Changes in business with the arrival of the BES index
The “BES”, which stands for “Benessere Equo e Sostenibile” (Fair and Sustainable Wellbeing), is an index created by ISTAT and overseen by the respected, forward-looking economist Enrico Giovannini. It is a composite of twelve indicators that measure healthcare, education, employment, cultural and natural heritage, security, politics, and more, and the underlying idea is that we need to get past our obsession with economic growth at all costs, and so with GDP, and to learn the lesson of the Great Crisis (that came about from a series of imbalances that were feeding the financial bubble) in order to radically rethink our traditional economic paradigms of production, accumulation, distribution and consumption. It will be Italy, through ISTAT, to chair the UN statistics working group in order to define the new sustainability indicators by 2015. And in fact, despite not having the most long-lived of economic cultures, Italy already has excellent examples of this synthesis of the new culture of enterprise in production and product in many of the mid-sized and larger organizations that have already learned the lesson of the “green economy” and have used this as a tool in being more competitive and in improving relations with the local communities, with their employees and with all other stakeholders. Just a few weeks ago, here on this blog, we spoke of “PIQ” (which stands for “Prodotto Interno di Qualità”, or “quality domestic product”). Now we have this new indicator. What should a business do with the “BES” index? Manufacturers can save on energy and water, for example, and do so while following the strictest standards of safety in the workplace. Labour relations can place a great deal of emphasis on employee wellbeing (e.g. by providing a bright, pleasant and attractive workplace). And businesses can provide products that come with guarantees of safety, reliability and comfort. They can take extreme care to properly recycle and dispose of waste and promote cultural initiatives throughout the communities in which they work, so that business becomes a driver of social interests, not just a source of jobs, income and production (see, for example, the enterprise foundations). There is a whole world to be redesigned with a critical eye, one in which Italy is not, for a change, stuck in the starting blocks.
The “BES”, which stands for “Benessere Equo e Sostenibile” (Fair and Sustainable Wellbeing), is an index created by ISTAT and overseen by the respected, forward-looking economist Enrico Giovannini. It is a composite of twelve indicators that measure healthcare, education, employment, cultural and natural heritage, security, politics, and more, and the underlying idea is that we need to get past our obsession with economic growth at all costs, and so with GDP, and to learn the lesson of the Great Crisis (that came about from a series of imbalances that were feeding the financial bubble) in order to radically rethink our traditional economic paradigms of production, accumulation, distribution and consumption. It will be Italy, through ISTAT, to chair the UN statistics working group in order to define the new sustainability indicators by 2015. And in fact, despite not having the most long-lived of economic cultures, Italy already has excellent examples of this synthesis of the new culture of enterprise in production and product in many of the mid-sized and larger organizations that have already learned the lesson of the “green economy” and have used this as a tool in being more competitive and in improving relations with the local communities, with their employees and with all other stakeholders. Just a few weeks ago, here on this blog, we spoke of “PIQ” (which stands for “Prodotto Interno di Qualità”, or “quality domestic product”). Now we have this new indicator. What should a business do with the “BES” index? Manufacturers can save on energy and water, for example, and do so while following the strictest standards of safety in the workplace. Labour relations can place a great deal of emphasis on employee wellbeing (e.g. by providing a bright, pleasant and attractive workplace). And businesses can provide products that come with guarantees of safety, reliability and comfort. They can take extreme care to properly recycle and dispose of waste and promote cultural initiatives throughout the communities in which they work, so that business becomes a driver of social interests, not just a source of jobs, income and production (see, for example, the enterprise foundations). There is a whole world to be redesigned with a critical eye, one in which Italy is not, for a change, stuck in the starting blocks.