Filed under: Sustainability
When Wal-Mart holds its periodic sustainability milestone meetings, CEO Lee Scott is known to joke about how big the sustainability department is getting. In reality, unlike the retail behemoth’s ballooning marketing department, there really is no sustainability department to speak of, at least in the traditional sense.
Wal-Mart Stores does have the now-commonplace “sustainability officer” — Senior VP-Sustainability Matt Kistler. But when it comes to the traditional trappings of a department head, namely budget and staff, Mr. Kistler is running lean. Fewer than 10 people report directly to him.
So goes the evolving dance between sustainability and marketing, as chief sustainability officers become as prevalent as chief marketing officers in Fortune 500 companies. Although more marketers are striving to act and look green, their sustainability officers seldom come up from the marketing side.
The gap between technical and marketing experts is nothing new, says sustainability consultant Peter Knight, but it must be bridged for companies to effectively communicate their green commitments.
More than 70% of consumers link marketers’ social responsibility to their environmental behavior, according to data from consultancy Conscientious Innovation. In such a world, sustainability officers and CMOs must find ways to join forces.
Influence gap
In many cases, the sustainability department has yet to achieve the size of the typical marketing department or the old-school power that a CMO wields in terms of sheer dollars controlled. And it probably never will.
At Wal-Mart, the “thought is if you’ve got this big department, then others will say sustainability is [that department's] job, not mine,” says spokesman Kory Lundberg. “If it’s integrated into the business, everyone has a commitment to it.”
Or consider P&G. Late last year, Procter & Gamble Co. formally created a sustainability department, naming Len Sauers VP-global sustainability. But while Global Marketing Officer Jim Stengel reports to Chief Operating Officer Bob McDonald, Mr. Sauers reports to Charlotte Otto, global external-relations officer, who reports to Mr. McDonald. Mr. Sauers oversees 50 people, but it’s not a 50-person department in the traditional sense.
“They are working with sustainability as they develop their programs within their own business units,” Mr. Sauers says.
“It’s a funny new duck that’s being created. Generally, [sustainability officers] exercise soft power. They have very little budget, direct reports or organizational authority,” says Adam Werbach, veteran environmental activist and now CEO of Saatchi & Saatchi S, which was created in January when Publicis Groupe announced its acquisition of Act Now Productions, Mr. Werbach’s green consultancy.
source: http://adage.com/greenmarketing08/article?article_id=127538
