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Roundtable: Getting Beyond Net Zero
Episode 25 • 16th April 2024 • Leadership for Sustainability • Osbert Lancaster @ Realise Earth
00:00:00 00:14:59

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Shownotes

Climate is only one of the planetary boundaries we need to work on. And we also need to tackle a whole range of social issues.

That's why item four and our sustainability leadership manifesto is: "develop and deliver initiatives that offer multiple benefits for people and nature".

In this Roundtable event, our guests, sustainability leaders across a variety of sectors, reflect on their experience of trying to move the agenda beyond net zero in their work.

Listen for insights from the sharp end about how to help colleagues to see the bigger picture and start engaging with the rest of the sustainable development goals.

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Transcripts

Mina:

In order to bring everyone along on this really crucial journey, I

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think it really is about bringing it

back, taking it down to square one.

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Malcolm: Instead of everything

seeming overwhelming and huge, that

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actually it all becomes something

that is perfectly achievable?

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Alejandra: How do you present and

make these things local and relatable?

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This is Leadership for Sustainability,

the podcast for sustainability

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directors, managers, and pioneers

who want their organization to make

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greater progress on sustainability.

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It's so good to have you with us.

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I'm Osbert Lancaster.

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I'm a long time sustainability

consultant, facilitator and director of

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sustainability leadership specialists

Realise Earth where we focus on

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the people side of sustainability.

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It's great news that net zero is becoming

more and more widespread as a concept,

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and that climate change is on the

agenda of more and more organizations.

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But climate is only one of the

planetary boundaries we need to work on.

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And we also need to tackle a

whole range of social issues.

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That's why item four and our

sustainability leadership manifesto is

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" develop and deliver initiatives that offer

multiple benefits for people and nature".

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At our recent round table, we

discussed, how do you help your

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organization to get beyond net zero?

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To see the bigger picture and

start engaging with the rest of

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the sustainable development goals?

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Morag Watson, my co-founder here at

Realise Earth, hosted the round table

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with me, and we were joined by some

great guests for an hour of discussion.

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Most of the discussion happened

privately in small groups.

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But in this episode, we share the

highlights from the plenary sessions.

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I'll let our guests introduce

themselves and take it from there.

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Mina: So I'm Mina Cole.

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I'm an environmental manager

and I work for Regen Group.

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Graham: Hello, my name is Graham Farrar.

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I'm head of sustainability

for Kings Rose Mining.

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Flo: My name is Florenca or Flo,

I'm a lead product designer, also

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work with regenerative business

design for The C Collective.

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Annie: Hi, my name's Annie,

short for Anne Marie.

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I am the Sustainable Life Coach

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Anna: I'm Anna, I'm an outdoor

facilitator mindfulness, for

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my business Wander Women.

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Gavin: My name is Gavin Allen,

I'm the group sustainability

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operations lead for Robertson Group.

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Malcolm: I'm Malcolm Curry.

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I'm an independent consultant

specialising in dispute resolution.

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Kemi: My name's Kemi Odafari, I'm a senior

finance business partner at UCL Partners,

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which is focused on health innovation.

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Alejandra: My name is Alejandra,

I'm an environmental engineer

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and waste management consultant

at company based in Malta

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Ellis: Ellis McKinnon, Environmental and Sustainability

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Manager, currently freelance.

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Morag: Wonderful.

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Thank you very much and welcome, everyone.

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It's delightful to have you all with us

here, and in a moment we're going to put

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you into some discussion groups but to

prep us for going into that, what I'm

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going to invite you to do is to think

about a time that you've helped your

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colleagues or your organization to commit

to taking an action on sustainability

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and an action that went beyond just being

a single issue like climate change or

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recycling to a much more holistic view.

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So think about that time you

did that, once you've chosen

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it, what was the situation?

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Who was involved?

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How did the process start?

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What happened next?

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What was the result?

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I'm going to give you a moments

silence just to have a think.

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And once you've got that in your

head, the bit I would like you to focus

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in is why did that approach succeed?

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Okay, so hold on to those

thoughts and feelings.

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You will go into breakout groups and

it's your opportunity to discuss exactly

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what we've just been talking about,

how you went beyond that single issue

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to a more holistic, what works, what

did you learn, what helped you succeed

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and an opportunity to share with peers.

