Managing People and Organisations - Sustainability in Brambles - Case Study Example

Sustainability in Brambles Name Institution Introduction Sustainability is an aspect that is very important to organizations. It involves the leaders in a firm making conscious decisions that help protect the environment from activities that may damage it (Blowfield, 2012). Sustainability further seeks to ensure that business life is prolonged as much as possible. Companies across the world have thereby adopted sustainable practices in so that they can ascertain that their operations last for long and that they are active participants in environmental protection. One of these companies is Brambles, which is an international company whose headquarters are based in Australia. It specialises mostly in renting out crates, containers and pallets (Brambles, 2017). Brambles’ Current Commitment to Sustainability According to Dunphy et al (2003) sustainability model Brambles is currently at fifth phase of the sustainability phase model. This phase is known as the strategic proactivity stage. It is a stage whereby a company works towards completely incorporating sustainability in its operations. The leaders of the company know that adapting sustainable practices will increase the company’s competitive advantage by creating a good reputation in the industry. The leaders of Brambles Australia thereby include the sustainable actions in their business strategies to increase its competitive advantage. However, this is not the only reason or influence behind their actions. They feel responsible for maintaining sustainable practices, not only to ensure that the business life is prolonged but also for the preservation of the environment as well as making the different stakeholders in the company happy and satisfied (Brambles, 2017). For example, one of the goals of the company’s sustainability goals is creating better business through diversification. The leaders understand that diversifying will help increase the number of customers its targets, thus, increased satisfaction in the market as well as increase the profits of the company while prolonging the life of the company. The phase is further characterised by the company’s focus on innovation (Dunphy, 2003). The technological inventions and modifications aim at solving the problems the company faces and the environmental challenges that the society seeks to solve. One of the ways the company shows commitment to sustainability through innovation is through structural modifications. The HR team is keen to equip the workers with the required skills and mobilise them to use their talents in the company. Brambles has also been improving some of its operations, such as the acquisition of the materials used to produce the products, by embracing some of the upcoming technological innovations. The company has also been investing in the research and development team, which Brambles normally calls the innovative team. Workers can therefore develop feasible ideas that promote sustainability while the firm avails a platform for their development through adequate funding. Evidently, the company is ready to incorporate emerging innovative techniques to ensure the survival of the business and the protection of the environment. The fifth phase is also characterised by the company in question seeking the support and cooperation of the stakeholders in the innovation and implementation of environmentally friendly processes and products (Dunphy, 2003). The involvement of the stakeholders is considered important as it makes it easy to for the company to achieve its sustainability targets. It is further considered important since through it, the company can gain the support and approval of the stakeholders. This is an important result as the opposition of a company by the stakeholders may make it impossible for the company to thrive. One of the ways that Brambles involves its stakeholders in its sustainability program is by working with their customers in planning on ways of minimizing transport usage. This helps the company reduce the level of pollution it causes to the environment through unnecessary use of transport. The company has increased the number of customers that it collaborates with to achieve this goal by 15% since the year 2015 (UNE Business School, 2017). The fifth phase further involves a company advocating for good citizenship to maximize profits as well as increase employee attraction and retention (Dunphy, 2003). Companies portray this character through their dedication on pleasing the employees. One of the ways that Brambles does this is by ascertaining that it continually improves its work environment. For example, the company works at reducing the injuries that the employees incur while at work. The management does this by making the work environment as safe as possible. The company further works at improving the workplace by seeking to promote gender equality by increasing the number of women in the board and the management. The number of female managers in the company have increased by 1% since 2015 (Brambles, 2017). The final strategy that the company uses to create a better workplace is increasing the employee engagement in the workplace. This is meant to increase employee satisfaction and thereby retention. The rate of employee enablement has increased by 2% since 2015 (UNE Business School, 2017). However, the employee engagement remained the same. The use of Innovation in Driving Sustainability Practices in Brambles Brambles embraces innovative as a means of enhancing the environmental advantages of the products and services it offers. More specifically, the company has been producing the upcycled half-plastic pellet (Brambles, 2017). The product is made of recycled plastics that the society either could burn to generate energy, carbon, and other harmful emissions in the environment or used to make lower quality products that have limited demand in the market. Some of the recycled plastics include bottles and toothpaste tubes. The pellet made from recycling is both durable and expensive to segregate. It has help reduce the level of carbon emissions, thus taking an active role in curbing global warming and diseases that arise from burning of plastics, such as reduced mental development among children. There is also reduced littering in the environment, which makes the environment unsightly. The pallet is also recyclable, hence does not pose pollution problems to the society. In addition, the product is the most fit for the customers who require meeting high hygiene standards since they are more washable than the wooden ones. Brambles Limited has also been embracing technology to work more closely with its customers, hence improving the sustainability of the supply chains. For example, the CHEP Innovation Centre that is in Florida collaborates with the consumers to test their products and services (UNE Business School, 2017). The firm conducts tests on packages, technologies, and new products and suggests ways of improvement. As a result, the consumers can cut down on their operational costs and focus on procedures that are environmental friendly. For example, if