Inter-Company Collaboration to Advance Sustainability Goals

Many business leaders have realized that embracing sustainability concepts is vital to their growth and survival. These companies are creating strategies to address market conditions such as climate change, globalization, resource constraints, poverty, world health, and security to enhance their brand equity, stock price and profits, improve their products and services, create more resilient systems and infrastructure, and a better quality of life for their stakeholders. Leaders also understand the importance of establishing working groups to represent intra-company operational silos, as well as executive board oversight, as key elements in developing and implementing a successful sustainability strategy. Though the UN SDG’s have more performance indicators tied directly to business and the workplace, multi-nationals based in the US find themselves with less policy support and government motivation to improve their environmental and social performance and move their sustainable development goals forward. Instead, these business leaders are exploring ways to advance sustainability goals through inter-company strategic partnerships, multi-stakeholder initiatives, task forces, and sustainability focused membership networks.