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I met Nadya Zhexembayeva at the Flourish and Prosper conference in Cleveland. Nadya, who received her doctorate at Case Western, is the co-author, with Chris Laszlo of "Embedded Sustainability." Her latest book is "Overfished Ocean Strategy." I attended one of her workshops, and then arranged to speak with her, by phone, after the conference.

Triple Pundit: Hello Nadya. The sub-title of your book is “Powering Up Innovation For a Resource-Deprived World.” Talk to me about declining resources. When I saw your workshop you showed a graph of steadily decreasing commodity prices.

Nadya Zhexembayeva: That graph is from the Economist which has been tracking commodity prices since 1864. For the majority of the 20th century, other than a sharp spike in the 1920s those prices have been falling significantly — until now. When you think of the fact that these are limited resources and that the population has increased by a factor of four during that time, driving demand up dramatically, this is a bit of an economic miracle. And this miracle has informed the mindset of most managers. They simply assume that prices will continue to fall forever. That is the basis of many of their growth models. However, what many people haven’t recognized is the fact that in the first 10 years of the new millennium, these prices have shot up a whopping 147 percent.

3p: Wow. That’s pretty dramatic. You say in your book that this new scarcity is here to stay. But how do we know that it isn’t just another temporary blip? After all, much of this decline had to do with productivity and economies of scale, as well as the accumulation of knowledge. Aren’t we still learning and innovating?

NZ: Yes, of course we are still innovating and learning. But if we look at the trend, although much of the price decline was from productivity improvements, we can’t overlook geopolitical trends either. Particularly after the Second World War, we have developing countries essentially being exploited by the former colonial powers to provide commodities at prices well below those that reflect their true costs, often as the result of corrupt arrangements.

3p: So, now those artificial factors have been largely eliminated, and we’re getting closer to “true” pricing. Time to get off the bubble?

NZ: Yes. We’re catching up to the reality. There are only this many molecules. Now new geopolitical forces are bringing in increased demand from rapidly growing new economies that are turning around that long term trend and driving prices up.

3p: So how do companies respond?

NZ: Well, for one thing, companies must renew themselves much more regularly. The life cycle of a business has shrunk from 50 years to seven years. That means that a company today has three years to refresh their business model before they go into decline. That’s why they need to learn to go from planning to modeling, because planning assumes a level of stability that no longer exists.

3p: So, companies have less time to do whatever it is they are going to do. But what should they be doing?

NZ: Well, first they need to get over believing that this is just temporary and begin to prepare themselves for the reality of today’s world. Let’s take a look at some of the points in the book. Principle Three talks about the growth of value as opposed to the growth of goods. Look at Adobe, for example, which has taken to offering their Creative Suite on a monthly subscription basis instead of selling it. So, it’s more about accessing the value instead of ownership. This has worked very well for them.

3p: So, they’ve become the Zipcar of software.

NZ: That’s right. Another company used to make air conditioners, but they were driven out of the market by competitors with lower costs on one side, and higher quality on the other. But they recognized the fact that they were very good and making motors. Now they are successfully making motors for the auto industry.

3p: So, that’s a matter of learning to mine your own enterprise for the highest value elements within it. Let’s talk about the other principles.

NZ: Principle One is 'Line to Circle.' That’s a very simple one. It’s essentially Cradle to Cradle. But in order to implement it, companies need to learn some other principles. It’s too much of a change in mindset. You can’t get there until you understand your value chain. That’s Principle Two: 'Vertical to Horizontal.' Who is near you? Who might benefit by utilizing this material? How do we eliminate the disposal cost? And what is the inherent value of the materials being discarded? When companies go through a transition like this, they need to find some low-hanging fruit to generate some revenue or cost savings to keep the initiative going.

3p: We already talked about Principle Four: 'Moving from Planning to Modeling.' Let’s talk about No. 5.

NZ: Principle Five is 'Moving from Department to Mindset.' If you separate execution from strategy you fail already. And if you don’t, execution is a job of the whole company.

3p: How do you develop a new mindset that will succeed in this new reality?

NZ: What I tell people is to look at the value that is being generated. What is the value generated by this meeting, or this email, or this hour of work? And if we can’t answer that question, maybe we should stop doing it. How can you create new value when, for example, you advertise for new employees, or if you rewrite a meeting agenda into a series of questions?

3p: Will we be looking at new metrics that capture value that isn’t necessarily monetary?

NZ: Yes, we are looking at new metrics. Volvo Aero, for example, measures flight hours for their engines, which can be offered as a service. Another example is a company that sells cleaning supplies, now measures the square feet of surface cleaned rather than the amount of product sold, which again, really changes the mindset.

3p: Very interesting. Thank you.

