Strategy for Sustainability
By Adam Werbach
Published by: Harvard Business Press, 2009
I expected Adam Werbach’s Strategy for Sustainability to have an adversarial tone; indeed, it is subtitled A Business Manifesto. After all, Werbach was an activist with Greenpeace, and is a former president of the Sierra Club. So you can imagine my surprise to find the book full of positive stories about the sustainability strategies employed by companies such as Walmart, Procter & Gamble, McDonald’s and Clorox. Apparently, these and other major corporations have been adopting a variety of strategies that not only help restore a greener planet, but also help their own financial bottom line.
Werbach asserts that sustainability requires businesses to assess three areas of change This STaR (society, technology and resources) analysis might be most useful in our work with schools. Organizations need to pay attention to social changes. In terms of education, think of demographic issues and how networking has become so pervasive.
In terms of technological change, I am reminded of the work of Alan November and how pedagogy should be influenced by our use of the Internet. Resource changes bring to mind rising costs or issues of recycling and reusing.
To create institutional change, Werbach insists the key elements are greater transparency, deep employee engagement and a strong network support. He seems to be steering us away from strategic planning toward more organic and pliable strategic thinking. And so we are reminded about consistent leadership and the need for a commonly understood sustainability culture within our organizations.
Certainly, Strategy for Sustainability informs my own personal actions, and I was comforted by Werbach’s corporate examples. For educators, there is useful information that might inspire students to make sustainable choices. For school leaders, however, it takes a bit of a leap to connect the business-oriented strategies and examples to an educational institution.
About James McConnell
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