How business management decisions should be affected by climate change

唐林可 王魏

Abstract: In the 21st century, the climate has changed a lot and has had an impact on business and society to some extent. At the same time, the world is losing its biodiversity at an alarming rate, and global pollution poses a growing threat to human health. As a result, the focus on profit maximization for modern business organizations is being challenged to balance the public's desire to maintain a legal business. How? Threatened by climate change, businesses can take steps to reduce the bad impact of climate change, seize opportunities by adapting to climate change and businesses can take meaningful steps to achieve their sustainability.

Key words: climate change  business management decisions  sustainability

Business can take measures to mitigate the effects of climate change. Companies can adopt proactive environmental strategies, and lead to higher economic profits. From the perspective of management, companies that adopt environmental strategies may benefit from special price, and the sales will increase because of the legitimacy of the market and greater social recognition, thus giving the company greater economic output and product differentiation competitors. Therefore, it can be seen that companies can take measures to predict the climate change and adopting proactive environmental strategies to minimize the bad effects of climate change and create more profits.

Business can adapt to the change and take advantage of the opportunities. The business that regards climate change as a valuable opportunity will accept the challenge and seek to improve their profitability to build competitive advantages by adapting to climate change. Hoffman(2005) supports that enterprises can seize unique opportunities to promote the operation process effectively solve the climate change problems to determine new market opportunities, and discover new financial opportunities, so as to establish intangible assets. In addition, the above earnings have a positive impact on corporate profits, earnings, costs and so on. Conclusively, business can adapt to the change and regard climate change as a valuable opportunity and an investment decision to build competitive advantages by adapting to climate change.

Business will take some measures to achieve their sustainable development. First of all, companies can face the challenge of the climate change by driving sustainable innovation. In 2011 Patagonia became a b company. In this way Patagonia has consolidated its reputation not only for innovative design and high quality products, but also for environmental and social conscience. And according to Matt Dwyer, Director of Materials Innovation & Development, “If we find something that provides a ridiculous performance benefit and also has a significantly reduced environmental impact, that is the sweet spot for new disruptive innovations. ”(Rourke&Strand, 2017). They constantly look for ways to minimize environmental damage, expand environmental benefits while building the best products. Meanwhile, using sustainability principles to create solutions gives them a good reputation. It is obvious that driving sustainable innovation is a good way for companies to face the challenge of climate change. Secondly, companies can take meaningful steps to improve their own environmental performance. Four-fifths of fortune 500 companies now publish sustainability reports describing a wide range of environmental activities. And thousands of companies around the world have signed up to the United Nations global compact (which calls itself the world's largest initiative for sustainable business development) and agreed to its principles of improving human rights, labor treatment and the environment, and reducing corruption(Lyon et al, 2018). This shows that the sustainability of companies has become the mainstream, and many companies have taken meaningful measures to improve their environmental performance. To sum up, Coping with climate change, enterprises should take some measures in sustainability for better development.

Threatened by climate change, business management decisions have the following effects. Firstly, business can take some steps to expand their economic benefits and reduce the threat of climate change. Secondly, business can take advantage of the opportunities by adapting the climate change. And finally, under the threat of climate change, businesses can take meaningful steps to achieve their own sustainable development. Acknowledging that climate change is inevitable, and recognizing the need to adapt to it, requires bold decisions by businesses.

Reference List

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