Image courtesy of Nadya Zhexembayeva

RP Siegel, PE, is an author, inventor and consultant. He has written for numerous publications ranging from Huffington Post to Mechanical Engineering. He and Roger Saillant co-wrote the successful eco-thriller Vapor Trails. RP, who is a regular contributor to Triple Pundit and Justmeans, sees it as his mission to help articulate and clarify the problems and challenges confronting our planet at this time, as well as the steadily emerging list of proposed solutions. His uniquely combined engineering and humanities background help to bring both global perspective and analytical detail to bear on the questions at hand.

Follow RP Siegel on Twitter.

By Jennifer Anderson

We often hear that sustainability professionals need to get better at talking to the CFO. Frankly, this is a scary proposition for many people. That said, experienced sustainability managers will tell you that having a good relationship with the CFO is absolutely essential to their program’s success. So, what exactly does that mean? Do you need to go back to school to get a finance degree? Many people I talk with stress about having to become versed in financial calculations and terminology. I felt it was important to dig a bit deeper into what a good relationship with the CFO really means.

To get a sense of how sustainability managers can best prepare themselves to work with the CFO, I decided to reach out to a sustainability manager I have admired for many years. Bennett Thomas has the fascinating dual role of Vice President of Finance and Sustainability at Hersha Hospitality Trust. Hersha is $2.5 billion publically traded (NYSE: HT) hotel investment firm. The company owns 50 properties in urban gateway markets including New York City, Miami, and Los Angeles, as well as The Rittenhouse hotel in Philadelphia. In addition to his finance role, Bennett founded and leads Hersha’s sustainability platform, EarthView^TM. He also reports directly to the CFO.

In our conversation, Bennett shared with me his very helpful perspective on relationship building with the CFO.

Jennifer: What were some of the early influencers for you that made you think that sustainability could provide financial value?

Bennett: In university, I studied civil and environmental engineering. After obtaining a few years of experience, I went back to school for an MBA. The concept of sustainability was intrinsic within both of those educational perspectives, the first being more environmentally focused, with the latter being more strategy and finance focused. I believe sustainability entails all of these perspectives and it just made a lot of sense to me. Another influence was the culture of Hersha. Hersha is very entrepreneurial and the core values of the company align very well with sustainability. The other factor that influenced it was timing. We were working on a lot of strategy projects when I started. I realized that no one in the industry was differentiating themselves on this point, so it was a good opportunity to do well by doing good.

Jennifer: When you talk with Hersha’s CFO, is it important to try to educate him about sustainability, or is it better to just go right for the bottom line?

Bennett: First, it is important to always know your audience. If a CFO is not already oriented toward sustainability, you may want to start with a macro view of sustainability trends within your industry to help make the business case for why this is important. Regardless of his/her position on sustainability, the project you are pitching should have a good ROI and a clear social or environmental benefit. Once you gain credibility by proving the value proposition, you can begin to weave in some of the broader sustainability concepts you want to get across as you present more opportunities.

Jennifer: Are there specific financial concepts a sustainability manager should have a handle on before talking with the CFO?

Bennett: Yes, absolutely. First off, the sustainability manager should be proficient with Excel. If you cannot navigate Excel, this will be a definite disadvantage. Secondly, if you don’t understand basic financial concepts such as IRR and the company’s cost of capital, work with a member of the finance team to get up to speed. Lastly, it is very important to have some grounding in the financials of the organization. If, for example, you are asking for $1 million for a project, but the Company’s capital budget is only $250,000, you will look as though you are unaware and unprepared.

Jennifer: Does everything have to be quantified? How should someone handle concepts that are harder to put a financial value on, such as brand or license to operate?

Bennett: Yes, you should try to quantify to the best level of effort you can. But be conservative. Initiatives should make financial sense based on easily quantifiable metrics. If it isn’t, then sensitize the less quantifiable metrics to see where you break even on the investment. Work with teams within the organization to see if the assumptions are reasonable.

Jennifer: Where do opportunities to reduce risk fit in? Is that part of the conversation with the CFO?

Bennett: Risk reduction is compelling. For example, when we knew that energy benchmarking would soon be required in many of our markets, we invested the FTEs to source and manage the data. We now use an outside firm to manage that data, but being prepared was a definite advantage and helped us along the way to better understanding our energy consumption, a significant expense. A CFO will understand and appreciate that.

Jennifer: Is there anything in particular that would impress you from a sustainability manager?

Bennett: The sustainability manager has to be the “one stop shop.” You must cover all your bases. Look at it from the perspective of a business owner who takes into account all aspects of the business from accounting to operations to strategy, etc. What would you want to know if you were running the company and were approached by a sustainability manager? If you don’t have the comprehensive expertise, consider how you can become the one who can understand how your proposed initiative will impact different areas of the business.

Jennifer: Any suggestions on what you should NOT do?

Bennett: Don’t forget about the triple bottom line. In every project you pitch, think about how it has the potential to impact the social, environmental, and economic bottom line. If you are not assessing and communicating all three areas of impact, you are doing a disservice to the company.

