Leadership
Exemplary cases of sustainability leadership and intrapreneurship, and the qualities, ethical principles and/or dilemmas inherent within them.
Sustainability Leaders Agree: Integrating Purpose, Brand a Top Driver of Corporate Leadership
Integrating purpose through a common brand promise and aligning sustainability strategy with internal culture and values are key drivers of corporate leadership, according to the findings of the just-released 2016 Sustainability Leaders Survey, by GlobeScan and SustainAbility in partnership with Sustainable Brands, released today at SB’16 San Diego.
Get Gritty: Building Personal Resilience for More Successful Leadership
In her Monday morning workshop at Sustainable Brands’16 San Diego, psychologist Laura Delizonna, PhD, provided an introduction to positive psychology, how it fosters success, and how it can be leveraged in the workplace. “Positive emotions help us broaden our vision, build resources, and grow as individuals,” Delizonna explained. Practicing mindfulness and building emotional intelligence, she added, have been proven to boost memory, ability to collaborate, and altruism.
Attention, Change Agents: How to Help Shape Your CEO's Sustainability Decisions
It’s no secret that your CEO’s level of commitment to sustainability can have a huge impact on your organization’s sustainability journey. That’s why we decided to speak with over 100 CEOs, board members, and sustainability executives from a range of global companies, to try to understand the factors that influence CEO leadership and decision making around sustainability — and how corporate sustainability change agents can help support that process. Here are a few of the interesting things we learned:
London, NYC Ranked Most Global Cities; San Francisco, Boston Among Most Innovative
For the first time since A.T. Kearney’s first Global Cities Index in 2008, London overtook New York City to claim the top spot. London has steadily improved its performance in the 27 metrics across the five evaluated dimensions: business activity, human capital, information exchange, cultural experience, and political engagement.1 While New York continued to lead in business activity and human capital, London was able to close the gap due to its leading position in cultural experience and increased political engagement. Paris ranked third and was the leader in the information exchange dimension.
Food and Beverage Giants Appeal to Congress for Urgent Action on Climate Change
In the wake of the signing of the historic global climate agreement on Earth Day, more than a half-dozen leading food and beverage companies converged on Capitol Hill last week to press U.S. House lawmakers for federal action on climate change.
Silk Launches Harvard Research Initiative to Examine Future Food Industry Challenges
Earlier this month, plant-based food and beverages brand Silk announced a year-long sponsored research initiative with the Center for Health and the Global Environment (CHGE) at the Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health, to investigate the perceptions of food industry challenges, including efforts to create a healthy and sustainable food supply for the estimated 9.6 billion people that will inhabit the planet by 2050.
Regenerative Business, Part 3: It's Not About Better Problem Solving
This is the third blog in a series on the seven First Principles of regeneration, drawing from living systems sciences. Read parts one and two.
5 Global Companies Join Forces to Fight Migrant Worker Exploitation, Challenge Others to Do the Same
The Coca-Cola Company, HP Inc., Hewlett Packard Enterprise, IKEA and Unilever today in London launched the Leadership Group for Responsible Recruitment, a collaboration focused on promoting ethical recruitment and combating the exploitation of migrant workers in global supply chains across industries. The five founding companies have committed to the “Employer Pays Principle,” which states that no worker should pay for a job - the costs of recruitment should be borne not by the worker but by the employer.
UK Airports Among World's Most Sustainable; Heathrow First to Attain Supplier Standard
Two airports in London, Heathrow and Gatwick, earned multiple certifications to the Carbon Trust Standard for their exceptional environmental performance. Heathrow has become the first airport in the world (and only the fifth organization in the world) to simultaneously hold four certifications, while Gatwick is now one of only a handful of organizations to hold triple certification.
Dannon, Chobani Bucking Business as Usual to Empower Farmers, Employees
Two of America’s most well-known yogurt brands are taking unconventional approaches create stronger ties with some of their stakeholders. Dannon is implementing a new supply system that allows the company to engage directly with its milk suppliers as part of an ambitious plan to influence farm practices, and Chobani will be giving its 2,000 full-time employees an ownership stake worth up to 10 percent of the company when it goes public or is sold.
