Discuss about the Orporate Sustainability Strategies for Sustainability Management.
Formed in 1993, Ecostore is a privately owned company that prides itself in being an environmentally conscious business that offers a collection of natural and eco-friendly products. The company is classified as a sustainable business as it matches the criteria set out that any company has to meet before being classified as a sustainable business. The company creates and stocks products that are focused on the health of the people and the environment. These products range from skin care, hair, and laundry as well as homecare products.
With an annual turnover of around $33million, Ecostore is a fine example of a business that has grown exponentially since formation. The business model on which the company is built upon is not your typical organizational profit making business model as Ecostore prides itself in being a disruptive not-for-profit company. This is based on the fact that a percentage of the sales money raised goes toward its foundation called Fairground which is the charity arm of the company.
Ecostore holds an importance to the Australian and by extension the international business landscape as it is an example of a business that is geared toward sustainability while being environmentally conscious. According to Chan et.al. (2001), it is noted that organizations that are passionate about the environmental responsiveness tend to remain competitive and increase their market share. In Australia, the market is experiencing a demand for sustainable products and with the eco-friendly products offered by Ecostore clearly sets them apart from the rest of the competition in the market. Their products are completely plant and mineral based thus have no negative effect on the environment mostly the Australian waterways. Chang and Fong (2010) laid it out clearly by saying that environmentally favorable products have positive effects on consumers that are equally passionate about such products.
Based on the 2015 carbon trust report by the world bank, the cost of adapting to new warmer worlds are set to rise and this is where Ecostore has an edge over other global companies as it is already adapting to the sustainability goals thus in a better position not experience any disruptions when other companies go through the adaptation phase.
With Ecostore being a disruptive not-for-profit company, the organizational behavior at the company is geared towards the well-being of the customer. Organizational behavior encompasses management, employee motivation, work satisfaction and team bonding. All these have an effect on the customer satisfaction and loyalty (Wiek et al, 2012). With a staff of about 60 employees, the company comes across as a closely knit organization with the founder as the chief executive. The well-being of the employees is entwined with the vision of the company and this is evident in the interaction between management and the employees. According to an article published by smartcompany Australia in May 2014, Ecostore is a company that holds ethics in high esteem and the organizational management focus is to make the employees better at what they are good at. Such an approach creates a relaxed environment and as recent studies show such environments enable employees to thrive and achieve their maximum potential.
Human resource practices are vital to the foundation of how a company’s employees interact with the company and brand as a whole. Ecostore places a lot of emphasis on the employee relationship with the company. When it comes to the aspect of sustainability based on the human resource management practices, comprehensive strategies that cover all aspects of the business are required. These business aspects encompass the board room, the employees, the company suppliers as well as the customers (Orlitzky et al, 2011).
The company executive is known to be lenient with the employees and with such does not implement a hierarchical mode of management at the company. The employees at the company are consulted for their views on the business as well as any ideas that they may have. This has a positive effect on the utilization of the various talents in the company. Such an approach has an effect when it comes to recruitment and talent retention as most employees would prefer working at organizations where they feel valued.
Being competitive in international markets are every company’s long term vision. This can be attributed to the fact that there is an increase in the profit margins for a company once it is able to compete favorably and comfortable in markets outside its locality. Ecostore is rapidly becoming an international company with its products being sold in markets beyond Australia and New Zealand. As the company is always looking for new and better ways of sourcing raw materials, product development, packaging and distribution, the access and penetration to the international markets will definitely ease some of these concerns. Ecostore’s sustainability practices have an effect on the way the brand markets itself as well as its products to the international markets. An example of this is the entry of Ecostore’s products to the lucrative South Korean market that is quite particular on eco-friendly products (Van Bommel, 2011). The South Korean market is currently experiencing a demand for products that have an emphasis on healthy living as well as minimal toxic levels. Based on this, it can be noted that international business has quite an effect on the quality of products in that this has to be maintained or raised. In the case of a drop in standards, the brand is likely to suffer to in the international market due to the fact that the world is now a global village and how people perceive a brand based on its performance in different markets has a huge influence on their interaction with the brand (Lubin and Esty, 2010).
With the partnership between itself and distributors in the different international markets, Ecostore has been able to push its products to a wider audience. This means increased revenue for the company and thus increased innovation and production to meet the demand for its products in the different markets.
In today’s world, the use and management of technology plays a big role in the success of companies that are focused on innovation. Technology management can therefore be defined as the application of management skills to the development and proper use of technology, Khilesh (2013). This is crucial to an organization as it helps the company to improve its efficiency and effectiveness while solving problems.
