By Melissa J. Anderson

Have you heard about the behavioral economic idea of the “nudge”?

Popularized by economists Richard H. Thaler and Cass R. Sunstein, a nudge is basically an arrangement that points people in a certain direction when they are given a choice. For example, in Thaler and Sunstein’s book Nudge: Improving Decisions About Health, Wealth, and Happiness, the two authors explain how putting fresh fruit, rather than desserts, closer to eye level in a cafeteria serving line influences students to make healthier lunch choices. The placement of the fruit doesn’t take the choice of dessert away – it just “nudges” students toward the healthier decision.

A new report by Ecoalign, an energy and environment marketing agency, details how businesses can employ nudges to help consumers improve energy conservation. The report, prepared by Dean Karlan, Professor of Economics at Yale University, explains that nudges do not change behavior. They serve as helpful reminders for an individual, of what he or she, in theory, wants to do – making it easier to overcome a short-term moment of weakness or laziness in the face of a long-term decision, for example, to eat better or recycle more.

Here are four ways that you can use nudges to help make your office more environmentally sustainable.

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By Melissa J. Anderson

A report recently released [PDF] by Best Buy’s explains how the company approaches sustainability – from three standpoints: people, technology, and power. The company combines employee engagement and sound environmental practices under the sustainability umbrella – explaining that they are what make the company grow sustainably.

In a bnet article, Carol Tice explains, When Best Buy talks sustainability, it’s not just talking environmental impact — it’s talking about designing the culture of Best Buy so that the company thrives, from worker treatment to supplier and factory relationships.

Of course, Best Buy recognizes that there are challenges ahead – there are always improvements to make. In fact, in many ways, the numbers listed in the report are not stellar – for example only a 75% retention rate or an 82.8 customer satisfaction score (although both of these numbers have risen over the past year). Brian Dunn, Chief Executive Officer, writes, in the report:

“For me, unleashing the power of our people captures the core idea that has always driven Best Buy, and, in my opinion, every great human organization: that a group of ordinary people can accomplish extraordinary things when they work together. In fact, it’s the only way anything extraordinary ever happens.”

At the same time the company is working to energize its employees and improve working conditions across the chain, Dunn says that the company is also cognizant that technology and energy use go hand in hand. Best buy is working hard to increase recycling efforts and build more energy efficient stores.

It’s a looming task, but, Dunn says:

“optimism isn’t just my genetic set-point; it comes from my objective observation that once people understand a set of challenges, they are capable of creating solutions that eventually surpass anything we can imagine.”

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By Kate McClaskey

We’ve all heard about the wave of more environmentally friendly automobiles that have been built in the past few years. Hybrids, electric cars, cars that run on bio diesel and ethanol, cars that run on hydrogen, the list goes on. Auto manufacturers across the globe have begun designing these in response to the exploding worldwide concern for the environment. But beyond creating products that are green, car companies are manufacturing them in green ways too, even in this tough economic time.

According to a study conducted by Gartner Research [PDF] in 2009, “sustainability will be a strategic theme beyond the recession.” Automobile companies are proof of this. Even as the recession crippled markets and companies alike, consumers began to demand better and more eco friendly cars. So the automobile companies stepped up to the plate and started investing even more money into making them. This means that they will “increasingly be justified to meet stakeholder expectations, to build trust and compliance, and to manage risk related to the business’s reputation” when it comes to sustainable cars.

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By Kate McClaskey

What’s new in CSR? Here’s what we have been reading this weekend.

BP’s still not on the ball…

Chrystia Freeland from the Washington Post speculates who’s to blame for the oil spill. She says it has taught us that the heart of the relationship between business and society doesn’t lie with the charitable deeds that companies do in their off-hours, but whether they are doing their day jobs in ways that help — or hurt — the rest of us. While BP was winning plaudits for being the first oil company to accept global warming as a scientific fact, the old-school Texas oilmen at ExxonMobil were unfashionably unapologetic about their core mission: to produce oil. Chastened by the Exxon Valdez disaster, however, they also became religious about safety standards. With hindsight, that attention to safety turns out to have had much greater social value than any number of creative CSR drives.

India creates voluntary CSR guidelines

JustMeans writes how for the first time in its history, the government of India, through its Ministry of Corporate Affairs, issued a set of voluntary CSR guidelines. Their intent is to add company value, focus on long-term sustainability contributions and provide benefit to stakeholders and society.

Will colleges soon start teaching CSR in school?

Aman Singh of Forbes.com questions how job seekers and business school graduates view the rising awareness of concepts like triple bottom line, corporate responsibility, and ethical management. Turning to four MBA candidates for some answers whether recent Wall Street shortcomings were redefining MBA curriculum at their schools. Each of the candidates agreed that a complete embedding of corporate responsibility within company cultures across America would require a coordinated push from employees and job seekers as well as students.

The truth about CSR compensation

Leon Kaye writes that more professionals have become interested and passionate about sustainability, judging by the growth in related academic programs and, anecdotally, the surge in networking and other professional events that have a corporate social responsibility theme.  Idealism and the genuine desire to accomplish good, however, may conflict with the reality of paying the mortgage or rent check.

Walmart’s green strategy raises some questions

Bob Lurie explores Wal-Mart’s vow made earlier this year to eliminate 20 million metric tons of greenhouse gases from its supply chain over the next five years. he says it turns out the promise may be more of a form regulatory vigilantism.