Jennifer: Thanks, Bennett. Are there any other final tips you would share with our readers?

Bennett: Probably one that can’t be overstated. Strong communication and relationship skills are critical. Once you get approval for a project, don’t disappear for months. Ask people to climb on board for the whole trip and keep them informed – of both positive and negative developments. Senior executives also don’t like surprises, especially if they have endorsed a project. This builds a long-term relationship and enhances your ability to bring an idea from concept to plan to reality.

Image Credit: Hector Parayuelos, Flickr

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By Maureen Hart and Bob Willard

Are we there yet? Most existing sustainability reporting and assessment systems focus on progress made since a prior baseline year. And each year thousands of companies publish corporate sustainability reports detailing millions of pounds of greenhouse gas emissions avoided, tons of waste reduced, and gallons of water and BTUs of energy saved. With all this progress being made, surely the sustainability battle must be almost won by now, mustn’t it? Unfortunately, no.

But it’s not for lack of trying. Many businesses, government agencies and NGOs are trying to chart a new and more sustainable course of development. They are changing their processes and systems in ways that use less energy and fewer resources, reduce emissions, and restore ecosystem functions. However, much of these actions are done piecemeal, hindered by the lack of a comprehensive understanding of what a sustainable organization -- indeed, what a sustainable global economic and social system -- would look like and an approach for getting there.

Another problem is that most of the sustainability reporting and assessment tools, guidelines and standards currently available – Global Reporting Initiative (GRI), Accountability 1000 and the Sustainability Accounting Standards Board (SASB), to name a few – are focused on external reporting and ranking. As a result, their output focuses on the most positive aspects of what the organization has done in the past, not the difficulties or challenges for the future.

So, what does sustainability really look like? And how do we know if we are getting there?

Two new open-source tools are now available to answer these two key questions, the Future Fit Business Benchmark from The Natural Step (TNS) Canada, and S-CORE from the International Society of Sustainability Professionals. Both of these tools can be integrated with the 150+ sustainability reporting and rating standards that are currently in use.

The Future Fit Business Benchmark, (formerly called the Gold-Standard Benchmark for Sustainable Business) defines a set of science-based performance criteria that describe a company that is fit for the future. The aim of the benchmark is to help business leaders and investors understand the rapid, radical and necessary changes required if companies, people and the environment are to have the possibility of mutual well-being and prosperity, today and in an unpredictable future.

Future-fit is a flexible context-based benchmarking tool that defines what level of performance is necessary, based on best-available science, rather than prescribing exactly how to reach that level of performance. Future Fit includes a set of key performance indicators (KPIs) and goals that measure truly sustainable practice. Companies are not able to compensate for poor achievement on a couple of KPIs by exceptional performance on others. To be a truly sustainable future-fit business, the company must do well on all of the KPI goals.

S-CORE is a high level sustainability evaluation that provides a framework for first understanding what organizations need to achieve relative to sustainability and then prioritizing effective collaborative action of all key stakeholders. S-CORE is a dynamic process that guides organizations in reviewing their business policies and practices for gaps and opportunities for improvement. It includes more than 70 practices organized by functional areas common to all businesses such as senior management, human resources and purchasing. S-CORE also has sector supplements that include practices specific to different industries such as manufacturing, construction, utilities and government.

Evaluating by functional areas makes it easy to assign accountability and responsibility while fostering organizational understanding and dialogue. Each practice describes three maturity levels of sustainable activities so that organizations can see where they are now and where they need to go long-term and the results feed into the organization's sustainability planning process.

These two tools fill a major void in today’s efforts to improve sustainable performance. To date, most of the sustainability performance improvement focus has been on after-the-fact reporting often using intensity, per capita or per product performance metrics. However, sustainability is not something a business can achieve by itself, so measures of water used, waste produced or carbon emitted needs to be based on the carrying capacity of environmental systems, not just the economic activity of an individual entity. In addition, most sustainability reporting is for external showcasing of success stories rather than a critical examination of what really needs to be done to create a sustainable future.

Future Fit provides a rigorous, science-based, and measurable description of a truly sustainable business that has the possibility of thriving both in the near term and in a resource constrained, less unpredictable future. We need a new future-fit benchmark that is firmly grounded in how scientists say companies must behave if businesses are to enjoy the support of healthy environmental and societal nests. The beta release will be available at for a two-month comment period on Nov. 1, and Version 1.0 will be launched as a free, open-source resource in July 2015.

S-CORE’s focus on internal evaluation and decision-making allows an organization to truly look at their barriers and challenges and prioritize actions while also identifying internal accountability and responsibility. Since it is an internal decision-making tool rather than an external reporting and ranking tool, S-CORE allows an organization to honestly evaluate its strengths and weaknesses and create plans for true sustainable progress. In addition, because S-CORE is done as a group exercise with key members of the organization, it brings all members up to speed on the challenges and opportunities for implementing and accelerating adoption of sustainable practices throughout that organization.

