Sustainability leaders have to move mountains

David Shaw

Former Global Net-Zero Transition Lead and ESG Growth Director, KraftHeinz

These results really lay bare the challenge that confronts industry and sustainability leaders globally. At an increasingly urgent time for action, it highlights the inaction we are seeing across the board and touches on some of the many causes.

Often, the criticisms land at senior leaders who are pulled into short-term decision-making to support a corporate environment that incentivises short-term financial wins across all functional areas.

Yet, when you throw in the bureaucracy, it can hardly be surprising to see the lack of impact or even signs of long-term investment in driving the changes needed when it comes to Sustainability. 

The breadth and depth of issues faced, from climate to biodiversity and human rights, pose an existential question of their own in terms of prioritisation.

This is also creating an increased volume of reporting and, ultimately oversight on often complex and opaque value chains, something that was never foreseen when supply chains were established or IT systems were designed.

Sustainability reporting based on thorough materiality assessments should be the cornerstone of future action and give rise to innovation.

However, this is hindered demonstrably by the variety and inconsistency of reporting requirements, from mandatory disclosures across differing geographies to customers and suppliers.

“This burden of reporting and bias toward financial materiality creates an unhealthy bubble around corporate responsibility to focus on primarily mitigating reporting risks. Playing defence when we need radical change that can only be unleashed through innovation and bold choices.” 

As humans, we can stumble at the first sign of complexity and look to truncate impact into black-and-white issues. However, sustainability is complex and is far more complex once you truly get into the details. 

“The failure to recognise and act on the complexity is in part driven by a dearth of knowledge and superficial thinking, but also by the lack of an established set of societal principles anchored into our corporate and legislative thinking.” 

Even for Sustainability leaders who are supported by the resources of the broader organisation, they are having to move mountains through issue awareness, education and knowledge creation to enable progress in the right direction across many fronts.

Often faced with the challenge of conflicting understanding or oversimplification of complex issues throughout the organisation, you can understand why they feel the personal effects of that responsibility highlighted in the survey.

 What now?

Are you with us? Play a part in developing the re:Generation Innovators playbook launching at our breakfast on the 9th September, or simply be the first to get the latest updates. Click here to register your interest.