Alice Kalro’s Post

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?

Which is the most dangerous kind of #greenwashing, and what can we do to diffuse it? ↓ Ever thought of the systemic aspects of greenwashing? Or, what kind of law would we actually need, in order for it to help secure a liveable future? The EU - a supposed leader in green regulation - introduced anti-greenwashing legislation this year, and previous weeks have seen some of the first court rulings and action against greenwashing. But, aren’t we yet again holding the wrong end of the stick? Our current notion of greenwashing has a widespread misunderstanding of sustainability baked into it. We think about claims about products and offerings and their relatively smaller harms, or about statements on organisational action towards reducing its harms. Once again: [status quo] + [no harm] is unsustainable. Our focus when weeding out greenwashing is misplaced. To reiterate, our outer context is one of transgressed planetary boundaries. Our best chance to secure a “less bad” future hinges on the negative impacts of the global economy shrinking to a fraction of their size, and some to zero, within years. In this context, not asking and not assessing whether a business has the potential to become sustainable leads to the crudest form of greenwashing.   Not disclosing that a business is unsustainable is a scam on stakeholders and shareholders alike. This is greenwashing on a systemic level. With the EU, UN, standard setters, mainstream consultancies and others taking part. The good news is that we’re not obliged to participate in this charade.   Directors, investors, CXOs, strategy and risk officers and managers, sustainability champions and all of us really - can choose to get off this merry-go-round, and get real. What can you do? (See comments - out of character limit) PhotoCredit: Thought Leader Global Media Taken during my presentation at the 8th Annual S-HUB Summit on April 24, 2024, Plenary 1: Framing Necessary Sustainability Action: 7 Key Points. You can learn the rest of the 7 points and much more in our upcoming online masterclass - “Planetary Boundaries and so what?” On May 21st. Details will follow soon. Read the full article in the arkH3 blog, link in comments.

“Reminding the folks operating in the Euro American sphere that they are performing erasure and this is not neutral. The harmful effects of not relying on all the world's knowledge is that humans are slowing down our response to the polycrisis.” What a call to action by Gillian Marcelle. This has been weighing on me. I cannot unsee the unnatural (and unbearable) whiteness of the Global North sustainability thought leadership space. We have to all do better. In spite of being busy, and overwhelmed, and exhausted, and in spite of having to work really hard for getting our own progressive thinking into the limelight… we need to question who is invited to share the limelight with us, and who is not… It takes courage. And risk. And not putting oneself first. I have recently refused participating at an event where I suspected I would be among white-only speakers, while supposedly unheard or underheard voices. And a few weeks later I accepted speaking at another event where I suspected the same, but the stakes were too high for me to say no, and my schedule too hectic to find room to question. I do not feel easy about that at all. (I have to at least address this with the organisers ex-post - will do). Many of us were cheering for “no more manels”. We knew manels left us outside, holding the fort but not the mic. So we should find it easy to relate. It is time we demand “no more whanels”.