Promoting environmental awareness usually ends up dividing the world into two camps - environmentalists that want to save the world, pitted against huge corporations that want to conquer it. Can the twain ever meet? That’s the multi-billion dollar question that has yet to be answered, but today we’ll share a little hope and inspiration.
Meet Ray Anderson, founder of Interface, one of the world’s largest interior furnishing companies. Just as he was about reaching retirement age, back in 1994, an environmental book landed on his desk that turned his world upside down. This epiphanal moment set him on a course for ’sustainability mountain’ - the corporate goal he has set for himself and his company.
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February 10th, 2007
Excellent interview, thanks for posting. You might be interested in what a smaller company in the US has been doing by including sustainability principles in their corporate documents: http://nylawline.typepad.com/greencounsel/2007/01/nau_a_legally_e.html
February 10th, 2007
I think you’ve hit the nail on the head Stephen. Successful, planet-stomping corporations are only following the guidelines of the corporate charter they’re founded on. Their foundational doctrine has them working for the sole purpose of keeping their shareholders happy, but ignores the planet the shareholders rely upon for survival.
If we can’t just rewrite these charters, then creating a new ‘Sustainable Corporation’ template, and enticing existing businesses to want to make the switch through attractive tax breaks, subsidies - and of course the promise of floods of supportive green-consumers - is a logical progression. How do we get it done?
February 11th, 2007
To me, the best part of this is the influence that Anderson’s commitment to sustainability has had on other corporations. No tree can grow unless a seed is planted.