Page 21 – Sustainability Academy

A New Year always brings with it, a new perspective either in business or personal. In terms of business, 2019 brought a shift towards Corporate Sustainability.

Corporate Sustainability means that individuals and companies have a duty to act in the best interests of their environments and society as a whole. Lately, businesses have developed sustainability strategies where social responsibility is an integral part of their business model.

More than 80% of Millennials say that their favorite companies have identified their values, according to Forbes. Research shows that Corporate Sustainability produces transparency and can increase brand awareness, trust and an overall advantage to companies. CSE’s unique research findings have been picked up by Forbes.

Businesses large and small get a competitive advantage in regards to sales and also talent recruitment by not only supporting social responsibility but also by walking the walk and demonstrating it. Social responsibility should be organic, dynamic and proactive.

A challenging two-day training offered by CSE provides the latest practical tools and resources required to implement or upscale corporate sustainability. Executives from Fortune 500 companies, local governments and academia trust CSE’s advanced training to become Certified Sustainability (CSR) Practitioners and earn a unique recognition in the Corporate Sustainability field.

The Practitioner Program in London focuses on key challenges, many of which were faced by hosting the Super Bowl. Topics include:

Integrating SDGs into a Sustainability Plan
New trends and how to gain a competitive advantage
Maximizing stakeholder engagement
How to influence C-Suite Executives and get support for a Sustainability Plan
The role of Investors and maximizing corporate performance in ESG ratings

The course includes a chance to complete a two-year sustainability plan that will qualify you to earn the globally recognized CSR-P Certification and become Certified Sustainability Practitioner. The final assignment helps participants implement practical tools.

The course provides a free CMI membership (a $200 value). You also receive Certified Learning materials (hard copy) and a training guide (electronic copy). During the two days of instruction, students learn from updated case studies from companies such as Apple, Ikea, and Unilever; informative videos from leading sustainable organizations; participant-specific sector CSR reports.

Best among the many values of the course is the friends made and networks built. You learn from fellow participants and they learn from you. The instructors listen to each individual’s challenges and offer pro bono advising services.

Among the engineers, facilities managers and tech specialists, Marketing, Public Relations, Communications, General Management and Human Resources this CSR training is not only for those working in CSR and Environmental Management. CSE’s training offers added skills to all professionals engaged in the field of CSR, small business, major corporation and mega-events included.

The first 2019 Certified Sustainability Practitioner Programs in Europe is in London 14-15 March, 2019.

While the game may have been slow and the score low, Super Bowl LIII in Atlanta fielded tons of waste, kicked the A/C into hyperdrive and scored better on sustainability than any other. Atlanta was prepared. The stadium used state of the art technology for lighting, water, food distribution and climate control. This was purposefully the greenest Super Bowl on record.

With efforts ranging from food waste recovery to solar panels to electric charging stations, an army of professionals across sectors took to the field. Will you be ready for the next mega-event?

The Practitioner Program in Atlanta focuses on key challenges, many of which were faced by hosting the Super Bowl. Topics include:

Integrating SDGs into a Sustainability Plan
New trends and how to gain a competitive advantage
Maximizing stakeholder engagement
How to influence C-Suite Executives and get support for a Sustainability Plan
The role of Investors and maximizing corporate performance in ESG ratings

Best among the many values of the course is the friends made and networks built. You learn from fellow participants and they from you. The instructors listen to each individual’s challenges and offer pro bono advising services.

Among the engineers, facilities managers and tech specialists, the Super Bowl also required

Marketing, Public Relations, Communications, General Management and Human Resources. Sustainability training is not only for those working in CSR and Environmental Management. CSE’s training offers added skills to all professionals engaged in sustainability, small business, major corporation and mega-events included.

The first 2019 Certified Sustainability Practitioner Programs in North America are in Atlanta, Feb. 21-22; Toronto, April 11-12; and Seattle, April 15-16, 2019.

This four-part series on Sustainability careers is written for new graduates and young professionals with fresh ideas, ample energy and a social awareness. It is also for established professionals outside sustainability who’ve become disenchanted with business’s disregard of basic societal needs.

How can you be part of the solution?

Part 3: How to find a job in sustainability

The challenge to finding a job in sustainability is that many career tracks do not have Sustainability in the title. You must dig into job descriptions for key words like Life Cycle Assessment, Supply Chain, SDGs and others you can learn by taking CSE’s free online course The future of the sustainability profession: Current trends and how to find a sustainability (CSR) job.

Here are some tips to get you started.

