Today’s guest post comes from Andrew Savitz, the author of a new book called  Talent, Transformation and the Triple Bottom Line: How Companies Can Leverage Human Resources to Achieve Sustainable Growth (Wiley 2013). As you can guess from the title, Andy argues that employees are the key to creating sustainable companies, but that they–and their colleagues  in human resources–are often overlooked when companies embark on environmental programs. I think he’s onto something. I’ve long thought that the single biggest business driver of corporate sustainability initiatives is the way they help better companies attract better people and motivate the ones they have.

Andy has been his career working with companies on social and environmental issues. A lawyer by training (and before that a Rhodes scholar at Oxford), Andy has been a congressional staffer, the general counsel for the Massachusetts Office of Environmental Affairs and head of the environmental advisory practice at PriceWaterhouseCoopers (PwC). Since 2005, he has led a consultancy called Sustainable Business Strategies.

Here’s our online conversation:

Marc: You say that you’ve written the book “in large measure to bridge the gap between sustainability and HR.” HR? Really? Why do we need human resource people to get involved with sustainability? They don’t know anything about carbon emissions, say, or LED lighting, do they? [click to continue...]