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Osbert: Welcome back, everybody.

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I hope you've had some interesting

discussions, insights and

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ideas and inspirations from it.

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I would like to invite the reporter from

each group to share your top insight.

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So , Room 1, which was

Flo, Gavin, and Kemi.

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Kemi: One of the things that we spoke

about was regulation and incentives, in

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terms of getting organizations on board.

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We certainly find that with bigger

organizations, they tend not to listen

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unless there's a sort of financial

benefit to their bottom line.

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So whilst it's necessary and correct

to focus on the sustainability

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improvements, what maybe gets their

heads turn is actually to say that there

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is financial benefit to this, which

does sort of bring its own sort of moral

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implications in that organizations

should be doing this anyway, but if

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you need to get that foot in the door,

sometimes that is an option to focus on.

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Osbert: Brilliant.

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Thank you so much.

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Room two is Annie, Ellis, and Mina.

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. Annie.

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Annie: We understand that getting

people motivated through their own

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personal values helps to create a good

mindset, which we've all experienced

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in different ways, pluses and minuses.

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However, to get beyond net zero,

it's almost about taking that

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mindset and making it a no brainer.

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So it isn't something that you actually

consciously think of, it's something that

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you do without even thinking about it.

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And that's where we need to get to in

terms of making it easy for everyone

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to know what to do, how to do it, the

best way to deal with it, the same way

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as you would do for health and safety,

or if you're driven by cost reduction,

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cost return on investment, that this

is something that is second nature.

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Osbert: Thank you so much.

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And room three, Anna, Graham, and Malcolm.

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Graham: I guess in, in my role,

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one of the key focuses has been

on the double materiality survey.

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So working through and, and trying to get

the business aligned, investors aligned

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and external stakeholders aligned with

what we think we should be focusing on,

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because that allows you to integrate

that concept into the business including,

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who you employ, what consultancy

support you need, what funding you need.

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And that also leads into how you

produce your sustainability report.

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And it's not just one person's

idea, it's a formalized process,

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under legislation in many places.

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Osbert: Double materiality?

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, Just remind us of the jargon.

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Graham: So the first materiality is

, financial materiality and the second

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materiality is impact to stakeholders.

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Osbert: Thank you so much.

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Okay.

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Is there anything else that

came out of those discussions

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that you would like to add?

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Alejandra: I think one part that we were

mentioning is about how do you present

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and make these things local and relatable?

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You have to start small every time

you think about climate change,

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it feels like so big for some of

these companies, especially when

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you're looking at SMEs or startups.

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So making that relatable, talking

about the local, you're part of it.

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And then there is also another aspect

that we see it's about like almost

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a contagion effect, which is your

neighbors, your, your other competitors

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are doing, and it was this whole thing

of scope three is going to get to you.

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So even though you can't, somehow we

need to find a way to do it because

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otherwise you can't be in business.

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And then somehow you also seeing that

your neighbors are transitioning, so you

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just feel compelled to do it as well.

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So there is a little bit of that

following the trend behavior.

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Gavin: I think, it's very easy for

bigger organizations to be able to

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fund their way to, net zero but there's

really a bit of a gap for SMEs.

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I'm quite fortunate, we've got a

sustainability supply chain coordinator

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that does quite a lot of work within

our supply chain, especially SMEs and

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how to calculate their carbon, you

know, terminologies like scope one,

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two, and three is probably fine to all

of us, but to an SME they're probably

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saying "I don't know what that is".

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And actually you break it and you

go "your fuel and your electricity".

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Yes, that's pretty much it,

and then whoever you use as a

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supplier, it's theirs and theirs.

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It's that whole concept of

everyone's scope one and two

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is someone else's scope three.

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Ellis: We touched on momentum,

maintaining momentum and keeping

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things relevant and kind of not getting

lost in the fog of everything else.

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Trying to keep it interesting for people.

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My own experience with the championships,

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Osbert: (That's the 2023 UCI

cycling world championships)

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Ellis: it was kind of like a drip drip

feed of communications, external and

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internal, to try and maintain it, so that

people don't, switch off so it becomes

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second nature to people to think about.

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Malcolm: One reflection I've been having

on this, and it's following on from

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what Graham was explaining about earlier

on, one of the things I took from the

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conversation, was about the narrowing

down of the SDGs that he was looking at,

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narrowing down the scope of the discussion

in order to make things into bite sized

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chunks, so it starts to become achievable.