It’s time to reframe corporate sustainability. It’s time that companies had a benchmark that tells them when they have achieved sustainability and an internal evaluation tool for assessing what really needs to be done to reach that level.

At the upcoming ISSP Conference 2014, Future Fit Business Benchmark and S-CORE will be the topic of a break-out session, Kickass Tools for Sustainability, led by Bob Willard and Maureen Hart.

ISSP Conference 2014 will be held November 12-14 in Denver. For more information, visit http://www.sustainabilityprofessionals.org/.

Image credit: Flickr/aigle_dore

Bob Willard is a leading expert on quantifying and selling the business case for sustainability. He is a teacher, speaker and author whose books include "The Sustainability Advantage," "The Next Sustainability Wave" and "The Sustainability Champion's Guidebook." He is a key contributor to the Future-Fit Business Benchmark.

Maureen Hart is the Executive Director of the International Society of Sustainability Professionals, the world's leading association of sustainability practitioners.

By Deborah Fleischer

At the AASHE conference, three different speakers evoked Ronald Heifetz's concept of adaptive challenges -- problems that can’t be solved with a simple, technical fix.  If ever there was an adaptive challenge, climate change is one of them: It will require systemic change at a large scale, collaborative conservations and  engagement of many sectors to solve.

At the opening ceremony of the conference, Dr. John Anderson, president of Millersville University, announced MomentUs, a new cross-sector climate solution, and the launch of  Solution Generation, a new initiative to engage higher education in climate solutions. Read on for an overview of MomentUs and Solution Generation.

MomentUs launches Solution Generation

MomentUs, a program of ecoAmerica, is a strategic, multi-sector organizing and communications initiative that is designed to build personal and institutional support for climate change solutions.  It includes an ambitious cross-sector marketing campaign to engage more Americans in climate change, where they "live, work, learn, play and pray." Sectors targeted for engagement include higher education, business, faith, health, communities and stewardship. Under the umbrella of MomentUs, each sector is launching its own campaign, with unique branding, to motivate more people to take action on climate change.

Faith was the first sector to launch (see Blessed Tomorrow).  Solution Generation, targeted to higher education, now has its own brand and website, including success stories and resources for making progress on the “Path to Positive.”  According to Dr. Carlton Brown, president of Clark Atlanta University, "Solution Generation provides higher education leaders with tools, resources and best practices they are generally not able to create on their own."  Dr. Anderson and Stephanie Herrera, the AASHE executive director, sit on the Solution Generation Executive Committee.

Herrera sees Solution Generation as a great opportunity to help get the word out about success stories and best practices.  “AASHE has successes throughout all our member campuses and we want to share these stories,” she explained.  The words she uses to describe Solution Generation seem to fit in well with the emergence operating system discussed in my post on Tuesday.  She describes it as “a convener and a network on climate, making connections to other stakeholders and high-caliber people.”  Herrera attended a MomentUs cross-sector meeting in Chicago, where she was able to dialogue with a rich mix of unusual allies. “I appreciated the opportunity of meeting with leaders from different industries during the MomentUs meeting,” stressed Herrera.  “It was a rare chance to have discussions on the role of higher education with corporations, mayors and faith-based groups.”

The 'Path to Positive' pledge

At a lunchtime presentation, Andrea Putman, higher education director for MomentUs, explained, “With the input of over 120 national leaders from many sectors, we have developed the 'Path to Positive.' The commitment is to simply to lead by example and engage others.”

You can read more about the pledge and explore taking it here. There is no fee for joining Solution Generation, and the pledge has no reporting requirements.  It is the first step in helping MomentUs begin to build broader support for climate solutions.

13 steps to communicate on climate

MomentUs identified 13 steps and guiding principles for communicating on climate, based in part on extensive research of past social movements, such as healthcare reform and the campaign to regulate tobacco, as well as extensive social science, communications research. You can read more about the 13 steps and principles here.  They are summarized below.

Images from the Solution Generation.

Deborah Fleischer is founder and president of Green Impact, a strategic sustainability consulting practice that helps universities, companies, and nonprofits amplify their green impact.

Food waste is a horrendous problem in this country that no one seems to want to talk about. Yet food is the one product type that everyone consumes, and while a surprising number of people don’t have it, those that do are shockingly wasteful. As recently as 2012, close to 50 million people experienced food insecurity, not in Africa or Bangladesh, but right here in the USA. Worldwide, that number is over 1 billion people.

That makes the fact that somewhere between a quarter and a third of all food produced worldwide is never eaten all the more shocking. America is the worst offender by far. Here in the states, the portion of food production that goes to waste is closer to 40 percent.

A report by the National Consumer League, called Wasted: Solutions to the American Food Waste Problem, came out last week. It maps the magnitude of the problem and, as the title suggests, offers a number of practical suggestions.

