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Video Interview: Bill Shireman, Future 500
TriplePundit attended the Sustainable Brands 2013 conference earlier this month. Follow along on this page for ongoing video interviews with sustainability thought leaders, corporate change agents and entrepreneurs who are leading the way to a more sustainable future.
Bill Shireman describes himself as both an activist and an entrepreneur. His organization, Future 500, is a highly effective stakeholder engagement non-profit who seeks to build bridges between activism and industry to address major social and environmental problems. Much in the spirit of the triple bottom line philosophy, Future 500 argues:
The most effective way to balance economic, social, and environmental objectives is by humanizing relationships between corporations and critical stakeholders to enable the genuine engagement that leads to breakthrough systemic solutions.
In our short video interview (see below), Bill told me that activism still has a very important role to play in terms of putting a spotlight on issues that may not be getting attention. However, the inherently adversarial nature of activism makes it limited in finding viable long-term solutions once all parties are paying attention. Future 500 picks up, at that point, to make real change happen.
Take a peek at the interview below for Bill's succinct and effective explanation of a very complex set of problems, including the impressive accomplishments to date by groups like Greenpeace, Rainforest Action Network, TFT, WWF, Future 500 and Robertsbridge Group.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kYlzFJQxGOM
Nick Aster is the founder of TriplePundit. Prior to launching 3p, Nick worked for Mother Jones magazine, successfully re-launching the magazine's online presence. He worked for TreeHugger.com, managing the technical side of the publication for 3 years, and has also been an active consultant for individuals and companies entering the world of micro-publishing. He also worked for Gawker Media and Moreover Technologies in the early days of blogging. Nick holds an MBA in sustainable management from the Presidio School of Management and graduated with a BA in History from Washington University in St. Louis.
