Services
Sustainability · Environment · Climate
All inquiries to Murray Hogarth by email mhogarth@the3rddegree.com.au or mobile +61 (0)417267235
Tailored sustainability strategies and solutions
the 3rd degree works with business and civil society organisations at Board, Executive and Management levels to tailor sustainability strategies and solutions that are right for them and their stakeholders.
Principal Murray Hogarth has been covering sustainability issues and trends as a journalist and business adviser since the mid 1990s, when the first corporate sustainability reports began to appear, and is a widely published thought leader in the area.
Whatever the risks and opportunities that environmental and social factors are posing for your enterprise, the 3rd degree can help with advice, innovative ideas and active support based on long experience.
Social media and your stakeholder world. Let the 3rd degree help you get plugged in
the 3rd degree is working with client organisations to build their place and profile in social networking, especially the online engagement workhorse Twitter.
Principal Murray Hogarth's background in mainstream media and many years working on sustainability strategy are now being deployed in the powerful new arena of social media.
Sustainability is a vibrant topic in this burgeoning global forum, many important stakeholders are operating in the space, and there are both risks to be aware of and opportunities to seize for progressive businesses.
If you want to build your social media position and need support, talk to Murray mhogarth@the3rddegree.com.au and follow him on Twitter at @The_Wattwatcher
Put your sustainability program to the test. Give it the 3rd degree!
the 3rd degree supports and advises organisations with social and environmental challenges and solutions as the world builds the new sustainable economy of the 21st century.
By engaging the 3rd degree early in your development of sustainability-related products, services, marketing campaigns, business strategies, reports and publications, you can get valuable assistance before you commit to major investments.
Examples of our current/recent work include helping:
- WATTWATCHERS - new consumer focused home energy efficiency devices to let householders and businesses see and manage electricity use in real time, coming to market in 2011 - www.wattwatchers.com.au
- GREEN CAPITAL - advising this leading corporate sustainability program run by the Total Environment Centre, now focusing on the sustainable economy & sustainability labels - www.greencapital.org.au
- 1 MILLION WOMEN - a major national campaign to engage 1 million women in practical action on climate change in their daily lives, now running major Facebook project - www.1millionwomen.com.au
- THE SUSTAINABILITY CARD - a planned service to enable consumer and business purchasing of sustainable products with cash rewards - www.sustainabilitycard.com.au
- PRIVATE CLIENTS - across a number of sectors including renewable energy generation, financial services, waste, publishing, forests, consumer services, beverages
Into the mainstream
Most of us want practical solutions to environmental and social challenges to pursue as part of our business operations and everyday living and working.
the 3rd degree provides expert and personalised support - on framing sustainability strategy, taking action and communicating what you're doing and why - to business, government and community sector clients.
How it affects your enterprise
Sustainability puts a lot of value at stake, both risks and opportunities, as business and other organisational decision-makers wrestle with core questions:
- What do consumers want? What will they pay for? And how can we communicate with them effectively and with integrity?
- In the value chain, what do our employees expect? What should we require from suppliers? What will our customers demand from us? And how can we perform better?
- Where will government policy-makers and influential stakeholders land on key issues? And how will changing regulatory regimes and community expectations affect our business?
How we help
We just do what our clients need - guiding and supporting through their leaders, managers and project teams - in:
- WHAT'S WHAT - Assessing what really matters for your business or organisation in regard to the environment, sustainability and climate change
- FRAMING ACTION - Working out what to do - and how to do it
- BUILDING RELATIONSHIPS - Mapping and engaging stakeholders, understanding their issues and insights, and establishing workable partnerships
- IMPLEMENTATION - Helping you do it, and
- COMMUNICATIONS - Knowing when and where to communicate what you are doing internally and externally, and what to say
We work with you to take meaningful action on climate and sustainability. We back up your team, injecting our expertise to streamline the task of tailoring and delivering the right responses for your business.
