The following is an extract from new book Forces for Good: Creating a better world through purpose-driven businesses, written by Paul Hargreaves.
Recently I was talking to a room of people at a Chamber of Commerce meeting about how we can make a positive difference to the world as businesses. One of my slides on the screen at the front of the room was a distressing picture of Bangladeshis flooded out of their homes trying to escape the water. I was talking about the need for businesses to respect the environment more to reverse global warming, when I was overcome by emotion at the lectern.
Being affected like this by an environmental issue took me by surprise, but we should be emotional about the damage we are doing to our planet.
What affected me in that moment was the reality that people’s lives were being devastated by the actions of other people elsewhere in the world. Too often, what we hear about global warming is statistics about temperature increases and the thickness of the polar ice caps. What we need to see and be more aware of is the fact that people are dying due to climate change.
Despite the tears, it was not just pity or empathy that I was feeling, it was anger. Anger at the way, mainly over the past two centuries, businesses, particularly those from the western hemisphere, have acted purely for profit at the expense of the planet itself. Admittedly, years ago, some of these actions were done through ignorance, but many were pure exploitation of the planet, and they have all been extremely damaging to other human beings. Why did anyone ever think it was okay for a factory to tip its untreated waste products into a river?
Leading by example
To add to the problem, developing countries have industrialized at exponential levels over the past 50 years, and they have all copied the developed world’s bad habits. Because the West has had a profit-at-all-costs mentality and hasn’t respected the environment, this attitude has passed to other countries such as China and India, and the issues are exaggerated due to their huge populations. They could justifiably say: ‘The West did not go to the extra cost of any environmental measures when they were developing and expanding, so why should we hinder our growth by doing more than they did?’ The West must now lead by example and reverse its own damage as well as resourcing other countries to change their ways. In all our actions we must think of the people in the world who will be affected negatively if we do not clean up our act.
I am humbled by organizations such as Greenpeace who were talking and acting for the environment for decades before the world sat up and took notice. It is to our great shame that it took the business community so long to hear what they were shouting from the rooftops. For too many, and for too long, running their business in a more environmentally friendly way has been put in the ‘too difficult’ box.
Now, though, we are at a significant moment in our history when there is momentum building, putting increasing pressure on businesses to act in the right way. Our staff wants us to change, our children need us to change and our customers expect us to change. Something that shocks many of the people I take in my teams to Africa is the complete lack of respect there for the environment. There is plastic litter absolutely everywhere and seemingly no desire to clean the place up.
The trouble is that when people in a community are wondering where their next meal is coming from, it is difficult to prioritize the environment. The problem is not just an environmental one, it is a socioeconomic one too. It is easy to identify when the problem is very visible, such as the plastic litter, but if only we could see the pollutants that have been spewed into the atmosphere or the oceans for centuries, we would have changed the way we do business many years before now.
We should make it our duty to visit a community that has been affected by climate change, which will further help our motivation to change. Seeing the flooding, the displacement and the forced migration will make us think again about our actions. Sometimes there is no substitute for seeing the damage we are doing with our own eyes. A good alternative would be to watch various films that have been made on the subject and ensure that these are circulated throughout your company. One excellent one, dating back to 2006, is The Inconvenient Truth by Al Gore.
Source: GreenBiz
