Departments

Some people see sustainability as a new thing they need to pay attention to, kinda like when a new social media platform comes up.

Say your team's been working an Instagram strategy for a while, and now this thing called TikTok is making waves, and you think it'll be important for your org to get involved.

Ok, simple enough - hire a TikTok person, build a strategy, and run it with the Insta one.

You're also seeing this sustainability thing more and more, it's everywhere. People are talking about their impact, zero-waste packaging is a thing, your coffee came in a composable cup this morning, and companies are contributing a % of profits to good causes... maybe we should pay attention to that too.

Ok simple enough. Hire a sustainability person, build a strategy, and run the sustainability plan.

But there's a critical difference.

While you do need to start somewhere (and making a dedicated hire is a great place to start) it's important to realise that unlike a marketing strategy, sustainability efforts will infiltrate every department of your org, and likely change the way they operate at least a little.

Marketing, yes.
HR, yes.
R&D, yes.
Sales, yes.
Production, definitely yes.
Finance, 100% yes.

Sustainability doesn't really work if it's a separate department with little input into the operations of the other departments. It's a pretty big shift in the way you think of business, and probably to the way you've always run a business.

This email from about a week ago highlights some of the differences you might see.