Insights
Spencer Stuart: Doing the Hard Work to Make Sustainability Stick
While CEOs and boards have increasingly empowered chief sustainability officers (CSOs) to retool organizations for a decarbonized world, it’s no secret some sustainability initiatives are faltering. If around one in three CSOs are seeing “substantial positive value” from delivering ambitious sustainability goals, that means almost two-thirds are not. Easy gains seem increasingly hard to come by, and sustainability efforts generally have run into headwinds amid economic uncertainty and the reality of the work required to meet global net-zero goals.
Meeting regulatory reporting requirements further complicates these efforts. But CSOs remain steadfast: 80 percent see sustainability and business strategy as inseparable, and they’re working to ensure sustainability remains a priority. The challenge now is ensuring the whole organization does too.