Question

6

IMPLEMENTING SUSTAINABILITY

Your heart is racing as you stand in front of the gathering of customers. Though not usually at a loss for words

you are having trouble answering their questions about the dangers of the materials and processes used by your

company, Interface, Inc., a manufacturer of commercial-grade carpet and flooring. What's more, when you hesitate

they doggedly persist. And none of the questions are about things you know, like discounts, lower prices, or inventory

After you conclude the meeting, you race back to the office and convene a task force to respond to your

customers' questions. But as soon as you assign the team its task, its members turn around and ask you to explain the

company's environmental vision. "What vision?" you think to yourself. Desperately looking for inspiration, you

happen upon a book by Paul Hawken entitled The Ecology of Commerce: A Declaration of Sustainability. You open it,

hoping to glean some good ideas that you can repackage for your task force (and your customers)

Interface generates billions of dollars in revenue each year, but in the process, it extracts over 1 billion pounds

of raw materials from the earth. The company is also a profligate water user, requiring millions of gallons a year for its

manufacturing process-not to mention the petroleum-based materials consumed and the greenhouse gases emitted

during the process. Furthermore, your product, carpet, is not recyclable. When people install new carpet, the old carpet

is dumped in a landfill

But Interface is not alone. The entire carpet industry works to the same standards. Competitors like Shaw Walker, J & J

Industries, and C&A Floorcoverings use the same amount of materials, have essentially the same manufacturing

processes, and generate the same amount of waste, all for products that can't be (or aren't) recycled

After reading Hawken's book, you realize that Interface will have to change. The question is, how much? How

much can Interface change its processes to be environmentally friendly without compromising the company's growth?

Sustainability requires that products either be able to easily reenter nature without depositing toxins or be recyclable

into new materials. For a manufacturing process to be sustainable, its net effect on the environment must be zero. That

might mean using renewable resources, redesigning the process to eliminate all waste streams, or even

product that can be infinitely recycled. That's a lot to ask. Can you sustain the company if you adopt environmental

sustainability as a vision?

Sources:R. Anderson, "Sustainability Drives Innovation," Environmental Design& Construction, December 2004, 38; M. Conlin,

or: In a New Documentary, Interface's Ray Anderson Discusses His Green Epiphany, Business Week,

From Plunderer to Pro

July 19, 2004, 60; L. Stevens, "It's Hip to Make Squares: Carpet Company Charts New Course," Fort Worth Star-Telegram, March

10, 2005; Recycling Commercial Carpet Has Become Easier with INVISTA Carpet Reclamation Centre's Announcement That It

Will Accept Carpet," Buildings, March 2005, 7; K. Weeks, "A Walk in the Garden: Taking Carpet Sustainability to a New Level

Shaw and William McDonough Focus on a Cradle-to-Cradle Lifecycle to Develop a New Collection of Commercial Carpet Tile,"

Contract. April 2004, 36-38

What are the three components of social responsibility?

Which level of social responsibility best describes the company's current operations? Provide an example.

Answer 1

The three components of social responsibility are economic, legal and ethical. The economic component is towards the stakeholders of the company who expect the company to make profits and give them returns. It includes gaining a competitive advantage in the market too. The ethical component states that the practices and operations of the company should be ethically and morally acceptable. Respect for society's values should be present in the goals they achieve. The legal component is that the company should work in compliance with the laws and regulations and not practice anything that is unlawful in terms of local, state and federal laws.

In the current operations, the company took care of the economic and legal responsibility but not ethical social responsibility. They were manufacturing such products and with such processes that were harmful to the environment. Being ethically right the company should find ways to protect the environment, recycle or eliminate waste and make their processes environment friendly. They had to create an environmental vision which makes their business ethically and morally acceptable.