Let's make money like there is a tomorrow
- Aug 24, 2009
"We at Virgin believe 100% that we owe it to our customers and staff to ensure that our future economic growth is built on firm, ethically sustainable business models.
"Businesses need to be bold and creative, to develop radical new products and find alternative ways of doing business.
"Since innovation and creativity are at the heart of the Virgin culture we feel that our group of businesses are well placed to take advantage of the opportunity this presents."
Richard Branson
- What does it all mean?
- What are we doing about it?
- Putting our money where our mouth is
- Where did we start?
- Virgin's people & planet promises
What does it all mean?
Sustainable this, sustainable that, everyone’s striving to say they’re sustainable – okay, but what does it actually mean?
We stand by the original definition of sustainable development:
“Sustainable development is that which meets the needs of the present without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their own needs”
Gro Harlem Brundtland, Prime Minister of Norway and author of Our Common Future, said that in 1987. She’s now a member of The Elders.
Very impressive eh? Aren’t we clever? But how do we translate that in to practical actions?
Well, we need to work towards a global economy that:
• creates a very low amount of carbon emissions
• recognises and uses responsibly the finite resources of our planet
• assists the appropriate distribution of wealth to minimise poverty
• develops products and services that add to emotional and physical well-being
Easy-peasy then…
What are we doing about it?
Hands up everybody – there’s no such thing as a sustainable product or company.
Phew, we feel so much better now we’ve got that off our chest.
What we want to do at Virgin is to ensure that our companies and products make a credible contribution towards creating a sustainable economy whilst meeting or exceeding the expectations of our customers and stakeholders.
This is our responsibility to the planet and to you.
We’re not there yet and we don’t have all the answers, but we’re on the journey. It won’t happen overnight, but we do expect change.
Putting our money where our mouth is
We now have to make money in a different way. One way of describing it is enlightened capitalism rather than thoughtless consumerism.
As a business, profit is the basis upon which we survive. But to provide you with a better deal and a better service means that we have to consider the state of the planet and well-being of people. We believe that we owe it to our customers and our staff to ensure that our future economic growth is built on firm, ethically sustainable business models. So it’s not only about profits any more – it’s about adapting the way we behave, to make sure we look after people and the planet too.
We want to create a place where people love to work and a community of people who feel inspired to deliver a brilliant customer experience – every time.
Virgin is a diverse group of businesses with a huge range of products and services from holidays to mobile phones. Our customers are from all walks of life and we recognise that to be the best we need to attract and retain people in our workforce who are as varied as our customers are. It’s the attitude our people bring to work that’s important, not what they look like, how old they are or what beliefs they have (although it’s good if they believe in the Virgin values).
We aim to reflect the diverse nature of society and to foster an environment which values people’s contribution irrespective of their age, sex, disability, sexual orientation, race, religion, marital status, ethnic origin or shoe-size. To support this our People teams within each Virgin company ensure that we have policies in place which lay out the core principles of respect and fair treatment and we regularly train managers to ensure they’re confident in their role of managing others.
We are reconsidering everything we are doing in order to provide solutions that move towards a low carbon economy with zero poverty that only consumes one planet’s worth of natural resources. We are determined to move beyond the paradox that living sustainable lives is both difficult and boring.
So we’re busy working out the best approach for each one of our businesses on contributing to this vision. We will also begin to look at all potential investments in new businesses through a different lens and assess their contribution to our drive for sustainability. We are working with governments, partner businesses and individuals to create solutions which can be implemented all over the world.
While we remain focussed on making money, we are committed to innovate in order to make our money in a sustainable way.
Boy – have we got some creative thinking to do…
Where did we start?
We started by asking questions of all of the Virgin businesses about our products and services, whether mobile phones, seats on a plane or credit cards:
• who are our stakeholders and how do we talk to them?
• what’s happening in our sector?
• what are the real issues in our sector?
• what progress have we already made towards sustainability?
• what strategy and plans do we have in place?
• what governance do we have?
• who are the leaders in our sector and what are they doing?
• how do we tell people what we’re up to?
• what investment have we made so far?
• what’s the added value of our company to a sustainable vision?
We uncovered the good bits and the bad bits. We’re not saying we now have all the answers, but now we know the truth (and nothing but the truth).
Since different Virgin businesses operate in different sectors, their strategies too will be different as they need to reflect the key issues in their own sectors. This is why we don’t have a plan A. What we have is a series of strategies feeding in to our overall vision.
The Virgin businesses are at very different stages on each of their journeys, but we’re all clear on the direction in which we’re heading.
We realise that this is a never ending journey where we are constantly learning and we will share our progress with you as we go.
Read Virgin’s people & planet promises:
