"Doing well by doing good." The phrase has been overused, but fortunately it is no longer a novel concept in business. Employees, shareholders, and customers are increasingly expecting companies to focus on their social and environmental performance hand-in-hand with their financial performance. In fact, recent studies by companies such as Edelman Financial Group and WPP indicate that when choosing between brands of equal quality and price, social purpose ranks as the number-one deciding factor for global consumers' purchases, above design, innovation, and brand loyalty considerations, and 75 percent of U.S. consumers want to buy from green brands. Failure to listen, given the means in the digital age to stand in judgment of brands, will result in business being withdrawn. The reverse is also true. Consumers will reward brands for their behavior with passionate advocacy enabled by the same social media tools.
At its core, the phrase "doing well by doing good" means that growth, revenue, and profit should be the byproduct of making a positive difference for multiple stakeholders, not the ultimate goal. This approach becomes more interesting when applied to the most microcosmic "business unit" possible: the individual consumer. If we could imbue this philosophy into our culture -- at an individual level -- collectively we would catalyze a broad positive impact previously thought unattainable. Businesses that embrace this philosophy focus on the connections between creating societal and economic value and are motivated by generating benefit for multiple and diverse stakeholders -- for their employees, supply chain partners, customers, investors, and the health of their brand. Many individual consumers are similarly motivated. Our choices are heavily influenced by self-interest; we want to have enough resources to support ourselves and be able to provide for and protect our families, while at the same time wanting to leave a positive mark on our communities and even the world.
The ROI of "doing good" for businesses is pretty easy to understand: improvements to the bottom line, increased customer satisfaction, and often a more visible, measurable environmental impact due to the larger scale. The return on making sustainable lifestyle changes at the individual level, however, isn't always as clear or pronounced. Given the magnitude of our environmental issues, we cannot always "see" the impact of our behavior. To get a critical mass of consumers to change their behavior, you have to make the return relatable and valuable on a personal level.
So which are the most effective motivators of behavior change? I believe there are three key pillars:
If we're going to navigate our way toward a sustainable future, we're going to have to think and behave differently. It's not about doing good for the sake of doing good. It's really about self-interest. By engraining this into both business and consumer behavior, we can more effectively move society toward a sustainable future, and, in the process, help people understand the connection between the environment, economics, and the well-being of our communities.
I appreciate you reading and responding.
You may not be advocating for more consumption. But if you're not advocating for less consumption, you're not actually part of the solution. Implicit in your thesis is the notion that consumer choices can be shifted to "green brands" -- implicitly or explicitly motivated by self-interest -- without re-evaluation of the thesis that consumer patterns are themselves ethically neutral.
The distinction between consumer and their environment is fallacious. As long as consumers perceive the marketplace as an ecological proxy, degradation of the whole will inexorably result. In other words, the very premise of the consumer's entitlement to make transactional choices that externalize the actual (ecological) costs can never support a substantive holism.
Capitalism requires growth. Growth, the way we're living, requires ever more raw materials. I don't care if you planted a monoculture forest after you clear cut the old growth one, causing the forest floor sediment to run into a waterway, choking the fish. Your single crop forest will NEVER house the multiple life forms you disposessed when you built that road, to get into that forest, to rip apart habitats of thousands of living things. And the timber industry is but one example.
Sustainable means RENEWABLE.
Framing the argument around continued consumption is gaslighting the issue to keep industrialized civilization chugging along while giving your subjects a big, fake warm fuzzy.
Imbue this: until we focus on reduction and allow local communities to provide local solutions and move away from this globalized economic system, we're all tied together in a most frightening way and the ONLY winners, albeit short term, are industry and their shareholders.
The Environment and the Planet are primary here. They are NOT a subset of the Economy.
People need to radically change their lifestyles from top to bottom in this country. 5% of the population using 25% of the worlds resources is never going to be sustainable. The carbon footprint of an American is 20+ times what a 3rd worlder produces.
f/f