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Institute for Sustainable Business Practice

Carmel Boyer School of Business

(440) 826-5923

The Institute for Sustainable Business Practice (ISBP) explores, promotes and seeks to drive principles of sustainability within business and organizational practice. Our programs and services serve business organizations and professionals in the Northeast Ohio region, as well as BW students and faculty. Our work is made possible with support of the McGregor Fund.

Transforming Challenges into Opportunities

Boosting People, Planet and Profit
A rapidly evolving movement, sustainability is an opportunity and challenge for organizations as they work to integrate sustainable business practices and boost the "triple bottom line" of planet, people and profit. Sustainability offers tremendous opportunities for visionary organizations and individuals to reduce corporate environmental footprints, develop sustainable products and services, strive for higher levels of transparency and be accountable to corporate stakeholders.

Serving the Business Community
ISBP serves as a resource center for the integration of sustainable practices. Focusing on concepts such as the "triple bottom line," ISPB's consulting services, peer learning for business managers and larger educational programs promote sustainability principles that generate tangible change and measurable outcomes within organizations. We believe that sustainability offers tremendous opportunities for businesses and regions that successfully embrace the process more effectively than their competitors.

Educating the Community
BW continues to make strides in advancing campus sustainability efforts and works to educate the community about these practices. Initiatives have included energy conservation; conversion to clean energy sources including wind and solar; waste reduction, recycling and composting; consideration of the integrity of the ecosystem in which our campus resides; and community relations. BW's Ernsthausen Hall was the first residence hall in Ohio to utilize environmentally friendly GeoExchange technology for heating and cooling and BW now boasts two LEED certified buildings, including the Gold level of the R. Amelia Harding House, which demonstrates sustainable living and includes community meeting space.

Preparing Today's Students for Tomorrow
A leader in sustainability programming, Baldwin Wallace launched Ohio's first undergraduate major in sustainability. ISBP works in partnership with this and other BW academic programs to foster understanding of sustainability concepts.

Programs and Services

The BW Sustainability Symposium
On an annual basis, ISBP offers a major two-day public event that focuses on sustainability themes critical to 21st-century businesses. Our inaugural event in October 2008 featured Stuart Hart, renowned management sustainability theorist at Cornell University. These major events are open to the general public.

Consulting/Collaboration with Organizations
ISBP offers sustainability-consulting services tailored to the needs of local businesses. Teams of faculty and student consultants can help local companies produce tangible outcomes to their bottom lines, their interactions within their communities and their impacts on the natural environment. Consulting and peer learning opportunities are available for managers of local companies to advance organizational effectiveness in sustainable performance.

Campus Speakers
The program shares a growing wealth of managerial and corporate expertise among Northeast Ohio corporations and beyond with students and faculty on our campus to help them keep abreast of changing business practices in sustainability.

Corporate Sponsors/Advisory Council

The ISBP is proud to partner with area corporations and nonprofit organizations that support our on-going efforts and share our commitment to advancing sustainable practices. These organizations provide financial support and serve as "champions of sustainability" who not only promote ISBP programs and services within their organizations but also keep the ISPB abreast of important sustainability challenges within their organizations, insuring our relevance to the marketplace. Representatives of our sponsors also serve on a rotating, term basis on our corporate advisory council.

Faculty Resources

David Krueger is director of the ISBP. He has served on the BW faculty for 20 years and holds the Charles E. Spahr Chair in Managerial and Corporate Ethics in the Carmel Boyer School of Business. He is also co-director of BW's sustainability major, the first in Ohio and the midwest region.
dkrueger@bw.edu
(440) 826-5923