Sustainability and Profit Making

Analysis of the Field
Sustainability is a concept that is receiving attention in numerous industries—from auto manufacturing to accounting (Bouten & Hoozee, 2015; Kwangeson, 2014). Companies like Tesla, Porsche, GM, Audi, Volkswagen and others are finding ways to become more sustainable by creating electric vehicles (EV) that consumers can buy in place of gas-powered cars to avoid polluting the earth. Sustainability concepts focus mainly on green energy and protecting the environment, but they also focus on managing waste more efficiently and promoting social goals and values that are important to communities. Lago, Kocak, Crnkovic and Penzenstadler (2015) examine the environmental dimension of software performance, for instance, and discuss how one of the main problems of “current software engineering practice with regard to sustainability is that the technical and economic dimensions are taken into account while the environmental and social dimensions are not” (p. 70). By focusing attention on how products and processes may impact the environment or society overall, companies and researchers are finding ways to bring sustainability concepts into the mission and vision of corporations.
Current issues and trends in the field of sustainability also focus on the dilemma of global warming, with many nations around the world creating public policy to regulate emissions, switch over the energy industry from coal-burning to green energy (solar, wind, etc.). The dilemma of food resources and food security, ending hunger and ensuring that there seed population is preserved in case of a disaster; and managing ecosystems (Anderies, 2014)—these are all aspects of sustainability that remain challenges for the modern world to address.
Research Topic
This research topic focuses on the need to develop corporate social responsibility (CSR) programs that promote sustainability. As Baumgartner (2014) notes, sustainable development is a major value for the world today: communities want to have companies that promote sustainability and consumers want to shop from companies that devote themselves to sustainable development. Companies like Patagonia, Eileen Fisher, Tesla, Kroger and others all have a sustainability program that is part of their CSR policy, which reflects the values of their communities.
Developing a sufficient CSR policy is important for a business to be successful in the 21st century as a new generation of consumers are entering the market and they have values relating to protecting the environment and promoting a sustainable future. In order to attract those consumers, companies need to reflect those same values in their corporate orientation. The development of a CSR policy that has sustainability as its core value is an opportunity for a company to engage consumers of the current and next generations and create appeal.
Dovleac (2015) shows that new communication technologies are vital for reaching out to the public and communicating a company’s sustainability policy. Tesla’s CEO Elon Musk is expert at using social media, for example, to promote his company’s sustainability vision, goals, and product development. Musk uses Twitter and Instagram to gain direct access to investors, consumers and others in the sustainable space: he posts links to articles that discuss current practices in green energy, solar power and so on. He highlights new achievements in his own company and gives updates on the future direction of the industry. Using social media the way Musk does could be a great way for a company to position itself in tomorrow’s market and develop a following and loyal consumer based dedicated to the brand.
Lubin and Etsy (2010) show that sustainability is today not just an option but an imperative: the reason is that consumers are aware of changes in their environment. They want to see corporations being more proactive and engaged on the environmental front. They want natural cleaners, natural foods; they want products that will not harm the environment and increase the likelihood of global warming. They are tired of corporations viewing consumers as puppets to be manipulated: they want to support corporations that are going to be accountable and transparent with them in their dealings. To succeed today, companies have to embrace sustainability, as this is the major way forward as far as the next generation is concerned.
Williams (2014) supports the outlook of Lubin and Etsy (2010) by discussing how CSR policies could change the world in the coming years. Because the global environment is impacted by what global industries do, from agriculture to manufacturing, the global business community in collaboration with governments around the world, must come to some kind of agreement in so far as what regulations shall be put in place to ensure sustainability in the future. The more that companies and governments work together and set standards for sustainability in all their respective industries, they can level the playing field and provide a new direction for the coming generations in terms of how they focus on and treat the environment.
Areas that will be impacted in industries by this topic are especially going to be the energy industries, where coal- and fossil-fuel burning industries may be at risk of being abandoned in favor of the promotion of green energy, such as solar, wind, and geothermal. Nuclear power plants may present a problem as there are numerous health risks associated with waste and containment, and the Fukushima meltdown in Japan is still a major sore spot for many, who object to the pollution it has placed into the Pacific Ocean.
The positive impact of this topic—the inclusion of sustainability-based CSR policies in all businesses of all industries in a globalized effort to combat global warming and ecological destruction—is that it would be a great way to bring the next generation of consumers into the fields of business. Workers, investors, consumers and all stakeholders appreciate it when companies show an interest in the values that the stakeholders cherish (Pressley, 2015). The more that companies promote an Ecotopic vision of the world, the more the world’s population can begin to get behind the movement and embrace sustainability as a standard that all civilizations around the globe should promote.
