Hari Balasubramanian
Founding Managing Partner at EcoAdvisors
Organizations are committing to sustainability, but many aren’t sure how to act. EcoAdvisors helps them realize the benefits while avoiding critical mistakes.
Being green may not be easy, but it can mean substantial payoffs to the environment and the bottom line. Many organizations recognize this but are struggling with the problem of “how to act.” Going off in the wrong direction can risk failure in meeting critical environmental and financial goals.
EcoAdvisors helps individuals, corporations, and organizations integrate sustainability into decision-making across four main sectors: voluntary, public sector, corporate sector, and investment sector. Mediaplanet recently spoke with Hari Balasubramanian, Founding Managing Partner at EcoAdvisors, to learn more about why it pays to be green and how EcoAdvisors can help.
Why should organizations integrate sustainability into their decision-making process?
The future of humanity on this planet depends upon it. If we don’t have a sustainable view of conducting business, then all of our life’s activities and humanity will not exist. We live in a finite system that we treat like an infinite system in terms of the number of resources it can provide and the amount of waste it can absorb.
How does sustainability drive business value?
Aside from enhancing reputation and responding to increased public awareness, there are unbelievable growth opportunities from a financial and economic perspective. Embedding sustainability within the organization, for example, can help with employee retention, meaning the costs associated with training new personnel go down.
What is sustainable value?
Anything that reduces the burden we place on the planet and which supports restoration and regeneration for a net-positive environmental impact is sustainable value. It’s also about identifying synergistic opportunities where you can create economic value without eroding the underlying value creation base, which is nature and the planet.
What are some common errors companies make in trying to go green?
One is seeing sustainability as a cost item on their profit net loss statement instead of a value creation item that generates additional revenue or reduces costs and other impacts.
Another is making sustainability an add-on rather than integrating it into the core business and operations. If you don’t integrate it, you can’t drive value because you won’t be able to see where there are trade-offs and opportunities.
Finally, people get captivated by technology, what we call the “bright shiny object syndrome.” Still, we need to understand the systems and what will influence change, and then scale demonstrated solutions rather than only looking for new, unproven silver bullet technologies. We must think about decarbonizing heavy industry and creating efficiencies in the built environment in legacy infrastructure with existing technologies.
We know and understand sustainability, the systems that shape it, and what solutions are going to make material pathways for progress.
Why should companies work with an organization like EcoAdvisors?
We know and understand sustainability, the systems that shape it, and what solutions will make material pathways for progress. This allows us to help clarify where trade-offs may be necessary and where synergies exist to accelerate economic and sustainability progress. We’re also quick to assess flash-in-the-pan ideas that aren’t going to make it either because the sustainability gain isn’t big enough or the commercial potential isn’t viable. Historically, we’ve been taught that there’s a fundamental trade-off between sustainability and economic growth. There are a lot of things in between that can drive both forward that we’re not scaling the potential of, and that’s where we focus.