The big drivers
The Australian and global sustainability shift is being driven by the cumulative impact of great economic, social and environmental trends and issues of our age:
- Climate change, water crises, species extinctions and other environmental dilemmas
- Energy pricing and supply security, and other resource constraints (the 'limits to growth')
- Poverty, human rights abuses and unresolved social justice and equity concerns and pressures, and
- Emerging health, safety and security challenges
Our approach and aspirations
the 3rd degree works at making sustainability happen.
We aspire to create value with our clients, their stakeholders, and society as a whole.strong>Working closely with decision-makers in our client organisations, we guide and support them to:
- Create practical and achievable solutions for the emerging green economy
- Integrate sustainability thinking and action into their core business to create value for shareholders and society
- Build a strong social and environmental ‘story’ and policy platform of their own, backed by performance, and
- Communicate credibly and effectively to their key internal and external audiences
A snapshot of what we do
Our service areas include:
- Developing holistic climate and sustainability business strategies for mitigation and adaptation
- Building an effective ‘policy voice’ through public affairs initiatives i.e. policy development, government relations
- Practical actions and initiatives to engage staff and value chain partners
- Executive mentoring, thought-leadership support and high-level coaching
- Stakeholder engagement, relationship development and alliance-building
- Solutions-focused product innovation & consumer behaviour change initiatives
- Developing and running community-based campaigns with sustainability objectives
- Credible green marketing communications that avoids 'greenwash'
- Communications strategy and activities (e.g. speech-writing, reports, presentations, articles, opinion pieces and media releases)
Where clients need help with professional and technical services outside of our skills-set, we can assist them to navigate the sometimes confusing offerings and conflicting advice to get what they need from quality service providers.
Retaining our services
We operate under both retainer and fixed-price project fee arrangements. We also provide speaking, workshop and facilitation services tailored to meet individual clients’ needs, including one-off engagements, by negotiation.
Please talk to us about what you want, how we can help, project structuring, and our normal terms and conditions. Contact info@the3rddegree.com.au
Examples of work by our personnel
- Overseeing and advising the development from scratch of a national mass-action campaign to drive behaviour change at household level to cut CO2 emissions
- Co-leading a team advising a major Australian energy utility on developing its climate strategy with a target to cut carbon emissions by 60 percent of its 1990 baseline by 2050
- Leading the research and writing of a business guide on credible green marketing supported by an extensive position paper on the problem of 'greenwash' and how best to avoid it
- Developing an innovative new device - for consumers to monitor and manage their household energy use in real time - through to early commercialisation stage
- Conceiving and leading the execution of the world’s largest consumer environmental competition ($100,000 in prizes) with a major Sydney’ newspaper, helping drive the distribution of about 1.5 million energy efficient light globes in a month; and building distribution links with major community networks
- Guiding a major Australian manufacturer in the renewable energy sector to build supportive relationships with enviornment groups, social welfare organisations and other NGO stakeholders
- Helping to initiate a national campaign for collection and recycling of consumer packaging in Australia as part of a major focus on Extended Producer Responsibility (EPR)
- Working as a member of strategy teams with ASX100 companies to shape corporate sustainability strategies that have won the clients national and international recognition as leaders in their sectors (including Dow Jones Sustainability Index)
- Co-authoring thought-leadership publications on corporate sustainability
- Designing and executing a comprehensive stakeholder engagement process that produced supplier criteria for a major international minerals buyer to cover a major new mining precinct in Australia's Murray Basin
- Creating and coordinating a new national environment awards
- Covering the Kyoto Climate Summit in 1997 as a journalist for a leading Australian newspaper
Reference
‘Murray Hogarth understands social and environmental challenges and how they impact on business. He has worked with me on a number of initiatives in Australia and across Asia. These initiatives have ranged from mobilising an Industry, Government and Community effort to address alcohol misuse, through to identifying and developing action plans across a range of markets and cultures to address community and environmental issues based on direct engagement with a broad range of internal and external stakeholders. Murray's forthright and probing style saw him play a critical role in agitating for change, ensuring that we recognised and engaged the issues head on. The outcome was measured not just in the success of each initiative, but also in the fundamental skills and confidence that we have gained in engaging the issues and stakeholders directly and in our understanding of the difference we can make to the world though our business and the way we approach it.’