The Triple Bottom Line (TBL) concept was coined by John Elkington and is a means to assess the degree to which a company pursues sustainable growth. The TBL identifies that the operations of a company should be measured along three aspects – Economic, Social, and Environmental . It alternatively goes by the term 3 Ps which stand for People, Planet, and Profits.
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The TBL is an accounting framework that attempts to broaden the standard definition of a company’s “bottom line”, and therefore looks both at “gains” and “losses”. In this framework, a company can assess its impact on and activities implemented towards social responsibility (people), the natural environment (planet), and its economic value (profits).
The areas in which these three ‘bottom lines’ intersect, especially when a company addresses all three, leads a company towards a sustainable business model
Focus Box: Business view of the Triple Bottom LineThe TBL sustainability framework acts as a catalyst to develop innovative and effective business models for the future. It encourages companies to look beyond the traditional measures of profits to include environmental and social accountability considerations to further enhance their operational efficiency, effectiveness and success. The table below are some examples of ways in which companies can achieve sustainability by overlapping economic, social and environmental aspects of the TBL.
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