Based on the above definition, it can be noted that Ecostore has not been left behind as it is constantly innovating and using new technologies to produce new eco-friendly products while at the same time bettering the existing ones with no addition of harmful or toxic chemicals to the products or the environment. The company has a manufacturing facility that is ISO 14001 certified and this has played a massive role in minimizing the company’s environmental footprint. It has to be noted that Ecostore is using technology to identify and improve its sustainability operations as well as identify and implement areas for improvement in operations whilst factoring in power consumption and waste level management.
Ecostore was founded by Malcom Rands and his wife in 1993 based on the discovery that they were being exposed to toxic chemicals in their cleaning and body care products. They realized that despite living the sustainable life and using sustainable organic products, the exposure to these toxic products was still real. The motivation behind the start of the company was to provide healthy and eco-friendly products as opposed to the existing products which had toxic chemicals and no positive bearing on the environment. Innovation places a lot of emphasis on learning so as to gain knowledge about the products to be delivered and this led the Ecostore founder to spend eight years learning about chemicals, their good side as well as the nasty side and decided to come up with something new for the market. This kind of innovation is what has led to the development of green products by Ecostore. This aspect of innovation shows no sign of slowing down as the company is constantly researching and innovating new ways of developing its products while maintaining the green aspect of the business. An example of this constant and new innovation is the invention of proprietary packaging bottles made out of sugarcane. The company moved from the traditional plastics made from petrochemicals that are derived from scarce non-renewable fossil fuels to a renewable and more sustainable solution of using sugarcane to create its bottles.
Innovation is key to the sustainability vision of Ecostore as it aims to be a provider of clean and ecofriendly products (Varadarajan, 2010). With the advancements in technology, it can be noted that the cost of these innovations is absorbed by the company and thus no extra cost is passed down to the customer. As evidenced earlier, this in return has a positive influence on the brand and the company’s sustainability approach as a whole.
As Ecostore seeks to expand its reach to the international market whilst maintaining a stronghold on the Australasia market, it is important for the company to implement different management strategies for the different markets. The sustainability aspect of the company has managed to give it an edge over traditional chemical based producers.
One of the management strategies that the company can implement in the future is an increase in the online marketing strategy of the company’s products. Ecostore’s products are quite popular in the Australian and New Zealand shelves and one of the strategies that can be used as the company eyes more international market is an increase in its online visibility. Online marketing can grow a brand beyond its borders and enable customers in far flung areas to place orders as well as sample the company’s products (chaltegger et al, 2012). The company website can also be revamped as it is the first point of contact with the online customers. A good website should be able to generate traffic and increase the number of orders placed via the online portal. With the advent of social media, the company can use this to create and maintain a healthy following of consumers who are yet to get to know about the company or its products.
Achieving the desired growth in a business is crucial and it is the aim of an organization to have a target in terms of revenue and profitability. There are relevant issues that organizations need to adapt to achieve revenue and profitability. It is relevant to adapt to the necessary changes since there is need for growth. Some of the major reasons why there are inadequate consideration of opportunities where the main focus is on business and what sub-segments. Another concept that is realized is the way in which there are no successful execution. Leadership is very important and in management in the different companies can adopt the following strategies. There needs to be a systematic framework that is relative to the strategies making sure there are key elements that might increase the probability for success. The need to have an amalgam in terms of gathering experience is crucial when undertaking research.
Conclusion
The need to have strengthening leadership practices where there are different roles played. Some of the needs is relative to the following needs to promote growth. For example, there is the growth by the sub-segmenting customers. There is always the issue of growing core business as well as the growing adjacent opportunities. There is the issue of creating the customer focused strategies. In addition, there is the need to have building organizational capabilities and performance management scorecards where there is the need to be effective when executive strategies. Organizations need to have a system in which there is the need to have a structure to achieve objectives. The need to have the strength to have the need to have strategies as a way of investigating ways of investing in infrastructure. Regardless of which strategy is selected, there is always the ongoing research on what exactly is required relevant of the strategies deployed.
Companies need to initiate the process to identify the chances for success relative to the strategies deployed. There are three customer strategies that need to be introduced in a company to make sure that strategies are achieved (Gond et al, 2012). The following strategies can be adopted by an organization. One of the needed strategies is growing of the core business. Another concept needed to be adopted is the growth of the sub-segmentation and most importantly the growth of nearby adjacent opportunities. One of the ways to ascertain is the way that management needs to consider the growth potential within the core business where opportunities and growth potential needs to be associated relative to the potential of an individual. As such, leadership is necessary to make sure strategies that can bring success need to be implemented.
Another recommendation is the customer focused growth where strategies are the main focus. It is recommended that the identification of the profitable growth opportunities is crucial since the main focus is understanding core business. Products are necessary when making sure that the overall performance is ensuring that measuring and benchmarking of the profits. There also needs to be the revenue growth where the reputation of the firm is always at risk. Having the need for the assessment is crucial to make sure that direction is crucial when ensuring the correct assessment.
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