Let’s start with a look at the problem. Most of the food waste in the developing world occurs in the supply chain. Either the farmers suffer crop failures due to weather, insects or disease, or they are unable to harvest the crops efficiently due to inadequate equipment. Inefficient transportation and lack of refrigerated trucks lead to more losses in transit. Consumers, despite the lack of refrigeration, waste less food since they have so little to begin with and they value it.

The situation is inverted in developed countries. Consumers waste more food. American consumers waste 10 times as much food as their counterparts in Southeast Asia.

Why do we waste so much? Well, one reason is because it’s become so cheap. Americans today spend only 6 percent of their total household expenditures on food. Back in 1982 that number was 12 percent. But, as the saying goes, perhaps you get what you pay for. According to Nadya Zhexembayeva, in her book "Overfished Ocean Strategy," the nutritional value of American food has been declining dramatically. A study of 43 vegetable crops over the period from 1950-1999 shows declines of 20 percent in Vitamin C, 15 percent in iron and 38 percent in riboflavin. American food waste has risen by 50 percent since the seventies at the same time that prices and nutrition have declined. Today’s American family of four throws away anywhere from $1,350 to $2,275 worth of food each year. Put that all together and we are looking at $165 billion, as a nation, being wasted.

The energy, water and land implications of this are enormous. In essence, this means that at a time of increasing resource scarcity, 20 percent of our land, 4 percent of our energy and 25 percent of our water is used to produce food that ends up being thrown out.

Unfortunately, the story does not end once that wasted food is grown. After the plates are scrapped and refrigerators cleaned out, the food in the trash bin must be hauled to the landfill, costing more energy, where it ultimately breaks down into methane, a highly potent greenhouse gas. One study in the U.K. found that eliminating all food waste from landfills would be equivalent to taking 1 in 4 cars off the road. One has to wonder: If the true environmental cost of our food were priced in, would we be so willing to waste it?

Hunger in the streets will not simply be solved by reducing waste, but the report tells us that, if we could reduce our level of waste by 30 percent, that would be enough food to feed our 50 million hungry. If only we could get it to them.

So, much for the bad news, though it surely represents opportunities for those with a mind to address them. Let’s take a look at some of the solutions.

Addressing the food waste issue requires a multifaceted approach. First, retailers need to move away from the buy-one-get-one-free mentality. That might be a good way to move product, but much of it gets moved right into the landfill with a brief stopover in the home. That used to be considered acceptable as long as the company was generating profits. Those days will soon be gone. Attitudes can also change about food that is less attractive but still perfectly safe to eat. Perishable foods near expiration can be sold at marked down prices where, if used promptly, it can provide excellent value. More retailers can participate in programs to donate overstock foods to those who are hungry.

But the biggest opportunities are with consumers. Perhaps the biggest barrier is consumer attitudes. Because of the fall in food prices, food is not valued as it was in earlier times. People need better information about how to store foods properly and expiration dates must be clearly labeled. Labels should indicate the date at which food will become unusable.

Perhaps tomorrow’s refrigerators will scan the inventory as they are being stocked and issue reminders such as this one. “Expiring tomorrow: milk and cheese. Use it while it’s still good.”

Public education programs aimed at reducing food waste have been quite effective in Europe. The U.S. EPA has a food recovery hierarchy that spells out the most effective use of unusable food -- starting with donating it and ending with composting. Rochester, New York-based Epiphergy followed this hierarchy in its extensive food waste recovery program. Middle stages include producing animal feed, followed by energy.

Cities can help by providing composting services and also by charging for waste collection by the pound instead ofusing a flat rate. That would encourage people to think twice before throwing things away.

These are all small steps. But when people understand the larger picture that ties them all together, it changes their attitude and their behavior. Experiences in Europe have proven that out. We need to raise awareness here and set ambitious targets for food waste reduction and we need to do it soon.

Image credit: Taz Licensed under Creative Commons Attribution 2.0 via Wikimedia Commons

RP Siegel, PE, is an author, inventor and consultant. He has written for numerous publications ranging from Huffington Post to Mechanical Engineering. He and Roger Saillant co-wrote the successful eco-thriller Vapor Trails. RP, who is a regular contributor to Triple Pundit and Justmeans, sees it as his mission to help articulate and clarify the problems and challenges confronting our planet at this time, as well as the steadily emerging list of proposed solutions. His uniquely combined engineering and humanities background help to bring both global perspective and analytical detail to bear on the questions at hand.

Follow RP Siegel on Twitter.

As stores and restaurants ramp up for the Christmas season, the eye is naturally on the bottom line. And even though the National Retail Federation is forecasting a bumper sales record, Kip Tindell, CEO of the Container Store, has a message for the fast-food industry: Pay your employees well, very well, and they will return it in profits.

