Hard to believe that the end of another summer is upon us.  Earlier this month I was on Cape Cod, enjoying a week of vacation, which included eating a lot of fresh seafood.   The menu included cod (of course), clams, flounder, haddock, lobster and scallops.  All of it was delicious, but with every bite there was a little remorse.  Ever since I first read the United Nations Environment Program’s (UNEP’s) prediction that the world’s fisheries could be depleted by 2050, I have suffered a tinge of guilt with every plate of broiled scrod, every cup of seafood stew, every lobster roll.

According to UNEP, 30 percent of global fish stocks have already collapsed – meaning that they now yield 10 percent or less of their previous potential.  I also know full well that some one billion people around the world, most of them from developing countries, rely on seafood as their primary source of protein and a major source of their sustenance.

Responsible fisheries management and improved practices here in the U.S. and around the world are a good start and help alleviate some of my guilt.  Fish farms also have a role to play in meeting the world’s growing demand for seafood, but they are not without their challenges or critics.  And while I’m intrigued by the promise of genetically altered fish, there are many unanswered questions and many associated risks still to be addressed.

The way corporations sponsor causes is changing dramatically. Sponsors are moving from investing in “properties” that deliver quantifiable ROI in terms of impressions, interactions, and sales to developing proprietary social programs that deliver qualitative ROI such as employee and customer trust and engagement.

Here’s the old paradigm: your corporation identifies a cause property (i.e. an event such as a Susan G. Komen Race for the Cure or the Canadian Breast Cancer Foundation’s CIBC Run for the Cure), pays a sponsorship fee to the related charity, and then spends, on average, at least 75 cents per dollar of the sponsorship fee on activating the event through a combination of internal and external marketing and communications.

Here’s the new model: your corporation identifies a social issue that is aligned with its overall community investment strategy and of high relevance to employees and external stakeholders, you develop a proprietary social program and secure one or more charitable organizations as partners, you activate the social program at a much lower cost through direct participation that delivers real engagement and through social media that delivers more reach and is seen as more authentic.

How do you measure sustainability ? I have been fortunate to gain a little preview of the input supporting the soon-to-be-released report offering answers to this very question. The report has been compiled by  Ethical Corporation and is called "Social and economic impact: measurement, evaluation and reporting: A must-have guide for companies operating in emerging markets and vulnerable communities". This  report promises to offer answers to many of the questions that most CSR practitioners and observers have been seeking. If only there were a way to capture all of a Company's sustainability impacts in a clear and consistent measurement methodology, we would all be much wiser, and probably, much more sustainable. The Ethical Corp report promises to include "a break-down and analysis of impact measurement methods, tools and processes currently available" based on insights from a survey of 116 CSR professionals worldwide, 30 in-depth interviews, a review of 60 Sustainability Reports and will include case studies from Henieken, Vodafone. SAB Miller, Tata, Unilever, Nike and more.

It is now exactly 7 days ago that a storm in the Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) world broke out over an article by Aneel Karnani published in the Wall Street Journal titled: ”The case against Corporate Social Responsibility”.

In the article he argued that the idea of companies having a duty to address social ills is not just flawed but that it also makes it more likely that we’ll ignore the real solutions to these problems.

All week last week the reactions to this article from around the CSR community flooded in. People tweeted on Twitter, shared on Facebook and emailed from one practitioner to the the other arguing for and against this point of view. Some reactions where in support of Mr Karnani but the majority where criticizing the simplicity of his argument and absolutely disagreed with his assessment that CSR in itself as a business principle was flawed.

This is a list of some of the reactions by authors and websites:

It has been a heck of a week up here in Paradise. For my usual August respite, Barack, Michelle, the kids and me all vacationed together on Martha’s Vineyard. Okay not exactly together, but only a few miles away on this small beautiful island, their hearts beat with mine. It was a sublime dream of unity.

I did see the camera crews at Sweet E’s Cupcake Shop waiting breathlessly for a glimpse of the Big O. But it was not to be, the First Fam was ordering gulf shrimp one town away. Still this week it was comforting to know that half the secret service, some of the nation’s best military and the Prez himself were battling it out with locals through the three day Nor’easter.

Speaking of unity, Krishna Das dazzled audiences at Union Chapel the other night with spiritual songs and chants in Sanskrit and English. It was a divine experience for everyone present. After two hours of musical love, I floated away with his new CD, “Heart as Wide Open as the World.”

Ahh, if only the world could be as wide open, loving and blissful as Martha’s Vineyard in August…

Earlier this month, Proctor & Gamble announced plans to use renewable, sustainable, sugarcane-based plastic for packaging on its Pantene Pro-V, Covergirl and Max Factor brands.

I’m happy to see that P&G did its research and chose not to use corn-based plastic. Corn-based plastic has been all the rage lately and can be found in everything from “compostable” silverware to paper coffee cups. Plastic made from corn is not as sustainable as it may appear. GMO corn is typically used and taking corn out of the world’s food supply is elitist at best. So good thing P&G went a different route.