Identify your own interests! Nearly every company needs a sustainability professional in some capacity. What do you like to do? What companies do that kind of work? CSE on LinkedIn and Facebook are good places to start.

Network – like it or not, this is a tried and true way to get any job. Go to city council meetings, alumni association or activist groups. Call your parents, your college professor, the boss you had one summer in high school. Ask them “who should I talk to about a job in sustainability?” Whatever answer you get, follow-up!

Investigate the sustainability challenges in your community (or the community where you want to work). Which companies or organizations are helping meet those challenges? Give them a call. Offer to volunteer or intern. This could lead to a job or help expand the always-important network.

Scan job boards — not the black hole you think. First, you might actually find a job. Second, you’ll learn which industries are hiring. Third, you’ll pick up on the titles associated with sustainability tasks. If you enter the word sustainability and five jobs appear in customer service, zoom in on key words and use them to expand your search. The next round might pull up jobs in HR, Communications or Operations.

Tell everyone. Tell every single person you encounter that you are looking for a job in sustainability. Post it on your social networks. Mention it at the birthday party of a friend of a friend. If you get a lead – follow up immediately. More importantly, you’re honing your ability to describe what you want. This will help refine your search and polish your pitch when you get the inevitable interview!

CSE helps professionals advance their careers through certified on-site and group training services globally as well as the online Sustainability Academy. CSE is a recognized global leader in professional Sustainability training and coaching and one of the first to recognize the growing need for advanced certified education in the sustainability field. The Sustainability Academy is CSE’s global initiative to offer affordable, specialized, online education focused on Sustainability and Corporate Responsibility. Our goal is to train 100,000 professionals by 2020 and make an impact on our planet!

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CEOs are plagued with sustainability demands — noisy headlines which keep them awake at night.

CSE’s 2018 research Sustainability (ESG) Reporting Trends North America 2018 focuses on the influence of Sustainability on Financial Results. We break down the data by sector. Taking an example from telecom, the most material issues which keep telecom CEOs on edge include:

Sustainable product design
Inclusion and diversity
Ethical Governance
Privacy and Security
Customer service and transparency
Talent management
Waste and recycling
Energy and emissions

What do these issues have in common? They all manifest as long-term risk.

One of the most challenging long-term risks, particularly from investors’ viewpoint, is climate change. With PG&E;s bankruptcy attributed to climate change by the Wall Street Journal, financial analysts are taking heed. Climate change risks affect volatile markets, supply chains, the urban centers where companies place factories and draw employees, not to mention the hazards to shipping and distribution conduits.

As we posted in Step Aside Fortune 500: ESG Rankings Are Key to Corporate Growth, investment rankings are influenced by sustainability considerations. Fitch Ratings integrated scoring system includes ESG criteria. According to Fitch, about 3 percent of a rating’s derivation is directly attributed to an ESG issue, and 19 percent is influenced by at least one ESG concern.

Companies with sustainability reports and an actively implemented sustainability strategy can mitigate long-term risks such as climate change. Sustainability can be a driver for stakeholder engagement, innovation and organizational change.

Are CEOs putting their resources in the right place? CSE’s experience can help C-suite leaders answer this question. CSE research highlights findings from many sectors including:

Energy & Energy Utilities
Mining & Construction
Food & Beverage
Healthcare
Transportation
Financial Services

There is a link between Sustainability Reporting and Financial Performance at the corporate level. No longer is financial performance based solely on quarterly returns. CEOs, CFOs, COOs, and management at all levels must be alert to long-term sustainability on near-term decision making.

Want to learn more about how you can leverage your sustainability efforts to mitigate long-term risk? Attend the Centre for Sustainability and Excellence (CSE) Sustainability (ESG) Leadership Training Workshop for C-Suite Executives, in NYC on Monday September 30^th – Tuesday October 1^st, 2019. CSE specializes in global sustainability consulting, research and training. Clients include governments, NGOs and Fortune 500 companies. CSE is accredited by CMI and is a GRI organizational stakeholder.

There is a widespread speculation over the necessity of promoting Integrated Reporting. More specifically, it is questionable what Integrated Reporting really stands for. What is admitted is that integrated reporting has yet to become a major trend for organizations that communicate their financial and non-financial performance. Main concerns are raised over the “usefulness” of these integrated reports to the majority of stakeholders of companies. Customers, clients, consumers, users, suppliers need to be further motivated by the structure and content of an integrated report.

