Green Business: Implementing Sustainability Strategies

Overview/Description
A plan for implementing a sustainability strategy stands a much greater chance of success if the essential players in an organization back it. Implementation of sustainability initiatives varies by organization and by sector, and because no steadfast procedural rules exist, these initiatives must be carefully planned. When implementing sustainability practices, you need to make sure those practices align with corporate strategy, and you need to establish some performance metrics to establish baselines and measure progress. Knowing the type of metrics you'll be collecting can help you plan the methods you'll use to report on your sustainability initiatives. These two considerations are as important as the physical implementation of the plan itself. This course covers ways to align corporate and sustainability strategies, as well as ways to measure your sustainability performance. It provides examples of how companies can implement sustainability strategies and discusses the importance of reporting sustainability results accurately. The way that companies market their sustainability efforts is also important to consider. Greenwashing a company's image to make it seem more sustainable can backfire and bring unwanted negative attention. This course addresses some of the challenges a company faces when deciding how to market its sustainability initiatives.

Target Audience
Individuals in leadership roles, directors, change agents and influencers, as well as members of any organization considering adopting more sustainable enterprise practices and individuals who want to effect social change within their organization

Expected Duration (hours)
2.0

Lesson Objectives

Green Business: Implementing Sustainability Strategies

identify ways to implement sustainability practices

align corporate strategy with relevant sustainability strategies

recognize the benefits of evaluating the organization's performance related to achieving its sustainability goals

identify ways to measure sustainability performance

recognize the role of a performance evaluation system in the implementation of a sustainability strategy

recognize examples of how to implement sustainability practices related to the environment

recognize the benefits of ongoing reporting of environmental sustainability results

match typical topic areas included in external sustainability reports with the descriptions of the types of information they should contain

identify the contents of key elements included in a typical internal sustainability report

recognize some of the challenges in marketing green businesses