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Welcome to the Sustainability NEXUS

Our mission is to accelerate our progression toward true sustainability by establishing uniquely respondent regional centers that coalesce the abundant but fragmented energy and talent already flowing into social and environmental sustainability goals in each region.

What is profit? New business models and old business types

Erik Porse - Saturday, 30 July 2011

Individuals, entrepreneurs, and companies across the world are re-examining the role of business in creating social and economic wealth. In a broad-based movement that has been building for decades, traditional delineations between “non-profit” and “for-profit” entities seem outdated, as companies adopt corporate social responsibility plans and NGOs move toward more business-based models of service delivery. Additionally, the economic downturn of the past years has forced thousands of individuals into the venture sector, as entrepreneurship has significantly increased in the face of high unemployment. It is a ripe environment for innovation in business models.

Any venture faces a set of choices upon inception: organizational structure; fundraising plan; collaborative partners, and more. The push to re-examine traditional business models has created vast new opportunities for businesses and ventures to pursue goals, but has also raised a whole new set of questions that can consume a lot of resources. How can for-profit organizations assure a social mission as part of the work? How can a non-profit pursue revenue-raising activities? Does acquiring and maintaining non-profit status interfere with more important work? Many ventures that bridge the goals of the triple bottom line (economy, environment, equity) can be weighed down, if not paralyzed, in the early stages of development just tackling these issues.

The Vocabulary of Sustainability, What the heck does it really mean?

Max Zahniser - Saturday, 30 July 2011

A wise man (either Aldous Huxley or Ken Wilber, or both) once said that the language we use often has a great deal more wisdom embedded in it than those who use it (paraphrased). Hence, we can gain a great deal of insight simply by looking up a word’s definition and/or etymology. This simple, yet rarely employed approach has served me well in navigating the ongoing discourse in the sustainability movement; a movement which has become bogged down and confused by cultural over use and misuse of many key words, adding to and even skewing meanings. Although the explosion of social and environmental initiatives and organizations is encouraging, many of these organizations and their leaders are exacerbating the confusion rather than moving toward the clarity we’ll need to really scale up the effectiveness of our collective efforts.

Sustainability itself is already an over-used, seldom understood word. Peter Senge (systems thinking and organization dynamics thought leader) pointed out that the blurriness of the term sustainability is both its greatest strength and greatest weakness. On one hand we’re finally discussing some things in one conversation that have been segregated for several generations, and we’re recognizing interdependencies that we have all but forgotten as a human race. On the other hand it is hard to take decisive and effective action when you’re overwhelmed and confused by a lack of clarity. But I believe we can achieve clarity and still more consciously discuss whole-systems.

True Collaboration

Glenna Stone - Saturday, 30 July 2011

The original idea behind the NEXUS Collaboration Center began with my graduate design thesis, which focused on designing an urban retreat around a charrette space. The term charrette, most commonly used in design circles, is defined as an intense period of design activity. After participating in my first charrette, I instantly realized how applicable the concept was to solve any type of problem, not just typical issues faced by design professionals. Software engineers, product designers, advertising agencies, and people in virtually every segment of the economy are all trying to solve a problem. Anyone trying to design a better process, product, or service can benefit from the charrette process as a superior alternative to brainstorming sessions and standard workshops.

The primary intention of my graduate thesis was to create a place where corporate employees (not design professionals) could meet to develop out of the box, innovative solutions that addressed the unsustainable aspects of their business. Whether in manufacturing, procurement, sales, transportation, or all of the above, small and large corporations face an expanding number of choices to more efficiently manage their operations and supply chains. The intention of the charrette center, aptly named