Thinking about creating or revising an environmental, social, and governance (ESG) strategy? Then explore these three key tactics:
Think of your ESG strategy as another tool that can help your company achieve your business goals and priorities.
Create a compelling purpose - what will happen if you achieve your goals?
Plan how you will get there by back-casting your progress.
Align with your Business Strategy, Goals, and Priorities
Understanding your company’s business strategy is essential if your corporate responsibility and ESG programs are to be more than a "nice to have" and your C-suite is going to commit. Corporate responsibility programs
that connect directly to business priorities, such as access to a new market, engaging emerging leaders, or using fewer natural resources, make sense and are more likely to gain the appropriate resources and recognition. You will also be better able to demonstrate the tangible impacts and value of your programs better.
Here's a quick assessment to see how aligned your ESG approach is with your business strategy. Grab a piece of paper and, across the top, write down your business priorities over the next couple of years. If you don't know what they are, you will likely find them on your intranet, in a recent CEO speech, or in your company's annual report. Now, underneath each of the priorities, list the corporate responsibility programs that contribute to success of each priorities.
Are most of your programs accounted for? Are there clear business reasons for the large majority of the corporate citizenship work you are doing? If the answer is no, you may want to re-assess your ESG strategy.
Create a Compelling Purpose
People have to know where they are going in order to be convinced to get onboard. A compelling purpose will help them understand the future you are seeking to create and how they can contribute to making it happen. By sharing this sense of purpose with colleagues, customers, and community partners, you mobilize your stakeholders. Vision is not an implementation plan. As Mary Ann Glynn, PhD, a professor at Boston College Carroll
School of Management, is fond of saying, “Martin Luther King Jr. said, ‘I have a dream,’ not ‘I have a five point plan.’”
Strong vision statements describe the future, are aspirational, and are unique to the company. Examples of strong corporate responsibility vision statements are:
USAA: Going above for those that have gone beyond
Unilever: Make sustainable living common place
Tesla: Accelerate the world's transition to renewable energy
Nike: Bring inspiration and innovation to every athlete
Back-Cast your Progress
Back-casting is a planning approach that shifts the starting point of the plan from, “where we are now,” to the, “where we will be.” If you start from where we are now, the tendency is to plan for incremental change, a little better or a little worse. Backcasting starts from the desired outcome and forces us to ask: How does our context and performance need to change in order for us to achieve this goal? Back-casting begins with your future state in mind.
For example, you may want to eliminate childhood hunger in your state, be the most ethical company in the world, or power your company by 100 percent renewable energy. Based on this vision, you then move backwards to determine what needs to change, the scope and scale of activities that need to happen, and the financial and human resources needed to make your vision happen.
This process is not about predicting the future, but rather creating it. The process also allows you to manage stakeholder expectations and provides a framework for creating metrics to demonstrate success.
Want to dive deeper into this topic? Then see Et Cetera below...
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