Schneider (2015) explains that sustainability can be good for all industries, particularly when industry leaders engage in reflexivity and spend time reflecting on how the concept of sustainability could be seen as an opportunity for positive change rather than as a challenge or barrier to corporate profits and the bottom line. Enhancing the bottom line does not have to come at the expense of sustainability causes; on the contrary, sustainable practices can boost productivity and create wider margins for companies if they spend time figuring out the best ways to make what they have work for them while wasting as little as possible. Figuring out ways for companies to be successfully sustainable within their own industries is a major key to creating good CSR policies.
Future Directions
As a global change agent, there are specific areas of further research that would prove beneficial for all industries: these include the use of renewable energy, the elimination of waste so that all companies are 100% sustainable and have no carbon footprint, and how to transition consumers off the fossil-fuel burning grid onto a grid and lifestyle that uses renewable energy. These areas of future research are important to consider, as they will set the foundation for the next century particularly with respect to how energy is produced and consumed (Anderies, 2014).
Companies, in other words, have to find new ways to address problems especially in either/or situations—where they feel they can either go the sustainability route and sacrifice profit, or go the maximizing profit route and sacrifice on sustainability concepts. Lago et al. (2015) point out this dilemma particularly well when they note that in the software industry, “traditional software decision making considers trade-offs either between different technical sustainability criteria (such as performance versus availability) or between technical sustainability criteria and economic sustainability criteria (such as performance versus costs). In contrast, sustainability-related software decision making involves trade-offs between environmental sustainability criteria (such as energy efficiency) and social, economic, and technical sustainability criteria” (p. 72). This sense of having “trade off” between one positive and one negative is the most pressing area that is needed for new research on the problem of sustainability in the next 3-5 years, as well. For corporations to make the big switch to sustainable practices and employ CSR policies that everyone can get behind, they need to find ways to be both sustainable and profitable so that all stakeholders are satisfied. It cannot be a situation where only one group of stakeholders is satisfied while another group is not. The whole community of stakeholders has to stand to benefit.
This is the main idea that is behind the topic of ThriveAbility (Baue & Wood, 2015). The idea here for future research is the leaders of industries have to find ways to make their industries not just sustainable but also “thriveable”—i.e., capable of thriving in a global environment. The thriveability concept is important to consider alongside the concept of sustainability because the latter really needs to rely on the former in order to work. A sustainable concept will not work if it does not lead to profits for the company and the stakeholders who invest in it. Consumers and communities may be happy that a sustainable policy has been put in place, but if the profits are not coming in, the company’s business model will not be sustainable. So learning to thrive within a sustainable framework is really a key area that needs to be researched in the next 3-5 years so that industry leaders can have a sense of what needs to change in order for their industries to be both successful and sustainable.
As Baumgartner (2014) points out, sustainable development should “be a source of success, innovation, and profitability for companies. To use this source and to deal with the challenge of sustainability, corporations need a framework they can rely on in order to identify opportunities and threats and to develop, implement, control, and improve corporate sustainability strategies to be both more sustainable (for themselves and the society) and more successful in economic terms” (p. 258). It is important for companies to know how to balance sustainability and economic thriveability in ways that work for both policies: a company must be profitable just as it must be sustainable in the coming years. The different stakeholders involved will demand that it be so, and the potential impact on the overall field of sustainability if it is shown how sustainability and thriveability can be reconciled across the board could be tremendous.
Currently, the field of sustainability is suffering in terms of how CSR policies are shaped from disillusionment: not all stakeholders believe companies really are mindful of sustainability, and the policies they develop end up looking like mere lip service (Bouten & Hoozee, 2015). This is not good for the field overall field of sustainability, especially when considering that the field must grow in a way that makes sense for corporations to see sustainability as a viable pathway to profitability. The merger of sustainable practices and policies with economic ideas that will help a company to be profitable is very important in the coming years.
Likewise, being able to communicate to all stakeholders how a company will be both sustainable and profitable is important, too, and more research is required on how to use communication tools effectively (Dovleac, 2015). As Tesla’s CEO has shown, there is a fine balance that must be maintained when using social media: Musk has demonstrated an inability to restrain himself at times as he has walked the tightrope of trying to be sustainable while also trying to convince investors that his company can be profitable. It has not always been easy for the car manufacturing CEO, and the stock has taken several hits over the past year as Musk has attempted to communicate more than he could actually make possible. He over-promises and under-delivers often and even made the mistake of tweeting out that he had enough interest from private investors to take the company private when in reality he did not. CEOs have to learn how to be a good communicator so as to keep investors happy and maintain the sustainable vision.




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