Why business must be included
in the global conversation about reducing our impact on the
planet?

That’s the opinion of one of Britain’s
top advisors to corporations,  Tony Manwaring, chief executive
officer of non-profit “think and do tank” Tomorrow’s Company.

“There is still a
strong case for business doing ‘good works’, but there are now far
more fundamental reasons for understanding why business success
goes hand in hand with social and environmental issues” says
Manwaring.  “This is not the old CSR (corporate social
responsibility) agenda,” he says. “Our view is that the old CSR
agenda is pretty much dead, especially for large global
businesses.”

 

Manwaring and
Tomorrow’s Company - which provides information and advice to many
of the world’s leading companies - believe that business can and
must be a force for good.

 

class=”box”>”This is not about business doing good. This is not
about business looking good. This is about business being
successful.”

Our view is that
successful businesses will also be good as a result,” he says. And
businesses are starting to realize that. “I think that there are
more bigger businesses that get it. They’re still in a minority,
but a growing minority.”

 

Those global
businesses with timelines in the decades, rather than years, have
been the quickest to pick it up. Manwaring says that while money
can still be made from short-term exploitation of the natural world
and its resources, businesses that aim to make money over decades -
rather than just a few years - down the road realize the importance
of developing new technologies and products that will be able to
thrive in a zero-carbon world: the key strategic challenge is when
to ‘jump the curve’, from carbon to post-carbon based business
models.

 

Businesses that
want to do “good” need help - although, not necessarily financial
assistance. “If you want to change big complex things, what you
don’t do is throw money at things,” he says. “What you do, is win
the battle of hearts and minds and create a new mindset.”

 

Indeed, there are
huge savings to be realized from driving down waste and reducing
carbon and water impacts - this is the compelling case for new
models of business success for businesses large and small.

 

Looking ahead, we
then have to start to ask - and answer - a rare question. “What
will the world look like in a post-carbon future? “  From
which it follows: “What kind of world do we want to live in? 
Which businesses will succeed and which will fall?  And what
will be the new relationship between business, society and the
environment which will result.”

 

It’s not how much
carbon there is in the atmosphere. That’s important, but that’s not
what drives business and it’s not want motivates consumers.

 

It is, very
simply, what does the world of tomorrow look like?  How are we
going to work, and how are we going to live?” asks Manwaring. “The
question is hardly being asked, but it should be - by leaders of
business and society alike.”

 

He stresses that
business must be included in the global conversation about the
environment and how to reduce our impact on the planet. Business,
he says, has the greatest capacity to create a vision for a
post-carbon world. But there is a huge disconnect between the
business community and society reinforcing the vacuum in thinking
about the future.

 

“You need a very
different relationship between business, civil society and
government. Many believe (incorrectly) that the business voice was
very silent and muted in Copenhagen. I think that belief stems from
a lack of recognition in the broader civil society about the role
business can play on these broader global issues.”

 

In fact, he
notes, the business voice in Copenhagen was quite clear and quite
direct. Leaders from major corporations spoke eloquently about the
need for a strong and enforceable regime to manage the climate
change agenda, to create the new level playing fields which would
give the confidence needed for investing in new business models and
innovation we need to bring rapidly to market.

 

Business leaders
need certainty in order to make the major investment decisions that
will be needed to deal effectively with climate change, he notes.
“After all, most of the investment dollars needed to deal with the
perils of global warming will come from the private sector,” he
says.

 

“Copenhagen was
just a very small part of the solution; an important part of the
solution, but you need a different governance and a different
vision of the future and a different set of relationships between
the key actors in our society and our world in order to have any
real hope of addressing climate change.”

 

Manwaring is a
big supporter of events like the upcoming GLOBE conference in
Vancouver, British Columbia, which brings business executives and
government leaders together to try and answer exactly the questions
that he says need to be answered. He will be bringing that message
personally to Vancouver during the GLOBE Conference, taking place
March 24-26, 2010.

 

“I think the
opportunity to understand what is possible and what is happening at
the new frontiers of business - to then put that in a different
kind of mindset and think about your business and the opportunity
of your business within that new set of possibilities is where
GLOBE really stands out and is really important.”