The Sustainability Handbook

William R. Blackburn

Earthscan, 2012 - Business & Economics - 822 pages

The Sustainability Handbook covers all the challenges, complexities and benefits of sustainability for businesses, governments and other organizations. It provides a blueprint for how organizations can reach or exceed economic, social and environmental excellence. It offers a host of practical approaches and tools including a model sustainability policy for organizations, summaries of sustainability codes and tips on selecting them, an extensive collection of metrics and a wealth of supplementary reference material. This is the essential reference for every organization in pursuit of sustainability.

What people are saying

User Review -

This is a comprehensive and thorough book on sustainability for larger businesses, but it also contains chapters on applications for smaller companies, NGOs, and governmental entities. We use this as a textbook in the Corporate Sustainability Strategy class that I co-teach at Harvard University Extension School. It provides a broad overview of sustainability from all three perspectives – environmental, social and economic – and includes many examples to help illustrate the concepts. Our students have given it consistent positive reviews, partly because of the case study examples and also because of the extensive appendices that provide a reference to the other tools available in the field. I would recommend this to anyone serious about the nuts and bolts of sustainability and how to make it operational in your organization. It is an excellent reference for sustainability professionals as well as students. Suzanne Farver, ALM, JD, Faculty, Harvard University 

User Review -

very good for showing how coca cola has become popular due its rising interest in corporate responsibility

Contents

• The Typical Executive View: 1
• An Operational Definition of Sustainability: 17
• Why Bother?: 33
• The Key Elements and Basic Structure: 123
• The Roadmap for Change: 163
• Chapter 6 Strategic Planning for Focused Sustainability Improvement: 189
• Chapter 7 Selecting Goals and Indicators: 225
• Deployment Integration and Alignment: 257
• Chapter 9 Data Systems Auditing and Other Monitoring and Accountability Mechanisms: 281
• Chapter 10 Transparent Sustainability Reporting: 309
• Chapter 11 Stakeholder Engagement The Role of NGOs: 373
• Chapter 12 Approach to Sustainability for Small and Struggling Companies: 419
• Chapter 13 Approach to Sustainability for NGOs: 431
• Chapter 14 Approach to Sustainability for Governmental Organizations: 441
• Chapter 15 Approach to Sustainability for Colleges and Universities: 477
• Making the SOS Sustainable: 543
• Appendices: 551
• Acronyms: 779
• Index: 789

About the author

William R. Blackburn is a lawyer and leading sustainability consultant with three decades of experience. Amongst his positions, Blackburn is a member of the Management Team of the Stakeholder Council, Global Reporting Initiative and expert delegate of the Working Group on the Guidance on Social Responsibility of ISO 26000. He was former Vice-President and Chief Counsel of Corporate Environment, Health and Safety at Baxter International Inc.

Bibliographic information

• Title: The Sustainability Handbook
• Author: William R. Blackburn
• Publisher: Earthscan, 2012
• ISBN: 1849773297, 9781849773294
• Length: 822 pages
• Subjects: Business & Economics / Business Ethics; Business & Economics / Development / Sustainable Development; Business & Economics / Education; Business & Economics / Environmental Economics; Business & Economics / Organizational Development; Political Science / American Government / General; Technology & Engineering / Environmental / General