subject: Make Sure Your Water Efficient Strategy Puts Your Reputation On The Line [print this page] Sustainability is a required metric in the society that we live in. To many it is seen as a demand, with all the negative connotations that such a term brings. To others, though, sustainability can offer as many opportunities and make greater fiscal sense. At the very earliest, organizations should come up with an accurate and believable baseline related to their scarce resource usage. Carbon and water footprints are first to be created.
A water efficient strategy may be implemented once a baseline position has been calculated and a thorough analysis of the true cost of water quite clearly understood. The full accounting approach should be adopted, so that expenses associated with indirect liabilities are factored into the equation. If a particular action associated with water treatment or discharge "upsets" a particular stakeholder or an investor, what are the real implications, in financial and other terms of this action?
If all liabilities and potential outcomes have been staged and carefully understood, a water efficient strategy must become the next priority. Sustainability must be part of the DNA of the organization, practiced both internally and externally.
Sustainable liability does not finish at the corporate boundary. As time goes by we are being forced to focus on supply chain operations and their individual liabilities, as they reflect on our own operations.
Suppliers must become more efficient as they produce and manufacture, transport or otherwise interact with products or services destined for our operation. While much of this focus may be on the energy and emissions, they must, as supplying organizations, also have a water efficient strategy of their own.
Many consider that a water efficient strategy should revolve around the curtailment of water usage itself. There may, however, be more capital to be gained in both direct and indirect terms by focusing on the creation of products that are far less reliant on water at their core. In other words, the water efficient strategy begins at the design phase and not at the operational phase.
Company strategies may be visible and should be manipulated for good effect by internal PR and brand management teams at every opportunity. It's amazing how many organizations are slow to understand how their sustainable practice improvements can benefit their brand management.
With effective measurement, tracking and reporting solutions in place, a water efficient strategy can underline how good a corporate citizen your organization is. This kind of reputational gain is very quantifiable and should motivate senior management just as much as potential financial savings down the road.