His concept isn’t new. Costco, Trader Joes and the Gap have all listed the benefits of paying their workers a living wage.

But Tindell’s approach, which he has detailed in the book "Uncontainable," goes far beyond that initiative, since he effectively pays them more than twice the national median salary. According to ThinkProgress, sales staff at the Container Store earn around $48,000 a year, rather than the median salary of $21,410.

“[One] great person can match the business productivity of three good people ,” Tindell explained in an article for Inc. It’s a strategy that has defied the common American ethic of paying low for jobs that are perceived to be entry level, such as restaurant servers, stocking clerks and sales representatives in large department stores.

But Tindell maintains that by paying staff what they need to not only survive but maintain a career, they will see their employment as just that: something they will work hard to keep and excel at. He calls this approach the “one equals three” strategy: Pay the employee well and she’ll do the work of three. The idea that manual laborers are “a dime a dozen” is out-done by the profits that are earned by not having to hire as many employees to do the same job, or having to spend valuable dollars on recruitment of new employees.

Tindell has a number of other strategies that fly in the face of convention as well, like never laying off staff to solve a fiscal challenge. According to Tindell, the 36-year-old company has never laid off staff to cut costs. He solved recessionary loses by doing things like freezing the 401K matches and raises. It sent a message to the staff that while rocky times might be ahead, their jobs were safe. They remained committed to the business, not critical of its ability to make a profit from all of their hard work.

He’s also a big proponent of hiring women for jobs that have historically been just below the glass ceiling. He isn’t abashed in giving his reasons, either.

“I think women make better executives than men,” he told Business Insider, chalking their prowess up to “emotional intelligence.” [That] skillset — communication, empathy, emotional intelligence, understanding what we stand for…and being like our target customer — really fits the bill with women,” he explained.

With about 70 percent of The Container Store’s management positions held by women, that’s news that researchers would be really interested in hearing. Previous studies have shown that women often get the pass when it comes to promotions.

Admittedly, I find myself squirming at those comments. It's no doubt they would likely cause an uproar if it were men, not women, who were being given the compliment.

Just the same, his contributions to breaking that glass ceiling and transforming retail marketing values have been considerable. They have also won him plenty of awards, starting with Earnst & Young’s Entrepreneur of the Year award in 1991 and the National Retail Federation’s Gold Award in 2010.

His Seven Foundation Principles, which he outlined in an interview with Forbes,  as well as several other venues, say just about all there is to know about why paying his sales staff more than twice the national average works. It isn’t just that they can earn a fair wage. They earn respect as well.

1. One Great Person = Three Good People


2. Communication is Leadership


3. Fill the other guy’s basket to the brim. Making money then becomes an easy proposition.


4. The Best Selection, Service & Price.


5. Intuition does not come to an unprepared mind. You need to train before it happens.


6. Man In The Desert Selling


7. Air of Excitement

Not surprisingly, Tindell's fundamental principles are great guideposts not just for retail sales, but human nature.

Image credit: Dave Dugdale

The Internet has reshaped how we do business in amazing ways. It’s provided a pipeline that has made it easier for companies and NGOs to reach out to consumers. It’s bolstered charity efforts by making them more accessible. And it has made it easier for consumers to find and reach all of those services.

But I often think the true value of the Internet is in the education it can share. It makes it easier for us to learn about the companies we’re considering doing business with and the products they offer. It also increases transparency when it comes to the initiatives we’re asked to donate to. In many ways, it’s truly made the world smaller and less complex.

But can a company ever share too much information?

Or put another way: Is there ever a time when a consumer’s question (and the answer) is better left unpublished?

That’s the dilemma that McDonald's seems to be facing these days. In an effort to quash rumors about its food quality, it’s opened the information vault and set up new, regionally specific online portals for the most fantastic questions consumers can think of. And we’re not just talking your blasé “how many calories are in your Big Mac” question. In the U.S., readers can find that at fastfoodnutrition.org.

No, these are questions that go beyond what most people would probably think to ask, like, “Are your hamburgers really made of white meal worms?” or “Why does your food, left out over time, never rot or decompose?” Both questions, while maybe educational for their replies, leave the fast-food consumer gasping for air.

What is interesting is that each of McDonald's regional websites (U.S. versus Canadian or Australian, for example) approaches this process differently, but they all, to some degree embrace the ethic that publishing the customers’ questions, no matter how stomach-turning, helps prove the company’s transparency. The Canadian site takes the no-holds-bar approach and publishes the questions in post-note form, spelling errors and all. Those who weren’t turned off by the meal worms and decomposition questions probably won’t be undone by the following veracity challenge: "What kind of subituts do u place in yur BEEF BURGER – BE HONEST!"

The U.S. site has cleaned up the spelling and the amazing number of redundant questions, while the Australian team seems to have tumbled to the fact that not all customer ponderings need to be aired on an international website.

