Mount Sustainability

http://www.interfaceflooring.com/library/PDF/journeybegins.pdf written in 2002
We will be the company that, by our deeds, shows the entire industrial world what sustainability is in all its dimensions: people,
process, product, place and profits by 2020 -and, in doing so, we will become restorative through the power of our influence.
We describe it as a mountain to climb and with the work of a team of globally recognized visionaries we have identified seven faces of Mount Sustainability.
We are currently in different places on each of those seven faces, but hoping to meet at the top. The top of Mount Sustainability represents a sustainable
enterprise - a company treading so lightly on the earth as to leave no environmental footprint.
The seven faces are:
1. Eliminate waste.
QUEST stands for Quality Utilizing Employee Suggestions and Teamwork. There are hundreds of
projects under way throughout Interface, eliminating waste. We measure all waste in the organization and
have saved over $165 million since 1994. This is paying for the revolution in our company as we
reinvest it in new technologies, equipment and Research & Development.
2. Eliminate harmful emissions.
We want to be sure that whatever we emit is harmless to the biosphere. We counted all outlet
stacks and pipes in our factories, and have set out toclose down every one of them. So far we’ve shut
down 66 of the 241 - 27% in 6 years.
3. Use only renewable energy.
We believe in time that all of our energy must come from solar, wind or other forms of renewable energy
rather than continuing to use seemingly inexpensive fossil fuels. Fossils fuel emissions are polluting our air
and changing our climate.
4. Create closed loop processes.
Taking our products back at the end of their useful life and giving them new life again and again through
a closed loop fashion. If we can get this right, we will never have to take another drop of oil from
the earth.
5. Minimize movements of people and material.
This is a difficult issue for an organization operating in 110 countries. We can video conference to avoid
unnecessary journeys; we can drive the most efficient cars available; we can locate our factories close to
their market; we can plan logistics for maximum efficiency; but we must maintain contact with our
customers. In the medium and long term we hope to eliminate our production of carbon dioxide, but in the short
term we are beginning to compensate for the carbon dioxide we emit. For example, we are working with
customers to provide ‘climate neutral floorcoverings’ where we offset the carbon emitted in the production
of our products and air travel by investing in non-Interface carbon emissions reduction projects around the world.
6. Integrate Sustainability into our culture.
Interface believes that sustainability is about sustaining the development of our quality of life as a
society, not some wistful notion of returning to hunting and gathering. This approach seeks to
engage all Interface stakeholders in understanding nature’s strategies and limits to deliver new and
better value to our customers. This includes our customers, suppliers, employees, shareholders and
the community at large. Interface and its Chairman and Founder, Ray Anderson, continue to “spread the
word” and encourage others to join us on the journey. The message is being heard. It has resulted
in Ray’s appointment to co-Chair the President’s Council for Sustainable Development, along with a
wide array of awards and recognition from Mikhail Gorbachev, the United Nations, the National
Academy of Sciences, and Fortune Magazine. Many Interface associates around the globe have also
become involved in taking the Interface story to government, academia and the corporate world and
their communities.
7.Pioneer new business models of sustainability.
We are proposing the redesign of commerce itself, which, perhaps, calls for the recognition of different
principles of economics than those currently reflected in laws. For example - creating laws that no longer
tax labor, earnings and property, but tax waste and pollution instead. Maybe, in the future, people like us
(or, more precisely, people like we were in 1994) will be imprisoned as polluters of the planet.
Today
Today we look carefully at each of our processes, adopting new technologies and abandoning some
conventional ones. We are investigating how we might redesign those that remain, finding ways of
manufacturing products that will leave a far lighter footprint on the earth. We have found that attention to environmental issues
and social responsibility is an unexpectedly rich source of inspiration and innovation, especially in
how to attract customers, rally people, design products and industrial processes - and particularly
to reduce costs. We have adopted a new sense of humility in design. Nature works, and she has much
to teach us, if we would only listen. We’re continuing to do what we set out to do in 1994, transforming Interface into a new kind of
industrial company. We have stayed the course on sustainability and have never wavered from this
commitment. It has meant too many positive things to our business, brought us too many customers,
and galvanized our people around too much pride and purpose to be abandoned or de-emphasized.
Today for Interface, sustainability is even broader than before. It is a new business model that seeks to
deliver superior value through a dedication to people, process, products, place, and profits (the five Ps of
sustainability). Doing well by doing good.