By Melissa J. Anderson

Last month Google hosted an event launching the Green Products Innovation Institute, an organization that “promote[s] an innovation-oriented model for eliminating toxic chemicals and other negative environmental impacts. The GPII prescribes a set of design principles, based on the laws of nature, to help businesses create products that are safe for people and the environment.”

The GPII will provide certifications for sustainable product design based on the Cradle-to-Cradle design philosophy and framework. According to an article written by by William McDonough and Michael Braungart, founders of the design philosophy, Cradle-to-Cradle:

“rejects the assumption that the natural world is inevitably destroyed by human industry, or that excessive demand for goods and services is the inevitable cause of environmental problems. Conventional industrial design is flawed because it developed in a time when few understood the dynamic relationship between economy and ecology, or the principles of the earth’s natural systems.”

They continue,”Cradle to Cradle Design, on the other hand, is modeled on the perpetual flows of energy and nutrients that support biodiversity. The intention: to apply the intelligence and effectiveness of natural systems to product, process and facility design.

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By Melissa J. Anderson (New York City)

One of today’s most widely used buzz words is “innovation.” Everyone’s innovating – or they want to! As Intel CEO Paul Otellini said at the recent World Congress for Information Technology, “Returning to sustained economic growth means taking a long-term view with a mindset of investment.”

He continued, “Innovation results from combining people who have good ideas with investment. These are the guiding forces that lead to ideas which spawn new businesses that create new jobs, and ultimately lead to wealth creation and higher standards of living.”

Several companies in the US and around the world are taking it upon themselves to encourage innovation. In the long run, they hope, encouraging innovation can help themselves grow and improve standards of living, as well as improve economies globally.

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By Andrea Newell (Grand Rapids, MI)

Does your company have a mentoring program? Were you considering signing up to mentor a colleague? You have great timing – January is National Mentoring Month.

We previously reported on the benefits of having a mentor at any stage in your career, but how do you actually go about mentoring someone? Dr. Lois Zachary, President of Leadership Development Services, contributed her insight to our article, but she is also the author of The Mentor’s Guide: Facilitating Effective Learning Relationships.

The Mentor’s Guide gives you a concrete process to follow in order to build a successful and mutually beneficial mentoring relationship. Zachary’s approach is much like a business project, and as the mentor, you are the project manager.

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By Jacqueline Libster (New York City)

Is “CleanTech” the new, hot buzzword for 2010? It’s on the lips of everyone in finance, banking, law, public policy, economics, regulatory and urban planning. CleanTech is the umbrella term for all clean forms of generating energy. It encompasses all the ways to improve efficiency and performance while reducing waste and saving money.

On December 1, the Women’s Network for a Sustainable Future (WNSF) hosted a panel discussion on CleanTech for women in business, addressing CleanTech from a local, national and global perspective, and where it might go in the future.

From “Oil Addiction” to Massive CleanTech Investment

Ann Goodman, Ph.D., the Executive Director of WNSF, said in her opening remarks that we all need to look for “greener, cleaner energy offerings” to reduce waste and improve efficiency. She added that, although innovations in CleanTech can save money in the long run, there needs to be a big financial investment upfront to bring this technology to the market.

Diana Propper, a Partner at Expansion Capital Partners, LLC, a clean technology venture capital firm, was the moderator of the event. She gave an overview of how CleanTech evolved. In her opinion, it all started in earnest around 2006 when crude oil was trading at over one hundred dollars per barrel and President Bush declared that the US was “addicted” to oil. This prompted widespread oil conservation, the likes of which we had not seen since the 1970s. At this point, Propper noticed the clean energy sector “began to engage.’ Investments increased, venture capitalists and investment funds began to raise money. Between 2004 and 2006 for example, Propper said that investments in CleanTech ballooned from $33 billion to $92 billion.

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By Melissa J. Anderson (New York City)

In 1972, we got our first real glimpse of what the Earth looked like from outer space with the iconic “Blue Marble” photograph taken by astronauts aboard the Apollo 17 spacecraft. But as Kathy Robb, Partner at Hunton and Williams and Chair of the Women’s Network for a Sustainable Future (WNSF) explained, it wasn’t just a pretty picture— it represented much more.

“This perspective, never before possible, dramatically affected our appreciation of the natural environment,” she said. Today’s view of sustainability “may well be another bright line,” she continued.

On Tuesday, October 6th, WNSF held its 6th annual Businesswomen’s Sustainability Leadership Summit. Entitled “New Dynamics of Sustainability Leadership: Changing Roles, Fresh Opportunities,” the summit took place at the Institute for International Education at the U.N. and brought together 200 women to discuss the new dynamics of sustainability in the business world.

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by Pamela Weinsaft (New York City)

On October 2nd, 2008, top women in sustainability from Fortune 500 companies, financial institutions, and non-governmental organizations gathered together at JP Morgan Chase for the Women’s Network for a Sustainable Future’s 5th Annual Businesswomen’s Sustainability Leadership Summit. This year’s theme -Leading Change: How to Champion Sustainability in Your Company.

Women’s Network for a Sustainable Future is committed to the mobilization of businesswomen in support of social responsibility and to advancing sustainable development by giving women in the workplace a voice in the sustainability debate. Participants at this year’s conference exchanged ideas, experiences and best practices concerning sustainability while networking and forging relationships with similarly-minded women.

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