Sustainability Leadership places new demands on organisational leaders and demands a new set of leadership development skills to be absorbed. How well is your organisation adapting to these demands within a changing world? A world in which leadership success is no longer measured solely on the end of year financial report! New corporate leadership demands are appearing to shape how we view responsible and capable leadership in business, such as carbon footprint reduction, ESG rating and the sustainability strategy embedded within the Corporate Business Plan and Purpose.
Five years ago, I created the consultancy Leading Green with the simple business objective of focusing on environmental sustainability leadership development skills, specifically those required to develop and transform organisational culture, purpose and leadership. By enhancing the strategic skills, visioning, sustainability system thinking and transformative management abilities that today’s leaders require, we would help leadership teams embed sustainability within their own business models and align their sustainability vision with future growth. The outcome has been dramatic, often resetting existing approaches to innovation, risk management, stakeholder engagement and growth strategy. It is proving a bold but ultimately exciting management step that delivers sustainable business advantage and resilience.
It’s a responsible management approach that makes possible the operational, cultural and financial changes needed for a Future-Fit Business. The last five years have flown by, but the excitement and ideas keep flowing from businesses as we coach or train them in new approaches to sustainability leadership development and its demands in the business, helping them formulate new ideas towards creating a more sustainable business model within their own organisation. I don’t believe in off the shelf solutions brought in by business distant consultants, I prefer organic growth and dissemination through the executive team, senior managers, teams and functions down to the frontlines of the organisation. Those that have to lead on business and organisational sustainability develop and actively deliver their strategy to ‘get green down’ internally.
I believe it is a more original step forward in how business leadership development coaches and organisations work directly together. The active focus remains on their professional leadership and delivery of growth into their business, whilst they learn and apply environmental and sustainability leadership development skills, rather than in many programmes where the objective seems to be to learn a skill and then hunt for a problem to apply it to. Here the focus is always on existing business priorities and what needs to be delivered today by a leader.
The reward over the last 5 years has been in uncovering hidden leadership potential, watching confidence grow as skills are applied towards sustainability outcomes, and in observing the ambition of organisations towards sustainability matters mature from ‘issues’ into ‘opportunities’. Today is a wet and ‘dreak’ (a great Scottish slang expression for ‘dismal’) Monday, I’ve just finished a coaching call with the CEO of a construction firm, and I have decided to take a few moments out to reflect on some of the key lessons learnt over the five years Leading Green has been active.
Working with businesses I have seen the positive change in employees’ motivation, alignment and commitment to their organisations grow, as their pro-sustainability or responsible leadership beliefs fuse with the change in corporate leadership culture.
Employees increasingly need to believe in their leaders, and our approach towards sustainability leadership development with its focus on helping executives and teams work together to brainstorm how the organisation can solve or address unsustainable issues pro-actively allows voices from all levels to be heard and applied into the strategic mix.
I believe it is the best way to grow long-term thinking rather than a sustainability ‘patch’ to issues, increase employee commitment rather than involvement in sustainability issues, and build a future-fit business model.
In the last 5 years, I have sat around many boardroom tables or listened in to AV debates, picking up on the sustainability issues that are not being spoken about, but which lurk there like proverbial elephant in the room. Often the issues that I have been called in to discuss are not the real environmental sustainability leadership or development issues that they need to address as a matter of urgency. In some leadership teams, the conversation can go round and round, hinting at other issues. Finally, it’s time to be blunt. What is the real problem, is it technical or cultural? What is the real desired outcome? and Do you have the leadership knowledge and skills to resolve it?
You can tell a lot about an organisation’s internal maturity and leadership development from watching its executives interact. In fact, I have a 15-point sustainability leadership development list I mentally tick off as I assess whether they have the mental resilience to deliver change. You can quickly assess the characteristics of an organisation’s leaders, and how their behaviours filter down and either harm or enhance the organisation. Are they dependent on positional power to give them a sense of authority, are they ‘yes’ men around the CEO mimicking their group think, are they risk-takers with a preference for short term wins, or are they authentic and willing to admit mistakes in the past and work towards a successful culture transformation?
It takes strength of character and leadership to talk openly about existing unsustainable practices such as:
No one like to admit weaknesses in thier leadership development or past sustainability mistakes in the corporate world, but sometimes it is the only way forward. It will be their collective will and ambition that will set the seeds for an honest conversation as to the extent that sustainability thinking can influence their future business model, its penetration into the organisational culture, and the extent to which they will lead and influence that change.
Assessing how mature they are in addressing the intangible business risks that sustainability management addresses is now a key, but previously unexpected, component within my work.
In a global marketplace, in which your closest competitor maybe a hemisphere and 9 time zones away, businesses are faced with an increasing identity crisis as to what their purpose is, what makes them the first choice for consumers and what value they represent to society, beyond that of the cheapest provider. This is one area in which many leadership development programmes fail to establish a foothold within the culture of the organisational leadership team, but one that remains a key component of sustainability leadership development.
