If in some cases it pays to be green, leaders are mostly confronted with hard decisions and difficult trade-offs when business and the environment come into conflict.

For there to be a set of sustainable economic practices, it is necessary to involve all parties concerned, from business to government and the nonprofit sector. Bill Barnett's approach to building sustainability into all human activities is to create environmental awareness in the basic knowledge set of all leaders across sectors.

Professor at the Stanford Graduate School of Business affiliated with the Center for Social Innovation, Barnett now offers the first executive education leadership program of its kind totally dedicated to building the capacity of business and nonprofit executives as well as government officials to help them navigate and advance a sustainability agenda.

How can you leverage environmental strategies to create a competitive advantage for your organization? When should partnerships be actively pursued? What are the risks in communicating about one's organization's environmental practices? These are some of the questions Bill Barnett is addressing in this presentation as well as in his Stanford executive education program Business Strategies for Environmental Sustainability.