Why Sustainability Is Now the Key Driver of Innovation

Harvard Business Review (9/15, Nidomolu, Prahalad, Rangaswami) – An article in the Harvard Business Review reports that executives falsely believe they must choose between the largely social perks of manufacturing sustainable products the financial burdens that accompany those perks, according to business strategy experts. Most organizations progress through five stages on the road to achieving sustainability. The first is seeing compliance as an opportunity to increase innovation, which is followed by creating sustainable value chains via the increase of water, waste, and emissions efficiency throughout the supply chain.

Next is creating sustainable goods and services through the application of such techniques as biomimicry, a discipline that studies elements of nature then duplicates them to solve product development problems. Forming new business models is the fourth stage, where organizations alter their methods of delivering and capturing value in a way that meets consumers’ demands. And finally, creating next-practice programs from a deeper knowledge of how renewable and nonrenewable materials affect business environments and sectors. Hat Tip: APICS