Corporate Social Responsibility

Leaders' overreliance on "DEI programming" is one of the biggest barriers in the way of real progress toward achieving #diversity, #equity, and #inclusion. Do you know where these events came from? The lunch and learns, cultural heritage celebrations, book clubs, and the like? Historically, these were all events put on by volunteer advocates and activists from marginalized communities who had little to no access to formal power and yet were still trying to carve out spaces for themselves in hostile environments. For leaders to hire figureheads to "manage" these volunteer efforts, refuse to resource them, and then take credit for the meager impact made nonetheless is nothing short of exploitation. If your workplace's "DEI Function" is a single director-level employee with an executive assistant who spends all day trying to coax more and more events out of your employee resource groups? I'm sorry to say that you are part of the problem. Effective DEI work is change management, plain and simple. It's cross-functional by necessity, requiring the ongoing exercise of power by executive leadership across all functions, the guidance and follow-through of middle management, the insight of data analysts and communicators, and the energy and momentum of frontline workers. There is no reality where "optional fill-in-the-blank history month celebrations" organized by overworked volunteers, no matter how many or how flashy, can serve as a substitute. If your workplace actually wants to achieve DEI, resource it like you would any other organization-level goal. 🎯 Hire a C-Level executive responsible for it or add the job responsibility to an existing cross-functional executive (e.g., Chief People Officer) 🎯 Give that leader cross-functional authority, mandate, headcount, and resources to work with other executives and managers across the organization on culture, process, policy, and behavior change 🎯 Set expectations with all other leaders that DEI-related outcomes will be included in their evaluation and responsibility (e.g., every department leader is responsible for their employees' belonging scores and culture of respect in their department). 🎯 Encourage responsible boundary-setting and scoping of volunteer engagement, ensuring that if Employee Resource Groups and DEI Councils/Committees want to put on events, it is because they are energized and supported to do so—not because they feel forced to run on fumes because it's the only way any impact will be made. It's long past time for our workplaces' DEI strategies to modernize away from the volunteer exploitation of "DEI programming" toward genuine organizational transformation. What steps will your leaders take to be a part of this future?

I’m happy to share some big news: for the fifth year in a row, Amazon is the largest corporate purchaser of renewable energy in the world. Transitioning to carbon-free energy sources is one of the fastest ways we can address climate change. It’s why we’ve invested billions of dollars in hundreds of solar and wind projects around the world. But you don’t need to be a company of our size to make a difference. If you’re exploring renewables energy investments, here are three helpful things we’ve learned along the way: 1) Location = impact. We’re supporting projects in regions where they can have the greatest impact – including locations that rely heavily on fossil fuels. For instance, we invested in nine solar and wind projects in India, where the grid is primarily powered by coal. They’re expected to help avoid an estimated 55 times more carbon than if they were built in Sweden, which has one of the world’s most decarbonized grids. As more projects become operational, we’re seeing how they positively impact the grid – and local communities. In Mississippi, for example, three solar wind farms backed by Amazon account for nearly a quarter of the state’s operational solar power! 2) Open + collaborative mindset. We started with just a handful of projects when The Climate Pledge launched. Over the years, we’ve learned the value of collaborating across sectors – we’ve worked with various energy companies, utilities and experts outside Amazon. That’s all led to us supporting 600+ wind and solar projects in nearly 30 countries – which are expected to produce the same amount of energy it takes to power more than 8 million U.S. homes. 3) Build great teams. We recruited a diverse array of energy experts and gave them room to Think Big, because we believe innovation is critical to evolution. When smart people who care about our planet are empowered to find solutions, change accelerates. We’re also investing in other sources of carbon-free energy, like nuclear – more to come on that this year! https://lnkd.in/d9sN_Pq2 #energy #carbonfree #sustainability #renewablenergy

"this position paper challenges the outdated narrative that ethics slows innovation. Instead, it proves that ethical AI is smarter AI—more profitable, scalable, and future-ready. AI ethics is a strategic advantage—one that can boost ROI, build public trust, and future-proof innovation. Key takeaways include: 1. Ethical AI = High ROI: Organizations that adopt AI ethics audits report double the return compared to those that don’t. 2. The Ethics Return Engine (ERE): A proposed framework to measure the financial, human, and strategic value of ethics. 3. Real-world proof: Mastercard’s scalable AI governance and Boeing’s ethical failures show why governance matters. 4. The cost of inaction is rising: With global regulation (EU AI Act, etc.) tightening, ethical inaction is now a risk. 5. Ethics unlocks innovation: The myth that governance limits creativity is busted. Ethical frameworks enable scale. Whether you're a policymaker, C-suite executive, data scientist, or investor—this paper is your blueprint to aligning purpose and profit in the age of intelligent machines. Read the full paper: https://lnkd.in/eKesXBc6 Co-authored by Marisa Zalabak, Balaji Dhamodharan, Bill Lesieur, Olga Magnusson, Shannon Kennedy, Sundar Krishnan and The Digital Economist.

