Profits v planet: can big business and the environment get along? | Yossi Sheffi

Sustainability can bring benefits to everybody - including company execs with their eyes on the bottom lineWarren Buffett said, "It takes 20 years to build a reputation and five minutes to ruin it." It has been more than two decades now since a 1996 issue of Life magazine depicted a Pakistani boy sewing a Nike soccer ball, reportedly for six cents per hour. After the story, the company lost more than half its market capitalisation in just one year - it took Nike six years of demonstrated social responsibility to recuperate. Even today Nike is - fairly or unfairly - ranked low on lists of ethical companies. It has survived financially, but the reputation of the brand may never recover.Environmental reputations can be just as hard to rebuild. NGOs like Greenpeace and the World Wildlife Fund believe in the potential fragility of the environment, and they see the potential fragility of companies' brands as a means of pressuring them to change. Continue reading...