What is your 1st step?

It takes a village to drive change in an organisation. Whilst there is no perfect playbook to implement the sustainability roadmap perfectly, there are some foundational steps to make it less bumpy.

It’s worth taking stock, and considering where you are on these steps:

• What is your company purpose? Rally everyone and all decisions around that single-minded purpose.
• Leaders know a lot, but they don’t know everything. Assume nothing and develop a bespoke leadership training programme so that all future decisions will be made through the lens of people & plant, not just profit
• Double down on leadership and accountability by tying executive compensation to climate change goals and metrics.
• Everyone is a functional expert, and it takes a lot of experts, internally and externally, to solve complex challenges. The best blend is a mix of internal knowledge and external objectivity.
• Build a sustainability objective in all the briefs, from innovation to marketing to hiring, and be clear on the specific targets and how it’s connected to the various UN Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs).
• Define your infrastructure to ensure consistency and continuity of the implementation. Does it sit with one person (Chief Sustainability Officer), a duo (Chief Operations Officer x Chief Sustainability Officer), a sustainability committee, a taskforce by SDG?
• Dedicate the same amount of time, effort, and resources to the earnings report as well as the sustainability report. Is the dream to have one unified team writing one combined report?

Whilst new investments and innovative technology can certainly create impact, it is ultimately the passion and courage of people that beat the drum of change.