“The vision is not just to change our company and eliminate our environmental footprint,
but through the power of our influence on others to become restorative,” said Ray Anderson,
founder and chairman of Interface, Inc. “In nine years, at the end of 2003, we had progressed
about one-third of the way from where we started in 1994, toward our goal of zero footprint—
what we call the top of Mount Sustainability. To name a few relevant metrics:
• Carbon intensity, down one-third.
• Greenhouse gases down 46% absolute.
• Number of smokestacks reduced by 33%, number of effluent pipes reduced by 47%, with
water usage down 78% per yard of carpet tile and 40% per yard of broadloom
This reduced footprint is embodied in every product we produce. As we perform life cycle
assessments on our products, we are moving toward evaluating our manufacturing facilities
on the basis of the cumulative impact of all the products a facility produces; and we are
doing this worldwide.”
Anderson looks to the future: “The remaining two-thirds of Mount Sustainability is twice as
high as the one-third we have traversed. Looking ahead to the next 10 years at Interface if
we are successful in executing our plan”:
• Waste will be halved again.
• Energy will be further reduced in relative terms by half again,
• Half the remaining energy will come from renewable sources (photovoltaics, wind, biomass).
• The number of smokestacks and effluent pipes remaining will be halved.
• Half of all materials will be post consumer recycled, including a portion from nylon 6,6,
said by some to be commercially impossible.
• Interface as a whole will be climate neutral.
• The Evergreen Service Agreement will be a major factor and a big competitive advantage
as we move toward selling the “service” our products deliver, while retaining ownership in
the products themselves, along with responsibility for recycling them.
• “ReEntry”—our reverse logistics and closed loop recycling initiative—will become a way
of life.
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http://www.interfaceglobal.com/App_Themes/Interface/Pdfs/B2B_Nov-Dec08.pdf

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May 2009
Ray Anderson, Founder and Chair of Interface, a true green business pioneering company, was asked what his best three pieces of advice for Barack Obama would be.
First was to shift the economy, and federal subsidies, from old technology to new and high tech industries. It’s estimated that 50% of coal power plants would be unprofitable without subsidies. “It’s time to shift the equation”, he said.
Second was to get a price on carbon. “By hook or by crook,” Anderson said. “It needs to happen, and I think a carbon tax is probably impossible politically, but cap and trade is possible.” Anderson went on to say that “Carbon has been getting a free ride, and it’s time to change that.”
And third, Anderson cited the controversy over nuclear power. Saying that our legacy of poison for future generations will be tough to justify, given that nuclear waste will outlast the lifespan of any language on the planet, so how can we possibly put good warning signs on our waste?

inquiries chris macrae info @worldcitizen.tv us tel 301 881 1655 ; us office 5801 nicholson lane suite 404, North Bethesda, MD 20852 USA - uk 80 queens road, suite 30, wimbledon, london sw19 8lb

Mapping is a process of discovery. It explores how to make the invisible principles and practices of real wealth creation visible, and therefore useable. Our planet needs case studies underline the search for new win-wins that build ‘system integrity’
Trust-flow is the unseen wealth to invest sustainability in. Tranpsaremtly mapped it develops a goodwill gravity tyhat invites with roleplayer in a community to multiply goodwill while sustaining their own cashflow.. Trust is not some vague, mushy, abstract warm-hearted sentiment. It is an economic powerhouse – probably just as economically and socially important as oil.
The point is, there are specific things you need to do to get trust flowing, just as there are specific things you need to do to get oil flowing. And like oil trust has a dark side. Right now, the world is awash with the carbon emissions which threaten the stability and sustainability of its ecosystems. Right now, the world is also awash with the ‘carbon emission’ of trust – mistrust. Indeed it may well be that our ability to tackle the one issue – the threat of environmental catastrophe – depends on our ability to tackle the other issue: how to generate, deepen, extend and sustain trust.>br>But what is the best way of doing this? One thing is for sure. You don’t build and sustain trust via some sentimental exercise of goodwill to all and sundry. There are three very simple principles at the heart of effective trust generation.
First, trust is generated via win-win relationships. It’s virtually impossible to generate or sustain trust without mutual benefit for those involved. But beneficial outcomes are not enough in themselves. For trust to be built and sustained, both sides need to signal a demonstrable commitment to finding win-win ways forward. Such a commitment may require real changes to what we say and do. Second, real ‘win-wins’ are hardly ever purely financial or material. You don’t build trust simply by walking away with more cash in your pocket. Trust works at all the dimensions and levels of human exchange. Yes, it’s about financial and material rewards. But it’s also about purpose (what people want to achieve). It’s about politics with a small ‘p’: the use and abuse of power, the crafting and application of rules of fair play. And it’s about emotions: the sometimes overwhelmingly strong emotions, both positive and negative, that are generated when people deal with other peopleWhat’s constitutes a ‘win’ – a sense of real improvement – is therefore highly specific. It depends absolutely on the details of who the parties are, what they are trying to achieve, in what context. Building trus, therefore involves discovering these specifics. Just as oil doesn’t flow out of the ground, get refined and pump its way into motor vehicles automatically and without effort, so identifying and doing what is necessary to get trust flowing requires dedicated, skilled effort. It requires a disciplined, structured process, not a vague sentiment.

