BSR Insight | Helping Your Suppliers Improve Their Sustainability Efforts
About the Author(s)
Jessica Davis Pluess, Manager, Research
Publication Date
December 13, 2011
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To increase the reach of sustainability efforts, companies are using sophisticated questionnaires, scorecards, and indices as tools for supplier engagement. However, companies often superimpose their own sustainability goals on suppliers without considering how these tools could enable stronger governance structures, systems, and strategies for suppliers.
Based on our work with a global apparel manufacturer on its sustainability strategy, we’ve developed the following recommendations to help companies ensure that the tools they use to evaluate suppliers and incentivize performance improvements support company goals as well as suppliers’ business priorities:
- Integrate sustainability issues into scorecards, and give these issues the same weight as cost, delivery, and quality.
- Encourage metrics that demonstrate business benefits—such as market growth and cost reductions—rather than solely measuring success based on meeting customer-reporting requirements.
- Incentivize transparent communication by not punishing early detection and proactive avoidance of problems.
- Support flexible evaluation frameworks that allow suppliers to develop their own unique programs rooted in employee and community needs.
About the Author(s)
Jessica Davis Pluess, Manager, Research
With strong knowledge of sustainability issues and rich experience in cross-sector collaboration, Jessica works with companies and BSR partners to explore meta-trends and key issues shaping sustainable development in the coming decades... Read more →
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