Creating a Sustainable Organization


Organizations that prioritize environmental, health, and safety (EHS) issues are well placed to attract better customers, better talent, and today’s growing number of socially responsible investors. But, to gain these benefits, companies must choose the right sustainability strategies, and then manage and measure them well. Now, leading business sustainability consultant Peter Soyka offers a complete and actionable guide to driving greater value through sustainability. In Creating a Sustainable Organization, Soyka bridges the disparate worlds of the EHS/sustainability professional and the investor/analyst. Readers will learn what the evidence says about linkages between sustainability and value… how to manage key stakeholder relationships influencing corporate response to EHS and social equity issues… how to effectively manage sustainability throughout the business… how to evaluate sustainability posture and performance from the standpoint of external investors and internal management… how to maximize the influence of organizational actors focused on sustainability, and much more. This book will be invaluable for all environmental, health, and safety decision-makers and professionals concerned with improving sustainability and value; for executives and strategists seeking long-term competitive advantage; for stock analysts evaluating potential investments; and for researchers and MBA candidates currently studying the techniques and potential of corporate sustainability.

From the Back Cover
“With investors increasingly concerned about whether they have appropriately priced ESG-related fat tail risks in their portfolios, Peter’s book provides a timely explanation as to why financial markets care about how companies manage their material sustainability issues, set performance targets for them, and then embed ESG principles into their core business.”
–-Abyd Karmali, Managing Director and Global Head of Carbon Markets, Bank of America Merrill Lynch

“Soyka brings a fresh and grounded view of corporate sustainability that understands the critical need to bridge the environmental and financial worlds. He makes it clear that sustainability is multidisciplinary and that leadership companies align it with core business drivers and metrics. Creating a Sustainable Organization  is a valuable work that should be required for any professional seeking to align sustainability with business success.”
––Joel Makower, Chairman and Executive Editor, GreenBiz Group; author, Strategies for the Green Economy

“In Creating a Sustainable Organization, Peter Soyka has woven together a wealth of personal experience, industry commentary, data, and academic analysis to present a compelling argument in favor of promoting corporate sustainability. But he doesn’t stop there–his primary accomplishment is in establishing a guide for present and future sustainability practitioners to pursue sustainability as an engine for value creation within their firms. Peter has given us insightful–and in some cases, uncomfortable–analysis. Those of us in the business of evaluating companies from the outside have as much to learn from Peter as those on the inside.”
–-Mark E. Bateman, President, Segue Point LLC; Director of Research, IW Financial

Sustainability and socially responsible investing (SRI) are each attracting growing attention from financial institutions, nongovernmental organizations (NGOs), private investors, citizens, and policymakers. In Creating a Sustainable Organization, Peter A. Soyka links these trends, showing how to use organizational sustainability to drive greater value for shareholders and other corporate stakeholders.

Soyka employs the powerful construct of Environmental, Social, and Governance (ES&G) posture and performance, showing how it integrates environmental, health, safety, and social issues with governance. You’ll learn how ES&G compares with Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) and the “triple bottom line,” and how and when to use it to improve (or evaluate) a company’s performance and investment potential.

Environmental, Health, and Safety (EHS) and sustainability professionals will gain a deeper understanding of how the financial community operates, what its members value, what motivates its behavior, and the basis of its growing interest in corporate sustainability. At the same time, investors and investment analysts will develop broader and deeper insight into how sustainability issues affect companies’ performance and prospects, and which sustainability practices create the foundation for long-term value creation.

Covers all this and more:

  • How sustainability affects enterprise value: the latest data
  • Barriers to corporate sustainability—and how they can be overcome
  • The surprising ways key financial players are now promoting sustainability
  • Responding to the growing diversity and sophistication of EHS stakeholders
  • Managing sustainability more successfully throughout the organization
  • Defining, measuring, and reporting on sustainability more effectively
  • Tracking sustainability performance from the investor’s viewpoint
  • Bridging the viewpoints of EHS and the financial/investment community
  • Becoming a more effective and influential EHS/sustainability professional

Book Details

  • Hardcover: 432 pages
  • Publisher: FT Press (January 2012)
  • Language: English
  • ISBN-10: 0132874407
  • ISBN-13: 978-0132874403
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