Alice Kalro’s Post

We are all overwhelmed. It’s a sign of the times. And we misconceive what the real ask is... In a recent chat on how arkH3 could help a group of CEOs, me and my counterpart spoke about the necessity to account for the outer planetary context from a systemic perspective. As a necessary precondition for relevant strategy and action. They explained: “Our members are so overwhelmed with the work their companies already take on with respect to climate change, we have to see if they’ll be open to TAKING ON MORE, to look at the remaining planetary boundaries too”. Here’s the major misconception. By looking at all planetary boundaries, you, or your leaders, would NOT be taking on more. You/they’d be putting the same amount of time and effort - into addressing what actually matters. Sounds smart right? Let me elaborate. We understand bodies have multiple vital organs. A physician making the choice to only diagnose 1 vital organ and build an action-plan on that basis, not at all checking other vital organs, would not be a great physician. The client would not be in good hands. The health plan would not secure the client’s immediate survival, let alone health. And this is how, by taking on the climate change blinkers, leaders breach their fiduciary duty. Not doing what is owed to our shareholders or owners. De facto ignoring what’s knowable and in turn devising and implementing irrelevant strategies. Building strategies without a grasp of the context within which they’re meant to deliver. Thinking that looking at the big picture means “taking on more” is symptomatic of still mainstream legacy sustainability approaches - sustainability-as-usual. Which insist on breaking the world into compartmentalised topics and them tending to them separately. (With carbon arbitrarily being topic #1 for most). Nonsense. We are not expecting leaders to do more - to invest more mindspace, cognitive capacity, time or effort. That is not the ask. We’re all overwhelmed. Overworked. We’re suggesting leaders do not do more, but that they do different. Do relevant. That they return from the nitty gritty that they have bought into to the big picture. As a matter of business continuity, shareholder returns, future readiness - which all go hand in hand with securing future liveable conditions on the planet. We only have years. But you won’t know that, or what the best available strategy is, by looking at 1 vital organ and being led to ignore the rest. Better guides are available. Better action-plans exist. Let’s do better, not more. What objections to looking at all planetary boundaries have you come across? #sustainablebusiness #CEOs #sustainability #sustainablestrategy

Are you keen to drive conversations on organisations’ proportional response to the polycrisis and their prospects for future-readiness? If you’d like to engage business or #sustainability leaders and help quickly revamp their grasp of #corporatesustainability and its inplications for strategy - from inadequate legacy notions to what really matters, the Planetary Ikigai Organisational Gap Assessment Tool (OGAT) is here to help. You can download it for free, and explore how non-technical, fast, and strategic in focus it is. You can also dig deeper and rehearse using the Tool with others in our live workshops - on examples of real-life companies. The next live workshop is coming up this Friday, May 31st, in 2 timeslots to choose from. We have a few seats let for each. You can read testimonials on our website. There’s about 1.5 hours of pre-work, so best not to leave your registration for the night before. :) Let’s flip the script together 🙏

This live masterclass is taking place tomorrow! I just love the content, it’s so practical! Highly relevant for strategic decision makers - CEOs, strategy, risk, revenue officers, Boards… and of course #sustainability officers and champions who want to bring real-world sustainability front and center of business strategy and business models - as a matter of both business and ethical imperative. We’ll briefly revisit the Planetary Boundaries - from a fresh perspective - not the nitty gritty, but the most important insights one needs in order to drive strategic decisions. Then we’ll look at the big picture from a systemic perspective: what do 6 overshot #planetaryboundaries mean for the global economy and big business? How does the shape the outer context in which we operate? Then we’ll bring this down to business #strategy, fiduciary duty and #corporatesustainability agendas and share 7+ concrete actionable takeaways for these. No Board, C-Suite or functional leader should miss this. (Fiduciary duty, remember… ?) Details and registration link in comments. The Masterclass will be available on-demand, from a recording, by the end of the week. Get in touch for bulk registrations and pricing (incl whole teams or company-wide access). Have a fruitful start of the week!

