US INSIGHTS
The objective: Embed sustainability into the core of business strategy and operations
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Lay the Foundations Set the Plan Enable the Change
Sustainability must be a critical strand of business strategy, motivating the transformation of operations and business models, and ensuring all opportunities are evaluated through a sustainability lens. We set out the key areas of action that leaders should focus on to accelerate their sustainability journey.
01. Lay the Foundations: Embed sustainability into leadership capability and culture
Making progress on sustainability is in large part a matter of leadership capability and culture. To drive sustained action, organizations must build a robust talent management framework that embeds sustainability into how leadership talent and reward decisions are made as well as how the leadership team operates.
Selection and Succession |
Rewards |
Development |
Disruptive Talent Investments |
Team Effectiveness |
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Ensure boards and CEOs apply sustainable leadership potential and track records as key criteria when selecting leaders. |
Integrate sustainability into the objectives, incentives, and remuneration of CEOs and other executives. |
Make sustainable mindset and leadership attributes a core focus of leadership development and crucible experiences. |
Make long-term disruptive investments in talent and leadership. This may require creating new positions or investing in new tools. |
Invest in understanding the expectations, priorities, and personalities of your leadership team to harness their collective capabilities in service of sustainability. |
02. Set the Plan: Connect sustainability priorities to the core
Who is on your board matters. Having board members with experience in driving sustainability-related transformations is hugely valuable. Not all board members need to be experts in the space, but a diversity of perspectives across the group that is relevant to the sustainability issues at hand, is a must.
Connect to the core |
Drive for value creation |
Engage the board |
Get specific |
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Orient your sustainability strategy around your company’s core business and areas of current or future competitive advantage. |
Begin with impact reduction but strive for goals that create added value both commercially and environmentally or socially by offering new solutions for entrenched problems. |
Ensure the board has an active stake in setting priorities and a clear role in achieving them. |
Translate enterprise-wide sustainability goals into concrete actions and measurable objectives that leaders and employees alike can feel in their day-to-day work |
03. Enable the Change: Communicate and build employee engagement
The sustainable mindset: purpose-driven belief that business is not a commercial activity divorced from the wider societal and environmental context in which it operates. Culture analytics are crucial: Traditional engagement and culture survey methodologies often produce flawed results which are overly positive and unable to reveal substantive, high-impact issues. New and more sophisticated culture analytics are able to reveal beliefs, experiences, and behaviors at a much sharper level of contrast. To drive a sustainable transformation, this level of clarity is crucial for leaders.
Measure culture and engagement |
Center on your people |
Tap into employees for innovation |
Engage employees strategically |
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Go beyond typical engagement surveys and use advanced culture analytics tools to get a deep scan of how connected employees really are to the organization’s purpose and whether the right behaviors are manifesting in the organization. |
Make “people” central to communications and engagement strategies; consider bottom-up not top-down approaches to mobilizing employees. |
Ensure you are leveraging the diversity of perspectives and solutions that employees of all backgrounds, and across the networks, can provide. |
Achieving strategic goals (sustainable or otherwise) is significantly harder without an engaged workforce. Pay particular attention to issues of diversity, equity, and fairness – and don’t fall into the trap of managing perception; instead, identify and tackle the root causes. |
Survey Results
Explore the "Divides and Dividends" survey themes
01. Macro, Micro and "Me"
Do business leaders and employees agree on the top sustainability issues affecting the future of society and their workplace?
02. Brand Management Versus Value Creation
How does the US compare to its global peers when it comes to accelerating sustainability action?
03. Next-Generation Leaders at the Vanguard
Next-generation leaders are a critical cohort in advancing the sustainability agenda. Are US organizations investing enough in their future executives?
04. Leadership + Culture = Impact
Do business leaders have the skills they need to pivot their organizations to a more sustainable—and profitable—future?
01. Macro, Micro and "Me"
Do business leaders and employees agree on the top sustainability issues affecting the future of society and their workplace?
02. Brand Management Versus Value Creation
How does the US compare to its global peers when it comes to accelerating sustainability action?
03. Next-Generation Leaders at the Vanguard
Next-generation leaders are a critical cohort in advancing the sustainability agenda. Are US organizations investing enough in their future executives?
04. Leadership + Culture = Impact
Do business leaders have the skills they need to pivot their organizations to a more sustainable—and profitable—future?
About the Study
The business case for sustainability is undeniable. Leaders who bridge the divides that threaten our global societies will yield significant triple-line dividends.
In a major global survey C-suite executives, next-gen leaders and employees, we reveal how leaders can grasp this opportunity:
- What are the environmental, social and economic divides that leaders should solve?
- How ready are leaders to advance the sustainability agenda?
- What actions should leaders take to deliver lasting value for people, planet and profit.
In the United States, study was conducted with 1,162 employees and next-generation leaders and 92 C-suite leaders from April 16 to May 12, 2021.