Sustainable Excellence: The Future of Business in a Fast Changing World

After listening to Aron Cramer speak during the opening keynote panel discussion, I wanted to learn more about his newly released book entitled “Sustainable Excellence”. I have been a fan of Mr. Cramer’s for a while and think that he is a very articulate speaker. A lawyer and former journalist for ABC news, Aron is currently the president and CEO of Business for Social Responsibility, a global consulting firm that works with companies to develop sustainable business strategies and solutions. Aron was interviewed in a featured session on Friday morning, and I made sure to have a front row seat.

The talk centered around the challenge that CEOs face when making decisions given that markets are so short-sighted. Afterall, the average stock in the US is held for only 11 seconds! Managers are often forced to consider only options with short term results instead of considering the bigger picture. Aron argued that this is one area that regulation could be very effective. Perhaps the SEC (in the States) could change the rules of the game so that managers would have more freedom to make sound medium and long-term decisions. This idea actually isn’t as far fetched as it seems, and has actually been debated before.

To follow on the theme of this year’s conference, “2020: Vision for a Sustainable Decade”, Aron was asked what he thought/hoped sustainable excellence would mean in 10 years. He explained that he hoped the two terms would be redundant. That is, sustainability would be baked into the fabric of business and “excellence” would be assumed. This made me think – how great would it be if the sustainability “movement” didn’t exist in 10 years, but rather was the norm in society like equality for women and civil rights for African Americans?  Aron joked that the surest sign that the movement has taken hold will be when a Chief Sustainability Officer becomes a CEO.

I really enjoyed this talk and was able to speak to Aron afterwords. He is an eternal optimist and remains convinced that the next generation of leaders are up to the challenge. I haven’t read his book yet, but am hoping to over the Christmas break (along with a dozen or so others that are on the list…)