Synopses & Reviews
Praise for The Triple Bottom Line"Whether you are a corporate manager, investor, consumer, or public official, this book will change your view of how corporations can succeed for themselves and for society. Savitz combines vision and practical advice in an elegant presentation."
—George Stephanopoulos, chief Washington correspondent, ABC News anchor, This Week with George Stephanopoulos
"Informative, persuasive, and practical, containing valuable advice for anyone seeking a more responsible and profitable approach to business."
—Steve Reinemund, chairman and chief executive officer, PepsiCo
"The main challenge of sustainability is how to take it from concept to action. Andy Savitz communicates in plain language what sustainability is and how everyone in the organization can help achieve it."
—Charles O. Holliday, Jr., chairman and chief executive officer, DuPont
"An engaging mix of powerful ideas and practical advice. Values matter and Savitz shows how profitability and responsibility can and must go hand in hand."
—Michael Morris, chairman, president, and chief executive officer, American Electric Power
"At long last a plain English, action-oriented guide to business sustainability illustrated with practical examples from world-class companies."
—Richard Cavanagh, president, The Conference Board, Inc.
"Andy Savitz gets it. He also happens to be witty, sensible, and a good writer as well as a good business strategist—sort of a modern Ben Franklin. That makes this book a joy to read as well as indispensable for businesspeople who wish to succeed in this new age."
—Walter Isaacson, president and chief executive officer and former chairman, Aspen Institute; author, Benjamin Franklin: An American Life
"A bold and readable foray into this complex subject. Readers will come away enlightened."
—Kert Davies, research director, Greenpeace US
Review
"Informative, persuasive, and practical, containing valuable advice for anyone seeking a more responsible and profitable approach to business." Steve Reinemund, chairman and chief executive officer, PepsiCo
Review
"The main challenge of sustainability is how to take it from concept to action. Andy Savitz communicates in plain language what sustainability is and how everyone in the organization can help achieve it." Charles O. Holliday, Jr., chairman and chief executive officer, DuPont
Review
"An engaging mix of powerful ideas and practical advice. Values matter and Savitz shows how profitability and responsibility can and must go hand in hand." Michael Morris, chairman, president, and chief executive officer, American Electric Power
Review
"At long last a plain English, action-oriented guide to business sustainability illustrated with practical examples from world-class companies." Richard Cavanagh, president, The Conference Board, Inc.
Review
"Andy Savitz gets it. He also happens to be witty, sensible, and a good writer as well as a good business strategist sort of a modern Ben Franklin. That makes this book a joy to read as well as indispensable for businesspeople who wish to succeed in this new age."
Walter Isaacson, presidentand chief executive officer and former chairman, Aspen Institute
Review
"A bold and readable foray into this complex subject. Readers will come away enlightened." Kert Davies, research director, Greenpeace US
Synopsis
The first book to chart the rise of sustainability as a profit motive an essential new management principle
In a survey of 900 global corporations released by PricewaterhouseCoopers in 2003, 80 percent of CEOs said they believe "sustainability" is or soon will be vital to the profitability of their company, and 71 percent said they would consider sacrificing short-term profits to move their company towards sustainability a sure sign that the world's leading CEOs see it as the corporate model of the future. Just what is sustainability? In a nutshell, it is a management principle that aims to create long-term shareholder value by seizing opportunities and managing risks related to the economic, environmental, and social impact of doing business. By putting the profit motive alongside a concern for the environment and for people, this movement has created what we unclear who "we" is the author? call a "win-win-win" situation. Its leaders are solid in the Fortune 100 companies like General Electric, DuPont, BP, Pfizer, and HP and it is rapidly spreading to all companies that are looking towards a sustainable business model. The Triple Bottom Line is the first book to chart the rise of sustainability, identify and explain the new paradigm, and show organizations, of all sizes and industries, exactly how they can benefit from it.