3) Third, even if we do steps 1) and 2) there’s still a good chance it won’t succeed. Why? Because it ignores an invisible third factor. In the real world, purely two way bilateral relationships don’t exist. There is always a third party whose interests or outcomes are affected by what the other two parties do but who is not a party to the contract. The environment is a case in point. Producers and consumers may both benefit from buying and selling to each other – but what happens if, in doing so, they destroy the environment they both depend on?

This raises a hugely important question. When two parties pursue win-wins and build mutual trust, are they doing so in a way which creates a win and builds trust for the third party at the same time? Or are they simply pushing the problems – and the mistrust – further down the line on to this third party? Building vigorous, healthy networks of trust is a different kettle of fish to ‘you scratch my back and I’ll scratch yours’ win-win conspiracies. It requires a Map of all the key relationships plus careful consideration of knock-on consequences. It requires a different perspective.

These three simple, basic steps do not happen automatically. They need to be worked at. The territory needs to be deliberately Mapped and explored. What’s more, there are obstacles in our way – mental and practical obstacles that need to be cleared. Prevailing economic theories about ‘rational economic man’ for example, deny the need to commit to win-win outcomes. Instead, they promote supposedly ‘rational’ (i.e. narrowly selfish behaviours) which actively undermine trust The same theories insist that the only valid measure of human benefit is money, thereby excluding from consideration many of the biggest opportunities for improvement. Meanwhile many vested interests do not want to extend the circle of trust to third parties and complete networks because their positions of power depend on their ability to take advantage of the weaknesses of these third parties. That’s another job for Mapping: helping to identify and mount such obstacles.
The potential benefits of doing so are unthinkably huge. They start with a simple negative: the relief that comes from when you stop banging your head against a brick wall. Mistrust breeds wasteful, wealth destroying conflict that tends to feed on itself. Anger and hatred engender anger and hatred. Simply easing or stopping the terrible waste of mistrust would transform prospects for many millions of people. We desperately need to find ways of doing this. Then there are the positive benefits. Understanding the real nature of human wealth – all those dimensions of purpose, ‘politics’ and emotion as well as money and material comfort – means we can start being human again; human in the way we think, and act. What’s more, many of these intangible benefits won’t cost a penny. They’re there for the taking, if only we puts our minds to it.
But there’s more, because trust is also an economic superpower in its own right. In the pages that follow we will show conclusively that material and financial riches are also dependent on trust. In fact, we will argue the case for going one step further. We will say that material and financial riches are a by-product of trust: the visible fruits of invisible, intangible human exchange. Once you understand that sustainable cash flows are a by-product of sustainable trust flows, your understanding of what makes a successful business is transformed.
Separately, each of these three fruits – reducing the waste of conflict, unleashing the potential intrinsic benefits of human exchange, and energising the sustainable creation of material wealth – are massive in their own right. Put them together and they represent a vast new continent of opportunity.
As we said, this book is addressed to entrepreneurs and system innovation revolutionaries. Wherever you happen to be, whatever the change you want to make is, the principles explored in this book apply. The wish to change and the will to change are not the same as being able to change successfully. For that you need to understand your territory. You will need new Maps.