Corporate Citizenship
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BSR (Business for Social Responsibility) 2009
| Saving the Planet Slowly but Surely | |
| posted 09-28-2009 |
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I'm at the BSR 2009 conference and expo in San Francisco. It is a picture perfect day "by the bay" and in front of the Hyatt Regency hotel the cable car fills with passengers and that iconic clang reminds me that I love this city I once called home. But I'm feeling weird. There are 250 corporate members in BSR. Most are among the Fortune 500 largest corporations in the world and about 1,000 delegates have come here today to focus solely on doing the right thing. Maybe that's why it feels so odd. I don't usually think of corporations as doing the right thing unless they are forced to, or because they'll make an inordinate amount of money in doing so, but today they have come to network with one another about the kinds of things they are doing around the world to address climate change, human rights abuses, supply chain irregularities, and the need to develop sustainable business practices. So, on the one hand I am delighted they each have spent at least the $1500 early bird registration fee per participant and then at least $169 room fee per night plus plus plus to send each freshly scrubbed professional to gently, very respectively, and even deferentially discuss ways of dealing with the worsening crisis in the environment and the many stresses and strains on the economy - especially as it impacts people around the world – that were caused by the very companies that sent them here to sort it all out. On the other hand it just feels like a stunt. I know I can't have it both ways. I want to believe they are sincere in doing the right thing. Monsanto is here touting their genetically modified organisms (seeds used to produce what are sometimes referred to as Frankenfoods) to build upon the green revolution that has added new crop cycles to the food supplies in much of the world. How can you argue with that? But it is also those crops that overburden farmers already suffering with depressed commodity process while the middlemen and food processors make tidy profits. Some of these seeds don't propagate, thus requiring ongoing purchases from Monsanto. I know there’s nothing wrong with doing business if it raises the income of the farmer, but the costs for some GMOs also asks Mother Nature to play roulette with a new entity in the biosphere. That's not all it's about either; it's also the arrogance of a narrowly applied technology being touted as THE answer and governments being strong-armed by their lobbyists to allow the use of the GMOs before we really know what the full spectrum of risks is. Something is better than nothing, though, right? Even GMOs have to be an improvement over losing half a crop to bugs and crop disease; right? And then I see why there is resistance even when the "solution" seems so darn obvious - like DDT, Thalidomide PCBs, nicotine. We've been there so many times before. It's complicated, of course. And uncomfortable. That’s the kind of conference this is, and why it is important for me to be here to grapple with these paradoxes and dilemmas. This is what happens at these kinds of conferences, but sometimes it's a little like listening to the fox talk about fixing the hen house. This is just day one. Tomorrow I'll share some more tales from the frontier of how the world's biggest corporations try to moderate some of the nastier effects of their own impact on the planet.  ______________________________ John Nirenberg’s intimate knowledge of leadership began in the 1st grade where, as the biggest kid in the class with amazing eye-hand coordination, he was the most sought after dodge ball player. By the 6th and final grade in elementary school he was the longest serving Captain of the Safety-Patrol. Alas, long before Enron, long before the collapse of MCI and Anderson Consulting, long before Dennis Kozlowski of Tyco International was convicted of grand larceny, he was fired in front of his class for forgetting to remove his chewing gum before entering the school building. From this auspicious beginning John studied leadership management and group dynamics before embarking on a career of service, teaching and consulting in organizational behavior, workplace community and leadership. His work has taken him to 122 countries. Along the way he spent more than nine years in Japan, Singapore, Malaysia, Australia and Thailand, wrote four books, published over 80 articles in 45 journals on five continents; and, gave over 80 professional presentations and workshops in 17 countries—all of this in his life-long quest to understand and appreciate collective and productive human behavior. And he’s still an optimist. |
