It’s time for venture capital to start thinking about sustainability and find partners in the space, just as they would find and recommend other operational partners for portfolio companies. The opportunities related to sustainability are too significant to ignore.

Sustainability reporting is important for your company, your customers and your employees. “Reporting” is sharing your sustainability actions, goals, and achievements with your stakeholders and community. At Green Buoy, we take “reporting” to mean sharing concrete sustainability goals, achievements and actions. In reporting, you are sharing sustainability numbers, figures, years and baselines on your website, on social media and in the press.

Recent data from McKinsey shows companies with robust sustainability practices were more potent in these five areas: "top-line growth, lower costs, fewer legal and regulatory interventions, higher productivity, and optimized investment and asset utilization." For private companies, these sustainability outcomes are driven by and for the interest of employees and the executive team. But it's unwise to discount the role of private investors, advisors and other stakeholders in company growth, innovation and sustainability.

Are you budgeting for sustainability in 2021? If not, you’re missing out on a significant competitive advantage.

With all investments, company leadership focuses on ROI. Luckily with sustainability, there is significant data to show ROI in crucial areas like employee engagement, profitability and customer satisfaction. Let’s review some of the returns you can expect to see from a sustainability investment for 2021.

You’ve started the B Corp Impact Assessment. But now you’re...stuck. You’ve gone through a couple of times and jumped around to different areas. Maybe you’re rocking one section but have completely ignored others.

Photos of the west coast sky are terrifying examples of climate change in action. The prevalence and intensity of wildfires are now visible in a visceral way. If you saw those photos and feared for your life and your children's lives, you're not alone. 

Employee engagement is one of those areas that's never "done." It's relentless and an ongoing task for founders and HR teams. So what can companies do to help increase employee engagement? What's a strategy that aligns with current employee engagement tools and increases engagement? Sustainability.

While silence or ignorance is comfortable, it’s no longer an option. It’s never been an option for millions of Black Americans and we stand beside them as they continue to make their voices heard. Change is necessary and long overdue. As a business, we create change with our dollars and our voice.

Here are the steps we are taking to help dismantle the existing system:

This is the final blog on corporate sustainability policies! Today we’re covering best practices, how to get employees to follow policies and how to share your corporate sustainability policies internally and externally.