Sustainable Business is Becoming More Prevalent

Green-minded folks have been touting the importance of sustainable business for some time and their hard work has generated big results. Today, sustainability plays a big part in the decision-making processes and everyday workings of companies all over the world and spanning all sizes. Today, we’ve got fascinating study results from the Deloitte Center for Energy Solutions that demonstrate that the way we do business has definitely changed and if a business owner wants to be competitive, they will need to join the party.
First, I’ll explain the study. It has been conducted annually since 2011, and the results are based on online interviews with 600+ decision-makers responsible for the energy management of a business. The information covered leans rather heavily toward the energy usage end of sustainability.
The 2014 study results indicated that energy management had become a “core business competency.” In 2015, the decision-makers interviewed had gone through another year of trying sustainable business on for size and decided, as Deloitte states, “…companies, by and large, now consider energy management to be an essential aspect of corporate strategy.”

Sustainable business works!

52% of the people surveyed described their energy management program as “extremely or very successful.” This went up from last year’s 42%, so this means that people have gained experience and seen results.
Businesses are setting higher goals for themselves. in 2014, they aimed to reduce their electricity consumption by 22%, and in 2015, it is becoming more common to aim to reduce it by 25%.
79% of respondents feel that their businesses have “become much more sophisticated in managing electricity costs.” This gives them valuable control over their business.
Over the last year, people have become more aware of the importance of aligning and integrating their energy plans with their corporate plans. When asked if their business had fully aligned energy and corporate visions, 52% said they did while last year only 43% did. The others who said they had a energy plan but it was not aligned with their corporate vision, or that they had incomplete or totally lacking energy visions lessened over the past year. So, there is definite movement toward both developing energy plans and integrating them with corporate plans.
55% of the businesses surveyed said that they generate at least some of their electricity on-site, up from 44% the year before. This becomes increasingly popular because it is the most sustainable way to get energy and it is easier to control your own energy generation than to monitor another party.

Realism is always important.

Business owners get excited about their sustainability efforts, but there comes a point when things get more difficult. Everyone starts with the smaller, more manageable tasks. That’s great, but it can feel a little daunting when you have completed those tasks and you have to move on to bigger, more complicated areas that will show results more slowly. Two-thirds of the people surveyed foresee this in their future and they are planning accordingly.
More businesses are giving themselves a little longer to reach their goals than they did in 2014. The average was 4.2 years in 2014 and is 4.5 in 2015.
It has been a little difficult for people to get complete employee engagement in their sustainability initiatives, but in 2015, 34% said that their companies have engaged all of their employees.
Time has also proven the need for quality measuring and analytic programs. 28% of respondents are using advanced energy data and data management systems, which is 6% more than in 2014. The same is true for analytical tools. 20% used them in 2014 while 27% used them in 2015.
This is just a taste of the results, Find the answers to your specific questions in the pdf file for the Deloitte Center for Energy Solutions’ study.