On the other hand, financial stakeholders seem to be more positive to that information presented and find it more respective, since the global trends are for these interested groups not only presented in the financial performance of companies, but also in their ESG (Environmental, Social, Governance) performance.

CSE, in the global certified Sustainability Practitioner Program this March, in London covers the importance of Sustainability Reporting while it showcases some of the best practices on reporting communication.

With regards to integrated reporting, it is directed towards specific audience/stakeholder groups, mainly the financial one and that is reinforced by the fact that the European Banking Federation is calling on financial sector authorities in the European Union to create an integrated and standardized framework for data reporting.

Additionally, according to a Eurosif survey it was found that 83 out of 90 European investors, who were asked, mentioned that they support the EU Directive for non-financial reporting and believe it should lead to integration with financial information.

Companies that are legally committed to report their non-financial information are considering integrated reporting in order to comply and communicate their performance to their financial stakeholder (investors, shareholders etc.).

Research shows that there is a tendency to combine the financial and non-financial (CSR) reports, but not describing them as integrated reports (or following the corresponding guidelines). They lean towards combining their financial reports with ESG performance indicators, or to just combine the two separate reports.

By any means, integrated reports still remain the least preferable form of report for organizations, while Annual Reports, CSR reports and Annual Reviews are mostly preferred.

According to CSE’s research for Europe and North America, no significant trends have been disclosed when it comes to integrated reporting. Out of a sample of 475 and 642 companies/reports respectively, the percentage of integrated reports was in the single digits.

Don’t forget to claim your seat at the Advanced Certified Sustainability Practitioner program in London. It will feature a presentation of the Surprising Research Findings 2018 on Sustainability Goals Integration and Sustainability (CR) Impact. The research focuses on reporting practices of more than 460 corporations from leading business sectors and outlines key considerations related to common strategic objectives, social impact goals, UN SDG’s, reporting and external assurance practices as well as legislation.

For more information, contact [email protected].

Move beyond ESG metrics by incorporating the UN Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs)

Investors are increasingly calling for robust corporate sustainability reporting (CSR). Stakeholders are pressing companies to go beyond the standard ESG (environment, social, governance) approach — measures aimed at limiting corporate impact. In Seattle, this manifests as leading the drive to improve the world.

Incorporating the UN Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) can guide companies toward areas of positive, measurable impacts which stakeholders desire.

CSE has incorporated the SDGs into its research, consulting and certification programs. CSE’s Sustainability Reporting Trends in North America 2018 finds that only 13.9% of companies are integrating SDGs in their reporting to stakeholders. Though low, this is double from 2017. This provides an enormous imperative for companies. Top companies are listening! Read more in Forbes interview with CSE.

The need for practitioners is urgent in urban centers, leading CSE to offer their Certified Sustainability Practitioner Program, Advanced Edition 2019, in Seattle and other cities in North America. CSE will address a topic critical to Seattle: sustainability in IT. Did you know that the City of Seattle alone employs over 750 people in IT?

CSE research has identified weaknesses in the IT sector which can have an important impact to SDGs 8, 9 and 11 covering decent work and economic growth, industry, innovation and infrastructure, and sustainable cities and communities. Silicon Valley corporations lag behind the sustainability achievements of the Fortune Global 500, leaving a major opportunity for Seattle.

Urban centers need an enormous influx of sustainability-trained staff. Whether it’s infrastructure, finance, shipping, or IT, trained sustainability practitioners are needed in every field and every discipline – public and private. CSE’s practitioner program offers Sustainability and Corporate Responsibility training which more than 90% of FORTUNE 500 senior managers and VPs have attended.

Key topics to the Seattle region will be the focus of CSE’s trainings in Seattle, April 15-16. Other spring trainings include Atlanta, Feb. 21-22; Toronto, April 11-12, and New York, June 6-7, 2019. For more information on registration, Early Bird and Group Discounts, contact [email protected].

This four-part series on developing trends and opportunities in Sustainability is for new graduates and young professionals attracted to sustainability careers. It is also for established professionals disenchanted with how many corporations and governments disregard obvious societal needs.

Last week we discussed about sustainability employment trends. Climbing the corporate ladder goes beyond advancing a career. It should include protecting access to resources, human rights, clean environment, educational opportunities and community wellness — worthy ambitions for emerging sustainability professionals.

Part 2: Career Path

With an entrepreneurial spirit and lots of hard work, you can carve your own path, build a business unique to your skills and interests. The Sustainability Academy Online Diploma on Social Entrepreneurship is a great place to start. For the rest of us, the best path is within an established organization. To excel on that path, you need a few pointers.

