Setting Goals for Environmental Performance
This is the season that many companies publish their corporate sustainability reports, and in those reports, updates on their sustainability goals. Some companies have recently announced meeting or exceeding goals they’d set. Apparel maker H&M, for instance, recently disclosed that it blew through its goal on the use of organic cotton. Others, such as Walmart (carbon emissions) and Starbucks (energy consumption) received attention (here and here) for falling short of some of theirs.
There are broad differences in how companies set sustainability goals and which goals they choose to communicate publicly. In my many conversations with sustainability executives it’s become clear to me that many of them are not sure they are going about this in the best possible way.
