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News & Views From the Front Line

Thursday, 15 April 2010

Sustainability in the Service Sector - video

Here's an extended clip from the Service Network event I did back in February. This will soon be on permanent display on this site.

Labels: gareth kane, service sector, sustainability, terra infirma

# posted by Gareth Kane : 07:00  0 Comments

Monday, 8 March 2010

People Power

I've just seen a quote on marketeer Seth Godin's blog, attributed to Carnegie:

"Take away my people, but leave my factories and soon grass will grow on the factory floors......Take away my factories, but leave my people and soon we will have a new and better factory."

There seems to be two approaches to sustainability - technology oriented and people oriented - and I always believe that the AND is important - you have to do both (hence my brainstorming tool).

But fundamentally everything is about people. People create technology, people implement technology, people operate technology. When a resource has a cost - that is a societal (peoples') value - you could argue that nature would put a higher value on a kilo of dung than a kilo of gold. So we always have to look at sustainability through the human lens.

I have a saying: the barrier to sustainability is six inches wide - the width of the space between our ears.

Labels: staff engagement, stakeholders, sustainability

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Monday, 21 December 2009

Sustainability in the Service Sector

I now have the details of the Sustainability in the Service Sector event on 11 Feb 2010.

The event will run from 9 - 12 noon at the Newcastle Falcons Rugby Club. I'll be doing the main talk on sustainability in the sector and, as my conclusion is that branding is the key driver for the sector, my good friend Graeme Mills of GPM Network will go into green branding in much more detail. We'll have lawyers Muckle LLP and the Northern Stage talking about their experiences.

The event is hosted by The Service Network. They charge £30 for non members. Click here to register.

Labels: branding, seminars, service sector, sustainability

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Tuesday, 6 October 2009

Personal Journeys

I'm writing this on the train back to Newcastle, having left a rather unseasonally sticky London behind me. I'm smiling to myself at one of those fantastically tautological announcements only train companies can make:

Labels: staff engagement, sustainability, workshops

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Wednesday, 30 September 2009

I'm on the train...

...down to Watford to run a sustainability workshop for senior NHS staff.

I love the train - even going through as bland countryside as East Yorkshire. The early morning sun is casting warm light and long shadows across the fields and villages. And of course I can get on with writing this blog, continuing with the Green Executive and catching up on my e-mail action list using the convenient wi-fi internet access. And drink coffee. Who on earth would prefer to drive or fly?

Two people on the next row are discussing the difficulties of hitting their organisation's carbon targets. I'm not deliberately earwigging (perish the thought), but I've got a Pavlovian twitch anytime someone mentions 80% by 2050 in my proximity. From what fragments I've overhead so far I could make about half a dozen suggestions...

Labels: carbon emissions, sustainability, train, workshops

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Friday, 25 September 2009

Book Review: Strategy for Sustainability by Adam Werbach

Adam Werbach was the youngest ever president of the Sierra Club and now heads up sustainability consultants Saatchi & Saatchi S having worked with many businesses including Walmart, so I had high hopes for this book. Unfortunately it does not get off to a good start, when Werbach lists ten of nature's rules for sustainability:

1. Diversify across generations.
2. Adapt and specialize to the changing environment.
3. Celebrate transparency.
4. Plan and execute systematically, not compartmentally.
5. Form groups and protect the young.
6. Integrate metrics.
7. Improve with each cycle. Evolution is a strategy for long-term survival.
8. Right-size regularly, rather than downsize occasionally.
9. Foster longevity, not immediate gratification.
10. Waste nothing, recycle everything, borrow little.

Problem is, two of these are demonstrably nonsense. Nature is not transparent, but has armfuls of beasties that rely on decidedly non-transparent tactics such as camouflage, mimicry and traps. If a fly knew what a Venus flytrap was, it would steer well clear. Likewise the idea that nature is 'obsessive' about protecting the young is disproved by watching any nature programme - just watch the annual slaughter of the innocents on BBC's Springwatch and you will see what I mean. I would also suggest the 'integrate metrics' rule was tenuous to say the least. Werbach also omits probably the most important sustainability lesson from nature - "Use Solar Energy". The other strange thing about these rules is that many are never or only briefly mentioned again, particularly number 1.

