Sustainability Strategies:

Develop Initiatives to Transform Your Business

8 WEEKS | ONLINE PROGRAM

Develop Your Vision

for a Sustainable
Business Future
Changes in technology, climate, demographics,
work habits, and consumer preferences are making
it essential for organizations to rethink traditional
business models. Sustainability has moved from
being a regulatory burden to becoming vital to an
organization's future vision and a necessity for
remaining competitive in a fast-changing global
market.

The challenges we face today require business

strategies that place environmental stewardship
and social responsibility at the heart of each
organization’s value proposition. To lead change
effectively, modern executives need to recognize
how sustainability-based initiatives can create
competitive advantages and drive value creation for
their organizations.

A multidisciplinary team of faculty at Stanford

Graduate School of Business designed this
program with two key objectives in mind:

1
To equip you with the necessary tools to
analyze, develop, and manage a
sustainability-driven strategy with the aim
of mitigating, and ultimately reversing, the
impacts of your organization's climate

2
footprint.

To empower you with the knowledge to

understand the sustainability challenges
we face and develop the leadership tools
and vision to solve them.

Sustainability Strategies: Develop Initiatives to Transform Your Business 1

 Program Walk-Through

Access to Stanford Manageable time Live sessions Assignments for you to

Graduate School of Business investment with faculty apply learnings to your own
proprietary strategy tools (4–6 hours/week) role or industry
and frameworks

Networking with global Featured case studies Feedback on Certificate of completion

peers and cross-industry assignments to ensure from Stanford Graduate
examples the relevance of the School of Business
program material

Key Takeaways
Develop an understanding of the impacts
and root causes of climate change to
communicate the value of sustainable
business practices to key stakeholders.

Learn to identify business opportunities that

arise by transitioning to an environmentally
sustainable organization.

Understand the interdependence between

innovation and sustainability as a guiding
force for developing your own sustainability
initiatives.

Develop a proactive mindset to lead change

effectively, with an eye toward positioning
the organization as an agent of change.

Sustainability Strategies: Develop Initiatives to Transform Your Business 2

Featured Program Elements
Framework

Business model Protest vulnerability

1 architecture framework 4 framework

DICE framework for innovation

2 (define, ideate, create, experiment) 5 Media coverage framework

Interest group and coalition

3 Triple bottom line framework 6 analysis

Featured Case Studies and Examples

Tesla: Creating a business model that prioritizes sustainability

Boeing/787 and Toyota/Prius: Exploring the building blocks of innovation

Citigroup: Managing a sustainability strategy in regard to marketing, politics,

and social interest groups

General Motors: Transforming a legacy business model toward sustainability

Lego: Balancing priorities between social good and good for the environment

Brazil/Amazon region: Balancing priorities between social good and good for the
environment

Electric 3-wheelers in Bangladesh: Exploring the value chain as a cycle and

identifying areas of improvement for sustainability

CNG mandates case studies: Explore how different stakeholders reacted to the
mandates in Delhi and the complexity of the impact of the associated government policies

Capstone Project
Create an action plan that will positively impact sustainability in your organization. Using your weekly
workbook exercises as inspiration, you will identify your priorities based on where you can make an
immediate difference for your organization.

Sustainability Strategies: Develop Initiatives to Transform Your Business 3

This Program Is
Ideal for Professionals
and Leaders Who Are:
Driving strategies at the business unit or
organizational level, where maintaining a
competitive advantage is critical

Striving to be on the leading edge of

environmental sustainability or
transitioning from a legacy business model
to a more innovative approach to business

Building strategies that move the needle on

sustainability efforts within their
organizations or industries

Developing and communicating the vision

and value of a sustainable business future

Sustainability Strategies: Develop Initiatives to Transform Your Business 4

Modules​

Module The Climate Challenge

1
Develop your understanding the climate challenges at hand and key terminology, including the carbon
cycle, energy build-up, tipping points, and cumulative emissions.
Reflect on how climate change is impacting your organization and what you can learn from your
competitors.
Make a pitch for sustainability as part of a communication exercise.

Module
2
Business Models and Sustainability
Understand the components of a business model using the business model architecture framework.
Examine Tesla’s business model as part of a case study deep dive.
Explore where your business model intersects with sustainability issues, and identify opportunities.

Module
3
Sustainability and Your Value Chain
Learn how Little’s Law—a numerical theorem—is applied to understanding circular economies and their
relationship to the value chain. Map your organization’s value chain in relation to sustainability.
Propose short-term and long-term actions that impact your organization's value chain as it relates to
climate change.