What McKinsey’s $650M Settlement Teaches Us About PR, Reputation, and the Arrogance of Thinking You’re Totally Untouchable: Assume every single email you send could end up on the front page of The Wall Street Journal. McKinsey’s $650 million settlement over its work with Purdue Pharma is more than just another corporate scandal—it’s a anti masterclass in what NOT to do when navigating ethical decisions, public perception, and crisis management. For a company full of the smartest people on earth, the missteps here are both stunning and deeply instructive. Here are five key lessons: 1️⃣ Ethics Are Non-Negotiable—Arrogance Doesn’t Protect You. The emails about “destroying everything” weren’t just unwise—they reeked of hubris. McKinsey’s advisors acted as though their brilliance made them untouchable. Spoiler: It didn’t. Assuming your actions won’t see the light of day is a mistake that smart companies don’t make—or survive. 2️⃣ Crisis Management Starts Before the Crisis. The lack of foresight in McKinsey’s actions is astounding. Advising a company at the center of a deadly opioid epidemic without considering the reputational fallout is a failure of both leadership and basic crisis PR principles. You can’t separate your business decisions from their social impact. 3️⃣ When the House is on Fire, Don’t Pour Gasoline. Destroying documents and obstructing justice weren’t just unethical—they were an invitation for harsher scrutiny. Bad decisions in a crisis amplify the fallout tenfold. Remember: transparency and accountability are your only lifelines once trust is broken. 4️⃣ Reputation Is Hard to Build, Easy to Destroy. For years, McKinsey was synonymous with trust, expertise, and discretion. Now, it’s associated with enabling one of the worst public health crises in modern history. This isn’t just a bad headline—it’s a permanent stain on the brand. 5️⃣ Your Emails Will Be Public Someday. The sheer audacity of assuming internal communications wouldn’t be scrutinized is baffling. Rule #1 of modern leadership: Assume everything you write, say, or email could be read aloud in court—or worse, go viral online. - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - McKinsey’s downfall in this case wasn’t just about greed or bad judgment—it was about forgetting that being “too smart to fail” isn’t a long term winning strategy. For all of us working in PR, compliance, or leadership: Let this be a wake-up call. The line between smart risk and reckless behavior is thinner than you think—and the cost of crossing can be close to everything. My take is that while this is a massive hit to a reputation and potential aspects of its business, given its value to clients across industries, they are likely to recover over time if they change the culture that led to this incident. They will likely not get a second chance at a new culpa. What’s your take?

Harvard Law School Forum on Corporate Governance just published the top 10 corporate sustainability priorities for the back half of 2025 (via The Conference Board). A few things stood out to me: 1/ ESG must be embedded. I’ve said this before (and I may never stop saying it): ESG can’t be siloed off. To be successful, it needs to live inside core business functions. At Atlassian, for example, our Sustainability and Procurement teams partner closely on supplier engagement goals—because that kind of alignment drives real outcomes at scale. 2/ Supply chain transparency is rising. With new due diligence laws and increasing reputational risk, we’re seeing more customer questions about ESG commitments during deal flow. If your sustainability strategy doesn’t include your customers, you’re missing a critical piece. 3/ Climate strategy now influences financial decisions. In FY26, we’ll be preparing for Australia’s ASRS regulation—which goes beyond disclosure, asking companies to demonstrate how climate-related financial risks and opportunities are integrated into business decision-making. (Think: beyond TCFD.) 4/ The regulatory demand is real. We’ve tackled California. Next up: ASRS which will be followed by CSRD and CSDDD. Of course we also know some of the guidelines here will change and new regulations will emerge. The fragmentation makes compliance a moving target—and keeping up requires serious agility and focus. 👉 The takeaway: Sustainability priorities are evolving quickly. The companies making real progress are the ones embedding it across their operations, supply chains, reporting, and decision-making. https://lnkd.in/gGJCy-kT

