If you plan on hiring college graduates for your management training program you best have a well defined green or sustainable practices plan or these graduates will go elsewhere.
Unfortunately, elsewhere is most likely your competition if they want a job in retail procurement.
In a recent USA TODAY article by Trevor Hughes titled More Colleges using green as a selling tool; the author discusses the impact that green programs have on college students deciding where they will attend College or University. It is a safe bet if these students are using this as criteria for selecting where they will spend the next 4 years of their life, that they will also use the same criteria to make their career decisions.
The article goes on to quote results form The Sustainable Endowments Institute survey in 2009 which found that 27% of colleges and universities included sustainability messaging in their admissions process and that in 2010 69% did. That is a 156% increase in one year.
The Sustainable Endowments Institute focuses on areas such as food sourcing, recycling, and energy efficiency.
Quite often when this author asks this question of mid level managers, associates and employees, I just draw a blank stare. If you have this discussion with investors, the eyes just roll and you can see the note caption saying blah, blah, blah.
If you don?t have a plan you can not blame anyone but yourself.
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