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I thought there's a real parallel there

between that and the question funnel

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that, I regularly talk about in dispute

resolution and mediation, where you're

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actually starting with a very wide

concept, and you funnel downwards and get

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more and more specific as you go through,

which means you end up with something

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that is realistic and is achievable.

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Mina: Um, it kind of links a little

bit to what Gavin was saying really.

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People of our expertise in this field

will kind of get used to terminology,

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but then in order to bring everyone

along on this really crucial journey,

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I think it really is about bringing

it back, taking it down to square one.

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Not everybody has the same kind of

background or research that, certainly

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people have done within this group.

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So I think language and layman terms

and kind of bringing it down to

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bare basics is extremely important

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Morag: We're coming to the end of our time together so we want to make

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sure that everyone has a chance to

contribute to this last session.

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So we're going to ask you to keep

your input really, really tight here.

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Take a moment to reflect on

what you've heard today and

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what you've discussed today.

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And to think, is there one thing

that you could take from this that

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you'll apply to your own work?

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One little thing that you might

do differently or that you just

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need to bear in mind and remember?

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We're going to invite you to

complete the sentence: " The one

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thing I will try doing is..."

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We'll go to Malcolm and then Mina.

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So the one thing I'm

going to try is, Malcolm.

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Malcolm: The one thing I'm going to

do is, to focus on that bite sized

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chunk concept and really working

out what, what can be achieved.

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Morag: Thank you, Malcolm.

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Mina will come to you and then Ellis.

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Mina: I think the one thing that

I'm going to continue to focus on

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is show greater support to supply

chain and other companies that I

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work closely to, um, to kind of

progress all together on that journey.

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Morag: Wonderful.

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Thank you,

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Ellis.

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Then Graham.

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Ellis: The one thing I'm going to take

away is what Annie said with regards

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to cultivating a healthy mindset

and frightening people to death.

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Morag: Thank you, Ellis.

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Graeme and then Anna.

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Graham: The one thing I'm going to take

away is continue to speak to people

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with diverse backgrounds and, and get

feedback and shape what I'm doing.

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Morag: Thank you, Graeme.

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Anna, then Annie.

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Anna: One thing that I'm taking away from

today is, to talk more confidently about

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the things that are already happening, but

also looking to constantly improve things

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because there's things for all of us.

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Morag: Thank you, Anna.

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Annie, then Gavin.

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Annie: The one thing I'm going to take

from today is just keeping things simple.

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Morag: Thank you.

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Gavin, then Kemi.

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Gavin: The one thing I'll take away from

today is keeping it simple, but also

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having that positive mindset and approach.

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Morag: Well, thank you.

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Kemi and then Flo.

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Kemi: The one thing that I will try

doing is starting locally and visibly.

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So be it work or sort of at home,

whether it's doing something

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small, but has that visible impact.

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Morag: And finally, Flo.

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Flo: So for me, I think it's be

aware of other people's context

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and try to make the solution or

the process approachable for them.

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Morag: Thank you, everyone.

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Osbert, back to you.

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Osbert: This is the end

of our time together.

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Thank you so much for sharing your

experience, your insights, and wish

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you all the best with taking your

next step and look forward to hearing

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how you're getting on with that.

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If there's anything you'd like

to pick up from this discussion,

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feel free to get in touch with me.

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It's been great having you with us

and I hope we'll see you again soon.

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Bye for now.

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Lots of great insights and ideas there

based on the experience of our guests.

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If I had to pull out just three themes

that I think are really important and

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applicable in most organizations, these

are the three that I would choose.

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First, when you're talking

about sustainability or any

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particular aspect of it.

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Avoid jargon and technical language.

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Keep it simple and make it relevant

to the people you're talking with.

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Two.

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Although it's essential to get beyond

net zero and address other issues,

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don't try to do everything, focus in

on the issues that are most material

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and where you can have real impact.

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And three, engaging people with

sustainability is an ongoing process.

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So keep talking, keep people involved and

ultimately work towards shifting mindsets,

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so sustainability becomes second nature.

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And there you have it.

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I hope you enjoyed our Leadership for

Sustainability round table, and that

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you'll join us for a future session.

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