What can we learn from EY’s Four Futures? They offer a different cautionary tale than EY intended... The Four Futures seem implausible, and therefore poor inputs for strategic decision-making. The purpose of this post is not to berate, but to point to common misconceptions at the intersection of #sustainability with #strategy, to help us all direct our efforts more meaningfully. Debuted at COP 28, the Four Futures installation channels EY’s insights on possible futures through imaginary testimonies from 2054, delivered by AI avatars. The intent is excellent: To provide a visceral and personable wake-up call. Some applaud it as a signal of a Big 4 consultancy awakening to our global predicament. The scenarios are: Business as usual Collapse Constraint Transformation Do you see anything off with that picture? I do. ▪ Continuation of BAU through to the 2050s, or 2100 is implausible. It would assume technology could offset the disasters, disruptions and increases in cost of doing business that will otherwise render continued compounded global economic growth impossible. Which will result in a collapse of the financial system, and the definite end of BAU. ▪ In relation to the above, and due to Earth systems eroding faster than scientific consensus foretold, features of life presented under the Collapse scenario will hit us no matter what, and a decade or two earlier than EY predicts. ▪ Constraint will feature in most future scenarios - whether it comes from national governments, or from “mere” global economy shrinking to within the planetary boundaries, or from the chaos unleashed. ▪ Transformation cannot prevent “collapse”, and it cannot undo the need for constraint. It can extend the window of opportunity during which we can secure a future sustainable, liveable state on the planet and broaden the range of what we’ll be able to afford within that state. Why are the Four Futures off? 1) They wear the climate blinkers - as though we had 1 transgressed planetary and not 6, akin to making recommendations to a patient who’s one organ is heavily strained, on that basis alone, while their other organs are failing. 2) The Four Futures were modelled on the conservative end of available data - or so we were told by EY during our tour, supposedly to make the shocking imagery more credible. In contrast, the precautionary principle in this case demands looking at the radical end of the forecasts. 2023 and early 2024 have shown that everything is happening much faster than even the most alarming estimates assumed. It seems to me EY needs to develop systemic thinking as a capability, as a matter of business continuity. (I expand on this in the full article). And that’s a lesson for us all. It’s time we drop the climate tunnel vision and take on a systemic perspective. Future scenarios produced looking at 1 planetary boundary alone are incompatible with relevant strategy, fiduciary duty, as well as unhelpful for securing a liveable future.

We’re not seeing any near enough action towards a #sustainability transformation and systemic change. Can we quickly turn this around? Big business leaders - C-Suites, Boards, Investors - are in a unique position of power and privilege to help actively drive change. But they haven’t really gotten around to do so yet. Many do not seem to “get it”. Some seem to get it, but don’t see securing a liveable future or wellbeing for all as their responsibility. Some see the responsibility but are unclear what to do - on how to operationalise this ambition. The result - as perceived by sustainability advocates - is widespread lack of support for relevant transformational action. Yet, this is not unchangeable. In fact, it’s easier to change than you probably think. When we look at the problem using science, ethics, a systemic perspective and strategic business acumen, we can quickly conclude that the to-do lists for securing a liveable future and well-being for all, and for securing future shareholder value and business continuity are actually one and the same. In other words, companies can only fulfill their fiduciary duty by pivoting into being in the business of doing what the world needs, and by driving the systemic change necessary to enable them to do so. That’s what business leaders are legally bound to do. But again, many do not get it yet (or get it, but….). Interestingly, many Boards and leadership teams have already been through training on the planetary boundaries, on doughnut economics, and the like. And nothing changed. Because most of these lack the “and so what?” - the “what does it actually mean for business, for strategy, for what is ours to do?”. (Hence the 4 facets of the SWoN Approach - which enables translating between real-world sustainability imperatives and business imperatives). Well, we’ve nominated ourselves to fill in that gap, to help unlock all the dormant transformation potential. And all you need to do is open the door. This 1-hour training is right for your leaders or colleagues, if they: 🔺 Do not see the point in strong sustainability action and cannot envision how lack of real-world sustainability affects their own agenda or responsibilities. It is right for you, if you are: 🔺 in charge of organisations or portfolios and keen to get a sense of what the polycrisis means for strategy and fiduciary duty; or 🔺 a sustainability leader or champion and keen to build the knowledge base to upgrade from “Sustainability-as-Usual” to “Sustainability-as-the-World-Needs”; or 🔺 pivoting your career and keen to get a science-aligned and systemic grasp of the real-world imperatives that corporate sustainability ought to be addressing. At arkH3, we speak a lot about driving so-called systemic interventions. That is, leaning in to our agency and stepping up to our responsibility vis-a-vis the state of the world. We try to drive such interventions wherever we can, however we can. Will you intervene with us?