The world suffered twin losses of brilliant corporate CEOs recently, with the much publicized death of Apple’s Steve Jobs and the less noted passing of Interface’s Ray Anderson.
Ray Who? Anderson was founder and chair of Interface, Inc. – the world’s largest manufacturer of modular carpet – a company that 17 years ago was set by Anderson on a path to pursue 100 percent sustainable operations and an environmental “footprint” of zero. He is also well remembered within YBP as the keynote speaker at an annual conference in 2004.
The closely spaced losses of these two business giants got me wondering about their lasting impacts on the world.
On the one hand, I agree with economist Stefan Karlsson, writing in The Christian Science Monitor, that “Steve Jobs deserved his wealth, as he created even more than he got for himself,” and also with blogger Greg Habstritt, who observes that Jobs “left [our world] a better place, and allowed us to focus on the things that matter most – innovation, simplicity, and connecting with those we care about.”
On the other hand, I’ll wager (with no risk, as none of us will be around to witness it) that in 100 years – perhaps less – Anderson will be ranked right alongside, or even ahead of, Jobs in lists of CEOs who’ve had the most beneficial and lasting impacts on our planet and its inhabitants.
I believe this because, where Jobs’s wealth creation lays mostly within the financial realm, Anderson likely exceeds Jobs and all other corporate executives to win the “triple crown” of wealth creation: environmental, social, and financial.
What’s more, Anderson may already stand as business history’s most influential leader in prompting companies worldwide to pay lots more attention to their triple bottom lines of boosting environmental, social, and financial capital. Anderson made things uncomfortable for almost every CEO in the US by proving, through spectacular real-world financial results, that monetary profits are not necessarily harmed by pursuing corporate environmental and social goals.
On the contrary, Anderson proved that pursuing these goals enhances financial performance, as he discussed in a 2009 podcast about Interface’s record in pursuing sustainability and zero environmental impact. The initiatives, he said, have “given our people … a higher purpose. … You cannot beat it for attracting the best people. … It is the most motivating thing I have ever seen in my 53 years in the business world.”
After only partially completing the first of eight phases of Interface’s sustainability efforts, Anderson added, “we have saved 400-and-something million dollars in the process. I mean real money. … Sustainability for Interface has become a self-funding process.” More amazingly, this was achieved despite two nearly catastrophic economic downturns: the current “great” recession and the earlier combination of Y2K, the dot-com collapse, and the terror of 9/11.
In the wreckage of those events, Anderson said, “the business case for sustainability became very clear to us. … Our costs went down, not up, dispelling that myth that there’s this tradeoff between the environment and the economy. … Our products were the best they have ever been, because sustainable design had opened up a wellspring of innovation. Our people were thinking of product development ideas they never would have dreamed of without the sustainable design impetus. … We won customer loyalty in ways that no advertising, no clever marketing campaign, at any cost, could have generated.”
Steve Jobs is rightly lauded for the many revolutionary products he brought into the world, and he will rightly be recognized centuries into the future.
And Ray Anderson, quite rightly, will be equally celebrated.
By Dave Stauffer