Sustainability – Whose job is it anyway?

Sustainability Professionals Roundtable, 8 November 2024

On Friday 8 November, we convened 14 experienced sustainability professionals from different companies and sectors in the Netherlands to explore the findings of our annual research report ‘Sustainability: Whose job is it anyway?’

Who should companies look to for driving change, now policy makers are shifting focus to other topics?

Sandwiched in between the US elections and the start of COP29, the event offered an opportunity to reflect on the potential direction of corporate sustainability over the coming years. With the expectation that policy makers will step back as driver of change, the discussion naturally centred around the question of who companies should look to for driving the sustainability agenda.

The answer, in short: themselves and each other. Like we found in the survey, client requests are an important driver of the sustainability activities of many companies. Though initially reactive, participants pointed out that engagement with clients on sustainability matters can result in collaboration for more sustainable products and services.

Even with political attention shifting away from sustainability, regulatory compliance and reporting requirements will also continue to be important drivers of the corporate sustainability agenda, according to participants. Many companies have made significant steps over the past years and realise that CSRD compliance helps them strengthen their sustainability strategy and increase transparency. The momentum that this has created will not stop overnight. Many companies will continue executing their strategies and will not retract their targets, because they believe in the path they have started to go down and see its value. This also means that companies will continue to ask partners in the value chain to take sustainability seriously.

Engaging the organisation is key

Participants spoke about their role in educating others in the organisation about the sustainability strategy. Many use different types of learning and development, often including e-learning and meetings with individual teams to make the sustainability agenda of the company relevant to their specific role. This is time-consuming, however, and a small sustainability team cannot do this with every function and sub-function in the business.

To engage colleagues in the sustainability strategy of the company, participants exchanged experiences about creating a positive story about the company doing great things. It helps to celebrate achievements, putting the spotlight on the people and team who have achieved it. This makes everyone realise that it is not the sustainability team achieving the targets, but that it’s the people in the business. Everyone should have ‘and sustainability manager’ added to their job function.

The discussion then moved to the question how sustainability professionals must inform Boards to get the right decision made. While upskilling Boards with sustainability knowledge is important, participants found that KPIs are an effective way to make Boards feel responsibility, as this integrates sustainability in overall performance management.

The journey from bolted-on to built-in is not linear

Patrick Blankers, who has been working as sustainability manager at Ericsson for many years, vividly illustrated what it means for a company to build sustainability into its core business. His description of the management of sustainability at Ericsson over the past 14 years highlighted the importance of senior management providing clear direction and the role of client questions to get sustainability on the agenda of commercial and operational teams. It also made clear that management of the sustainability agenda is a dynamic process, where priorities and governance structures evolve with the maturity of the sustainability strategy as well as financial performance of the business.

Times like these, when some companies and governments take a step back, are frustrating for the sustainability professionals who have been working hard to develop and implement ambitious strategies. The coming years, progress may rely on leading businesses and committed individuals in these companies staying the course. But it is good to realise that there are many more of these than, say, five years ago, creating a momentum that will continue to drive the transition.

Download our annual report Sustainability: Whose job is it anyway? here

Author: Sytze Dijsktra, Netherlands Country Manager, Simply Sustainable