The Triple Layer Business Model Canvas - integration of economic, environmental, and social elements

Background

Alexander Joyce, Raymond Paquin and Yves Pigneur Triple-layer Business Model was introduced at the 1st ARTEM Organizational Creativity International Conference on 26-27 March 2015 in Nancy, France.

The three scholars' paper, "The Triple Layered Business Model Canvas: A Tool to Design More Sustainable Business Models," discusses simultaneously improving a business model for economic, environmental, and social benefits.

The triple-layer sustainable business model elaborates on the one-layer business model canvas, which Alex Osterwalder and Yves Pigneur published in 2010. You can see the one-layer Business Canvas model on this channel. The link is placed below the film.

A sustainable business model adds an environmental and social layer to the economic layer, all three of which influence each other crosswise.

Far from being a mere obligation, the social and environmental dimensions offer fertile ground for innovation and the discovery of new possibilities.

About the model

The Triple Layered Business Model aims to support organizations that wish to innovate upon their current business models and create more sustainable business models.

The model is composed of three layers. 

The blue layer is The Economic Business Model Canvas. 

The green layer is The Environmental Life Cycle Business Model Canvas. 

And The orange layer is The Social Stakeholder Business Model Canvas.

All three model layers contain nine elements, also called building blocks.

The individual layers.

The blue layer is the known Economic Business Model Canvas. 

We will not discuss the nine building blocks of the economic layer here, as the film mentioned earlier provides an overview.

At its core, this layer is about profit. You want the revenue streams to exceed the cost structure in the short and long run.

The Environmental Life Cycle Business Model Canvas, the green layer, is the second layer.

The big picture

The core concept of the sustainable business model is to establish harmony among the three layers by mutually influencing each other. Viewing the social and environmental layers not as burdens but as platforms for innovation and new opportunities is crucial. Concurrently, the sustainable business model serves as a mechanism for dynamic operation, where each building block affects its counterpart in a different layer.

The triple-layered business model canvas tool can serve three purposes.

First, it can serve as a representation to ensure all the elements are considered and then to understand the whole. The triple-layered business model canvas visually supports designing new business models together.

Second, the triple-layered business model canvas can serve as a generative tool by changing individual elements and cascading the consequences to render the whole coherent with new avenues. 

Third, it can serve as a validation tool. One can add up or balance the costs versus revenues and impacts versus benefits, which can be done qualitatively or quantitatively.

The model is suitable for aligning members of your organization around your mission of bringing good to the world.

It is a good working tool for getting organization members to see new contexts and, thus, new business opportunities. 

Use the model in the initial stages of idea generation about where the organization is going.

It is recommended that the model be used in workshops dealing with innovation or new business concepts.

It isn’t easy to give a general example of the use of the model. All organizations will have their approaches to the three layers. 

Criticism of the model

Some standard units of measurement and how they should be calculated are missing in the two new layers.

It can sometimes be challenging to see in which layers and then in which block information should be placed.

Getting stakeholders inside and outside the organization to approach the world with a common culture is a big job.

There are no guarantees that business model transformation alone will ensure sustainability.

The advantage of working with the triple layered business model tool is, that it brings to light relationships that would otherwise go unnoticed in the original business model canvas.