Sustainability across E, S, and G keeps breaking into company mandates

• Sustainability continues to rise in importance at the highest levels of organizations going into 2022. It’s moved far beyond being solely a corporate social responsibility (CSR) strategy. This is true for multiple factors which underpin sustainability: those that form the 17 UN Sustainable Development Goals and cover all environmental, social, and governance (ESG) aspects organizations must address.
• The importance of sustainability across these various ESG factors shot up in the second half of 2021. We’ve selected the three indicators from our Pulse Survey data that capture elements across E, S, and G: Environmental sustainability, diversity and ethics, and supply chain resilience. These were put to our network of Global 2000 enterprise executives in a list of 10 options that included these 3 ESG factors, alongside adopting technology, optimizing processes, COVID, digital fluency, IT modernization, outsourcing, and working from home.
• A huge driver of change was the COP26 UN climate summit held in November 2021 (see us present our research here), which saw a broad consensus that sustainability is moving from goal setting and ambition to delivering on more detailed transition plans. Combine the hype around the summit with further clear examples of climate change’s impact throughout the year, and constant media and political conversation leading up to COP26, and sustainability is cemented at the front of mind. It will be front of mind throughout 2022. It must be front of mind—and addressed—far beyond this year. But 2022 is a critical starting point.
• Governments will be challenged to bring more detailed transition plans to COP27, to be held in Egypt, in November 2022. Organizations of all kinds must match this—to get ahead of regulation, but also lead the way throughout their ecosystems. Ratings organizations like CDP, are increasingly focusing on transition plans, not just ambition.
• Consulting, services, and technology firms are developing sustainability services portfolios to meet this demand and are largely aiming to embed sustainability as a native competency for all employees across industries, technologies, and business functions. See our Sustainability Services Ecosystem Mapping study for more.

The Bottom Line: Organizations need transition plans that roadmap their decarbonization to net-zero, beyond, and address ESG factors throughout all 17 UN Goals. Competitors, governments, and organizations of all kinds continue to wake up to the increasing importance of sustainability. The priority is now solving the problem(s).