And that’s a pretty good takeaway. Those of us who would never think of asking a company we have willingly patronized whether it uses inedible critters in its food are left to wonder not whether it’s bunk, but why the question keeps getting asked.

As Chris Morran, senior editor for the Consumerist put it, “If people are asking what’s in your burger, you’ve already lost.

“[What McDonald’s] completely overlooks is that the real problem is the fact that people are asking these questions to begin with,” says Morran.

Ditto. But I would go a step further and say that the issue is really a matter of the vision McDonald’s has of its corporate future.

When the golden arches first went up, the company’s concept took the world by storm. It was a new, it was fresh and its true appeal was that it super-charged our imagination. That’s the selling point of mega-sellers. Their brands offer a change.

And that change doesn’t have to be taste (although I would think it would help for a hamburger chain). It simply needs to prove it’s bold.

That’s what I think McDonald’s is trying to do. But in challenging customers to put up the weirdest, most unthinkable questions, it’s undermining that spark it has traded on for so many years: the sense of enthrall in trying something new, that doesn’t come with a whole lot of uncomfortable questions that shouldn’t have to be asked in the first place.

Maybe the message McDonald's needs to be sending out is not a line-by-line correction of its public image, but a highlight of how it’s going to use its considerable experience to remake the food industry for the 21st century. That was its selling point in the mid-20th century, and it worked.

Image credit: Pointnshoot

By Giles Hutchins

Much has been explored recently about the flaws in our current economic paradigm and ways to move beyond capitalism. For instance: conscious capitalism, capitalism 2.0, regenerative capitalism, closed-loop economics, co-operatives, social enterprises; and yet so often the underlying logic that created our plethora of problems in the first place remains unquestioned, even unwittingly applied to these new ways of operating.

Woven into our scientific-philosophy and socio-economic thinking at deep and partly unconscious levels is a corruption of the most fundamental degree. It is a flawed logic that sets us apart from each other and Nature – an illusion of separation. It is what Einstein spoke of as an optical illusion of consciousness which now manifests a devastating delusion.

Any new business approach that does not address this corrosive and deeply divisive logic at source will not last long. The new frontier of business must be rooted in a new logic – a new consciousness no less - that transcends this illusion so that solutions and remedies no longer apply the corrupting logic of yesterday.

As Peter Drucker famously said, "In times of turmoil the danger lies not in the turmoil itself but in facing it with yesterday’s logic."

Yesterday’s logic understands the world and universe as purposeless, devoid of meaning and consciousness. It is the same materialistic worldview that pervades our media, arts, philosophy, education, science and economics today and is seldom questioned yet deeply divisive. It is a logic that pits us against each other where Nature is viewed as a ‘war of all against all’. It creates a carcinogenic way of attending and an evolutionary path of selfish ascendency where the cancer sets about destroy its host and then winds up killing itself. It is not in the least wise, and yet it is still what we teach ourselves to believe. This flawed logic leads to climate change, poverty, inequality, wars, patriarchy, egotism and capitalist consumerism.

Whilst the founders of Western philosophy respected the innate wisdom of life beyond the confines of any illusory sense of separation, over time we have tended towards egotism and materialism, debasing ourselves and demeaning Nature. Time is no longer on our side, and humanity now needs to live up to its name of Homo sapiens - wise beings - and wake-up to the insanity of our own mind-set.
The good news is that there is a transformation in our midst, a paradigm shift no less. The questioning of our short-termism, rampant consumerism and capitalistic approach comes with a rising trend of co-operatives, B-Corps, social entrepreneurship, open sourcing and creative commons approaches in business and beyond.

We are reminded of Paul Hawkin’s discovery in his work "Blessed Unrest" that millions of organisations are now actively engaged in the emergence of a new paradigm. Yet we do need to awaken the importance of rooting any new paradigm in wisdom beyond illusion i.e. in re-cognising that we are expressions of Nature and that our own consciousness is immersed within a wider, deeper matrix - the ground of our being – which the great minds of Jung, Einstein, Da Vinci, Confucius and many others before us all understood, along with our present day activists such as Satish Kumar, Llewellyn Vaughan-Lee and Thich Nhat Hanh. Only with this re-cognition will we ensure our solutions are both inspired by AND in harmony with Nature, which is the only viable pathway towards a truly sustainable future for life on Earth.

By allowing space and time within our hectic busi-ness for an opening of our cognition to the inner and outer depths of ourselves, each other and Nature, we gain understanding of Nature as a powerful source of inspiration, and begin to realise the answers to our pressing challenges are all around and within us. For instance: the attunement that emerges within flocking and shoaling may provide insight for self-organising community groups; nested cycles of ecological transformation may provide insight for social development; diverse microbial soil communities beneath our feet may provide insight for localisation within globalisation; ecosystem-thinking may provide insight for ecological production processes and waste re-use; Nature’s regenerative cycles may provide insight for organisational resilience; deep immersions in Nature may provide psychological insights which aid our self-other-Nature attunement. From bacteria to bees and from Aboriginal Australian communities to the Scottish Highlands we start to uncover gems of truth to share in helping our neighborhoods become vibrant and life-enhancing.

