Page 22 - The Green Building Bottom Line The Real Cost of Sustainable Building

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NARRATING VALUES, SHAPING

VALUES, CREATING VALUE

MARTIN MELAVER

SUMMARY

This chapter is divided into three parts.
Part one looks at the values embedded in two overarching master nar-
ratives about capitalism—a narrative of indifferent capitalism and a narra-
tive of capitalism with a difference. Both consider the role of business in
fostering financial prosperity as well as its responsibilities toward the
social and environmental consequences of its practices. The argument is
made that embracing one of these narratives—the narrative of capitalism
with a difference—is a critical precursor to the shaping and practice of
values within a business.
Part two considers the organizational substructure of a business focused
on shaping values. Values in a company are shaped by three systemic lay-
ers: basic guiding principles that serve as a bill of rights for the values-
driven company, structural concepts that form the basis for more concrete
values, and specific values themselves. With these foundational layers in
place, the company focused on a green bottom line has the capacity to cre-
ate actual financial value from the values it practices.
Part three focuses on the specific value creation a company realizes by
undergoing the foundational work described previously.

My father Norton Melaver, who for four decades ran M&M Supermarkets, the prede-
cessor to our real estate company, Melaver, Inc., has a favorite story that will be famil-
iar to many readers. As he tells it, a businessman is strolling along a beach one day

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