P&G will source the sugarcane-based plastic from Braskem SA, who manufactures the material using ethanol made from sustainably-grown Brazilian sugarcane. The process transforms sugarcane into high-density polyethylene (HDPE) plastic, a type commonly used for product packaging. It remains 100% recyclable in existing municipal recycling facilities.

The beauty products will be rolled out globally over the next two years and are expected to be on shelves in 2011.

Now, P&G needs to work on the sustainability of the shampoo, conditioner and make-up inside the packaging as well.

Follow Cindy on Twitter @ethicalbiz

The cover essay in The Wall Street Journal's special Executive Advisor report yesterday attacks advocates of corporate social responsibility, calling the belief that "businesses have a responsibility to act in the public interest and will profit from doing so" ineffective and flawed.

Aneel Karnani, an associate professor of strategy with University of Michigan's Stephen M. Ross School of Business—ironically the venue for the 2011 Net Impact Conference, where I am headed in October as a speaker on Diversity as a Strategic Advantage--brings up several issues in his op-ed, some that rankle, and others that well underline today's complex market.

To get some perspective on how Karnani's claims have been received, I reached out to many of my contacts in the CSR community, largely through social media. Everyone who responded has a distinct stake in Karnani's article: they are professionals committed to furthering corporate responsibility, and while they view the debate from a variety of standpoints, there is unanimous agreement that business strategies must evoke sustainable practices for continued growth—whether we call it CSR or not.

Why do some companies win public trust and others lose it? That’s a question more people are asking themselves, as global faith in business remains unfortunately fragile. Turns out the trust deficit, a trend on the rise for ten years now, is more than a mere wrinkle on the face of capitalism. It’s a pressing concern for every shareholder.

When companies lose trust, they often lose capital. Case in point: Gulf disaster stocks BP, Halliburton, Transocean and Anadarko each sank between 25 and 45 percent during the past four months. The Goldman Sachs-SEC debacle pushed company shares down by 15 percent, and the Dow down by 130 points. Massey stock plunged 42 percent following a deadly string of safety failures. Toyota shares dropped 16 percent following its massive recall. And as of today, none of these companies has fully rebounded, indicating the markets grow slower to forgive.

“The last couple of years have provided plenty of reasons for a building sense of mistrust,” says Motley Fool’s Alyce Lomax. “Goldman Sachs and BP have become the most recent high-profile examples of the many big institutions whose highly paid managers seem to be only out for themselves. ”

How can people be convinced to significantly green their lives? To make the big changes needed to conserve natural resources and decrease energy use?

Robert B. Cialdini may have something to suggest. Cialdini' is the author of Influence and I’ve been reading his follow-up book Yes! 50 Scientifically Proven Ways to Be Persuasive. Each of the 50 ways is given its own chapter in the easy to read book and number 14 is titled: “How can one small step help your influence take a giant leap?”

This chapter tells the story of two social science researchers posing as the Road Traffic Safety Committee and their quest to get homeowners to place “a large, unsightly sign measuring six feet by three feet and stating DRIVE CAREFULLY on [their] front lawn.” Unsurprisingly, only 17 percent in the “posh neighborhood” agreed to place the sign in their yard. But what was astonishing was that the researchers were able to increase that rate to 76 percent among a similar group “simply by making one seemingly insignificant addition to their request.” From page 65 of the book:

A different research assistant approached this separate group of residents two weeks prior to this burdensome request and asked them if they’d be willing to display a very small, relatively inconspicuous sign in their window that read BE A SAFE DRIVER. Because it was such a small request, almost all of these residents agreed. Two weeks later, when someone else came to their home and asked them if they’d be willing to place the large billboard on their otherwise perfectly manicured lawn, they were much more inclined to agree.

Ann M. Charles wants senior management to realize that the economic collapse has changed the culture of leadership forever. Founder of BRANDfog and producer of the upcoming Great Leaders Conference, she firmly believes that for companies to be successful, they must embrace social media while recognizing that corporate responsibility is no longer a vague, idealistic concept.

Having spent almost 20 years in marketing and witnessed firsthand a pervading sense of short-termism across corporate America, Charles started BRANDfog in 2009 to address this gap and offers social media and CSR advisory services to CEOs.

Part of her endeavor is an exclusive, by-invitation-only event called the Great Leaders Conference: Corporate Social Responsibility and Leadership for a Responsible World. We sat down for a chat about the conference, scheduled for October in New York City, her mission for BRANDfog, and what her interactions with management reveals about their attitude toward CSR.

An excerpt:

"On a broader level, this is not a CSR conference. It is the Great Leaders conference because it aims to highlight a cultural change among leadership. Leadership is changing on a number of fronts and very quickly, in a way that CEOs are really struggling with. For example, social media has blown the doors off the closed corporate culture, where customers want to know what the company stands for, what the CEO believes in, what the core values of the organization are, etc. In a way, companies can no longer control their messaging. There is a two-way exchange that can't be ignored today.