In starting, let me posit that higher levels of sustainability in our work environment will significantly increase employee engagement, one of the most important drivers of the success of an organization. Higher levels of sustainability will only prevail if there is a “tone from the top” supporting this idea. Only then can we hope that higher levels of sustainability will “trickle down” through the organization and reach most leaders, managers, and employees as key elements of good business practice. However, while we all like to use the word “sustainability”, and probably associate something rather positive with it, I am not sure that we have had a good conversation in our organizations on what we mean by “sustainability”: is it financial, environmental, or life balance? “Sustainability” is one of those terms that many people can project a lot onto, and unless the conversation to come to an agreement on what “we mean by it” happens in earnest, it can be very fuzzy.

“Sustainability” is one of those terms that many people can project a lot onto, and unless the conversation to come to an agreement on what “we mean by it” happens in earnest, it can be very fuzzy.

Without the “tone from the top”, increasing levels of sustainability in organizations is even more demanding than it would otherwise be. Hence, exploring the topic of sustainability in the C-Suite using a wide-angle lens is a worthwhile endeavor.

First up, we have to ask: “Why is sustainability of leadership roles important?" and “How can it contribute to the success of our organization?”.

Dealing with Individuals

“We often forget that we are dealing with individuals who perversely try to behave as human beings,” Peter Drucker said of leaders in organizations and the people they lead.

The 20th century has been dominated by theories and practices that derive standards of good leadership from hierarchical organizations, with military organizations as an important reference. Douglas McGregor’s Theory X is an example of that and has been replicated in the vast majority of factories. Early impulses to create more sustainable conditions were driven by highly inspired factory owners but did not become a general trend. It can be argued that in many countries, certainly east and west of the North Atlantic, trade unions have contributed to creating more sustainable conditions for deskless workers over time, with quite a bit of work still to do, no matter where we look.

“We often forget that we are dealing with individuals who perversely try to behave as human beings”

However, to answer the questions posed at the top of this piece, we need to look at today’s organizations and their development. What stands in the way of these places being properly sustainable for their people and leaders? Factors include competitive pressures, short-term demands by shareholders, a lack of resources, inadequate leadership and management practice and, at the highest echelons of leadership, quite a bit of ego.

Raising levels of sustainability is ever more important these days, as many economies face acute shortages of talent across many sectors. One result of this development is that companies that do not pay attention to changing values in the target employee populations risk no longer being able to attract the quality and quantity of people needed to sustainably manage their businesses going forward. Too many business leaders have not yet understood this dynamic. If your target employee population wants more sustainable careers, and you don’t offer that to them, they will move elsewhere and make your competitors successful.

Turning an idea such as increasing sustainability across the board into a reality requires deep conviction and powerful champions who will drive this idea forward even against opposition, and it requires courage and perseverance to make it work. It will be easier to implement when the main shareholders of a company are deeply convinced of the merits of this approach. Therefore, we see an opportunity for companies with dominant or majority shareholders (often family-owned companies) to lead the way. Very few are ready to take bold decisions as Paul Polman did within his first month of being named CEO of Unilever. He announced that Unilever would stop quarterly reporting with immediate effect, as quarterly reports did not support the pursuit of more mid- to long-term plans, and he invited shareholders who were not happy with this decision to take their investment money elsewhere. Imagine doing that at any time of your tenure as CEO of a listed company, let alone in the first month.

By honestly speaking with and listening to one another we can create transformative insights.

He clearly decided to switch off the autopilot, to leave the beaten track, to go against the grain use the image you fancy most. He could have been inspired by an approach consisting of seven steps to success, after being willing and able to acknowledge autopilot(s) driven by habit, emotions, or entrenched positions, and then to switching them off and finding more mindful answers to key questions.

1. Taking the time to understand the situation and focus on what might be at stake, without jumping to conclusions straight away listen to really understand each other. (Mindfulness)

2. Understanding the purpose of what is or what might be What is it that higher levels of sustainability might help us achieve? And what happens if nothing happens? (Why?)

3. Seizing the opportunity to look at the situation from as many vantage points as possible, what do higher levels of sustainability look like from a leader, a manager, an employee, a customer, a family member, a shareholder perspective? (Perspective)

4. Clearing away the assumptions and beliefs, grounding the situation in facts and mutually recognized decision-making criteria, creating a shared reality that all involved can agree on. (Reality)

5. Investigating the options available and inspiring action to get to the decisions needed, whether this ends up being a “do nothing” decision or the launch of a large-scale cultural transformation program. (Investigate)

Most people find it difficult to “say no” and even more difficult to “do no”.

6. Staging the activities needed to move from the status quo to the desired leveled, and creating time boundaries that marry the time and space to consult all stakeholders with a clear timeline to action. There is a time to switch from consulting and listening to deciding and acting. (Staging)

7. Getting things done and avoiding having too many spanners thrown in the wheels all the way to the “ribbon-cutting ceremony” and the first employee engagement results that show movement in the right direction.

If we allowed ourselves to have honest conversations and invested some time in the early stages of the development of such ideas, we would get to functioning results much quicker. If we were all prepared to be honest, to hear what we need to hear (vs. just hearing what we want to hear), and to be respectful with all constituents involved, we would then get to effective decision-making in pursuit of a well-stated objective, along an agreed and sensible timeline.

