Creating World Leading Business

Initially, my goal in putting this blog together was to help business leaders in developing sustainable workplaces, providing tips on how to encourage a change in the culture of the organization that would support such efforts, and sharing concepts of communication and psychology of the work place that would help workers adopt sustainable goals, become more productive and be more passionate about their work. It’s still about that, but in the process of studying the many issues related to creating sustainable businesses in a sustainable world economy, I’ve come to believe that there are other considerations that are perhaps even more important.

All the traditional business arguments still exist that sustainability is really about eliminating waste and reducing expenses and that this is ultimately good for the business and the environment. So keep up the good work if you are deploying LEAN processes, adopting LEED standards for your buildings, using renewable energy sources, developing green teams, encouraging recycling and doing what you can towards water and energy conservation. You’re on the right path.

But let’s look at the bigger picture!

The goal of our economy » Continue reading “The Argument for Global Governance (and why businesses should ecourage it)”

I was recently invited to Vietnam to participate as an Investment Consultant on behalf of potential large scale North American investors to review a development project in Yen Tu, Vietnam, a place of pilgrimage for Vietnamese Buddhists. My consultancy work in the area of investment and development is based on a simple philosophy: If it isn’t good for the world, it isn’t good for the courtry either. Coupled with a recent course on sustainability the whole effort had me pondering the best ways to encourage and increase sustainable international development which aids a country in reducing poverty without taxing the planet’s resources.

Development has the potential to do harm but can also be used to do good if it addresses the local needs in a sustainable way. But even high standards such as LEEDs doesn’t guarantee that the results will be positive. On the other hand, using investment opportunities such as Yen Tu to encourage Sustainable Development and the use of LEEDs standards will certainly help to create skills for the future. It increases local expertise related to sustainable building practices, especially when the work is performed primarily by local developers. And it ensures that newly acquired expertise stays local and gets used on future building projects.

From an investment perspective, one way is to encourage sustainable development is to share methods and approaches through active program participation, collaboration and educational programs which allow for project participates to learn new sustainable techniques, always bearing in mind that we can also learn something from the local participants. Some investors are interested only in getting a good return on investment and less interested in how the development work actually gets done. Savvy investors recognize that sustainable building practices bring higher returns, especially when looking a long term value of the project. (If you happen to have access to a few hundred million you’d like to invest, feel free to call me and I’d be happy to direct you on how to invest in this or other projects in Vietnam. After all, there is a very satisfying feeling when you invest in a project that makes a difference in the world while earning you a reasonable rate of return.) Given a secure revenue stream, which the Yen Tu project certainly promises (see details below), long term profits will always be higher when operating expenses are reduced, a natural outcome of lower energy and resource costs. It’s simple math.

» Continue reading “Sustainable International Development”

Have you ever noticed how world of business increasingly depends on concepts such as Business Clustering (geographically grouped businesses that work together to provide functions that one business alone can’t) as well as the growth of Global Innovation Networks (GIN – businesses that connect together globally to provide innovative products more efficiently by utilizing the local strengths and unique competative qualities of each country and market). Both trends continue in spite of the fact that, particularly from a GIN perspective and especially in weak economies, there is a continuous outcry to stop outsourcing and create jobs locally.

Have you ever noticed how much the structure of Business Clustering and Global Innovation Networks resemble the formation of neural nets in the brain? Just as there is a certain randomness in the brain’s learning process where dendrites create random spikes to other neural paths, some of which survive and other of which don’t, businesses create collaborative ventures and, likewise, some of these serve the needs of the market and others don’t. Just as the brain has compartmentalized functions and specific neurons that play different roles in the functioning of the brain, businesses have specific roles which they play and each cluster serves a different market segment.

So what does this similarity teach business leaders about the creation of Sustainable Businesses?

» Continue reading “Sustainable Business and Global Innovation Networks”

Upon reviewing an article from the WBCSD (World Business Council for Sustainable Development) and based on studies from the (IEA) International Energy Agency on the needs for energy in global development, one issue became crystal clear; that without investors feeling the need to move their funds toward Sustainable Technologies and Sustainable companies, there would be insufficient capital to keep up with growing global energy demand. While this causes a major problem for “developing” countries, it also causes a major challenge to move towards sustainable energy in “developed” countries. Note that I have added the quotes because, in a world that is being injured by much of the development we have experienced, one may question the long term efficacy of the whole notion of “development” as we currently know it. The term “Developed” in the fullness of time will more likely be something like “mature” and mature has a very different implication. What mature country would continue to destroy it’s own environment? Well, that’s a different topic so let’s move on.

In a quote from the report the author states that “Today private sector investments constitute the largest share (86%) of global investment flows and are expected to be essential to addressing climate change. A large additional flow of tens of billions of dollars will also be needed for adaptation.”

One of the most effective means of a government to weild it’s financial power is to influence the direction of Private Investment Capital. Rather than trying to “be” the investor as in many of the current government incentive scheme’s which directly invest, wouldn’t it be possible to take a different approach? » Continue reading “How to move Investment Capital to Sustainable Technologies”

An interesting news item made me ponder on the how optimum the current market is for creating and acting on new ideas.

