Triple Line Bottom Method of Management - Essay Example

John Ellington first explained the concept of the triple bottom line in his book “The cannibals with forks” (Kaplan, 2004). This bottom line continues to measure profits; it also measures the organisations impact on the people and on the planet. It can be referred to as a way of expressing a company's impact and sustainability on a local and a global scale. The major concept behind the triple bottom line is that companies are responsible to stakeholders. This includes individuals who are directly or indirectly connected to the company. The company is also responsible for the planet that we are living on. This approach views the shareholders in the company as being part of the stakeholder. In this paper, triple bottom line is to look at its integration in management.

Background
Organisations that are involved in community support, and affect the community surroundings beyond the organisation. By doing this, they reduce risk. Organisations that support the triple bottom line approach are regarded as safer investments. Hence, these organisations are able to procure funds; they also avoid legalities with the governments by fostering good publicity and avoiding angering special interest groups.

Strategies in adopting triple bottom line
Adopting a TBL perspective will require focused commitment through long-term strategic thinking, planning alignment, and implementation (Kaplan, 2004). Companies should adopt two strategies to incorporate the triple bottom line principle into the organisation operations. The organisation should understand that sustainability requires innovation; the sustainability strategy should also be customised.

Triple bottom line organisations take pain to do away with the ecological footprint. This type of organisations strives for sustainability. They recognise the fact that paying more attention to the environment may be profitable. They argue that it is not all about money. This can be seen as a sacrifice when these companies take pains to reduce their energy use, dispose of toxins in safe ways and try to produce products that are safe for consumption.

This approach, viewed by many people, can seem like a waste of time but in the real sense, it can prove worthwhile, to some extent. Many companies today, for example, sports teams and media companies, hire people for their success. They motivate and retain good people in the company’s profiles. These people become the stars and are not the shareholders in the company. Hence, such companies remain with no option but to focus more on their customers. In many parts of the world today, good people are in short supply; hence, companies need to look after their workers well. If the organisation will not be able to look after its workforce well, then it will not attract and retain the people they need to work in that particular organisation. Triple bottom line contributes to the hiring of top talent, retaining of top talent, increased employee productivity, less manufacturing expenses, increased revenues and market share, and easier financing.

Companies that follow the triple bottom line way of doing things have big considerations on how they impact the people that they get involved in. This can include the people who supply the raw materials to the company, and the company chief executive (Kaplan, 2004). The company makes sure that they consider everyone’s well-being. They may offer health care, provision of good working hours, education and job advancement.

Analysis and Challenges of the triple bottom line
The triple bottom line comes with its challenges when applied to an organisation. Profits in this approach are just an aspect of their mission; the approach encourages that companies focus on how they impact their customers. The goal to generate a profit, despite another outcome, is tampered with by the need for the company to consider the societal and the environmental consequences of actions it carries out. This approach is very difficult to quantify because, while an organisation may be able to quantify some of the financial aspects, it is very difficult to quantify social and environmental aspects. For example, if a company makes a promise to recycle as a way of protecting the environment, it would be very hard to quantify this. Hence, this approach tends to make the company sound compliant, by the fact that they tend to say that they have engaged in activities that can be classified as environmentally sound.
Shareholders in most companies are geared toward short-term goals rather than long-term goals. Traditionally, the management of any organisation is to increase the profit, by maximising returns. Read More