Werbach drops another clanger when he describes 'cradle to cradle' as the concept of eradicating toxics and improving energy efficiency at every life cycle stage from raw material extraction to disposal. Wrong. Cradle to cradle, as the name suggests, is about making products endlessly recyclable - there is no 'disposal' stage. There is also a somewhat unnecessary comparison of sustainability requirements with the famous business book 'Good to Great'.

This is a really great shame as the guts of the book, Werbach's TEN cycle of transparency, engagement and networking is a strong model for the human side of business sustainability (although why it has to be a cycle is not clear - why not three parallel activities?). Transparency is interpreted as both opening up available information to everyone and collecting all possible information. In engagement, Werbach advocates getting individuals to choose their own 'personal sustainability plan' to get them really engaged, and in the networking chapter he demonstrates a limited number of advantages of engaging with external stakeholders. All of this activity should be aligned to the business's sustainability 'North Star Goal'. Werbach omits any discussion of technological solutions, management structures or innovative business models.

In summary, I found the book really frustrating. The North Star Goal and TEN concepts are excellent, but I was constantly distracted by clangers, tenuous logic and clunky use of language. Werbach needs a really tough editor to cut the book down to the good 50% which could then be developed further. A deeply flawed gem.

Labels: adam werbach, book review, sustainability

# posted by Gareth Kane : 07:07  0 Comments

Monday, 21 September 2009

Monday Morning Training Tips

I'm taking a coffee break between client meetings on Teesside. I've just been with a world class engineering company, mapping out the content of two training seminars I'm doing for them, one on CSR and one on Sustainability & Design. While they're fresh in my mind, here are three top tips on sustainability training:

1. Sell the course to delegates

Many people are cynical about training. Many people are cynical about sustainability. You need to sell the purpose of the course to the delegates, both at the start and at points through the session. In this case I'll be pointing out how 'green' can win tenders and the business opportunities for this company in the low carbon agenda.

2. Mind the gap

If you leave a gap between the content of the course and the implementation of those ideas back at the desk, most of your hard work will fall straight through it. I always get delegates to apply the knowledge and skills they are learning to their day job during the session - closing the gap up before it occurs.

3. Make it thought provoking

Challenging your delegates is more effective than lame attempts to make the session fun. Ask questions, puncture myths and put people on the spot. If you can do fun too, then do it.


I think these are the most important three. Do you have any more?

Labels: csr, design, sustainability, training

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Wednesday, 16 September 2009

New! Executive Coaching Service (with Free Trial)

Are you responsible for delivering sustainability in your organisation? Are you finding it difficult to get momentum started? Do you feel lonely, frustrated and unappreciated?

Our coaching programme will give you the support you lack by providing a sounding board, helping you set personal targets to improve your performance and providing you with a smorgasbord of hints, tips and techniques to overcome your particular problems.

For a one-off annual fee, you will receive a personal one-to-one coaching session by telephone every month, but you can contact your coach at anytime by phone or e-mail should the occasion arise, subject only to availability. This is an extremely cost-effective way of benefiting from our skills and experience without having to fashion a project to justify it. The constant reinforcement of learning and reflection on past performance is much more effective than attending a simple training course.

Even better, we're offering a free trial session:

1. E-mail your details to coaching@terrainfirma.co.uk with three times during UK office hours on different days when you will be available for 45 minutes.

2. We will contact you to confirm one of those times or suggest another.

Please note this service is aimed at those with a genuine business need and we retain the right to discretion over who can participate in the trial.

Labels: coaching, sustainability, terra infirma

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Monday, 27 July 2009

Engineering the Future

I'm a member of the Institute of Engineering & Technology - back when I was appointed a member it was the Institute of Electrical Engineers (IEE). These engineering institutes have been around for a long time and they're very prestigious - you can't just turn up and pay your fees, you have to demonstrate a wide range of competencies gained through structured training, fulfil professional criteria and undergo a tough interview.

I joined as a student/graduate member during my sandwich course and later became an associate member. When I was deciding whether to apply for full membership, I had just completed 3 years in the environment/sustainability field and I was wondering if it was really for me. Just at that time, the IEE created the "Engineering for a Sustainable Future" network, so I thought "Yes! This is my spiritual home". But what a furore erupted in the letters page of the monthly news! The term "political correctness" featured heavily - "it is not the role of the engineer to get involved in a political agenda, harumph, grumble etc". One letter even blamed climate change on wind turbines slowing the prevailing winds, I kid you not.

