What you can do!

You Make a Difference at the Sustainable Business Institute (SBI)INTERNS & VOLUNTEERS—We Need You!

The Sustainable Business Institute (SBI), a 501(c) (3) public benefit corporation incorporated in California in 1995, is the oldest organization in the world with the mission of motivating private enterprise to enhance profitability by adopting sustainable business practices.

What can you do to help?

Many projects and initiatives are underway at SBI. Come visit and find one or more that you would like to be involved with. In doing so, you will meet diverse business people, make a significant contribution in promoting sustainability, and enhance your own skills. You can spend whatever time best fits your schedule--a few hours a week, 2 days, 3 months, etc.

Check SBI’s website to learn about its many programs and services: www.sustain ablebusiness.org Any one of these can benefit from your involvement. Where your help is most urgently needed right now, however, is on one of the following:

· SBI’s Seal of Sustainability™ (Seal)

Seal of Sustainability™ publicly recognizes and honors businesses and their leaders throughout the world for implementing sustainability practices. A select group of volunteers will be trained to identify companies which have begun the journey of sustainable business practices and invite them to join SBI as a member and apply to receive SBI’s Seal. Financial incentives for these volunteers and interns help motivate successful outcomes. Other volunteers may prefer to work with other aspects of the Seal application process. (e.g., marketing and research to identify business candidates for Seal application).

· SBI Membership

Membership in the Sustainable Business Institute is open to private-sector CEO and senior executives who are responsible for the vision and strategic planning of their companies. SBI’s website details some of the specialized services that members enjoy. Volunteers and Interns are needed to help make companies aware of the opportunities that membership in SBI brings (i.e., marketing), to do web research and expand SBI’s membership prospect data base (CEO Research), to attend meetings and talk with prospects, etc. You will be able to explain to company executives how they can use some of the tools that SBI provides to implement sustainable business practices and increase operating profits through energy and resource efficiencies.

· Sustainable Business Practices Library

One of the most valuable benefits of SBI membership is members sharing information with one another on how they instituted sustainable business practices in their companies -- the what’s, the how’s, strategies to overcome problems, positive outcomes (e.g., energy savings, profit increases), etc. SBI’s “Sustainable Business Practices Library” provides such information in two forms: written “Cases” and CDs made from tapes of CEOS & senior executives live presentations on sustainable business practices at various SBI events. Volunteers with writing, editing, organizing, and technical capabilities (e.g., transferring tapes to CD) will find this an interesting undertaking.

· Web Newsletter

This project will involve creating a bi-monthly newsletter for posting on SBI’s website. The newsletter will contain cases drawn from SBI’s own “Sustainable Business Practices” Library as well as researched information from other sources, such as: environmental data of interest to SBI constituents. Volunteers with any or all skills in the use of graphics, writing, editing, web research are ideal to set up and launch this SBI Web Newsletter. Ability to work as a team is a must.

· Web Research

Interns and volunteers are needed to do Web Research to identify foundations and other grant sources which support SBI goals and objectives, as SBI intends to undertake a major expansion of programs and memberships and will be seeking funding to do so.

Contact: Please send an email to Jessica Fullmer, SBI Chairman and Founder (jhfullmer@sustainable business.org) or call 408-370-5783 and explore together how one or more of these opportunities best fits your needs and SBI’s. We believe you will find Volunteering invaluable. For certain SBI sees it as a most welcome contribution to our effort to bring sustainability to our Planet.

A Call to Join Sustainable Business Institute’s “Sustainable Revolution

A Call to Join Sustainable Business Institute’s “Sustainable Revolution”

We have had our agriculture and industrial revolution now its time for something new!
The Sustainable Business Institute (SBI) calls on you to join in a revolution unique in history—a “Sustainable Revolution”--where all commit to meet economic, environ-mental, and social needs without using up the earth’s resources that future generations and all of life on the planet need to meet theirs as well. Former U.S. Vice President Al Gore’s movie “An Inconvenient Truth” underscores the urgent need for action. This October the non-profit Sustainable Business Institute will launch its Seal of Sustainability (SOS), started in 2000, a unique assessment process which publicly recognizes companies with business practices that contribute to saving or restoring resources this planet so badly needs. We are looking for 100 volunteers to help us launch the Seal in October. We invite you to be a volunteer!

I heard Bill McKibben, a scholar in residence in Environmental Studies at Middlebury College, speak at a recent CERES Conference. Bill is a world renowned environmental author of the 1990’s book The End of Nature--a classic work on the environmental crisis, the greenhouse effect, and the depletion of the ozone layer. At the conference, he talked about a subject Gore and others have raised about CO2 concentrations reaching a “tipping point,” in which Earth’s natural ecosystems will begin to collapse and degrade faster than the rate of restoration.

The unsubtle conclusion to all this is that we are now tampering with the earth’s natural systems, possibly making degradation permanent, in effect threatening all life on our planet. It hit me that up till now, we have lost species that will not exist again. As horrible as this is, an even worse situation has arisen. McKibben said that reports from leading scientists now indicate that the “tipping point” will likely be reached much sooner than Gore’s suggested 10-15 year timeline…perhaps in even 2-4 years unless, that is, something halts or slows it down. Check out McKibben’s website: www.billmckibben.com. Again, the point: If CO2 emissions continue to increase at the current pace, our natural systems will be permanently damaged. There will be “no going back.” Losses can never be restored.

SBI, our partners, youth leaders, and volunteers invite you to spend time and energy to pull together your contacts and resources and devote serious effort to address this global emergency. Everyone is busy. Not trying is simply not an option. Companies use most of the world’s resources. SBI’s Seal of Sustainability is one means by which they can engage in sustainable business practices and lighten their footprint on our planet. SBI will launch its SOS in October in Silicon Valley. Below are action steps you can take to help us do it successfully. Join with us in this vision to sustain a quality of life for all our planet. We urgently need your involvement.

Sincerely, ACTION STEPS:

1) Contact SBI:jhfullmer@sustainablebusiness.org

2) Identify at least 5 companies* you believe have sustainable business practices:

Jessica Fullmer a) Identify appropriate company executive

Founder and Chairperson b) Request SOS Application Package

Sustainable Business Institute

www.sustainable business.org c) Follow up to urge submission of application

3) If possible, attend October launch of SOS

*any size, any type, any country

4) Contact us to volunteer in one of the committees

5) Attend the Sustainable Business User Group (SBUG) if you are a business person July 11 at 11:00 am. (See website)