CLIMATE CHANGE SUSTAINABLE LEADERSHIP
David Katz, Plastic Bank CEO The World Wide Fund for Nature (WWF) estimates plastic waste in oceans kills 100,000 marine mammals globally every year. Think about this statistic for a minute and it’s easy to get tangled in emotions such as angst and guilt. But David Katz is different: he thought of a solution. Katz saw this crisis and reframed it as a business concept — Plastic Bank — where people in under-privileged coastal communities are paid to collect waste which has washed up on beaches and deposit it at Plastic Bank branches. The plastic is later processed into raw materials and sold to consumer goods companies to use for recycled packaging. As of December 2024, the company estimates it has removed the equivalent of 7.5 billion bottles from the oceans. But Katz is not only removing plastic from the sea, he’s also helping people out of poverty and providing circular packaging for other businesses… all while making a profit. As he told me on the podcast: “What we’ve done is create a monetary standard that reveals value in what was once considered waste.” Pinar Akiskalioglu , Takk founder One aspect of where business can cause problems is in the pursuit of growth for growth’s sake: aggressively making, marketing and selling products regardless of whether people need them, and the impact this has on the planet. Pinar Akiskalioglu is an antidote to this. Her ecommerce business, Takk, is an “essentials only” personal care brand which urges customers to only buy the bathroom products they need. It’s part of a stand against the “choice overload” many beauty companies force on consumers. There is only one version of each product, while ingredients are kept to an absolute minimum. 7RGD\>EXVLQHVV leaders] are being forced to consider what impact they want to have on the world. “
W hat should business leadership look like decades of coaching and academic work - and one that has become ever more pertinent during the past five years of extreme global disruption. The world has changed, and it means leaders and companies can no longer live in their bubbles. Increasingly, they are being called out to serve something greater than themselves and their shareholders. They are being forced to consider what impact they want to have on the world. One example of this shift can be seen in attitudes to climate change and sustainability. There is no doubt business has done huge amounts of good for the world, from lifting people out of poverty to creating innovative products which make our lives better. But there is also no doubt 20th century business models, predicated on mass production and unlimited use of the earth’s resources, have caused huge today? It’s a question I’ve been asking over two amounts of damage. Long ago, we reached a point where this became unsustainable. A rethink was needed. With that has emerged a new archetype of business leaders who are reframing environmental challenges as opportunities for their organisations — and the wider world. Today, the best leaders aren’t just executors, but also innovators, creators and bridge builders. They reconcile things we didn’t think were reconcilable. They combine oil and the water. And through that, new strategies emerge. I’ve had a unique insight into this shift through my Leadership 2050 podcast, which I hosted as part of my previous role as senior fellow in management practice at the University of Oxford’s Saïd Business School. Through the podcast, I interviewed leaders who are setting the agenda for a more sustainable and equal future by confronting the challenges humanity faces and, most importantly, finding business-based solutions. Here are three leaders I spoke to who are leveraging their businesses to bring the world back into balance.
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THE FUTURE OF ENERGY
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