Triple Bottom Line

The “triple bottom line” captures the three ways in which a company's performance can be conceptualized and measured. John Elkington refers to these three domains as economic prosperity, environmental quality, and social justice. The concept of the triple bottom line implies that a company's effectiveness cannot be judged by financial performance alone. To become more sustainable, a company needs to meet the requirements and expectations of most, if not all, of its stakeholder groups, which include shareholders, employees, customers, suppliers, the local community, and the natural environment. Performance with respect to all these stakeholder domains is reported, for example, in Global Reporting Initiative (GRI) measures, on which an increasing number of companies rely. However, some observers argue that even future generations must be considered in ...