This bigger principle is nothing shockingly new; Thomas Edison already said: "I never perfected an invention that I did not think about in terms of the service it might give to others. I find out what the world needs, then I proceed to invent”. It proved a successful strategy…
A realisation.
Much happened since the Club of Rome raised an alarming red flag in 1968 in their report “The Limits to growth: a global challenge”. Most public and private sector leaders realise now that an economic growth paradigm that does not take into account the preservation of the natural resources of the only planet Earth we have, nor the legitimate expectation of the less privileged in the world to have access to a fair share of this growth; is not sustainable and can even lead into multiple scenarios of self destruction.
Redefining.
Our economic system, fueled by large scale company investments and innovation, has been extremely successful in creating prosperity and value for a significant part of the current population. I’m convinced that the most effective way to bend “business as usual” growth scenarios in a sustainable direction builds on redefining company’s value propositions and supporting this by (re)directing massive resources to the necessary investments and innovation in service of a more sustainable development.
Rethinking.
Of course we also urgently need to rethink “Western” consumption patterns. How else can we protect our air quality, address our waste and landfill issues and ensure that privileged access to food leads to longer and healthier lives and not to reduced life expectancy due to indulgence and obesities. This in contrast to the fact that 3 out of every 5 newborns enters the world in a below $2 a day poverty situation in an emerging country. Their legitimate request for a decent life will even with more modest Western consumption result in ongoing global economic growth.
Responsibility.
A growing group of citizens, their voices bundled in NGO’s and political movements, are demanding fundamental changes in the contribution of companies to society. The legitimacy of the contract between companies and society in a business as usual scenario is questioned. This is not just “fixed” by providing the market with supposedly “greener” products at a premium. It means that these citizens expect from companies ethical behavior in service of people and planet in everything they do. Anything less can be seen as a breach of confidence between companies and society and many brands have seen how their brand appreciation went from “hero to zero” overnight after public exposure of unacceptable practices in their business conduct.
The good news is that promising progress at scale is made. For example; renewable energy is already seen as a significantly better investment opportunity than fossil fuels and this will trigger accelerated share decrease of the latter. Scaling of more sustainable technology brings downs the costs and pulls forward the break-even point with conventional solutions. The crux is to reach these tipping points ASAP. Also deforestation due to agriculture expansion in the tropics has slowed down due to global attention for climate action (like COP 21 Paris in 2015) encroachment of e.g. palmoil, soy, pulp & paper and cattle into tropical forests. And massive amounts of capital are sitting in development banks and impact investors “waiting” to scale investments in high SDG (UN Sustainable Development Goals) impact deals. I believe these changes start to move way beyond good PR for front-running brands; they form the new “license to operate” for companies at large.
On a positive note.