a packaging is harmful to the environment, the innovation team suggests other packaging options that are more efficient in terms of price and chemical emissions. This has helped Brambles to meet the set specifications and requirements of the countries in which they operate. Additionally, the company can protect the environment while improving the level of sustainability of the business through building more positive relationships with the clients. The organisation’s Human Resource Management of the firm ensures continuous development of ideas and supports implementation of innovative ideas to promote the sustainability of Brambles. The company has an innovation team that oversees educating people on how to capture and develop new and feasible ideas. Equipping the workers with the relevant skills and knowledge increases their ability to participate in solving the problems of sustainability the firm may be facing (Brambles, 2017). For instance, the workers have been playing an active role in instigating ways of value delivery to the customers. For the people that come up with feasible ideas, the organisation funds them. As a result, the employees are encouraged to develop a new mindset, where they consider may consider ways outside or within the business that would improve the operations. Moreover, workers develop a sense of belonging as the customers increase their level of loyalty due to the ability of the firm to address their needs. There is increased retention of the employees as the company acts as an attraction for workers in other firms. Brambles, through BXB digital, has been able to incorporate the Internet of Things (IoT) into its products to address consumer supply chain needs (Gutierrez, 2016). BXB aims at equipping the products of the firm with digital intelligence. For instance, the innovative team is working towards installing sensors on the pallets, containers, and crates. The devises would display the temperature of goods and the destination of the goods. Using this information, the customers that deal with perishable goods can adjust the transporting conditions to the optimum requirements. As a result, there is reduced damage rate of the goods and the customers can cut down on costs and increase their profit margins. Such a feature would help improve the relationship between the business and customers, thus improving the level of sustainability of the firm. Moreover, reducing food spoilage increases the level of supply in the society, thus improving the level of food supply and availability in various parts of the world. Recommendations The Brambles is currently performing well in its sustainability plans. The different sustainability practices used in the keep improving over the years. However, there are aspects with which the company should improve as well as work on so that the improvement trend can continue to be recorded. Although the current percentage of women in the board is 30% and the company is working towards increasing this number, it is a drop from the number recorded in the year 2015 which was 33% (Brambles, 2016). The company should thereby investigate to find out what was the reason for this reduction. This will help the management work to avoid a reduction of the number of women in the board in the future, thereby ensuring that the company achieves the set goals. Improving in this area will help the company move to the final phase of the sustainability phase model as the leaders will not be busy dealing with issues of inequality but will rather concentrate on promoting sustainable values in the industry. The company should further work on improving its employee engagement. According to the current sustainability report, the rate of employee engagement remained the same from the end of year 2015 to the end of year 2016 (Brambles, 2017). It is important for the company to keep improving in its employee engagement so that it can move to the last sustainability phase. To increase employee engagement in the company, the management should engage in activities such as rewarding the best performing employees (Volper, 2012). This would help increase competition amongst the employees as well as their commitment to their work. Every employee would give their best in their work so that they can be rewarded as the best employee. Thereby, the level of production in the company will increase, the revenues will increase and the level of sustainability in the company will increase. The company recorded its employee turnover as 31.6% in the year 2016. This was an increase from the previous year record of 29.3% (Brambles, 2017). It is important for any company to have a high employee retainment rate. It helps ascertains that the company does not keep spending its resources on training new employees (Allen & Bryant, 2012). The company should assess the level of employee turnover and set a target that it will work towards achieving in its sustainability goals. Doing this will help cut down on costs of training new employees as well as increase productivity of the company since the retained employees will work faster than the newly hired employees do (Saridakis & Cooper, 2016). Continually assessing the employee retention rates will also be part of the process of the company working towards moving to the final phase of the sustainability phase model. A combination of these recommended strategies in the operations of the company will help it increase the level of sustainability in its operations and thereby grown into a company whose leaders do not have to strive to ensure that all its operations are sustainable. The company will put more effort on conserving the environment that it will in ensuring that all its operations are sustainable. It will thereby be an ideal example of a fully sustainable company. References Allen, D. & Bryant, P. (2012). Managing employee turnover: Dispelling myths and fostering evidence based retention strategies. New York: Business Expert Press. Blowfield, M. (2012). Business and sustainability. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Brambles. (2016). 2015 sustainability review. Retrieved on August 11, 2017 from http://www.brambles.com/Content/cms/pdf/legacy/PDF/Sustainability/2015_Sustainability_Review.pdf Brambles. (2017). 2016 sustainability review. Retrieved on August 10, 2017 from http://www.brambles.com/Content/cms/sustainability-2016/BRL179_S31_Sustainability_Report_for_web.pdf Brambles. (2017). Sustainability goals. Retrieved on August 11, 2017 from http://www.brambles.com/sustainability-goals Dunphy, D., Griffiths, A. & Benn, S. (2003). Organisational change for corporate sustainability. Routledge: London. Gutierrez, P. (2016). Brambles announces IoT innovation team. Retrieved on August 11, 2017 from https://www.iothub.com.au/news/brambles-announces-iot-innovation-team-415487 Saridakis, G. & Cooper, C. (2016). Research handbook on employee turnover. Northmpton: Edward Elgar Publishing. UNE Business School. (2017). CHEP Australia: Creating business value through sustainability. Volper, R. (2012). 7 compensation tactics to help retain employees. Retrieved on August 11, 2017 from https://www.cnbc.com/id/46045960 Read More