Nonprofits, if I had to build corporate partnerships from scratch today, here’s the real playbook: 1. Stop begging. Start collaborating. Your opening line to a company should never be: “We’re looking for sponsors.” Instead, it should be: “We’re building a movement around [cause]. Want to co-author the story?” Shift your posture from “needing help” to “offering opportunity.” 2. Ditch the gold-silver-bronze garbage. Create partnership experiences that feel custom-built: Fund an innovation lab Co-host a thought leadership series Launch a branded scholarship program Make them the hero of a tangible impact, not a logo on a step-and-repeat. 3. Play offense on LinkedIn If you’re waiting for CSR managers to stumble onto your website, you’ve already lost. Connect with CSR, ESG, HR, and Marketing leads at 50 dream companies. Post 3–4 times a week showing WHY your mission matters to their brand narrative. Share wins with attribution: “Thanks to partners like [Company], we [result].” Visibility builds familiarity. Familiarity builds trust. Trust builds checks. 4. Build a Corporate Advisory Council. Invite 5–10 execs from different companies to join a “founding circle.” No donation required upfront. What you’re asking for: • Their insights • Their network • Their pride of ownership Once they feel bought in, the dollars will follow. 5. Make it ridiculously easy to say yes. No 17-page decks. No committee calls. No 90-day “we’ll get back to you” limbo. Your ask should be crystal clear: “We have a $25,000 project funding gap.” “Here’s what you’ll get in return.” “Here’s how your brand will be celebrated.” Simplicity wins deals. Period. 6. Follow up like a human, not a robot. No “just circling back” emails. No “checking in on my proposal” DMs. Send them micro-wins: “Just wanted to share, we hit 100 youth served this month!” “This story made me think of your team’s values.” Stay top of mind without being top of inbox spam. In 2025, partnerships are won by building narratives, not asking for charity. You’re not selling sponsorships. You’re offering legacy. Act accordingly. Want to learn how we’re helping nonprofits land $25K–$250K partnerships without begging? Comment “Build” or DM me. We’re opening a private training soon.

This week we virtually brought together our cross-company team of Google colleagues working in sustainability to reflect on progress in 2023 and to look ahead to 2024. As part of this meeting I shared my reflections on the top six global trends that are shaping the sustainability landscape this year. Would love to hear your thoughts too. 1) Half the world's population is going to the polls--sustainability will be on the ballot in many places. 2) Extreme weather and climate impacts are being felt now and getting worse--2023 was hottest year on record. We breached 1.5 C increase from pre-industrial levels for the first time and 2024 will likely bring more of the same especially with El Nino persisting. 3) Individual interest in sustainability--Extreme weather events (among other factors) are also contributing to growing individuals interest in sustainability. We’ve seen searches for “solar energy,” “electric bicycles,” and “electric cars” at all time highs yet there’s a wide “say-do gap” among consumers—between those who are concerned about sustainability, and those who ultimately make sustainable decisions. 4) Critical year to prepare for sweeping EU sustainability disclosure regs--reporting begins in 2026 on FY2025 date. Also awaiting potential new guidance from the SEC. This is changing how companies manage their operations, market their products, and much more. 5) Progress is not linear--Total spending on clear-energy surged 17% last year to $1.8T (BloombergNEF). The world is set to add as much renewable power in the next 5 years as it did in the past 20 (IEA). And yet in the US the rooftop solar market is facing headwinds (residential solar industry is floundering. In late 2023 alone, more than 100 residential solar dealers and installers in the U.S. declared bankruptcy). While in India the PM just made a major new commitment to rooftop solar (cover 10 Million houses across the country within one year. A large line of credit is being made available for the program) 6) Once in a generation moment for AI--Google & BCG shared a report late last year showing the potential for 5-10% in emissions reductions enabled by AI by 2030 through accelerating existing tech. The are also exciting new frontier opportunities with GenAI like ensuring foundational models are excellent on climate science and sustainability and major potential to unlock new ways to produce and interact with sustainability data and reports.

“Corporate Apology” - new cartoon and post https://lnkd.in/gKApXv8e The recent CrowdStrike debacle gives lessons for all of us in how to (and how not to) communicate in a crisis. The initial tweeted response from CEO George Kurtz fell flat, as panned by comms expert Davia Temin: “This is a response scrubbed by a legal team with lawsuits in mind. It holds little to no accountability, which is what makes apologies so powerful. And it positions Kurtz almost as an AI voice — automated, soulless. In fact, ChatGPT does a better job of appearing to care than he does.” A bundled attempt to apologize to partners with a gift card didn’t help, as captured in this PCGamer headline: “After crashing 8.5 million computers, CrowdStrike says sorry to its partners with a $10 Uber Eats gift card, which was also broken.” Ultimately and eventually, the company found its way to a full-throated apology, but the early missteps made a bad situation worse. As Ben Horowitz wrote in “The Hard Thing About Hard Things:” “If you are going to eat shit, don’t nibble.” While an extreme case, CrowdStrike illustrates some of the tensions at play in any brand crisis — trying to balance responsibility and mitigate liability with incomplete information while still trying to fix the issue. The path of least resistance is a Mad Libs corporate apology that satisfies no one. Far more effective than an apology is an amend. It’s not just about saying sorry — it’s about taking responsibility to make things right. What’s at stake is everything invested in building a brand in the first place. As CrowdStrike CSO Shawn Henry put it, “The confidence we built in drips over the years was lost in buckets within hours.” For related cartoons and all the links in this post, click here: https://lnkd.in/gKApXv8e To sign up for my weekly marketoon email newsletter, click here: https://lnkd.in/g9DBM6tD #marketing #cartoon #marketoon

