Identifying the sustainability initiatives
CSR (Corporate Social Responsibility) reflects upon a business approach that takes active participation in contributing towards sustainable development by providing environmental, economic and social beneficiaries to the stakeholders. While CSR is perceived as a conceptualisation with varying viewpoints of authors, it is at the front of corporate sustainability initiative across the globe (Angeles, 2014). Companies are taking the needful strides for enhancing their sustainability initiative by getting all the stakeholders and consumers on board. The purpose of this report is to redefine sustainability initiatives by Nike, evolving from CR concerns towards innovation and driver of growth. The sustainability initiative taken by the company takes active participation in addressing global trends, which influences business operations, enhancing commodity prices, and rising expectancy level of the consumers. The underlying ideology was to shift the focus from the utilisation of scarce resources and emphasising on supply chain resilience. The case study analysis emphasises the following areas:
The first initiative was the movement of the CR department in an upstream positioning within the procedure of corporate decision-making. The second initiative revolved around the development of multiple indexes for rating the sustainability initiatives, concerning independent manufacturer of contract.
Analysing and evaluating the authenticity of the selected sustainability initiatives: This section would examine the authenticity of the selected action in a broader context. It will emphasise the actual intention of companies for initiating a sustainable practice.
The contribution of the chosen initiative to enhance e positive social and human outcomes for human resources: This section would reflect upon the effectiveness of better working environment and sustainability training programs as a mean for attaining social and human issues.
Differentiation of outcomes for similar initiatives within a variant context of business: Lastly, the study will examine the results of the selected sustainability initiative by Nike in regard to a dairy company (Argi- Mark)located in the USA.
In the year 2009, Nike took active participation in implementing several sustainability initiatives, which had a substantial influence over the Oregon Headquarter of Nike in accordance to manufacturing base across the globe. A useful step that Nike initiated was to influence of its sustainability programming involving the movement of CR division as a model of strategic alignment within organisational context and development of guiding tools for the creation of new procedure of product creation in decision-making. As stated by Lueg, Pedersen & Clemmensen, (2015), the CR Department of Nike did not play a monitoring role. Instead, the company took active participation in transforming the CR team to Sustainable business and innovation team. As per the viewpoint of Barkemeyer, Preuss & Lee, (2015), the approach initiated by Nike served as a sustainability initiative for human resource department as it took active participation in identifying the root reasons for the labour and sustainability-related issues. In this regard (), stated that creation of innovative business models and innovative solutions would reflect upon putting the workers with the creative supply chain management. As per the case study, the unified approach of recruitment and training is taken into consideration, by preferring referrals from present employees combining with an exclusive training program prioritising behavioural patterns within the organisational value. Particular impetus was also given to cooperate with the employees over the skill sets of trainees. The initiative discussed here fits within the model of HR and responsible management initiated by George & Regani, (2019), which takes active participation in identifying five phases of HRM procedure aimed for attaining a cultural and sustainable practice of business. As argued by Barkemeyer, Preuss & Lee, (2015), the traditional approach of training and development was ignored by the HRM department. According to the viewpoints of Cavaleri & Shabana, (2018), more impetus was given on prioritising soft skills over the traditional importance of hard skills. It is obvious that motivated employees in a safe working environment contribute towards organizational success in the competitive environment.
Analysing and evaluating the authenticity of the selected sustainability initiatives
To promote innovation and enhance Sustainability, Nike took active participation in creating an index that ill measure sustainability as per product and production designing is concerned. Specific metrics were created for identifying the influence of energy, waste, chemistry and water. As stated by Lyon et al. (2018), the footwear made by Nike has lesser impact on the environment. A balanced scorecard also calculated the performance of the factor. The inclusion of environment-friendly materials takes active participation in successfully maintaining the ecological balance. Additionally, as per the viewpoint of Miller et al. (2017), it also enhances the corporate reputation of the company in the competitive market. The human resource department selected an environmental team consisting of scientists and chemists, giving an overview of ecological influence and product and production designing choices. As stated by Rao et al. (2017), the launching of Nike FlyKnit and Green Products triggered the sustainability practice of Nike successfully. As stated by Kauppi & Hannibal, (2017), Human resource department these days, takes active participation in offering incentives and giving recognition to employees for achieving sustainability practice in the workplace. It should be the primary objective of every Human Resource Department for ensuring worker cooperation and proper environment oriented training to attain environmental goals, thus making the Globe a better place to live in.
