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Setting and Managing Sustainability Goals
Green Research, June 2011, Pages: 18
A growing number of companies are using sustainability goals as a means of signaling their commitment to become sustainability leaders, and to compete for superior positioning versus their rivals. In numerous interviews with sustainability executives, however, we have observed that companies' practices for selecting and managing sustainability goals vary widely. We have seen goals crafted on a foundation of meticulous analysis but we've also learned about goals made up on the way to a television appearance. We've seen highly professional practices established for managing and rewarding sustainability performance and we've also seen companies with goals but no tools in place to achieve them.
This study identifies the trends and best practices for defining, managing and communicating sustainability goals, an important new competitive arena for companies.
Key Questions
- What is the right way for companies to establish sustainability goals?
- How should companies manage sustainability performance to ensure they achieve their goals?
- When and how should sustainability goals be communicated to the public, and what is the place of internal sustainability goals?
Key Findings
- Companies should craft sustainability goals in consultation with internal and external experts and stakeholders, combining bottom-up and top-down analysis to produce goals that are material, achievable, quantitative and time-bound. A quarter of sustainability executives at leading companies have “aspirational” sustainability goals without a clear plan to achieve them.
- CEO support, operating executive accountability and regular progress reporting are the best practices of managing sustainability goals. Fifty percent of sustainability leaders tie part of C-level executive compensation to the achievement of sustainability goals. But over forty percent say progress on sustainability goals is reported to senior management only semi-annually or annually.
- Public sustainability goals demonstrate commitment and help galvanize internal staff and drive results. Seventy-nine percent of sustainability leaders have public greenhouse gas emissions goals while 45 percent have public waste and water goals. Companies with immature management or measurement practices should start with internal goals but aim to go public in short order.
Who Needs this Report
- Sustainability executives
- Senior executives and strategists
- Sustainability consultants
- Environmental and strategy consultants
- Vendors of, ERP, EHS, carbon accounting and sustainability management systems
- Industry associations
- Non-governmental environmental organizations
- Universities and sustainability research centers
- Sustainability public relations and marketing agencies
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