Conducting business in more sustainable ways becomes increasingly relevant today and a “must-have” in the future. The sustainability megatrend is driven by a growing population, accelerating urbanization, resource intensity, government regulation, climate change, and – most importantly – by the fact that consumers are increasingly demanding healthy, affordable, as well as socially and environmentally responsible products. Organizations react by implementing more sustainable practices to grow their business, to attract the best talent and to remain relevant to their investors.
But what does “sustainability” mean in a business context exactly? How are sustainable strategies crafted? How are they put into action? And finally, what is the role of information technology in all of this?
Meet SAP, the global powerhouse in enterprise software who has made it its purpose to use IT to help the world run better and improve peoples’ lives. Widely regarded as a sustainability thought leader, SAP has worked with some of the most advanced businesses to understand the challenges and formulate the solutions and strategies how IT can help companies advance their sustainability journey.
In this course you will learn the links between sustainability and innovation, how IT can help create competitive advantage, reduce risk and cost as well as drive growth leveraging sustainable principles. Eventually, our objective is to help you succeed in articulating, embedding and executing a sustainable strategy at the company in which you are or will be working.
Course Content
Week 1: The Business Case for Sustainability
The week contains the following units: Welcome; Root Causes; Sustainable Value Creation; Engaging Top Management; Organizational Setup for Sustainability & The Role of IT
Week 2: Sustainable Strategies
The week contains the following units: Crafting a Sustainable Strategy; Stakeholders and Materiality; Analysis and Target Setting; Examples of Environmentally Driven Initiatives; Examples of Socially Driven Initiatives & Examples of Transformational Innovation
Week 3: Sustainable Business Processes (Part 1)
The week contains the following units: Embedding Sustainability Into Business Processes; Sustainable Design; Sustainable Sourcing and Procurement; Sustainable Production & Sustainable Logistics
Week 4: Sustainable Business Processes (Part 2)
The week contains the following units: Sustainable Consumption; Sustainable End-of-Life Processes; Environmental and Social Capital Accounting; Sustainability in Finance and Administration; Sustainability in HR & Sustainability in IT, aka Green IT
Week 5: Stakeholder Engagement
The week contains the following units: Engaging Line of Business Leaders; Engaging Employees; Engaging Society - Corporate Social Responsibility; Engaging Business Partners, Authorities and Opinion Leaders & Engaging Investors
Week 6: Sustainability Reporting
The week contains the following units: Purpose, Audiences and Standards; Data Quality and Assurance; Integrated Reporting; Report Delivery; Rankings and Recognition & Recap of Key Course Learnings
Week 7: Final Exam