Saving the Playing Field: A Tale of Two Professional Sports and Sustainability
Sports and corporate sustainability are two fields not always thought of as playing on the same court. But the two have more in common than one might initially expect — both are about winning through fair competition and the display of excellence. In recent years, the line between the sports business and sustainable business have begun to blur as the the industry embraces triple bottom line principles.
The Personal Triple Bottom Line: Insight, Impact, Income
Two decades ago, John Elkington introduced the Triple Bottom Line (TBL), a disruptive corporate tool to measure a company’s success based on three Ps: People, Planet and Profit. TBL and its derivatives are widely used by companies around the world. While some companies have embedded the TBL into the core of their business, many others loosely practice it to varying degrees.
Embracing the Purpose Paradox: The Key to Transcendental Leadership
In the summer of 2012, I came upon a discovery so mind-blowing that it has taken me nearly four years to get my feet back on solid ground. After two decades of research to find the connection between human nature and Mother Nature, a simple E=mc2-type equation emerged. I call this the Voice Code. Believe it or not, this discovery has revealed the natural laws that govern all human thinking. In doing so, it has allowed us to now clearly map the timeless principles and practices that all visionary minds master to become a force of nature in the pursuit of their life’s purpose.
6 Secrets of Staggering Genius
In the summer of 2012, after two decades of research to find the missing link between human nature and Mother Nature, the “Voice Code” emerged. This disruptive equation reconciles more than a century of social research and shows the scientific basis for the seemingly supernatural powers of game changers such as Steve Jobs, Albert Einstein, Martin Luther King, Jr., Mother Theresa, Gandhi, Oprah Winfrey and countless lesser-known outliers of human thriving.
Enrich Not Exploit: The Business Case for Bold Commitments
On significant birthdays, it is traditional across much of the world to receive gifts, but somewhat characteristically, one of the world’s most altruistic brands is bucking that trend. Last month, on the eve of its 40th anniversary, The Body Shop launched its new CSR strategy, ‘Enrich not Exploit,’ setting out 14 targets for 2020 that assist vulnerable communities around the world, further reduce the environmental impact of the brand, and support The Body Shop in its aim to become the ‘World’s most ethical and sustainable global business.’
UN Calling on Local Business Leaders, Changemakers to ‘Pioneer’ Action on SDGs
To spur action and inspire businesses to help advance the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs, or global goals), the United Nations (UN) Global Compact announced a multi-year Local Network SDG Action Plan last month.
Canada Accepting Public Comments on Draft Sustainable Development Strategy
Last week, the Government of Canada released the 2015 Progress Report and 2016-2019 draft of the Federal Sustainable Development Strategy (FSDS).
The Climate Movement Needs More Corporate Lobbyists
Across corporate America, there is broad support for action on climate change. Leading businesses and executives vocally supported President Obama on the Paris Agreement. Many companies have committed themselves to getting onto a sustainable path, and many are pushing their commitment out through their supply chains. This is good, and it’s important.But it makes us in Congress feel a little left out. The corporate lobbying presence in Congress is immense. But in my experience, exactly zero of it is dedicated to lobbying for a good, bipartisan climate bill.
Regenerative Business: Diving Into the History, Etymology and Practice of 'Regeneration'
Forty years ago, I meet a cadre of business designers and developers who called what they did Regenerative Business Design. They had led a revolution with extraordinary success in Procter & Gamble, which gave the business world a state of the art approach in producing Return on Investment with people and assets. They delivered earnings for the consumer products giant that were the envy of all industries, in an industry whose margins were collapsed to below 5 percent.
7 Components of Purpose-Led Brands
We have entered the Age of Purpose — purpose as a collective value of growing cultural importance in many societies; as an emerging leading force in personal and career development; and as a driver of business decisions looking to create long-term value, build resilience and connect with increasingly conscious stakeholders. It may be early days for the Age of Purpose, but there are many signs it will only continue to gain momentum.