What a difference eight years makes! The IET's journal now features a clutch of sustainability news stories and articles every issue and every third or fourth issue seems to be a special on some aspect of the field - the last but one being on "fuels for the future". And of course they should. Look at the issues - renewable energy systems, energy storage, grid connections, energy efficiency, industrial control systems, replacing goods with data, future fuels, intelligent grids, monitoring systems (including smart meters), building design, vehicle design, lightweight materials - the list is endless. Engineers are at the core of sustainability and they now see it as an exciting, fast moving and cutting edge ride to get on.

So well done to the IEE/IET for facing down the old duffers - onwards and upwards!

Labels: energy efficiency, engineering, renewable energy, sustainability

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Tuesday, 5 May 2009

Swine & Sustainability

OK, now it appears safe to do so, let's have a look at the probable origins of swine flu. We take a natural system - the pig - and industrialise it - breeding for maximum production and rearing them in huge numbers in unnatural conditions. Such a system maximises the opportunities for disease to flourish, so we dose them in antibiotics, but the bugs have the same desire to survive that we all do, so they mutate and adapt. The industrial system can only be made more productive by exporting it to countries where costs are lower, standards are lower and, for the same reasons, the local health infrastructure cannot cope with the results of the recipe for pandemic we have created. And guess what we get?

We appear to have been lucky this time - this flu spreads quickly but apparently doesn't have the proteins necessary to cause widespread death, but I get the impression that this is down to luck rather more than anything else.

All our environmental problems come from the same root cause - we are happy to exploit the natural resources around us (land, oxygen, animals, plants, fossil fuels, minerals etc, etc) without worrying about the sustainability of supply of those goods and services ie how they fit into the planet's natural cycles. One of the godfathers of the permaculture/organic farming movement, Masanobu Fukuoka, famously said:

"If we throw mother nature out the window, she comes back in the door with a pitchfork."

This disregard for the physical realities of the piece of rock we inhabit can lead to slow(ish) degradation like climate change and sudden disasters like pandemics. It is down to human nature that we fear the latter much more than the former, even though the impacts are often fleeting.

But both tell us we have to learn to respect the natural limits of the planet we live on - this is what we call sustainabilty. That will take ingenuity, innovation and some restraint. But we can, and must, do it.

Labels: climate change, sustainability, swine flu

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Monday, 27 April 2009

Greener businesses doing better in the recession

According to Management Consultancy, AT Kearney, in 16 of the 18 industries they studied, companies committed to sustainability outperformed industry averages by 15% over the six months from May through November 2008.

I know I keep banging on about this, but sustainability is not some fuzzy luxury like having modern art in your foyer. It is good business sense - lower costs, marketplace differentiation, lower risks, motivated workforce, better PR etc, etc. If a read another story about an organisation cutting environmental programmes "for survival", I will scream!

Labels: at kearney, green business, recession, sustainability, sustainable business

# posted by Gareth Kane : 10:47  1 Comments

Tuesday, 7 April 2009

Top 10 Myths About Sustainability

Scientific American's article on the myths surrounding sustainability is worth a read (hat tip to Mel Starrs for this link).

Labels: sustainability

# posted by Gareth Kane : 08:05  0 Comments

Friday, 9 January 2009

Book Review: Sustainability By Design

Warning: don't be fooled by the cute sunflower on the cover, or the modest page count, John Ehrenfeld's Sustainability by Designis the most intellectually rigorous treatment of sustainability that I have ever come across.

Ehrenfeld's diagnosis of the earth's problems is that we have become addicted to Having. The addiction analogy is a great one - we want more and more stuff even though we know that getting any of it will not satisfy us for long and only make us crave more. He then uses systems theory to argue that eco-efficiency, corporate social responsibility and (the standard view* of) sustainable development won't get us out of this addiction.

Instead he proffers and deconstructs a new definition of sustainability as "the possibility that humans and other life will flourish on the Earth forever". In particular the word 'flourish' is included to force home the idea that sustainability is not just a lack of unsustainability, but much more ambitious and positive than that. Drawing on the work of thinkers such as Heidegger, Fromm and Maturana, he argues we must move from our addiction to Having to a state of Being. To this we need to disrupt our current patterns of behaviour and he gives a range of examples of how that might be achieved.