Develop multiple skills. Sustainability practitioners will be integral to legal teams, marketing departments, ERM (risk management), communications, R&D, HR and many other cross-organizational departments. Increasingly, department heads want a sustainability expert who can answer questions, lead programs and inform policy throughout the corporate structure. You can get that degree in accounting your mother always dreamed of AND be a sustainability professional. Are you interested in Communications? Then, the Introduction to the GDPR is essential.

Take opportunities to be an Intrapreneur. EVERY organization can be more sustainable. Find those pressure points, work out solutions and present them to the decision makers. Do this in your department, in other departments, for your boss and your boss’s boss. Develop the skill to pitch an idea. Find the ideas which will make your company stronger. You might lead your company’s next success in limiting its carbon footprint or the best social impact project to improve community relations.

Find a mentor or sponsor within the organization. This person needs to share common sustainability interests and ambitions. She or he needs to be in a management, director or even C-suite position. Cultivate this relationship. Couple your energy and creativity with their experience and leadership.

Be brave. Take the hard jobs. Ask for help and give praise. Stand your ground for what is right. Courage and perseverance include risk. Expect to have a brilliant idea (or ten) which others will dismiss. By taking the hard jobs, showing you are game and capable for the challenging tasks, you gain respect and expertise, so your next brilliant idea cannot be dismissed.

Aim for the C-suite. Better yet, plan to take over – CEO, President, Chairperson of the Board. Set this goal and the path will manifest. Be the first Fortune 500 CEO who started as an associate in the Sustainability Division!

CSE helps professionals advance careers through certified on-site and group training services globally as well as the online Sustainability Academy. CSE is a recognized global leader in professional Sustainability training and coaching and one of the first to recognize the growing need for advanced certified education in the sustainability field. The Sustainability Academy is CSE’s global initiative to offer affordable, specialized, online education focused on Sustainability and Corporate Responsibility. Our goal is to train 100,000 professionals by 2020 and make an impact on our planet!

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Which state was named best climate for business four years in a row? Which has the most travelled airport in the world? Where are 25 of the FT 500 headquartered? If you guessed Atlanta, Georgia, you are spot on. With this much opportunity, corporations are looking for ways to leverage their resources.

They may be surprised to find that TRANSPARENCY is key.

Research from the Centre for Sustainability and Excellence (CSE) finds definitive evidence supporting the benefits of transparency in Corporate Sustainability Reporting. CSE research links Sustainability Strategies and Reporting to positive financial results.

These findings have been presented around the world during CSE’s Global Certified Sustainability Practitioner Program. The encouraging findings have been welcomed by executives from Atlanta companies and organizations as diverse as the Atlanta Regional Commission, Atlanta Motorsports Park, Exide Technologies, Home Depot, HD Supply and Coca-Cola.

CSE closely tracks sustainability reporting trends in North America. These trends can be used to strengthen Atlanta’s position as the business “capitol of the Southeast”. CSE’s Sustainability Reporting Trends in North America 2018 research, along with previous findings on Silicon Valley, represent an ongoing commitment to provide timely and relevant sustainability content for C-level and upper management corporate leaders.

CSE has developed a Return on Sustainability (RoS) model which will be presented at the Atlanta practitioner program. Enablers include a culture of transparency and comprehensive strategic goals that respond to stakeholders’ expectations. Transparency does not only refer to putting out a sustainability report, but to including material metrics which are verified.

With a focus on sustainability, companies gain high sustainability ratings (ESG), and stakeholder perceptions are positively influenced. Positive financial performance was demonstrated in two-thirds of companies linking transparency to strong communications.

Other important emerging trends:

* Companies with the highest sustainability rankings have better financial performance than companies with lower rankings based on CSRHub ratings.

* While there is still poor adoption of the United Nations Sustainability Development Goals (SDGs), rates have doubled since last year – driven by stakeholder expectations.

* Most companies use the Global Reporting Initiative (GRI) guidelines.

* Carbon footprint reduction is a priority, with many companies having well-stated and measured targets.

CSE’s Certified Sustainability Practitioner Program (Advanced Edition 2019) offers corporate trainings on these key topics and many others. The first 2019 programs in North America are in Atlanta, Feb. 21-22; Toronto, April 11-12; and Seattle, April 15-16, 2019.

Artificial Intelligence (AI) is being defined as “any computer system able to perform tasks that generally require human intelligence”. In terms of sustainability, the key parameter is that if we want AI to “work” towards a more sustainable world, we must first teach machines what sustainability is and how to make a positive impact.

