Future-Fit → Geoff Kendall: Connecting Sustainabilty Performance to Investment Attractiveness

Corporate Sustainability with Philip Beere

Dr Geoff Kendall is an entrepreneur whose experience spans sustainability consulting, high-tech startups, corporate communications and academic research.

Geoff holds a PhD in artificial intelligence, and has co-founded two software businesses. The second of these was acquired by a global technology company, where Geoff went on to serve as marketing director for three years.

Geoff switched careers in 2010, joining London-based think-tank SustainAbility, and for four years he led the communications team and advised some of the world’s biggest corporations on sustainable business models. In so doing he realised that there was no reliable way to measure how sustainable a company is now, and how much more it needs to do, and he wanted to fix that. So in early 2014 Geoff left to set up Future-Fit Foundation.

In this episode, the following topics are discussed:

• The Industrial Revolution and the past 250 years
• The Wealth of Nations — makes economic assumptions — that infinite growth is possible
• Infinite growth is not possible or desirable
• Growth vs. Sustainability
• Defining growth
• The good side of GDP
• Future Fit — the need to have a clear destination when setting sustainability goals
• Karl-Henrik Robert — the rules of the game that humans can flourish
• Business can only thrive if society as a whole flourishes
• Investment banking and the natural environment
• Indexes are missing necessary factors across sectors
• Some sectors have systematic problems
• We must get beyond assessment as defined by reporting mechanisms
• Future Fit is a management tool to assess progress
• 450 pages of guidance to map and track
• Disconnect in terms of what companies provide and what investors want — does a rating tell an investor anything meaningful?
• Trajectory — and credible story
• The bell curve of companies on the sustainability path
• Security of supply
• Companies that is paying attention and reducing impact — it is indicative of a better management team — resulting in better financial performance
• Systemic risks that business is exposed to
• SDG’s and Future Fit
• The Future Fit Development Council
• Future Fit Crash Course
• A lot of MBA programs do not talk about environmental impact
• Reevaluating company mission and purpose'

NOTES and RESOURCES

Geoff Kendall

Global Green Growth Institute (GGGI)

Paul Ekins

Karl-Henrik Robert

Future-Fit Business Benchmark

ABOUT PHILIP BEERE

Philip is host of Corporate Sustainability; the podcast that explores companies and people who inspire innovation, improvement, and sustainable business practices through purpose-driven missions and initiatives. Philip is a longtime marketer, who consults companies on how to use stories and narrative to help build their brands. He says sustainability stories are one of the most powerful ways companies can manage their reputations.

Connect with Philip at www.philipjames.co

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