Analytical Essay

Running head: ANALYTICAL ESSAY- SUSTAINABILITY

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Sustainability

Sustainability can be treated as the ability to continually maintain something at a

certain rate. The class readings convey sustainability as the ability to keep both human beings

and the biosphere to exist at the same time. Corporate sustainability, as portrayed in the

speaker notes, is an effective approach that is designed to establish admirable stakeholder

value (Benn, Edwards, and Williams, 2014). The notes state that such an outcome can be

achieved through the strategy to take a step that prioritizes economic, cultural, social,

environmental, and ethical principles of guiding business. Some of the most effective steps in

driving sustainability in business comprise the following:

1. Involving a sustainability manager who is responsible for advising an organization on

best sustainable practices.

2. Having budget and action plan.

3. Assessment of the company’s culture, property, practices, and buildings.

Compare with the knowledge learned from class lectures, it is evident that

sustainability strategies are created to promote proper employee environment, longevity, and

transparency to fuel development in a business setting. To better understand this concept, it is

important to identify the difference that exists between corporate social responsibility (CSR)

and sustainability (Grayson & Hodges, 2017). CSR is filled by norms, morality, and ethics,

while sustainability drives businesses to undertake intertemporal trade-offs. The trade-offs

often help companies to protect intergenerational equity. In other terms, the guest speaker’s

note pictures the bane of sustainability as short-termism (Castle,2019). To successfully

enhance sustainability effectiveness in any businesses, three key factors must be strongly

adhered to. These include stakeholder engagement, transparency, and the ability to foresee

the future and think ahead (Benn et al., 2014).

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…In this regard, both the class lectures and the guest speaker’s PowerPoint hold that

stakeholder engagement promotes lots of education that often informs stakeholders on how to

respond to critical issues (Skift, 2019; White,2019; Castle,2019). Issues, in this case, maybe

energy efficiency and waste production. The ability to think ahead improves the capability of

a business to look forward to the future. This is essential, especially in understanding trends.

At the same time, it is a sustainability aspect that enables one to generate rational ideologies.

Both class and guest speaker’s PowerPoint make it clear that sustainability is a tool that helps

create profitable businesses (White,2019; Castle,2019). In sum, this analytical essay is mainly

focused on sustainability and technological trends and, at the same time, compare and

contrast classroom knowledge with the guest speaker’s notes.

Sustainability comes along with a wide range of advantages to any organization or

business setting. Generally, at the implementation stage, it increases the ability of an

organization to draft operational initiatives. For example, an organization can define how to

reduce its expenses on energy and water consumption without necessarily affecting its

operations. Alternative actions that arise from sustainability include adoption recycling and

composting programs, carbon offsetting initiatives, ethical and local sourcing, and cutting

excess packaging (Castle, 2019; Skift, 2019). Sustainability for businesses enables them to

create models that help, especially in resolving the ever-emerging 21st-century challenges

(Castle, 2019; Skift, 2019).

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According to the presentation by the guest speaker, it is clear that apart from the listed firms,

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business leaders across the globe are seeking practical metrics and standards that support the

application of sustainability principles (Castle,2019). Sustainability reduces the negative

impact of innovation and, instead, helps increase opportunities for businesses. At the same

time, sustainability principles enable corporations to pay attention to how their operations

influence the community, environment, and economy (Benn et al., 2014).

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Most importantly, sustainability enhances the acknowledgment of climate change. That is,

through sustainability, firms get to appreciate that addressing climate change requires zero-

emission goals, efficient discharge and waste management, increasing resilience, risk

management, as well as cost reduction measures.

At the meaning while, while addressing such factors, businesses would be, at the same

time, ensuring a safe working environment for workers, creating amicable manufacturing

chains, promoting privacy protection, and fostering security policies that are respecting the

rights of people (Dyllick & Hockerts, 2002). By applying an analytical approach to both the

class lectures and guest speaker’s PowerPoint, individuals may understand that sustainability

comes with a wide range of advantages (White,2019; Castle,2019). For instance, companies

that are considered to be sustainable have proved to be great contributors to economic growth

as they tend to enforce women empowerment. On the other hand, sustainability is a factor

that enforces businesses

to………………………………………………………………………………………………

…… Another policy may presuppose that bottle depot-generated revenue would be

reinvested into green projects (Benn et al., 2014). On the same note, sustainability also guides

firms on how to undertake local sourcing and ethical purchasing. According to Benn et al.,

(2014), sustainability comes along with the principles that define how to work with suppliers

that share the same ecological and ethical ideologies, as well as purchasing goods and

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products that are credible and certified. Firms that follow these principles will focus on local

sourcing, as well as promote edible gardens in society.

The world economic forum extends the perception of business sustainability. The

WEF has, over decades, continued to employ experts with the role of drafting applicable and

profound sustainability principles in various fields. It is based on the fact that the world

economic forum recognizes the significance of corporate sustainability as it creates a strong

foundation upon which most world business leaders base their sustainability practices and

policies (Dyllick & Hockerts, 2002). To improve the positive influence attached to

sustainability, most corporations are not only choosing to partner with just start-ups that are

considered greener, but they are also paying attention to three major corporate sustainability

pillars (Benn et al., 2014). These pillars are economic, social, and environmental ones. The

environmental pillar seems to be the most important as it arguably guides corporations on

how to review their processes for greener alternatives. It is through this pillar that

sustainability enables companies to cut packaging waste and carbon footprint (Benn et al.,

2014). Not only does sustainability under the environmental pillar help companies to reduce

their negative environmental impact, but also aids firms to enhance their financial returns and

public reputation. In sum, sustainability increases environmental awareness by creating

formidable greener practices. The social pillar helps improve support that a company gathers

from society, employees, and other stakeholders. That is, a firm can understand how to

interact with the community and stakeholders. The pillar facilitates fair employee treatment,

as well as having a respectful supply chain. The guest speaker’s presentation proves that

building a business that is characterized by a profound culture which is community-oriented

enhances the firm’s sustainably (Castle,2019). Such a culture often promotes innovation

among employees, thus, gradually improving the business model, processes, and product

quality.

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Under the economic pillar, business leaders are changed that they do not only focus

on accumulate profits, but also pay attention to risk management (Dyllick & Hockerts, 2002).

This pillar makes sustainability more critical as it shifts the company’s focus to acquire a

balance of ethics and profits. On the same note, the economic pillar balances the pressure that

arises from the implementation of the sustainable measures (Dyllick & Hockerts, 2002).

Sustainability enables companies to appreciate that corporate policies do not have to be

dangerous and self-defeating, but instead, they should focus on how to achieve positive

reputation and growth (Benn et al., 2014). In this case, the economic pillar of sustainability

enables a company to continue implementing change at a rate that is gradual and financially

beneficial.

In conclusion, the analysis above includes both comparison and contrast of class

lecture notes and guest speaker’s presentations.

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References