Rediscovering, or finding a new, sustainability value proposition provides a significant business opportunity for companies to align their corporate purpose and strategy with the external image they present to the marketplace as suppliers, clients, advisers, and competitors. In doing so, the internal clarity of and meaning of what the organisation believes in strongly with the beliefs, attitudes, and societal ethics of the wider world. It takes direct organisational action, rather than marketing or public relations lobbyists, to establish the verify your actions, and this needs leadership.
To quote Larry Fink’s words:
‘Every company must not only deliver financial performance but also show how it makes a positive contribution to society. Without a sense of purpose, no company, either public or private, can achieve its full potential.’
Working with businesses to establish their unique sustainability value proposition, can now often involve re-examining the company’s purpose considering sustainability values. Is a service provider to utility companies who digs and then fill in trenches in the road now a waste recycling business as 80% of all operational assets support this function? A large house building company that incorporates a solar electricity network into its housing estates is still primarily a builder or a micro-grid renewable energy company? A large landowner who allows his land to be inundated during flood events – a cereal grower or a water harvester? These are real events that I have encountered over the last 5 years that demonstrate that in expressing your business’s positive contribution to society, an organisation can also attract and motivate a wider spectrum of stakeholders, engage with its employees, and drive internal innovation.
Reflecting on this, there have been a few coaching steps that have required focus and attention in our work, notably
For the curious, innovative, and willing to learn this is a fantastic sector to be in. No one can claim to truly be the global expert in business sustainability and sustainability leadership. There is still so much to be developed and applied within sustainability leadership development.
It has led me into sectors for which my professional training has given little preparation (nuclear power, palm oil supply chains, recruitment agencies, and the river charity networks) and from which I have learnt so much from the businesses I have worked with. There are companies with whom I know I will never work, notably one car manufacturer whose lawyers wrote me a letter in respect to a Leading Green blog on unethical boardroom behaviour and the dangers of corporate groupthink after fitting emission limiters to their vehicles, and there are those whose leaders I would love to sit down with and explore their leadership mindset and worldview.
The conversations I have had, the friends made, the lessons learnt, the debate in workshops as new ideas are discussed and that look of ‘Ohh, yes! that is what sustainability means for our business!’ when training and watching new sustainability leaders start to make in-roads within their organisation’s culture. It all adds up towards a new cadre of developing professionals within that sector. We haven’t solved all the world’s problems yet but slowly we are turning around some of the most efficient organisations on the planet to focus their attention and ingenuity on these mega-issues.
I am experiencing fewer and fewer organisations with an ‘issue attention’ focus on one sustainability aspect, but leaders with a broader view of the wide range of intangible risks and trends that can emerge within the organisational in-tray marked ‘sustainability stuff’.
Interestingly this is providing new challenges as my work moves from influencing environmental and sustainability management systems and mitigating environmental impacts, towards more strategic debates on how organisations identify and avoid unsustainable risks and issues in the first place. Ensuring issues never present tangible risks to within enterprise risk management systems is a fascinating area, especially when you throw in the wildcards of disruptive technologies and market players. Technology impact assessment and megatrend analysis can go a long way in preparing boardrooms for disruption, but you still need leaders with an understanding of sustainability issues and knowledge to hear, react and decide the correct pathway through the risk minefield.
It is certainly a mentally active challenge in leadership development.
A simple statement, but critical in my work. It is pointless calling me or any other sustainability professional into your organisation for sustainability leadership development assistance if you do not believe in the benefits of applying a more environmentally and socially sustainable long-term approach to your business.
It takes personal bravery for a leader to say ‘stop’ to the business behaviours that have dominated their career, and to reflect on the consequences of past action. This is where executive sustainability leadership and development coaching can assist in providing a safe space in which to explore past business truths against today’s reality. In many cases, their leadership behaviours are rekindled, not through the avoidance of past behaviours through self-control, but through a rekindled interest in the business, its future, and its legacy.
The best organisational sustainability leadership development initiatives are achieved when the leadership is engaged, communicating, and leading a transformation in the organisation. I have worked with several great sustainability managers and directors, who receive little support from their colleagues amongst the senior teams, or who actively stand in the way of transformation. Yet the corporate message is clearly stating a high expectation, or greenwash, that the business is actively working towards sustainability.
Twenty years ago, most business leaders had a scant understanding of sustainability issues impacting the business, today it would be a brave but foolish executive who states he has no understanding of climate change, materiality, or supply chain impacts. I have observed several executive leadership teams try and set a high-performance bar on thier sustainability managers whilst possessing little interest or understanding of the issue, risk or personal leadership demands on themselves when implementing a final direction and outcome. If you have little wish to change the internal organisational culture as a senior leader, consider what impression that ultimately signals to the rest of the organisation. We all have experience of new ‘initiatives’ that burn brightly on their launch day, and then sail straight onto the rocks because no one remains at the wheel!
As I look back over the past five years, helping leaders find a new self-identity and meaning in the business’s purpose is I believe the driving force behind my passion for sustainability leadership development and more sustainable business, growth, and where Leading Green and its customers need to be when staying ahead of the curve.
I hope this helps.
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