Every company has their own approach to a sustainability strategy. And if we are to develop a more sustainable approach to doing business, is it about operating within our business confines, or is it about having a template that can be used in every business environment? However you view it, there are key components of every sustainability template that can be transferred to any company. What are they? 

Measuring Your Footprint

For any business that needs to change, they need to understand their operations. To address the issue, you have to look at the emissions across the value chain, as this will give you a complete picture. You can't act on all the areas that are responsible for the biggest emissions, but it’s now easier than ever to measure these things accurately due to smart meters and machine learning. But it's also a great component of a template that you can take to any company. The variety of private businesses available for sale out there that don't have templates in place is surprising, but for anyone looking to move to another company, having a solid understanding of the company's environmental impact is the most important part of a sustainability template. 

Adapting the Operations

When you increase your knowledge and set realistic targets, you can begin to adapt appropriately. You can switch your energy sources to renewable components, and make changes to the fleets, for example switching petrol-powered vehicles to electric, and, of course, recycle as much as possible. These may sound really obvious, but these are the best foundations to begin. Sometimes, altering infrastructure within the business is the easier bit, but when you start to factor in the impact of these changes on the supply chain, this is when you need to have a bigger conversation. 

Long-Term Planning 

It can be a challenging task for many companies and will find it easier to focus on one or two aspects, which could mean that, as a business, you will have to have a more radical rethink in the future. It can be difficult to adapt to new environments and conditions, and in order to run a sustainable business, you will need to operate with a strict time frame. For example, ensuring you are cutting your emissions by 50% within the next four years. But solving these problems requires solid collaboration between businesses and the government. As a company, you might find it difficult to solve your problems, which is where you need to start communicating with your local government to ask for more support. 

We are now living in a post COP26 world, and learning to run a sustainable business is still a considerable challenge for so many companies. But in order to do it properly, you must remember that you should not only be aware of your sustainability issues, but you have got to learn how to communicate them in a transparent manner. This means engaging with customers with better methods of being more sustainable, while also educating them.

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