The UNC Kenan-Flagler blog provides a behind-the-scenes look at the UNC Kenan-Flagler MBA program. In the blog post highlighted below, Joel Thomas (MBA ’11) provides an inside look at a brown bag lunch with Wal-Mart's vice president of sustainability, Matt Kistler.

On Friday, 9/25, UNC Kenan-Flagler Business School hosted a brown bag lunch with Matt Kistler, the vice president of sustainability for Wal-Mart. The event was open to current MBA students, and I think I speak for the 30 students who were there when I say we were fortunate to be able to engage in an informal dialog with someone on the front lines of sustainability work at a leader in the field. Below is a small sampling of the conversation. Items listed in bold are questions from students.

How is sustainability organized at Wal-Mart? Is it its own department? How is it connected to the rest of the company?

Kistler’s response consisted of a few parts. First, his vision is to get sustainability integrated into the company’s operations to the point that a sustainability branch is no longer required. At this point, there is a department heading up sustainability initiatives; however, their initiatives are focused on incorporating sustainability practices into their results. Also, he mentioned that their sustainability office is relatively small and operates with just one consultancy. Their power, or "secret sauce", derives from robust networks including thought leaders, NGO’s and academic institutions.

What emerging sustainability challenges does Wal-Mart face?

Kistler focused on a number of challenges, but one jumped out at me: Wal-Mart (and all retailers for that matter) need to figure out how to transform linear supply chains into cyclical ones.

Why does Wal-Mart care about sustainability?

Kistler focused on the cost savings that Wal-Mart enjoys thanks to more sustainable practices. For instance, Wal-Mart’s truck fleet is 38% more efficient than it used to be. That means that they spend 38% less on fuel than they did before upgrading their fleet. For a company whose second largest cost is energy, this is good news. More directly put, Kistler said that Wal-Mart’s sustainability office does not undertake an initiative unless it is a profitable one. In other words, there is no philanthropic thrust behind any of their programs. This makes sense, given Wal-Mart’s corporate mandate; however, it does make me wonder how they determine whether a decision will be profitable or not. For example, it is quite possible that Wal-Mart could still be profitable while being bolder and adopting more sustainable products, even ones that are a little more expensive. In other words, how much of a long view has Wal-Mart truly taken compared to other companies? It is hard to tell.

Have you personally changed at all in this role?

My personal favorite was this question. Kistler stated that he looks at the world through a different lens. He sees buildings in terms of how inefficient they are. In fact, he mentioned that he is a terrible party guest as he will analyze his hosts’ home and find all of the inefficiencies down to CF light bulbs and less efficient heating systems.

On a final note, Kistler mentioned that he’s frequently asked which business schools ask the best questions, and that we were giving his current top schools a run for their money. The message I took from this is that we should keep doing what we’re doing!