Ecocentricity Blog: Summertime and the Living's Easy

And we’re back! Well, I guess I’m back. My thanks to Jim Hartzfeld for filling in for the last two posts with some great blogs. I wish I could say that I was frolicking on some far-off beach for those two weeks. Alas, I was just working on other things.

Also, they’re back! Students, I mean. Here we are at the end of August, which means kiddos are mostly settled in at school and parents are almost done saying, “Finally, they’re back in school.”

Since my kids aren’t old enough for school yet, I don’t actually know the answer to this question – do kids still have assigned summer reading? I hope so. If I had to suffer through it, I hope today’s young ‘uns do too. That last week of summer vacation was always a drag as I crammed in all the reading I avoided in the previous months.

Looking back on it, I am glad for the exposure that summer reading gave me to books I might not otherwise have read. I’m pretty sure that The Catcher in the Rye, The Giver, The Great Gatsby, and To Kill a Mockingbird were all summer reads for me. They are all amazing books.

Without the discipline of school (and the threat of a teacher calling on me in the first week back asking me to summarize a book’s plot), I’ve fallen out of the habit of reading in the summer. Fortunately, I was able to restart the habit this year. It was a good summer with some great books.

I’ll share a few over the next several posts. As a reminder, we keep a running list of favorites here on our website. We will add the new ones I write about as we move along.

To get things started is Green to Gold by Daniel Esty and Andrew Winston. The world of environmentalism is incredibly broad, with issues ranging from microplastics to deforestation to coral bleaching to acid rain. That breadth means that environmentalists, some of us at least, are generalists. We know a little bit about a lot of things, but we don’t necessarily become experts on the details. I know that I’m guilty of that for sure.

But the details matter. You likely will not solve coral bleaching without an understanding of exactly how sensitive different species of coral are to water temperature and pH balances. I certainly don’t know those things, but I’m glad that there are biologists who know, research, and write about the details.

So what are the details when it comes to greening a business? That’s what Green to Gold offers. Esty and Winston provide an easy-to-read and detailed playbook on why it’s smart to make business green, what steps to take, and what pitfalls to avoid along the way. On these matters, Esty and Winston are true experts.

The book is now more than a decade old, but just as relevant today as it was on its release date. If you are interested in exploring the details on greening your own business, Green to Gold is a great place to start.