Twenty years ago, Delaware-based DuPont became the first U.S. public company to appoint a chief sustainability officer (CSO). To skeptics, the controversial chemical giant wasn’t exactly taking a risk: Linda Fisher had been deputy administrator of the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, an appointee of the George W. Bush administration that took little interest in regulation or climate change.
DuPont may have hired her in the hopes of boosting its troubled environmental image, but in her 12 years with the corporation, Fisher surprised many by bringing in changes that led to notable reductions in pollution. She pushed executives to see climate issues not just as an emissions problem, but as the source of new business opportunities through innovations in sustainable materials and processes, such as producing ethanol from plant waste and reducing the volatile organic compounds in paints. As executive vice-president James Collins said at the time, “Under Linda’s leadership, DuPont announced its first set of market-facing sustainability goals in 2006, tying how we invest in R&D and grow revenue with sustainability in mind.”
Fisher’s personal rise from simply tweaking the supply chain to resetting corporate strategy became emblematic of the growth of the CSO position itself – in sheer numbers and in increasing clout. Where sustainability efforts were initially thought to belong on the soft side of business, somewhere between human resources, marketing and communications, and health and safety, companies are now recognizing that CSOs do their best work at the top of the organization, working closely with the heavy hitters in finance, operations and strategy, and even the CEO and the board of directors.
“The role of the CSO is evolving. The CSO is taking centre stage,” says Prathmesh Raichura, KPMG Canada’s national ESG governance leader. “Besides taking an active role in identifying ESG-related risks, they’re identifying the levers for reducing greenhouse gas production.”
“They’re talking to the investor community, they’re collaborating with the [chief financial officer], aligning with the CEO’s goals, and communicating with the board,” Raichura adds. “We’re seeing the CSOs becoming more and more important and more integrated with their organizations’ financial performance.”
CSOs’ central role is likely to only grow. As more organizations grapple with reducing their Scope 3 emissions, up and down their supply chains, CSOs will be more responsible than ever for creatively collaborating with suppliers, customers and end users. The relationships they manage, built on mutual needs and opportunities, will reshape industries.
Raichura, who has worked in the ESG (environmental, social, governance) area for two decades, says most organizations first engage with sustainability as a box-checking exercise. It takes time for them to see “soft” sectors such as climate regulation, diversity and community as sources of business growth. “Compliance and risk still play an important role, but we see CSOs increasingly take more responsibility for value creation.”
At first, only a few visionaries could see the potential in building ESG into their business plans. U.S. outdoor clothing producer Patagonia made sustainability core to its brand, promoting recycled and organic materials, supporting fair trade practices, and actively advocating for environmental causes.
By 2010, household products giant Unilever had developed a “Sustainable Living Plan” geared to reducing the company’s environmental footprint. The 10-year plan cut carbon dioxide production in Unilever’s manufacturing by 75% and reduced manufacturing waste by 96%.
As a Deloitte study pointed out in 2021, “In a world where the speed, volume and complexity of change can threaten to throw organizations off their stride, there is a pressing need for strategic thinkers who can clarify the issues at stake, mobilize their colleagues and orchestrate purposeful change.” In many cases, Deloitte found, “the CSO is emerging as the ‘sense-maker in chief’ in the organization.”
“My role is to purposely not fit in. My role is to bring change into the company.”
—Alanna Boyd, chief sustainability officer, Sun Life Financial
Sense-makers are in high demand. Weinreb Group – a San Francisco–based, woman-owned recruiting agency specializing in ESG professionals – published its first CSO survey in 2011, when just 29 U.S. public companies employed CSOs. As of 2023, Weinreb found that 183 U.S. public companies have CSOs, and, its founder Ellen Weinreb noted, “CSOs are gaining substantial power and influence, which means the country’s most prominent companies are better positioned to rise to the challenge of growing social and environmental issues.”
There is no single model for a successful CSO. Some juggle many responsibilities but have no direct reports and little influence, while others run professional departments and hobnob regularly with top executives. Studies show that organizations get the best results when they set up their CSOs to succeed – by giving them clear mandates and having them report directly to the CEO.
One way to speed things up is to make the CEO the CSO – or vice versa. Global retailer H&M made news in 2020 when it promoted its former head of sustainability, Helena Helmersson, to CEO – replacing the founder’s grandson. In her sustainability portfolio, Helmersson led the company’s commitment to using organic cotton and recycled textiles and phasing out hazardous chemicals in production. As CEO, she sees her job as embedding sustainability throughout the company, which aims to reduce emissions by 56% by 2030 – a big challenge for a fast-fashion brand. In 2023, she was named co-chair of The Fashion Pact, a global alliance aiming to make the industry carbon-neutral.
At Ikea, each country CEO also wears the CSO hat. “Sustainability is core to our product development, to our operations and to our people agenda,” says Selwyn Crittendon, the recently appointed CEO/CSO for Canada. In an email interview with Corporate Knights, Crittendon explains that the dual role ensures that “in the Ikea spirit of togetherness, we’re all pulling in the same direction.”
Ikea’s sustainability is wide-ranging. “Operationally, we’re focused on transforming into a circular business, becoming climate-positive and regenerating resources while growing our business,” Crittendon says. At Ikea, sustainability is everybody’s business, he says, and “sustainability measurements are included in every unit’s performance scorecard,” though the company does not have a mandatory sustainability-linked bonus model.
Not that having a high-ranked CSO means a company has a flawless environmental record. In 2022, the Netherlands Authority for Consumers and Markets forced H&M to remove its green “Conscious” and “Conscious Choice” tags from clothing until it can comply with relevant rules and regulations. Also in 2022, a Romanian non-profit filed a complaint against Ikea, alleging that the company was “clear-cutting without a permit and without an environmental impact assessment in an Ikea-owned old-growth forest.” Ikea’s third-party auditor, Forest Stewardship Council, denied Ikea was breaking any rules.
One good thing about the improvisational approach to the CSO function is the opportunity to bring new voices into the executive suite. “In my 20s, my question was where can I have impact?” says Alanna Boyd, who studied political science and international development while volunteering with Oxfam and an intercultural development program in Bolivia. After stints in government advising on trade and finance, and then working on global social issues with Barrick Gold, she joined Sun Life Financial in 2016 as vice-president of government relations, regulatory affairs and sustainability. Being a bigwig in finance “never entered my mind,” she says, but in 2021 she was named senior vice-president and CSO.
Impact came naturally to Boyd. At first, she oversaw two sustainability staff; now she has 35 direct reports. In 2019, she launched a sustainability program that integrated ESG values into the company’s investment programs (including prioritizing low-carbon solutions in the construction projects it funds) while integrating with Sun Life’s core mandates of health and financial security.
Viewing diversity and inclusion through a business lens helped Sun Life develop new products for more diverse families, such as fertility and adoption benefits.
Today, Boyd meets regularly with the CEO and other senior officers and sits in on all board meetings. When asked if her activist background sometimes leaves her feeling that she doesn’t quite fit in, she deftly turns the tables: “My role is to purposely not fit in. My role is to bring change, and what’s going on globally, into the company. Having more diverse people around the table who don’t all fit in leads to better outcomes and better decisions.”
