Gaining competitive advantages through sustainability
By Holly Barrett, CMO, NextCorps
Sometimes stories are so captivating, you feel compelled to share the experience with anyone who will listen. That’s because good stories can safely transport you into the center of an antagonizing situation. Expose you to different thinking and different outcomes. And, even inspire you to take action.
This is exactly what the documentary film, Beyond Zero, does well. In just 80 minutes, it takes viewers on Ray Anderson’s quest to eliminate all the negative environmental impacts of his global public company, Interface, by 2020.
The true story chronicles one adventure after another that every founder and manufacturer can relate to. A major customer who doesn’t want to buy anymore. The challenges of regulatory compliance. The need to innovate to remain relevant. And, employees who don’t know where to start. But it also features the failures and successes in adopting more sustainable practices that eventually result in major competitive advantages for Interface—across its operations and product lines— that have put this carpet manufacturer at the top of its industry.
Pursuing more than profitability
I’ll be honest. After spending years marketing energy efficiency programs for clients like NYSERDA and major utilities across the U.S., and leading certification and sustainability processes for two B-Corps that put the triple bottom line into focus every day, I didn’t think I’d learn anything new from the film. After all, I’ve seen firsthand how a company can be good to its people and the planet and still be profitable. I know that sustainability doesn’t have to be an “either-or” decision.
But because NextCorps’ Clean Energy Manufacturing Hub and RIT’s Golisano Institute for Sustainability (GIS) were offering the free screening and a panel discussion to demonstrate how capitalism could be reimagined, I grabbed my popcorn and found a good seat. Surprisingly, what the film did do is remind me of the pure power of purpose.
Ray Anderson had built a successful, profitable company. His purpose and vision for the company was serving him well. But all that changed when just one person said they wouldn’t do business with Interface because they failed to comply with environmental standards.
Rather than simply move onto the next deal, Ray saw it as an opportunity—a call to lead a new purpose in life.
After grabbing a copy of The Ecology of Commerce by Paul Hawken, he quickly realized that simply “complying is not a vision.” To reframe his purpose, he challenged his leadership team to examine the carrying capacity of their operations. By doing so, they could begin to understand how they could conduct business in ways that didn’t lead to environmental degradation. And, align all future commercial decisions with what’s best for the planet.
I won’t give any more of the film away, other than to say what happens next will get anyone in business—from founders to equipment operators on the floor—thinking about how sustainability can give business and work more purpose and meaning.
Intentionally designing your business for impact
While Ray’s new vision drove the transformation of Interface, it also extended to a more personal purpose of helping other companies explore the many ways sustainable practices can be adopted to reduce greenhouse gas emissions and waste; improve employee attraction, engagement, and loyalty; grow customers and profitability; and many more benefits.
Ray was known for saying, “We have a choice to make during our brief visit to this beautiful blue and green living planet: to hurt it or to help it.” In my experience in mentoring teams that are building a business, I see that they’re so focused on the problem they’re aiming to solve for customers through their business operations that they fail to intentionally define the kind of business they want to create.
With growing statistics on how a company’s purpose influences purchase decisions, brand loyalty, and employee satisfaction and retention, the business case for exploring how to make a positive impact is well documented. According to a 2022 IBM study, cited in the Harvard Business Review last year, “more than two-thirds of employees said they would be more likely to apply for and accept a job with an organization that they considered to be environmentally conscious, and nearly half (48%) also said they are willing to accept a lower salary from an organization that they perceived to be environmentally sustainable.”
Taking the first steps: Advice from the experts
For leadership teams, taking the first step toward sustainability can feel overwhelming. To help provide clarity on where to start, experts featured on the panel discussion that followed the screening shared their recommendations.
“If you want to pursue more sustainable practices but don’t know where to begin, the New York State Pollution Prevention Institute (NYSP2I) can help. To get started, think about your purpose. Why do you want to do it? Is it to meet regulatory requirements, like ISO? Are you having organic discussions inside your company about changing your values and behaviors? Are your customers asking you for it? Having clarity on the purpose can help your team and us align on goals. Depending on your organization type, we can then use tools such as our Sustainable Manufacturing, Supply Chain, Energy Use, or Life Cycle assessments to help you understand your environmental impact, identify opportunities, and set metrics. Your goals can be really simple: to collect data to benchmark where you’re currently at, or to create a plan.”
– Kim Bawden, Senior Staff Engineer and Technology Commercialization Program Manager, NYP2I“Keep in mind that not all environmental impacts are within your business. Some could be upstream within the supply chain materials you use. Doing a Life Cycle Assessment can help you understand how your product compares to competitor offerings, the impact your process and material selection has to guide your decision making, and even how you can communicate valuable information to your customers. Remember that the assessment is just a snapshot in time. There’s a lot of uncertainty in the supply chain, so this step is easier to do if your products are further along, not necessarily at the startup stage.”
– Dr. Callie Babbitt, Professor of Sustainability, GIS“You CAN do something, and the Climate Solutions Accelerator is ready to help. We offer resources and structured training to help organizations form Green Teams and develop Climate Action Plans that are unique to their operations and goals. We’re also giving away state funding to help people fix the heating and cooling in their homes. One of the programs we operate, for example, is the Finger Lakes Clean Energy Hub, a NYSERDA-funded initiative that works to ensure underserved communities participate in the transition to clean energy. We offer energy advising, referrals to vetted contractors, and community education to encourage residents and organizational leaders to electrify their homes, buildings, and vehicles.”
– André Primus, Manager of Organizational Programs, Climate Solutions Accelerator of the Genesee-Finger Lakes Region“Keep in mind that sustainability is a goal. You can get close, but you’re never done. Your efforts should evolve as your business does.”
– Dr. Michael Thurston, Technical Director GIS, and Director of the NYS Center of Excellence in Advanced Sustainability in Manufacturing, GIS“Everything is interconnected. Just by making simple choices as part of your daily routine, you can influence change. Sustainability has been around for a long time. Every little bit you do counts.”
– Andrew Naukam, Associate Director of the NYSP2I at GIS
In addition to these resources, if you’re a manufacturer, printer, food and beverage, or production-related company located in Rochester and the Finger Lakes Region, the NextCorps Growth Services team can also help you get started by outlining a project and connecting you to a host of funding opportunities to get it done.
As Ray Anderson realized through the many steps his company took (and continues to take), it is possible to lead with more purpose. “The only way the Earth can change is if business—the most pervasive and influential force on the planet—is willing to lead.”