The simplest of these is the two button toilet flush. By providing a decision point (high volume or low volume flush?) this product makes us stop and question why would we want to use more or less water and therefore links us (however briefly) to the natural world and the pressures upon it. He calls this disruption of our habits and routine by products 'presencing'. The disruption principle is also applied to the design of organisations and governance structures. Of course Ehrenfeld cannot provide all the answers within a 215 page book, but this work provides a context and springboard for the next generation of sustainable solutions.

Despite the approachable and open writing style, this a challenging read as it covers a lot of ground very quickly and the philosophical and linguistic concepts behind the arguments can be hard to grasp if you are coming to them for the first time as I was. It certainly disrupted my thinking on sustainability and has given me a deeper understanding of the principles - particularly on the consumption side of the coin.

In short: quite brilliant, but be prepared for an intensive intellectual workout!

* I define sustainable development as the process of achieving sustainability (so this work would be part of that process), but Ehrenfeld uses the standard definitions (eg meeting today's needs without compromising the needs of future generations).

Labels: books, eco-product, ehrenfeld, sustainability, sustainable production and consumption

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Wednesday, 3 December 2008

The myth of the environment and recession...

...is that the environment and sustainability can only be addressed when there is plenty of money about.

Let's be blunt - the current economic situation is good for the environment - we are driving less, insulating our houses more, and are likely to buy less tat with which to disappoint our loved ones on Christmas Day. But saving the world shouldn't be about living in poverty.

On a business level, there are two proven ways of surviving an economic downturn. One is to cut unnecessary costs, the other is to innovate.

It constantly staggers me that companies immediately try to cut staff costs. OK, if you have far too many people standing about doing nothing, then you should have already got rid of them. But if you cut your workforce, you cut your ability to respond to the inevitable upturn when the recession ends. The same people see waste and utility costs as a fixed cost of doing business which is complete nonsense. And with the true cost of waste being about 10 times the cost of disposal, there are massive cost savings to be made which will make your business more productive, not less. We found an average of £175k pa savings in 26 businesses in a raft of industries - and you don't have to make redundancy payments for waste.

Turning to innovation - it is well known that markets for green products are expanding fast and, in some - say white goods or baby food - the eco- end of the market dominates the 'conventional' by a factor of 3-4:1. Other sectors will follow, if they get the quality and labelling issues right more than anything else. Is it a surprise that the new electric Mini has just been launched when the big 3 US car companies are staring the grim reaper in the face?

The sustainability agenda does have the scope to help a business through the economic downturn. It's a pity the myth makers don't understand that!

Labels: green products, rant, sustainability, waste minimisation

# posted by Gareth Kane : 16:54  0 Comments

Tuesday, 30 September 2008

Are we at a point where Sustainability = sustainability?

I'm not an economist, but here's my take on the current financial situation. The bank crashes are due to the bubble bursting in the 'sub prime' mortgage market - too much money lent to too many people who can't afford to pay it back - a clear Corporate Social Responsibility issue (that's real grown up CSR, not the paper thin small-local-donations type CSR). We are also afflicted by 'short selling' - betting on shares losing value has serious ethical implications too - gambling on horses losing is illegal in many countries for good reason. Other industries and the general public are struggling with high and rising oil prices (an environmental issue) - leading to a breakdown in consumer confidence which furthers the vicious circle.

Sustainability with a big 'S' is about economics, environment and ethics. In the past there has been a need to differentiate between this and the small 's' sustainability ie the medium term viability of an organisation. But now I believe the two have converged and Sustainability is not an option when it comes to sustainability. Proper CSR would have saved the banks, and energy efficiency and/or a distributed energy system would make the economy much less dependent on the price of oil.

Maybe now we will wake up and smell the (sustainably sourced) coffee.

Labels: csr, ethics, sustainability, sustainable business

# posted by Gareth Kane : 05:31  1 Comments

Thursday, 28 June 2007

Terra Infirma sponsors CSR Forum

We are delighted to announce that we are now sponsoring the Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) Forum on SustainabilityForum.com.

The sponsorship forms part of our own CSR commitment: to get sustainability issues discussed and disseminated as much as possible. Despite having only been established recently, the Sustainability Forum is proving an excellent resource for exchanging information on this wide ranging topic. We are very proud to be able to play our part in its future.

Labels: csr, sustainability, terra infirma

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