As stated by Fransen. & Conzelmann, (2015), business sustainability reflects upon a procedure through which the companies take the responsibility of managing economic, societal and environmental risks in accordance to benefits and obligations. However, Nawaz & Koc, (2018), a sustainable business always emphasize on economic and social value for creating a healthy ecosystem, thus enhancing corporate reputation successfully. Hike companies tend to improve their public and corporate reputation through environmentally sustainable practices; however, revenue generation, increasing market share and productivity is the ultimate goal of every company. Investing in CSR sustainable approaches can churn successful outcomes in the long-term. Kozlowski, Searcy & Bardecki, (2015), stated that inferior corporate reputation could affect the supremacy of an established brand in the competitive market. As per the viewpoints of (), the economic crisis has compelled established brands such as Starbucks and Nike to implement sustainability initiative to be successful. However, Xu et al. (2018), stated that executives often find it difficult to identify the most effective ways of designing and implementing sustainability programs. Therefore, being unable to entirely capitalise on the CSR initiatives, which promotes business value, the achievement is much less irrespective of its interest. For example, while considering the case of Procter and Gamble, the Stakeholders had queries regarding CSR initiatives taken by the company, therefore, questioning the intention of companies regarding their business relations. In case of Nike, enhancements of communication with the stakeholders have contributed towards improvement of consumer and employee loyalties, thus automatically enhancing organisational productivity. However, (), argued there is the presence of too many metrics for measuring sustainability, which creates confusion. In addition to this Cohen & Munoz, (2017), opined that consumer often does not consider sustainability initiative as a critical factor for influencing their purchasing decisions.
Identifying the sustainability initiatives
While educating the workers through sustainability training programs and creating better working conditions for employees, it is evidential that the company was able to overcome organisational criticism and embraced a co-operative working environment whereemployees attain common goals. Lyon et al. (2018), argued that while the sustainability initiatives could prove to be successful for organisational stability, employees should also be aware regarding the motive of implementing a sustainable approach. Many of them do not have a bright idea regarding the business motive of achieving a viable strategy. However, environmentally sustainable initiatives successfully reflect upon societal wellbeing. As per Miller et al. (2017), Nike not only redefined the sustainability initiatives they also embraced revitalising their HR department for ensuring consumer and employee loyalty in the long term.
Furthermore, often become challenging companies to communicate their products credibly, thus avoiding being identified as greenwashing. Moreover, SME often finds it challenging to attain financial sustenance, if they prioritise CSR approach. Lastly, Kauppi & Hannibal, (2017), stated that sometimes, companies even find it tough to motivate the workers for attaining sustainable initiatives. Therefore, on a whole, it is tough to assess whether the initiatives are creating a positive influence on social and human outcomes, despite the fact, the balancing of research papers seems to indicate a proactive impact.
Organizational sustainability does not mean only sustainability in terms of financial stability but in modern organizational context, it has various perspectives such as sustainability in terms of innovation, human rights, empowered workers and environmental as well. Different organizations have different impacts of introducing sustainability in their organizations. Moreover, it can be said that various industries has different outputs and results of implementing the same sustainability strategy. As stated by Bocken et al. (2014), while applying the innovative sustainability practice by empowering the employees in travel and tourism industry, the outcome typically reflects on more satisfied customers with the help of more responsive assistance team. Contrastively, as opined by Johnson & Schaltegger, (2016), integrating the same strategy in manufacturing industry, applying the strategy will enhance the skills of the workers, which will enhance the product quality?
Nike shifted their perspective from a CR team consisting of 130 employees who were policing the facts after the event towards an integrated “sustainable business & innovation” team (SB&I) in their production pipeline to address the needs of labours and find the root cause of labour problems and created an entirely new business module. As opined by Amini & Bienstock, (2018), being a fantastic innovation towards sustainable employee management, this strategy will not be feasible for an SME in US market such as Agri-Mark, which belongs to the dairy industry to conduct an experimental innovation strategy. Supporting the fact, Lueg&Radlach (2016) stated that, application of a new business model, which empowers the employees, maybe beneficiary for a company in order to gain financial stability in long run, but would be highly difficult to implement due to the associated cost factor, which a small company such as Agri-Mark will not be able to afford. Along with this, even the company manages to perform such actions, the lower level workers might not be able to grasp the benefit of such education or system due to lack of literacy.
Conclusion
Adhering to the terminology of the non-profit “Fair Labour Association” (FLA), Nike followed the “fair wage” and started empowering and respecting employees of factories instead of increasing a sudden pay scale, which they considered as an alternate parameter. As opined by Brown (2017), Nike included training programs as a solution to empower the workers and make them feel valued to increase employee engagement, which is an impressive strategic movies. However, contrasting the statement, Fukugawa (2018), stated that implementing such activities in a small company such as Agri-Mark to increase employee engagement would not be cost effective. And the employees working in a dairy farm will not be able to accept this knowledge and sense of being valued employee as an alternative of high pay scale, as the income standard of such workers are very low.
Conclusion
On the contrary, it could be concluded that the sustainability initiative of Nike has enhanced the corporate reputation, productivity, supply chain and relationship with stakeholders in the competitive market. Application of multiple indexes and Upstream of CR teams were the sustainability initiative taken by the company. The company objective was to enhance consumer and employee loyalty, which was triggered by implementing the sustainability initiative. While better working conditions and sustainability training programs,the employees might be well aware regarding the actual intentions of the company’s sustainability strategy. Lastly, while analysing the sustainability initiative taken by Nike in context to Dairy Industry, it could be stated that application of sustainable approach for a SME could be tough owing to the lack of training programs and poor literacy level of dairy workers.
Reference List
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