The recent World Economic Forum’s Future of Jobs Report 2025 highlights the trends reshaping the global labor market. WEF estimates a net increase of 78 million jobs with employers expecting 40% of the skills required to shift over the next 5 years. The report notes “helping workers achieve the right mix of technical and human skills will be vital as the future of work continues to evolve.” These trends and forecasts align with a recent podcast conversation I had with John Nixon. It doesn’t get more energetic than a workforce development convo with John who leads Siemens Digital Industries Software's Energy & Chemicals Industry. John: “What excites me is workforce development is so incredibly important to us in Energy & Chemicals.” He emphasized the industry’s skill challenges along with labor shortages - noting 10% of engineer demand will be from data centers by 2035. We doubled down on intersections. We discussed the industry skills intersection as digital twins go into the field. We looked at the timely intersection of supply and demand changes in engineering education. John emphasized the “tremendous skills gap” that requires a new level of skills development due to digital transformation, as well as talent turnover in academia and industry. The challenges are global. That’s why you see whole regions like the European Union recommending microcredentials to promote a culture of lifelong learning. The United Arab Emirates adopted a policy to leverage microcredentials to strengthen opportunities for learning and employability. It’s clear a new level of digital fluency is required to meet the transformation in the energy industry. Credentials play a key role in providing recognition for knowledge and skills and connecting talent with employers. They address the need for more flexible and accessible learning pathways. Now more than ever, academia and industry must collaborate on creative, cost-effective digital solutions. sie.ag/76vR91 #workforcedevelopment

A poacher’s paradise becomes a haven for wildlife In northern Kyrgyzstan, once a stronghold of illegal hunting, roe deer are returning to the highlands. Conservationists now count over 250 individuals where there were just 33 a decade ago. The resurgence isn’t due to sweeping government enforcement or outside intervention—it’s the work of villagers, reports Sonam Lama Hyolmo. A network of community-based conservancies, supported by local NGOs, is quietly reshaping conservation in Kyrgyzstan’s rugged backcountry. Shumkar-Tor, one of the country’s earliest such efforts, began in 2012 in the wake of political upheaval and post-Soviet resource collapse. What started as survival-driven hunting turned into a conservation crisis as wildlife populations plummeted. To counter the decline, organizations like the Ilbirs Foundation began training residents to monitor wildlife, supplying GPS trackers, patrol gear, and walkie-talkies. Today, over 80 locals across 10 conservancies patrol vast territories on foot, horseback, and, increasingly, with digital tools like SMART (Spatial Monitoring and Reporting Tool). “The local community’s ownership and attitude shift towards species conservation has made this possible,” says Zairbek Kubanychbekov, Ilbirs’s director. Villagers’ deep knowledge of terrain and wildlife gives them an edge over poachers—and overstate-employed rangers, of whom there are too few to cover the immense landscapes effectively. These grassroots patrols have led to fines and arrests: for illegal logging, the shooting of marmots and partridges, and even the seizure of 3.5 tons of illegally harvested Persian onions. At Jashyl-Oroon conservancy, which spans 250,000 hectares, camera traps and GPS-enabled patrols have improved response times and increased deterrence. But challenges persist. Poachers often use thermal imaging tools and carry weapons. Some are rumored to have ties to officials. Yet local volunteers are less vulnerable to intimidation—they’re unpaid and unafraid of losing jobs. To bolster frontline efforts, the Ministry of Natural Resources is digitizing wildlife trade records and improving coordination with border agencies. An electronic database now verifies species permits under CITES, a global conservation treaty. Conservation in Kyrgyzstan remains fragile. But in the mountains where snow leopards roam and red deer graze, the steady return of wildlife suggests something rare: a community-driven effort not just to survive, but to restore. 📰 Mongabay News: https://lnkd.in/gVr4yhpD