No it doesn’t mean making three times more money.  It’s about social responsibility, environmental initiative and yes economic accountability. According to Wikipedia, , triple bottom line accounting means expanding the traditional reporting framework to take into account ecological and social performance in addition to financial performance.

The phrase was coined by John Elkington in 1994.[2] It was later expanded and articulated in his 1998 book Cannibals with Forks: the Triple Bottom Line of 21st Century Business.[3][4] Sustainability, itself, was first defined by the Brundtland Commission of the United Nations in 1987.

The concept of TBL demands that a company’s responsibility be to stakeholders rather than shareholders. In this case, “stakeholders” refers to anyone who is influenced, either directly or indirectly, by the actions of the firm. According to the stakeholder theory, the business entity should be used as a vehicle for coordinating stakeholder interests, instead of maximizing shareholder (owner) profit

This evening I attended the first class of an eight week program to learn more about how I can incorporate sustainable and TBL strategies into the business practices of Strategize & Organize. The course is being instructed by Richard Eldin of The Progress Group.   Over this eight week period, I’ll be sharing with you what I learn.

In my class notes I saw a quote from Nelson Mandela, “You can never have an impact on society if you have not changed yourself”.  How true that is also with people who want to get organized.  I’ve always said it’s like a 12-step program. Getting organized is not necessarily for those who need it, but for those who want it.  We all have to accept the first step that our lives our unmanageable in order to get organized.  Similarly with the environment, accept that our own habits may be unmanageable and we can change our own behaviors with how we treat our world as well.   We have to again take a first step and admit that our lives are unmanageable and that we can change ourselves and make a smaller ecological footprint. 

All this new information really is getting me to think about what impact can I make in the community running my business?  Initially, helping clients move from paper files to electronic files, teaching clients about resources to recycle old product, becoming an educator within the community, to name a few.  I’ll be working on these ideas and initiatives over the next few months and will report them and I’ll be updating my business plan.

© Strategize & Organize. 2010. Anne McGurty