For those who agree that higher levels of sustainability of leader and employee roles are desirable, as they help to create higher levels of employee engagement (usually leading to better business results), here are some more ideas of what we can do to increase levels of sustainability:

• Youth when speaking about the future of a business, or when creating ideas to develop the future of a business, it is critically important to also include the future (i.e. youth) in this conversation. Sounds easy and obvious, but it is not mainstream practice.
• Diversity even though it might be demanding or painful at times, we are all well advised to speak with and listen to people who are different from us. Only that will allow us to broaden our perspective and see established things in a different light or see new things as they are relevant for the development of our organizations.
• Empathy, curiosity, and gratitude are great elements to underpin conversations,, especially with critics or opponents. By honestly speaking with and listening to one another we can create transformative insights.
• Pull vs Push change is a lot easier if there is an attractive pull (i.e., towards motivation) rather than a punitive push (i.e., away-from motivation). This has been proven by, among others, Professor Richard Boyatzis in his work on the intentional change theory.

Hope those who say that one of the key roles of leaders is to create hope are certainly right hope is a key ingredient of successful change, whilst cynicism is one of the biggest enemies of and obstacles to change.

Make it Personal

And, if the opportunity arises, make it personal.

During a recent World Economic Forum conference, there was a panel of CEOs, each representing companies with more than 100,000 employees, on the broad topic of sustainability and what was required of “big business” to make good on their promises. In the late evening before this panel was supposed to happen, the organizers were alerted to the fact that a highly visible leader of the “Fridays for Future” movement of young climate activists was going to be in the room. After some hectic back and forth between nine and eleven o’clock that night, it was decided to invite this person onto the panel.

The panelists were informed, additional briefings were offered, and the panel opened with everyone being supremely nervous about what would happen next. The activist waited for her turn to share opening remarks and, recognizing that everyone else on the panel was a member of her parent’s generation, asked a simple question: “How do you convince your own children that your companies are embarking on the right course towards more sustainability?”. Everyone in the room, and most certainly the organizers of the panel, held their breath. One after the other, all the panelists answered the question, revealing how important they felt the question was and how seriously they took the topic. They actually spoke of their own children and how they (their children) were trying to hold them (the executives) to account. Much to the organizer’s delight, everyone came away from this very rich conversation feeling that this had been one of the most impactful sessions during the entire multi-day conference. It was proof that under the right conditions and with a degree of courage, even supposedly hard-nosed CEOs can have very human conversations with each other in public and are very aware of the role of their respective companies in creating more sustainable businesses. And while everyone can always do more, let’s recognize what is being done today and take it as a good step in the right direction.

Permission

From this account, it became clear that C-Suite leaders who are willing to take societal concerns seriously and put people first have far greater opportunities than those who do not. It takes the “tone from the top” to give permission to people at different levels in organizations to pursue ideas that can make businesses and their operations more sustainable, not just in terms of classical ‘ecological’ sustainability but more importantly in terms of ‘people’ and ‘financial’ sustainability.

The importance, specifically of the topic of personal sustainability, has grown immensely since the beginning of the pandemic in early 2020. For those who can work from home or from anywhere, the lines between time spent working and time spent away from working have blurred a lot more, putting an extra strain on many. The phenomenon of not being able to properly switch off from work has become a lot more common. For those who want to make meaningful contributions through their work, no matter which company, industry, profession, or sector they operate in, this has become much harder to do and often exceeds the ability to adapt to new circumstances, and to leave behind old behaviors that are no longer suitable to changing situations.

Most people find it difficult to “say no” and even more difficult to “do no”. In other words, asking for more resources, more budgets, and more time has not been properly replaced by an honest conversation about what can be done and what cannot be done with the given time, energy, people, and budgets available. Not having the courage to have this conversation seems to be one of the biggest risks to personal sustainability. Accepting that people find themselves in an almost constant situation of ‘overwhelm’ effectively reduces everyone’s ability to cope and seriously undermines any idea of self-efficacy.

Passion Good and Bad

Today’s organizations often communicate around passion. Passion for their products, for the contribution they can make to society, or, as a variation of passion, their obsession to improve their customers’ lives. Passion can help enormously, as passionate people usually are in high-energy mode, which in turn facilitates getting things done. At the same time, passion can be a double-edged sword. When used wisely, it can invite collaboration and get others to enthusiastically join the bandwagon of an idea; when not used wisely, it can effectively stop organizations from getting things done if opposing ideas are passionately being promoted, trying to convince others how they are superior and should therefore be pursued. It is easy to see how teams all passionately pulling in one direction can get a lot of things done, while passionately playing a game of tug-of-war consumes enormous amounts of energy without really allowing people to get anywhere.

This leads me to the final question, as a repetition of the opening question: Do we all agree on what ‘higher levels of sustainability’ look like? In my experience, this is a conversation that happens far too rarely. And the risk is that we all use the same word without ever trying to find out what we mean by it. Failure to have this conversation will make any progress a lot more difficult.

My wish, therefore, is for any team in any organization to start here. Have an honest conversation to define what ‘higher levels of sustainability’ really mean for you what is visible and tangible in how people interact that makes the place more sustainable.