a few things; 1) it will hold the organization accountable for taking next steps, and 2) it will engage staff and other stakeholders by showing them they are part of an important effort.
