Engaging Stakeholders: The Secret to Sustainability Success
What’s new. Broad stakeholder engagement is the key to adopting a holistic view that drives sustainability in purpose-driven businesses.
Why it matters. Incorporating broad perspectives and insights leads to sustainable outcomes. Just think about how Whole Foods brought organic produce to the mass market and impacted farming practices. John Mackey, author of Conscious Capitalism and co-founder of Whole Foods, took a broad view and included employees, customers, suppliers, communities, the environment, and investors as stakeholders.
Meet the stakeholders – People, Planet & Profit. The future-forward stakeholder model of people, planet & profit is more important than ever because they are intertwined on a global scale. When People & Planet take center stage, companies can focus on building long-term value-creation and measurable Profit.
POV:
93% of employees believe that companies must lead with purpose
Consumers are 4-6x more likely to trust, protect, champion, and purchase from companies with a strong purpose
Go deeper. In my transformation work, there are two tools that I use to enable taking a broad view of stakeholders: Stakeholder engagement assessments and a process called Q-Storming.
Stakeholder engagement assessments are tools that allow you to consolidate data and organize your approach to interacting with your stakeholder group. As each situation is different, I craft my own matrices using strategies from the Project Management Institute (PMI). This presentation Stakeholder management strategies: applying risk management to people walks through a handful of strategies that can be tailored to individual environments. To broaden the stakeholder group that is being assessed, I recommend adding the three pillars of sustainability to the matrix, the community (People), the environment (Planet), and the economy (Profit). While you may not be able to address all three pillars, including them as a stakeholder plants the seeds for sustainability.
Q-Storming, a technique very similar to brainstorming, focuses on questions. Instead of looking for solutions, the goal of Q storming is to ask questions. Imagine a group of stakeholders with different responsibilities and goals all sharing their questions. GOLD MINE!! In one session, you will learn more about what is needed to develop sustainable business processes than any single requirements gathering session. Here is an article where you can learn more.
The bottom line. Incorporating a broad group of stakeholders and their perspectives into your transformation plans is key to creating value and driving holistic, sustainable outcomes.
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A FRESH APPROACH | Chiefly & Co.’s fractional experts accelerate sustainability & profitability for companies driven to do well while doing good. Learn more at chiefly-co.com
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