When AI is mentioned in CSR reports it focuses on how AI presents opportunities for companies. AI is already being used in sustainability in the form of reducing energy consumption and environmental footprint, but also for providing more innovative products and services.

A number of companies are using AI in order to go the extra mile in improving efficiency. Companies like Google, Xcel are using AI to improve efficiency, while IBM and Interserve are using AI to improve their products and services which range from weather prediction to building construction.

Further to environmental applications, AI has great potential to improve human health and wellbeing, especially in remote areas and in developing countries. For example, Ada Health, an AI-powered chat box telemedicine app asks relevant personalized questions in order to identify potential causes of symptoms as well as suggestions on how to proceed with care.

Also sectors like the fashion industry are examining how they can implement AI in order to control the production process, but also to predict what styles will sell well and what styles will fail.

Developed and Developing countries are already formulating national AI strategies. Especially for developing countries, AI will be a great tool to upgrade their infrastructure, step up R&D and skills development in order to leapfrog advanced economies. However, companies seem to fail to acknowledge that AI may pose some risks to sustainability, such as bias, job loss and increased consumption. And of course there are basic questions that need to be answered such as how to make the machine understand, and take into account, ethical and philosophical questions, and how to make up for the lack of crucial human qualities such as wisdom, empathy, compassion.

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Even though Artificial Intelligence (AI) is the present and future, it is with in depth knowledge and research that we may create a better and more sustainable future for everyone.

Join us in London on March 14-15 2019 as we discuss the subject of AI and many more crucial areas of sustainability. Also, we are excited to present in London, CSE’s brand new research findings on Sustainability (CR) and Non-Financial Reporting in Europe. The research explores the level of commitment of European companies, through their common Sustainability and Corporate Responsibility strategic goals, and how well they measure their impacts and social value.

Investment advisors, fund managers, family offices – they all have their go-to indices when choosing corporate investments. They watch the S&P 500, Dow Jones and Nasdaq indices. Most of us even have favorite stock pickers with less stodgy parameters (who hasn’t been beguiled by Seeking Alpha or the Motley Fool?).

What are the indices guiding the over $11.6 trillion in US assets under management (AUM) using SRI strategies? Sustainable, responsible, impact investing represents 26%—or 1 in 4 dollars—of total US assets under management (USSIF.org).

Important indices which rank companies based on SRI, CSR (corporate social responsibility) and ESG (environment, social, governance) criteria include:

Bloomberg Barclays MSCI ESG Indices
CSRHub
FTSE 4 Good
Dow Jones Sustainability Indices (DJSI)
Morningstar
NasdaqCRD Global Sustainability Index (NQCRD)

CEOs, CFOs, and VPs of investor relations must pay attention to how their companies rank on these and other indices because investors – institutional and private – watch these closely. There are mutual funds and ETFs based solely on these.

Many sustainability portfolios rely heavily on these indices, and other professional portfolio managers such as Pax World, Domini and Calvert create their own indices which are then used by private investors. AUM in the 780 so-called alternative investment vehicles nearly tripled since 2016, many of them available from traditional investment houses such as Goldman Sachs, Merrill Lynch and UBS.

Companies finding their way on to these indices are rewarded. CSE research has found a connection between financial performance and sustainability strategies and reporting. Of companies with the highest Sustainability scores (as ranked by CSRHub), 73% improved financial results, as expressed by change in revenues 2016-2017. Sustainability Reporting and comprehensive strategies regarding community, employees, governance and environment correlate to a positive impact on profitability.

Sustainability rankings reach beyond the CEO, CFO and Investor Relations. Sustainability concerns permeate the corporate structure. Supply Chain risk and management is only one of many key elements reaching beyond finance and toward Operations. With SRI investments often including exclusionary screening, COOs are affected by investment policies related to conflict risk countries. Sustainability rankings take these and many other criteria, new to traditional corporate thinking, into account.

Want to learn more about how you can leverage your sustainability efforts for higher rankings? Attend the Center for Sustainability and Excellence (CSE) Sustainability (ESG) Leadership Training Workshop for C-Suite Executives, in NYC on Monday September 30^th – Tuesday October 1^st, 2019. Stay tuned for more information.

CSE specializes in global sustainability consulting, research and training. Clients include governments, NGOs and Fortune 500 companies. CSE is accredited by CMI and is a GRI organizational stakeholder.

Part 3: How to find a job in sustainability

Part 2: Career Path

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