Synopsis
As regulators, environmentalists and socially concerned shareholders play increasingly more powerful roles in the daily affairs of even the biggest companies, the most significant new business concept in recent years is sustainability. It's a hard-line approach to bottom-line fundamentals now being embraced by such aggressive managers as GE, Pepsi and Toyota with encouraging results. By focusing on common ground it helps convert hostile investors into allies and suggests ways to transform potential environmental confrontations into opportunities. The problems are real, so are the solutions that sustainability suggests. Hershey Foods Corp ignored it, and management faltered. Understand it, as Procter & Gamble has worked hard to do, and discover unexpected solutions.
The Triple Bottom Line by former Rhodes Scholar Andy Savitz is the first book to chart the rise of sustainability, identify and explain this new management concept, and show organizations, of all sizes and industries, exactly how they can benefit from it.
Andrew W. Savitz knows about sustainability from two decades of work as a corporate environmental advisor and a founding partner of the sustainability practice at PriceWaterhouseCoopers, where he helped firms small and large increase their profitability and their responsiveness to environmental and social problems. Before that he was a senior environmental law officer for the Commonwealth of Massachusetts. Savitz now runs, Sustainable Business Strategies, an independent advisory firm in based in Boston.
Synopsis
The Triple Bottom Line is the groundbreaking book that charts the rise of sustainability within the business world and shows how and why financial success increasingly goes hand in hand with social and environmental achievement. Andrew Savitz chronicles both the real problems that companies face and the innovative solutions that can come from sustainability. His is a hard-line approach to bottom-line fundamentals that is re-making companies around the globe.
Synopsis
The Triple Bottom Line by former Rhodes Scholar Savitz is the first book to chart the rise of sustainability, identify and explain this new management concept, and show organizations, of all sizes and industries, exactly how they can benefit from it.
Synopsis
Your company's sweet spot is where its financial interests coincide with social and environmental interests.
It is called sustainability, and Fortune 100 companies like DuPont, PepsiCo, and Toyota are beginning to see it as the most transformative business concept in years. Responding to growing pressure from regulators, environmentalists, and socially concerned shareholders, these and other firms are charting solutions that will reap environmental and social rewards along with financial ones. Companies that defy the principles of sustainability find themselves suffering significant setbacks to their business objectives.
The Triple Bottom Line is the groundbreaking book that charts the rise of sustainability within the business world and shows how and why financial success increasingly goes hand in hand with social and environmental achievement. Andrew Savitz chronicles both the real problems that companies face and the innovative solutions that can come from sustainability. His is a hard-line approach to bottom-line fundamentals that is re-making companies around the globe.
Savitz identifies and explains this new management concept in plain language and with good humor, showing leaders in organizations of all sizes and industries exactly how they can benefit. He provides memorable stories and simple rules of the road to help you find your company's sweet spot. In the end, he shows that sustainability is a fundamental approach to management that lets businesses protect and grow the resources they need to succeed.
About the Author
Andrew Savitz (Cambridge, MA), perhaps the world's most foremost expert on the critical new subject of sustainability, is the lead partner in the Sustainability Business Services practice at PricewaterhouseCoopers. He also serves as PwC's liason delegate to the World Business Councilfor Sustainable Development and its representative to the U.S. Conference Board's Townley Center, which covers environmental and corporate social responsibility issues.
Table of Contents
Introduction ix
Part One: The Sustainability Imperative
1. Selling Hershey: A Business Fable for Our Times 3
2. The Sustainability Sweet Spot: How to Achieve Long-Term Business Success 21
3. The Age of Accountability 41
4. Business Responds 65
5. Embracing Accountability 77
6. The Backlash Against Sustainability 93
7. Renewing the Penobscot: "A More Productive Use of Capital" 105
Part Two: How Sustainability Can Work for You
8. Where Do You Stand Today? Your Self-Assessment 129
9. Shaping Your Sustainability Strategy 145
10. Launching Your Sustainability Program 163
11. Managing Stakeholder Engagement 177
12. Dealing with Special Stakeholder Challenges 191
13. Measuring and Reporting Your Progress 209
14. Creating a Culture of Sustainability 227
Epilogue: The Future of Sustainability 235
Appendix A: Glossary and Key Action Steps 253
Appendix B: For Further Reading 265
Notes 267
Acknowledgments 283
The Authors 289
Index 291