Challenging economic conditions haven't outweight envionmental concerns for many  companies.

One of the world’s leading public relations firmso firmsFleishman-Hillard Inc and the American Marketing Association surveyed 270 people with 1/5 of the respondents coming from marketing or communications businesses and the remainder represent a strong cross section of other economic sectors.

When it comes to new and potentially expanded opportunities for sustainable development communicators - primarily those who hold marketing or public relations jobs -remain optimistic for the future. This optimism is a welcome bright spot in a time of increasing global economic uncertainty and rising climate crisis.

Obviously projections are never perfect but the results from this survey reveal valuable insights.More than half of the organizations surveyed 58%  will place greater emphasis on sustainable initiatives in the next two to three years. Of those surveyed.

For accurate analysis you must know how the companies define sustainability. Just over half53% believe sustainability has to do with balancing financial human and naturalresources for long-term benefit than with environmental protection while 23% define sustainability in terms of focusing on renewable energy resources 10% define it as driving waste and inefficiency out of the supply chain7% believe it's reducing our carbon footprint and dealing with global warming 3% say reducing our national dependence on foreign oil and focusing on renewable resources and 5% none of the above.

What's the reason for their new found sense of economic and environmental optimism? According to AMA /  Fleishman-Hillard's summary there are several factors including: consumer demand corporate culture technological advancements and the new policies of the Obama administration .
 

Reputations.

One section that jumped out at me involved the signifigance of comapny reputation. The survey asked "Over6d4 the next two-three years do you expect each of the following considerations to discourage or encourage your organization's adoption of sustainably practices-

These results show the added importance of online reputation management Most companies still have a long way to go before they can practice what they preach. Only 36% are extensively involved in recycling programs and even more surprising was the stat the only 20% of companies surveyed are extensively involved in improving electric energy efficiency.

Those results reminded me of a CMO survey by Alterian which revealed that only 4.5% of CMO's were "very satisfied" with their visibility.Half of the companies in the AMA/Fleishman survey feel that economic realities encourage the adoption of sustainability practices but some 29% feel that economic realities discourage adoption and 27% believe their organization purposefully keeps a low profile on sustainability efforts. Over half (54%) disagree while 19% do not know.