|
Green to Gold: How Smart Companies Use Environmental Strategy to Innovate, Create Value, and Build Competitive Advantage
|
| List Price: | $27.50 |
| Price: | $18.15 & eligible for FREE Super Saver Shipping on orders over $25. Details |
Availability: Usually ships in 24 hours
Ships from and sold by Amazon.com
72 new or used available from $13.20
Average customer review:
Product Description
This book explores what every executive must know to manage the environmental challenges facing society and business. Based on the authors' years of experience and hundreds of interviews with corporate leaders around the world, Green to Gold shows how companies generate lasting value, cutting costs, reducing risk, increasing revenues, and creating strong brands, by building environmental thinking into their business strategies. Daniel C. Esty and Andrew S. Winston provide clear how-to advice and concrete examples from companies like BP, Toyota, IKEA, GE, and Nike that are achieving both environmental and business success. The authors show how these cutting-edge companies are establishing an “eco-advantage” in the marketplace as traditional elements of competitive differentiation fade in importance. Esty and Winston not only highlight successful strategies but also make plain what does not work by describing why environmental initiatives sometimes fail despite the best intentions.
Green to Gold is written for executives at every level and for businesses of all kinds and sizes. Esty and Winston guide leaders through a complex new world of resource shortfalls, regulatory restrictions, and growing pressure from customers and other stakeholders to strive for sustainability. With a sharp focus on execution, Esty and Winston offer a thoughtful, pragmatic, and inspiring road map that companies can use to cope with environmental pressures and responsibilities while sparking innovation that will drive long-term growth. Green to Gold is the new template for global CEOs who want to be good stewards of the Earth while simultaneously building the bottom line.
Product Details
- Amazon Sales Rank: #3171 in Books
- Published on: 2006-10-09
- Original language: English
- Number of items: 1
- Binding: Hardcover
- 384 pages
Editorial Reviews
From Publishers Weekly
Two experts from Yale tackle the business wake-up-call du jour-environmental responsibility-from every angle in this thorough, earnest guidebook: pragmatically, passionately, financially and historically. Though "no company the authors know of is on a truly long-term sustainable course," Esty and Winston label the forward-thinking, green-friendly (or at least green-acquainted) companies WaveMakers and set out to assess honestly their path toward environmental responsibility, and its impact on a company's bottom line, customers, suppliers and reputation. Following the evolution of business attitudes toward environmental concerns, Esty and Winston offer a series of fascinating plays by corporations such as WalMart, GE and Chiquita (Banana), the bad guys who made good, and the good guys-watchdogs and industry associations, mostly-working behind the scenes. A vast number of topics huddle beneath the umbrella of threats to the earth, and many get a thorough analysis here: from global warming to electronic waste "take-back" legislation to subsidizing sustainable seafood. For the responsible business leader, this volume provides plenty of (organic) food for thought.
Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.
Review
"Green to Gold is a must-read for the twenty-first century CEO. Esty and Winston provide convincing examples of how companies out-compete their peers by tackling sustainability head on, engaging stakeholders, developing NGO partnerships, and folding environmental stewardship into their corporate culture."-Tensie Whelan, Executive Director, Rainforest Alliance (Tensie Whelan )
"Every business, big or small, in manufacturing or services, faces environmental risks and opportunities. Esty and Winston show how companies have benefited from taking these challenges as strategic opportunities, but they also detail why corporate environmental initiatives often fall flat. There are important lessons to be learned from both the successes and the failures."-Bertrand Collomb, Chairman, Lafarge (Bertrand Collomb )
"No executive can afford to ignore the green wave sweeping the business world. Esty and Winston show how to make sustainability a core element of strategy-and profit from it."-Chad Holliday, CEO, DuPont (Chad Holliday )
"Environment and sustainability issues have become an important focus in business generally and in the financial world in particular. Green to Gold is rich with both big-picture thinking and practical ''how-to'' suggestions that will help bankers, analysts, fund managers, and investors stay on top of the ''green wave.''"-Larry Linden, Advisory Director, Goldman Sachs (Larry Linden )
"Esty and Winston have produced a compelling blueprint for how companies can address critical environmental problems, from climate change to water, and improve their performance, gain competitive advantage, make more money, and win friends."-William K. Reilly, Founding Partner, Aqua International Partners and former Administrator, US Environmental Protection Agency (William K. Reilly )
"The future of our country and our children''s world depends on getting society on a sustainable track with regard to both energy needs and environmental requirements. It is up to corporate leaders to meet this challenge, and Green to Gold blazes a trail for businesses of all kinds to follow."-Michael Morris, CEO, American Electric Power (Michael Morris )
"Green to Gold is a must read for anyone interested in investing in the vast emerging environmental markets."-Mark McGough, President and CEO, Pentadyne Power Corporation (Mark McGough )
"Green to Gold provides the definitive thinking on how business leaders can address environmental issues in the new economy, a world where companies win by integrating company strategies with social challenges, rather than treating economic and social as separate and different."-Michael E. Porter, Professor, Harvard Business School (Michael E. Porter )
About the Author
Daniel C. Esty is Hillhouse Professor of Environmental Law and Policy at Yale University with appointments in the Environmental and Law Schools. He is also a former top official with the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency and has advised companies across the world on corporate environmental strategy. He lives in New Haven, CT. Andrew S. Winston is director of the Corporate Environmental Strategy Project at Yale’s Environment School. He has advised companies on corporate strategy while at Boston Consulting Group and has held management positions in strategy and marketing at such leading media companies as Time Warner and Viacom. He lives in New York City.
Customer Reviews
Green to Gold
Esty and Winston seem to be a perfect duo to write this book. Together they have a very strong and complementing background, ranging from experiences in academics and government to green and strategy consulting. The result is a book that has the right balance of theory and practice. While many books on green business only focus on the bright side, Esty & Winston are more realistic. They admit that not every business policy leads to win-win situations and describe the main fallacies, therewith making their book more "complete". The book is very easy to grasp through clear structures, concise business maps and numerous examples of S&P 100 firms. Furthermore, the latter ensures that you'll remind the book's message every time you'll order a cup of coffee at Starbucks or a meal at McDonald's.
The first 70% of the book is most interesting. After that, Esty and Winston start repeating concepts as well as business cases. Although the discussed cases are strong and helpful, Esty and Winston refer to the same companies over and over again, while forgetting about many other so called "WaveRiders". I'm wondering what the book would have been like if they had picked another set of front running firms to shed light on. They could probably fill a complete second book with it, so who knows..
Solid Book / Good Content
I have revisited this book a number of times since I read it last year. It is a good resouce in understanding the benefits and dangers of going green.
Must read
Excellent breakdown of the drivers for companies to go green. Also excellent analyses of strategies used by the corporate world to achieve their goals with green programs. Many examples of what worked and what didn't work.
Great reading!
