Sustainability Efforts—and a Leader’s Responsibility
The conversation around sustainability in business is a massive one—most especially because businesses often succeed through innovation, more people get jobs when businesses grow and both the speed and success of innovation in industrialism is what’s largely created the need for a more sustainable world. It’s quite the full circle. We all have a personal responsibility to educate ourselves and understand the impact we’re having on the planet. But that sort of revelatory thinking and conviction-based action can’t be separated from our work life and home life—because how we spend our days, what we do and who we do it for matters. Our work matters: we have an impact.
In this article, we’re going to dig into how a leader can own their part in contributing to a more sustainable world. Whether you lead an organization, a team or yourself, you have influence. We believe there are three ways every leader can work toward sustainability.
3 Ways to Work Toward Sustainability
Make an Actionable Plan. At Building Champions, we believe the first step toward leading sustainability work is to get clear on your goal and desired end result. It’s easy to be emotionally drawn toward an important cause—and if you’re a leader with influence—you can easily rally your team to join you through a persuasive speech during a team meeting. But, so often, there’s a gap between excited motivation and the end resulting action. People get busy, distracted and forgetful—and without a plan for accountable action, a dream can die (even a really inspiring one). So consider your product or service, the way your company does business with others and the impact you’re currently making. And ask yourself, “What can we do better?” Then, once you’ve identified the unique areas of sustainability that your organization can change for the better, begin to craft a plan for transformation. This may look like small incremental steps—and that’s a great start. But for a plan to really succeed, there needs to be a vision, actionable goals, due dates and accountability. So share your vision, your plan and your deadlines with your boss, your team and your employees. If you lead a team responsible for executing on the work, then make sure they understand the greater vision and how they uniquely contribute. Get everyone excited! But the excitement must be followed up with actionable steps and accountability share-outs.
Understand your Roadblocks. Harvard Business Review published a great article explaining the four hidden enemies of sustainability efforts: structure and governance, processes and metrics, culture and leadership, and method and skills. So be honest with yourself. Which of these four “hidden enemies” does your organization fight against the most? Are you allowing any of them to defeat your efforts? How can you rally the troops to combat them? This will likely take a new strategy or at least an adjusted one. So if you want to make a deep and wide organizational contribution toward sustainability this should be a discussion at the Leadership Team level. Carve out the time to strategize and deploy a new plan of attack. And don’t let the magnitude of the project overwhelm you—it’s not something you’ll be owning alone—that’s why you have a team.
Resource your Team. This means budget, time, people and education. Help your people doing the actual work understand why their efforts matter and how they’re contributing to the bigger picture—not just for the good of your organization but for the good of the world. Provide them with learning opportunities to fully understand the impact your organization is currently making and encourage them to think creatively and collaboratively as to how that impact can become more sustainable. And it might be hard to budget toward these efforts during a year of economic uncertainty, but if it’s something you truly believe is important, then you need to stick to your financial convictions. You may be looking at hiring a team focused on this exact work or you may give passionate employees the opportunity to join a task force or take on a stretch assignment to work toward the organization’s sustainability efforts. This could also involve a reorganization, but in any case, there must be room for scalability. Your work toward sustainability now might very well position your organization for growth—and with growth comes opportunity. Lead your team with a compelling vision toward sustainability but follow that vision with the appropriate resources.
We know it can sound corny to say that sustainability in business is a heart issue, but it really is true. If it’s not something you consider important, take some time to learn from the perspectives of others as to why it’s important. As a leader, it’s vital to look beyond your own sphere of influence and pay attention to how your actions (and products) impact others. We say it often, but leadership is a privilege—and with privilege comes responsibility.
This article was inspired after we watched a video highlighting the impressive sustainability efforts that our client, Daimler Truck North America, is making. This sort of public-facing video is a phenomenal way to inspire action, foster accountability and show others what is possible when people rally together toward strategic action. We are impressed by their leadership and are rooting for them as they tackle sustainability head on.
If you’d like to learn more about how to address sustainability efforts within your own organization, our coaches would love to walk alongside you as you create your own unique plan of action. Learn more about our Executive Coaching program to see how we can help you improve your executive presence, decision making and influence throughout your organization. As you take sustainability efforts to the next level, we’ll help you take your leadership to the next level.
