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How to Quantify Sustainability’s Impact on Your Bottom Line

Harvard Business Review

Specifically, our analysis found that the net benefits to ranchers ranged from $18 million to $34 million (12% to 23% of revenues) in net present value projected over 10 years. For slaughterhouses and retailers (Brazilian operations), we also projected positive benefits: $20 million to $120 million (0.01% to 0.1% of revenues).

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Great Brands Never Have to “Give Back”

Harvard Business Review

A recent headline, “JCPenney Releases 2013 Sustainability Report,” reads like the punch line to a bad joke. One that is exemplified by efforts like GE’s Ecomagination project, which involves developing alternative-fuel engines and other products that address today’s environmental crisis and drive economic growth.

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The Comprehensive Business Case for Sustainability

Harvard Business Review

Sustainable businesses are redefining the corporate ecosystem by designing models that create value for all stakeholders, including employees, shareholders, supply chains, civil society, and the planet. This can disrupt a firm’s ability to operate on schedule and budget. ” Improving risk management.

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Leadership Development Should Focus on Experiments

Harvard Business Review

Industry research, for example, shows that companies spent more than $24 billion on leadership and management training worldwide in 2013, an increase of 15% from 2012. product pricing, operational efficiency, customer service, etc.). Someone else designed an experiment to get a plant operation down to zero accidents.

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Is the End of GE Capital Good News for Ecomagination?

Harvard Business Review

At times, I’ve been critical about the sometimes-loose definition of what GE “counts” as an ecomagination project (making oil sands production a bit cleaner, really?). What we don’t see behind the scenes in every consumption moment is a long chain of physical impacts and draws on resources. billion people.

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Entrepreneurs Take On Manufacturing

Harvard Business Review

However, in recent years a parallel explosion of digital tools and services has taken place in the manufacturing realm as well, drawing in computer-assisted design and 3D printing equipment to open-source operating systems, the cloud, and the Internet of Things (IoT). Second, a number of important inputs have gotten cheaper.

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As Emerging Markets Slow, Firms Search for “New” BRICs

Harvard Business Review

In this new operating environment, I find more and more multinationals looking to new frontier markets for growth while demanding profitability from their emerging-market operations. Case in point: Ford is planning to introduce at least five new models after seeing a 33% increase in sales in the first half of 2013 in Nigeria.