The ??you should be looking at in your business.

I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again; the world is burning.

People and the planet are suffering due to decades upon decades of businesses not considering the impact they have on the world and ignoring sustainable practices, or at best them being an afterthought.

But sustainability needs to be at the core of all businesses. And if it's not, you are in trouble.

According to the World Economic Forum the top five business risks are all environment-related. On top of this, according to a survey by Deloitte, millennials currently make up 40% of all consumers, and 40% of this demographic believe that the goal of business shouldn’t be a healthy bottom line, but a contribution to society.?

So how your business is run, makes products or delivers its services, and how you define your values is huge. Not only are sustainable practices important for the planet, they’re crucial to your business surviving in the years ahead.

The word ‘sustainability’ can seem quite vague at times though, and with that lack of specificity can come unclear communication from businesses, or outright greenwashing. Rather than trying to create sustainability policies or communications that connect with what you have already decided your business offers, sustainability needs to run through every aspect of the organisation.

But how?

There are many different ways a business can become sustainable, for example: by reducing waste, preventing pollution, adopting clean energy, conserving water, planting trees. Businesses can also use sustainable materials and make their more products sustainable; they can also adopt sustainable business policies.

On a micro scale, this can include things such as;

• Limiting the need to travel by hosting video conferences
• Video conferencing positively affects People (better work-life balance), Planet (fewer CO2-emissions) and Profit (less travel, less wasted time, fewer costs)
• Offsetting CO2 emissions
• Businesses can invest in CO2 reduction projects (eg. planting trees) and encouraging employees to buy their flight (if a flight is necessary) on websites such as FlyGRN, which offsets a flight’s CO2 emissions for free.

But the key is to make sustainable practices part of every single department / aspect of a business no matter what size they are. This will help businesses to retain the best talent while attracting and retaining more customers. The brand enhancement that comes with putting sustainability at the heart of business will help with all this. Not to mention the opportunity to save money from efficiencies and develop new products and services that get them ahead of the curve.

As such, education and support in what it means to be sustainable is crucial. Learning from others and recognising that any ‘failure’ of your business to not hold sustainability at its core is only a failure if it’s not something you’re working to rectify.

What would be a failure would be not recognising the current situation for what it is - an emergency. But this could also be an opportunity. We know that sustainable businesses are needed for the future of our planet and the best way to achieve this is to start working together.

And this is what The Better Business Network is all about; connecting and supporting businesses to increase their positive impact on the world alongside their profit.

We believe individually we are one drop, together we are an ocean. And oceans are powerful.

If you are interested in getting involved, join us for one of our upcoming Meet The Founders or other Events to give you an insider look at how The Better Business Network works, what you get in the members portal and what we do to support our members, to get them to that next level; smashing those goals consistently to help them succeed!

?I’ll be discussing my vision for the future and how you can be part of a bigger project to create systematic change as one community rather than trying to make that impact on your own.?

You’ll find out first-hand from our members what it’s like being part of our supportive community and how it’s benefited their business.

Find out more, and sign up, here: https://thebetterbusiness.network/upcomingevents/??