Three R’s to help ground our paradigm shift:

1. Re-designing: new ways of operating and innovating beyond 'hurting' into 'healing' (shifting from the take/make/waste paradigm to a regenerative approach which nourishes life).


2. Re-establishing: reconciling our self-other-Nature relation (attuning our self-Self within the embodiment of our neighbourhood, drawing on, for instance: eco-psychology, phenomenology, co-creative community engagement, leading-from-the-heart, contemplative practices, the way of Council, shamanic practices and deep Nature immersions).


3. Re-kindling: igniting ancient wisdom through the inspiration of Nature (enabling organisations, communities and societies not merely to reduce their adverse impact but to flourish in the years ahead by practising wise approaches to life that draw on, for instance: ecological thinking, eco-literacy, permaculture, biomimicry and indigenous wisdom).

A special for Triple Pundit readers - a 20% discount code AF1014 when ordering The Illusion of Separation paperback here and the ebook here. Giles Hutchins will be speaking about this new paradigm at The Hub in Islington, London on Dec. 10, to attend book here.

Giles applies twenty years business experience to the emergence of new business logic inspired and in harmony with nature, for a short video see here. Author of The Nature of Business and recently release The Illusion of Separation Giles blogs at www.thenatureofbusiness.org, facebook community https://www.facebook.com/businessinspiredbynature and tweets @gileshutchins

An impressive team of judges, supporters and contributors have been lined up to join Foreign Secretary Rt. Hon. Philip Hammond MP at the inaugural awards and showcase on 6 March 2015 at Mercedes-Benz World in Weybridge, Surrey.

The judging team responsible for selection of the winners includes Camila Batmanghelidjh CBE, Founder of Kids Company; Tony Juniper, Environmentalist and Writer; James Cameron, Chairman of Climate Change Capital and Bruce Poon Tip, Philanthropist & Social Innovator.

NatWest, Carillion and Global Action Plan are among the awards sponsors.

David Picton, Carillion, chief sustainability officer commented: "Authentic corporate social responsibility is business-essential - not just a ‘nice-to-have'- creating positive legacies for communities and environments, as well as building public trust in sustainable businesses. Integrated, effective sustainability is about making tomorrow a better place, so we're delighted to support the National CSR Awards and celebrate outstanding examples of responsible business"
 
NatWest business development director, Graham Chaston added: "We are delighted to support the National CSR Awards as we celebrate the successes and achievements of businesses from across the country."

There are seven categories including Best Community Development Project, Best Carbon Footprinting & Offsetting, Best Education Project and Environmental Leadership. There are three business sectors for each category: SME (1-250), large business (250+) and public sector/not-for-profit.

 

Generating electricity from wave power in Britain took a step closer to reality this week after green energy company Ecotricity’s innovative device – Searaser – successfully completed first stage testing at Plymouth University’s CoastLAB wave tank.

The brainchild of British inventor Alvin Smith, Searaser is designed to overcome two of the biggest hurdles in the deployment of renewable energy on a scale that fulfils Britain’s future electricity needs – cost and variable output.
Ecotricity and the Searaser team have spent the past 18 months optimising the design of the device and modelling outputs in real word conditions around the coast of Britain – with the assistance of one of the world’s leading marine energy consultants, DNV GL Group (formerly Garrad Hasan).

Smith said the determining factor in making wave power efficient, and therefore cost-effective, was resilience: “This week’s wave tank testing was carried out to validate the extensive computer modelling we’ve been undertaking.”
“We’ve put Searaser through the most extreme testing regime here at CoastLAB and it’s passed every challenge.”

Unlike other marine energy technologies, Searaser won’t generate electricity out at sea but will simply use the motion of the ocean swell to pump high pressure seawater ashore, where it will be used to make electricity. The motion of the waves drives a piston between two buoys – one on the surface of the water, the other suspended underwater and tethered to a weight on the seabed.

As waves move past, the surface buoy moves the piston up-and-down, pumping volumes of pressurised seawater through a pipe to an onshore hydropower turbine to produce electricity.

The Searaser could be used to pump seawater into coastal reservoirs, from where it can be released at any time of the day or night, to make renewable electricity on demand.

Ecotricity founder Dale Vince said: “Our vision is for Britain’s electricity needs to be met entirely from our big three renewable energy sources – the Wind, the Sun and the Sea.

“We believe these ‘Seamills’ have the potential to produce a significant amount of the electricity that Britain needs, from a clean indigenous source and in a more controllable manner than currently possible.”

 

Picture credit: © Joseph Cortes | Dreamstime Stock Photos