The news item was about Canadian research on obesity and how the researcher was regarding obesity as an auto-immune disease which impacts T-cell production by reducing the so-called “Good” T-cells and increasing the “Bad” T-cells. The researcher indicated that already they had found ways of normalizing T-cell production in mice and that potential treatments for humans are on the horizon, the implication of which would be a potential for reducing obesity, type 2-diabetes, and the plethora of diseases associated with obesity.

From a health perspective, such a discovery has amazing potential for reducing the costs of health-care, especially in developed countries where obesity is prevalent. But that same discovery could be devastating for the long term and potentially even short term profits of drug companies that have invested billions in research for treating symptoms.

At this point, it is a hypothetical problem but leads to the old question: Do drug companies hide cures, do oil companies buy up technologies up like cold fusion, do auto companies crush electric cars to protect current investments? Do large multinationals buy up threatening new technologies in order to protect their original investments in outdated technologies at the peril of greater human interests?  What does or should a top executive pay the most attention to when they make decisions: personal reward, company profits, shareholder dividends, their own sense of power to make decisions, building a legacy or ethics?

Asked the opposite way: Can we make a better system of economics for propagating new ideas which uses profit potential in different ways? Can we create incentives in our economic system that would consistantly encourage executives to make decisions based on any one of the above motivations and still come up with the same decision, ideally the one that benefits human society the most?

» Continue reading “Thoughts on Creating a Sustainable Capitalism”

An on-going theme in the world is how countries tend to argue about land claims, especially when resources are involved. Businesses have similar disputes over intellectual property, defense of minerals rights, and other competitive matters. Individuals have disputes over ideas, who is right and who is wrong. Whenever one person or one institution violates the claim or values of another, disputes arise. 

Conflict, by it’s nature, signals a need for change. But underlying the existance of conflict is a deeper and more distressing issue. The fact that we accept conflict as a tool and allow conflicts to flourish signals a lack of maturity in human creativity and development. If not handled with extreme care, conflicts are destructive, either physically, spiritually, emotionally, financially, socially or environmentally. The larger the dispute, the more destructive.

What’s worse is that conflicts tend to be destructive long after the disputing parties find a way to stop the dispute. They continue to cause challenges as long as bad feelings linger, until learning occurs, mindsets change and reparations are completed. Some disputes unfortunately last centuries.

But there are better and more creative solutions that using conflict to find solutions. Let’s look at a few impacts of conflict and consider alternatives. » Continue reading “Reaching the future together (Leadership, Conflict, Sovereignty and Organizational Culture)”

As we watch the news of enormous red dust clouds over Arizona and Australia due to record drought, the discovery of the record melting of Icebergs in Greenland at a rate that the IPCC models failed to predict, record temperatures being set in northern and western Canada, record flooding in Atlanta which is sweeping people and vehicles away and  record wild-fires in California all at the same time, in addition to the recent first time ever passage of a commercial German vessel through the north east passage without an icebreaker, along with record flooding this year in Taiwan, Burma, and Vietnam, if there was any doubt left that we are experiencing climate change, there certainly isn’t anymore. And anyone who believes that it’s not caused by human activities simply isn’t accepting reality.

The question now is, how will the world be impacted and how will businesses respond? Although there is still far too much rhetoric, even the world leaders at the UN Summit on Climate Change preceding the Copenhagen meeting, most notably Obama noting that “the old habits, the old arguments are irrelevant”, are beginning to speak seriously about the issue. Even China, which understandably refuses hard targets in the light of excessive energy usage and emissions from developed countries, is taking a leadership role in developing solar, wind and other renewable energy sources.

 The question is not about whether changes in business will occur: the question is, what will drive business the most? Will there be sufficient agreement on policy and limits at the global or national government levels or will the change in the earth’s environment itself be the greatest imputus for business to adapt and what will that mean for business? » Continue reading “Climate Change impact on Business Leadership and Planning”

In a 2006 article written by US Senator Jim Webb, he addressed an increasing disparity between salaries of CEOs and their employees, where CEO salaries top 400 x the amount of their average employee, vs 20 years ago when the difference was 20 x. Recently with the economic downturn, an even brighter light was focused on this issue as a result of failing financial institutions doling out rich and unjustified executive bonuses. Those of us who are not in the position of a major corporate CEO may view this disparity as a fundamental injustice. While there will always be richer and poorer in the world, the extremes of wealth and poverty can be problematic for a number of reasons, even though there are arguments which strive to justify these compensations.

But are they helpful or hurtful to global development? » Continue reading “Global Corporate Development – CEO Salaries and the (positive) impact of Outsourcing”

When I heard about the existance of the Cash for Clunker program, it seemed like a reasonable approach to start stimulating the economy and to get some potential benefits for the environment. After hearing a few of the details, I thought perhaps there is room for improvement. Mr. Obama suggested that if there’s a better idea, then use it no matter what the source. So here are a few ideas to improve the program, for what their worth. » Continue reading “US Cash for Clunker program”

According to a report by Environmental Leader, Wal-Mart will be announcing a new sustainability index initiative for rating the sustainability of products that it sells. The initiative will include other retailers, researchers, universities and suppliers and possibly go so far to look at entire life-cycle of the products with the goal to reducing or eliminating non-sustainable products. Also according to the report, while they plan to start the initiative, they also plan to hand it off to a group yet to be formed to ensure neutrality in reporting and rating. » Continue reading “Wal-Mart’s Sustainability Index Initiative”