One big idea: Does Wall Street really care about sustainability? This was one of the questions in the air at the Ceres conference last week, where managers of trillions of dollars of assets gathered to assess and advance the state of ESG/SRI/sustainable/impact investment.
Sprint CEO Dan Hesse observed that he’s never been asked about Sprint’s sustainability initiatives on a quarterly analysts call–despite Sprint’s rapid rise up the Newsweek rankings to #3. Anne Stausboll, CEO of investment giant California Public Employees Retirement System (CalPERS), wasn’t surprised. There are three kinds of investors, she said: traders, raiders and owners. The traders are looking for short term gains, and they’re the ones on those calls. CalPERS sees itself as owners–with an investment horizon of 100 years–and just isn’t interested in those calls.
Often we find what we’re looking for. What is your company looking for?
Quote of the week: “The things to do are: the things that need doing, that you see need to be done, and that no one else seems to see need to be done.” — Buckminster Fuller
Opportunity: Like CalPERS, Natural Logic focuses on building durable value. How? Increasingly, with a deep, challenging and powerful process of systems design that may challenge you to rethink your value proposition and business model, as well as your sourcing and operations. Interested? Learn more here.
Events: Coming soon: International Society of Sustainability Professions, where I’ll be on a “wisdom panel” with the new Hall of Members; Sustainable Brands, where I’ll co-lead a pre-conference workshop on systems thinking and moderate a session on “Radical Optimization: How the Internet of Things, 3D Printing and Innovative Data Analysis are Transforming Manufacturing and Supply Chains” (register with discount code NATLOGICSB13 for 20% off!); “Making Change Irresistible” at the Spring of Sustainability series. (And here’s how you can book me to keynote your next event.)
With best regards,
Gil
Gil Philip Friend
President & CEO Natural Logic Inc. | Building value at the intersection of profit, brand, risk and purpose.
Tel: 1-510-248-4940 | Cel: 1-510-435-6346 | Skype: gil_friend | Blog | LinkedIn | Twitter | About.Me
PS: Does your sustainability team have a coach?