Business
How Business Leaders Can Save Time Building Their Sustainability Strategy?
Reducing your business’s carbon footprint is no longer optional for UK businesses: the UK government has a Net Zero target, and consumers are becoming increasingly focused on buying from sustainable sources.
As such, no business in any industry can afford to sit by and ignore sustainable business practices anymore. Unfortunately, one of the big downsides many businesses face when building and implementing sustainable strategies is the amount of time it takes.
To help, here are some simple time-saving techniques to try when creating a sustainability strategy for your business.
How Business Leaders Can Save Time Building Their Sustainability Strategy?
Engage Stakeholders From The Start
While it might be tempting to hire an outsourced consultancy to assist with your corporate sustainability strategy, a better approach is to work with key stakeholders, such as employees, customers, suppliers, and local communities.
Getting them involved in the strategy development process can provide valuable insights and ensure that the strategy addresses their concerns and expectations. Stakeholder engagement can also help build buy-in and support for the sustainability initiatives, ultimately saving time when you come to implement your plans.
Think Long Term
Sustainability strategies aren’t just about short-term time savings but also about ways you can ensure that your business doesn’t have a lot of work to do implementing your plans moving forward. For example, if you’re exploring sustainable sources of energy, such as solar panels, then you need to consider how you will maintain them over the coming years. Suppliers like AR Power offer ongoing solar panel maintenance, so you can save time in the long run and make the most of your investment in renewable energy technology.
Copy Your Competitors
Instead of starting from scratch with a blank ideas sheet, make the most of the work your competitors are doing. Use their strategies as a starting point to help you save time and effort. You can check out what has worked for them and what hasn’t to save time when trialling out new techniques and to give your business a better chance of success. While you don’t have to copy them entirely, embracing and researching how your competitors are being more eco-friendly can be a valuable time-saving tactic.
Leverage Existing Sustainability Frameworks
Another solution to use instead of starting from scratch when making your sustainability strategy is to embrace widely recognised sustainability frameworks and standards.
Some popular governing bodies developing frameworks for corporate sustainability include the Global Reporting Initiative (GRI), the Sustainability Accounting Standards Board (SASB), or the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). These guidelines provide outlines, metrics, and best practices that can serve as a starting point for developing a sustainability strategy so you have a basic framework which you can tailor to your business’s unique requirements.
A Brief Summary
Ultimately, incorporating sustainable approaches into your business will always be a long-term, time-consuming process. However, by employing these strategies, you can streamline the process of developing a comprehensive sustainability strategy, saving valuable time while still ensuring a robust and impactful approach to sustainability. Make the most of these tips and keep exploring new ways to save time while also reducing your company’s carbon footprint to preserve the planet for future generations.
Christy Bella
