Interesting article. Perhaps too early to tell whether a large company can really balance its market objectives with societal expectations. Wal-Mark brings out strong opinions on both sides of the issue re: can a corporate be socially responsibility without such efforts being perceived as cover for an agenda tied to profit motives. Still, the trend is worth monitoring and the article highlights some thought-provoking stories. In the article ad if you keep a background conversation going on how social software applications might help facilitate transparency, community building and network relationships (assuming that the organizational dynamics are being addressed in parallel).
... Against this backdrop, Wal-Mart CEO H. Lee Scott Jr. unveiled a new plan to reduce the company’s environmental footprint. In an October 2005 speech broadcast to all 1.6 million employees in all 6,000-plus stores and shared with some 60,000 suppliers worldwide, he announced that Wal-Mart was initiating a sweeping “business sustainability strategy.” The idea was to reduce the company’s impact on the environment through a commitment to three ambitious goals: “To be supplied 100 percent by renewable energy; to create zero waste; and to sell products that sustain our resources and the environment.” 3
But these weren’t the plan’s only goals. “Sustainability represents the biggest business opportunity of the 21st century,” says Jib Ellison, founder of Blu Skye Sustainability Consulting, which helped Wal-Mart formulate its business sustainability strategy.4 His firm pointed out that actively pursuing an environmental agenda would help Wal-Mart differentiate itself from its competition, maintain a license to grow, and make its supply chain dramatically more efficient. In other words, a good business sustainability plan would help Wal-Mart get even better at what it does best: drive down costs to generate profits.
To go green, Wal-Mart, with its headquarters in Bentonville, Ark., would have to think outside the “Bentonville Bubble.” For years, the company had operated in relative isolation from its external stakeholders, including nonprofits, government agencies, consultancies, and academic institutions. Without much in-house expertise on sustainability and environmental performance, it would need to involve these stakeholders in its new plan.
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And so Wal-Mart began to reach out to its external stakeholders. The corporation first identified areas of maximum environmental impact and then invited stakeholders to join 14 “sustainable value networks” – such as the seafood network and the packaging network – to work toward business and environmental sustainability in each area. (See “Wal-Mart’s Sustainable Value Networks,” above.) In return, network participants would gain information about and say in Wal-Mart’s operations.
Elm and Andrew Ruben, Wal-Mart’s vice president of corporate strategy and business sustainability, directed Wal- Mart’s network leaders to “derive economic benefits from improved environmental and social outcomes,” says Elm. “It’s not philanthropy,” he adds. By the end of the sustainability strategy’s first year, the network teams had generated savings that were roughly equal to the profits generated by several Wal-Mart Supercenters, Ruben and Elm report.
Stanford Social Innovation Review : Articles : The Greening of Wal-Mart (March 11, 2008)
Interesting article. Perhaps too early to tell whether a large company can really balance its market objectives with societal expectations.
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Jessica warner
Realty
Posted by: Jessica warner | April 04, 2009 at 06:46 AM