Module
4
Leading for Environmental Sustainability
Identify opportunities to lead sustainability change at any level of your organization, and learn how to
become an agent for change.
Understand how leadership can be leveraged to support and grow sustainability goals across the
organization.

Module
Innovation for a Sustainable Future
5
Explore the interdependency between innovation and accomplishing sustainability goals.
Understand the role of leadership in managing the risks associated with change.
Examine several use cases, including Toyota/Prius, Boeing/787, and Tesla, using the DICE framework—a
unified framework for business model innovation.

Module
6
The Politics of Sustainability—Part A
Analyze the impacts of political risks from private political groups, such as nongovernmental
organizations, individual activists, and the media, using Citigroup's case study as a practical example.
Investigate the influence of location-based political risks on business decision-making through Tata
Motors' case.
Apply practical tools to mitigate and manage political risks in various business contexts.

Module The Politics of Sustainability—Part B

7
Utilize a structured framework to systematically assess the responses of various interest groups to
environmental policies.
Examine the intricacies of global environmental policy development and implementation, and evaluate
an organization's existing sustainability strategy.

Module
8
The Triple Bottom Line
Use the triple bottom line framework to measure, evaluate, and communicate sustainability
performance for your organization.
Analyze sustainability-related strategic performance and how it relates to your organization’s
value-creation activities, and create your action plan for sustainability.

Sustainability Strategies: Develop Initiatives to Transform Your Business 5

Faculty
William Barnett
The Thomas M. Siebel Professor of Business Leadership, Strategy, and Organizations
Professor Barnett studies how organizations are responding to the challenge of
environmental sustainability. He is establishing research sites around the world,
investigating a number of areas where organizational adaptation is key, including
the proliferation of climate tech startups, issues around environmental justice, the
challenge of climate migration, and the urgent need to preserve the world's
rainforests.

Chris Field
The Perry L. McCarty Director of the Stanford Woods Institute for the Environment and the
Melvin and Joan Lane Professor for Interdisciplinary Environmental Studies at Stanford
University
Professor Field’s research focuses on climate change, especially solutions that
improve lives now, decrease the amount of future warming, and support vibrant
economies. Recent projects emphasize decreasing risks from coastal flooding and
wildfires. He has been deeply involved with national and international efforts to
advance understanding of global ecology and climate change.

Saumitra Jha
Associate Professor of Political Economy
Professor Jha’s award-winning research focuses on economic, financial, and
organizational approaches to mitigate political polarization and violent conflict and
to promote economic development, and his work has been published in the leading
journals of both economics and political science. Jha has also been honored with the
Teacher of the Year Award, as voted by the students of the Stanford GSB Sloan
Fellows Program.

Haim Mendelson
The Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers Professor of Electronic Business, Commerce, and
Management
Professor Mendelson leads efforts at Stanford Graduate School of Business in
studying digital business and its interaction with organizations, markets, and value
chains and incorporating their implications into Stanford GSB’s curriculum and
research. His research interests include digital business, digital platforms, supply
chain management, and market microstructure.

Joseph Piotroski
The Robert K. Jaedicke Professor of Accounting
Professor Piotroski leads Stanford GSB’s efforts to develop this Executive Education
program on sustainable business strategies. An expert on helping leaders and
organizations measure and manage value creation, Professor Piotroski’s research
focuses on corporate transparency, governance, regulation, and decision making in a
global context, most notably in China and other developing economies.

Sustainability Strategies: Develop Initiatives to Transform Your Business 6

 Erica Plambeck
The Charles A. Holloway Professor of Operations, Information and Technology
Professor Plambeck is an expert in manufacturing operations and supply chain
management, and her current research focuses on environmental sustainability.
She received the Presidential Early Career Award for research in supply chain
management and was recognized as a faculty pioneer in social and environmental
stewardship by WRI and the Aspen Institute.

Stefanos Zenios
The Investment Group of Santa Barbara Professor of Entrepreneurship and Professor
of Operations, Information & Technology
Professor Zenios is the faculty co-director of Stanford GSB’s Center for
Entrepreneurial Studies. He is an innovative teacher and researcher, and the main
architect of Startup Garage, a popular GSB course that helps hundreds of Stanford
GSB students and executives learn and apply the innovation processes that are at
the center of the Silicon Valley ecosystem.

Program Information
DURATION PROGRAM FEES EMAIL: [email protected]
8 weeks USD 2,800 PHONE: +1 (401) 443 9709 (U.S.)
4-6 hours per week Flexible payment options +44 12 7959 8043 (U.K.)
are available for this program. +65 3129 4367 (Singapore)
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