John Elkington recalled his famous Triple Bottom Line model, better known as the Triple P model, in June 2018 (1). Very few people are aware of this and organizations keep proclaiming that they follow the “People, Planet, Profit” trilogy of a recalled model. John Elkington found that his model was misused and that the planet suffered greatly from the focus on profit, the only break-even point. His goal of creating a model that would lead to a more balanced business approach with respect for nature did not work. Given the current state of the planet, one can only conclude that this was a visionary observation. In this article we will show that our current approach to sustainable development is not sustainable on our limited and vulnerable planet. We will need a new definition and approach that focuses on the quality of all life to ensure a long-term successful future for organizations and society as a whole.

The state of Spaceship Earth

Buckminster Fuller introduced the term “Spaceship Earth” in his 1969 book (2) and it has never been more relevant than today. Spaceship Earth is a very special spaceship because it hosts a biosphere that contains all known life in the universe. You might think we do our utmost to keep this precious spaceship in good condition, but current data shows a different picture. One of the most comprehensive models to describe the state of the planet is the “Planetary Boundaries System” developed by the Stockholm Resilience Center (3). In this model, nine critical features and their boundaries for safe operation were defined. Together they describe the state of planet Earth. This article shows the latest results and the conclusion is that 6 of the 9 vital systems for the good functioning of our spaceship are out of specification. As a quality professional, imagine the following situation: A production manager comes to you and says that the parts are ready to be shipped to the customer, but six of the nine critical features on the drawing are out of specification. His question is simple: “Can we ship the parts?” What would your answer be?

The unbalanced Triple P

In the People, Planet, Profit trilogy, the people and planet aspects are mostly qualitative. The profit aspect is quantitative and easy to quantify, so it is always prioritized, especially since the benefits (more profit) are immediate. For example, by clearing a few hectares of the 6.7 million square kilometer Amazon rainforest, an immediate profit can be made for the farmers who move livestock to the cleared area. If given the choice, the forest would always be cleared, since its benefits are much harder to calculate and the negative consequences of clearing do not become apparent until much later. This one choice is not a problem, but this happens thousands of times, and each time the forest loses. This is how a rainforest is cleared.

Any system that considers sustainable development as a combination of people, planet and profit will always lead to the destruction of nature. This is true for Triple P, for the UN SDGs (Sustainable Development Goals), for the ESG (Environmental, Social, Governance) system and many others. This is illustrated in Table 1 for the SDG system.

This table shows that if the entire world population lived like people in the most sustainable developing countries, we would need about four planets to meet human needs. There is only one. This problem is directly related to the definition of the United Nations Brundtland Commission in 1987: “Sustainable development is development that meets the needs of the present generation without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their own needs.”

This definition refers only to one form of life (humans) and does not define or limit the “needs” of that form of life. In a quantitative, growth-oriented economic system, additional “needs” must constantly be created.

A different perspective: Holistic quality management

As shown in §2, we cannot simply carry on as before. Any new system must combine two things: focusing on all life forms as they are all intertwined, and prioritizing the qualitative aspects of the planet and people. Today, the planet is sacrificed and people are turned into human resources to maximize profit, while profit should be used to help both the planet and people thrive.

A new definition: “Sustainable development means that the present generation takes the necessary actions to pass on our unique biosphere to the next generation in a better condition than they found it. And so on…” (6).

This definition encompasses all life and is therefore holistic in nature. It sets a clear goal and can be measured using indicators linked to the most critical problems such as biodiversity loss and climate change and their respective causes. This is obviously a macro-level definition, but it also shows how organizations can contribute.

Companies that focus on business excellence want to be the best in the world, holistic thinking aims at a long-term flourishing planet and all life on it. Holistic quality management can combine both. Quality can play an important role in this and is presented here as a working tool for achieving true sustainability.

Through improvement methodologies such as Lean Six Sigma, Root Cause Analysis and many others, quality has already made a great contribution to making organizations more sustainable. However, these efforts are mainly aimed at reducing environmental damage. This is good and must continue, but given the current state of the biosphere, it is not good enough. Organizations must move towards holistic quality leadership and contribute to improving the global ecosystem. Actions to be taken may include:

• Include “future generations” and “Earth’s biosphere” as interested parties in your Quality Management System (QMS), assess their needs and expectations and implement them throughout the organization. Use them in your risk analysis methods and in your design reviews and verifications.
• Use double materiality thinking to assess the risks and opportunities associated with the current status of the biosphere. The impact of climate change on business will be, and already is, much more critical than commonly thought. One of the key elements is water, both too much (floods) and too little (drought). Investing in the reuse of process water is an example of how to combine profit with sustainability.
• Treat the Earth’s biosphere as a shareholder. One way to do this is to reserve a certain number of shares for organizations working on ecosystem restoration. This can be local or global, but this way you link the success of the organization (doing good for the world) to ecosystem restoration (doing good for the world).
• Many of our economic activities revolve around adaptation to nature. We need to rethink technology and development to be adaptable To Nature, therefore natural processes go hand in hand with economic development. Low-tech solutions with low energy consumption are cost-effective and much more durable.

Conclusions

Data shows that an approach to sustainability based on balancing economic, social and environmental aspects leads to the degradation of ecosystems. When faced with a choice, meeting human needs always takes precedence over caring for nature. Only by creating a holistic definition of sustainability that puts the Earth’s biosphere at its core can true sustainability be achieved. The right way is to focus on the quality of all life and use quality methods to achieve this.