Sustainable BT Is Pursuing Its Own Self-Interest--And That's a Good Thing
He then shows that many of the eco-friendly practices, such as teleconferencing, that BT is promoting in the name of sustainability are also revenue sources for BT. And this leads Mellor to question--albeit gently--the genuineness of the company's commitment to the cause:
Here we have a hugely-prominent British company enthusiastically evangelising the sustainability (read 'green' mostly) agenda, practising what it preaches, which is a solidly good thing, and using the green agenda to sell its kit and services.We all share Mellor's cynicism about televangelists who live high on the hog. But that's because living in luxury contradicts the spiritual message most televangelists promote, which is about humility, self-sacrifice, and service to others. However, there's no contradiction between running a profitable, growing business and the "green gospel" of sustainability, so Mellor's comparison seems off the mark.
This could be interpreted as having an element of jumping on the green bandwagon to pursue its own self-interest. When BT says sustainability makes commercial sense it certainly does for BT because other businesses may well use BT products and services to pursue their own sustainability goals. . . .
For BT it's almost a case, one might suggest, of self-interest driving its sustainability agenda rather than being a byproduct of it. I don't know if this is true and am not pointing an accusatory finger at BT. But the co-incidence of self-interest and the sustainability agenda evangelising at BT is surely worthy of note.
One instinctively believes more in the commitment of priests who take a vow of poverty than in the religious faith of television evangelists living in million-dollar homes.
If anything, we'd make the opposite point: The more profitable BT's eco-friendly offerings are for the company, the deeper and more sincere BT's commitment to sustainability is likely to be. Anyone who has worked in a corporation will confirm that there is nothing more heartfelt than the desire of executives to report healthy profits every quarter! And this sincere love of profit is shared by board members, shareholders, and all the other key decision-makers at most companies.
So the extent to which BT is able to align its profitability goals with genuinely sustainable practices is not a measure of the company's insincerity, but just the opposite. Such alignment is exactly what believers in sustainable business need to pursue. Without it, green initiatives lose money and therefore become philanthropic efforts rather than profit sources--which makes them inherently less sustainable in the long run.
This is not to say that teleconferencing and the other business practices being promoted by BT are genuinely green--that's a matter for experts to evaluate by objective criteria. But the fact that promoting these practices serves BT's self-interest isn't a bug--it's a feature.
Labels: BT, Chris Mellor, Finance and Investment, Measurement
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By 
, on
November 6, 2007 12:27 AM
Mark,
You're right, of course, to say that a product can't be described as "sustainable" except in a specific economic context. (By the way, this is Karl Weber writing--I'm responsible for the post, not my fellow blogger Andy Savitz, as indicated by my initials at the top of the post.) Both Chris Mellor and I were speaking of products and services as "sustainable" just as a handy shorthand for the more complex and complete analysis one would have to do before seriously applying that word, since we were both interested in focusing on different but related issues. Your comment serves as a useful reminder that the shorthand is no substitute for the full context. Thanks for making it.
By 
KW, on
November 6, 2007 6:08 AM
I agree that there can be a yawning gap between the acceptance of beliefs/attitudes aligned with "good CSR" and the actions taken by a business. Sustainability is a domain where, according to this most recent survey of U.S. business leaders, positive attitudes aren't connecting as strongly as yet with actions in planning, researching, developing, and marketing sustainable products and/or services. See www.corporatecitize07.com and click on the powerpoint slides from the Net Impact Annual Conference for some of the details.
By mpopovich@hitachifoundation.org, on
November 6, 2007 12:54 PM
Hi Karl:
Thanks for the reply. In agreeing with me, you said of sustainability assessments that "a product can't be described as 'sustainable' except in a specific economic context". I'm not sure that's what I meant. Why do you say that as opposed to, say, a specific social or environmental context? What does an economic context have to do with the environmental sustainability of an organization's operations?
Regards,
Mark
By Mark W. McElroy, on
November 6, 2007 11:05 PM
Mark,
I don't think we're saying two different things. I am just using the word "economic" broadly, to refer to the entire context in which a product or service is used. Your point is well taken and I fully agree.
Karl
By KW, on
November 7, 2007 6:57 AM
Hi Andy:
A comment, if I may. My own view is that your analysis (and Chris Mellor's for the matter) invite confusion for two reasons: 1) they leave open the question of whether or not BP's operations are themselves sustainable, which is the real measure of corporate sustainability, and 2) they treat products as the sorts of things that themselves can be sustainabe or not, when in fact they cannot be assessed as such.
As for the first issue, whatever products a company happens to offer, or not, has nothing to do with the social and/or environmental sustainability of its own operations. Thus, nothing in yours or Chris's analsysis offers the slightest indication as to whether BP, the company, is socially and/or environmentally sustainable.
Regarding the second issue, products (or services) are not, by themselves, subject to sustainability assessments. Rather, it is the production, delivery, use, and disposal of such products (i.e., human activities, not inanimate objects or abstractions) that can be sustainable, or not. Only when we see how a BP product or service, for example, is produced, delivered, used, and disposed of can we make sustainability assessment, but even then for activites only. Moreover, every such analysis will always be context specific. The same product when used by one customer may be sustainable, but be unsustainable when used by another. Thus, the product-centric view of sustainability just doesnt make sense.
Regards,
Mark