The Intersection of Sustainability and Ethics in Business

What if traditional business ethics focused solely on shareholder value are insufficient?

Join us for an enlightening conversation with Alison Taylor, clinical professor at NYU Stern School of Business, as we explore the need for businesses to embrace broader ethical frameworks. Alison shares her insights on tackling pressing contemporary issues like climate change, inequality, and human rights, as well as why younger generations are demanding greater corporate accountability.

We discuss the shifting landscape of value creation from tangible assets to increasingly crucial intangibles such as branding, IP, and stakeholder trust. Historical incidents like the Exxon Valdez and BP Deepwater Horizon oil spills serve as case studies highlighting the evolving impact on stock prices and corporate reputation. We also delve into the blurred lines between internal and external corporate culture, emphasizing the importance of transparency in the age of social media, where younger employees are quick to expose unethical practices.

Navigating social and political issues is another significant challenge for today's CEOs. Authenticity over PR-driven efforts is crucial, as is focusing strategically on core issues without overpromising. Alison uses her book "Higher Ground" to provide real-world examples, including Starbucks' sustainability efforts. The episode concludes with an emphasis on empowering sustainable leadership through mentorship, highlighting the emerging influence of millennials and Gen Z in driving corporate change.

Chapters

• 0:07 Evolving Business Ethics and Sustainability
• 8:04 Corporate Culture in Modern Business
• 18:19 Social, Political Issues in Business
• 28:53 Empowering Sustainable Leadership Through Mentorship

Transcript

Jessica: 0:07

Welcome to another episode of Sustainability Unveiled, where we explore the critical intersections of sustainability, environmental stewardship and corporate integrity. I'm your host, jessica Hunt, and today we have a very special guest with us, allison Taylor. Allison is a clinical professor at the New York Stern School of Business, the executive director of Ethical Systems and a renowned business ethics and corporate responsibility expert. Are ethics the new competitive edge in sustainability? We're about to find out. In today's episode, we'll explore the evolving landscape of business ethics and corporate integrity, how leaders can effectively prioritize environmental and social responsibilities without compromising business growth, and what it takes to build a healthy organizational culture supporting these values. We'll also discuss the tricky area of navigating social and political issues.

Jessica: 0:59

And if you haven't already read it, get a sneak peek into Alison's newly released book Higher Ground. She was kind enough to take time out of her day and book tour to speak with E&E Leader. We hope you enjoy the conversation. So excited, allison, to have you on with us today, and I really just want to jump right in and talk to you about business ethics and corporate integrity, so they are at the heart of so many of your talks and writings. From your perspective, how are these concepts evolving in today's corporate environment?

Alison: 1:34

Yeah, well, thank you so much for having me, jessica, first of all and what a great kickoff question. So ethics and integrity, I would argue and it is a key argument in my book and my general approach is a topic that we have become incredibly confused about, and you are a sustainability expert so you will know this right. We have this traditional idea from Milton Friedman that what it took to be an ethical business is you focus on shareholder value and you don't break the law. Those arguments and those concepts no matter. You know, there are certainly a group of people trying to bring those arguments back and I say to them well, good luck curring and retaining anyone under 30.

Alison: 2:20

I mean, if you talk to young people, you look at business headlines, you think of society's concerns in general. They're not necessarily about whether a company is or isn't breaking the law. They're about things like climate change and inequality and biodiversity and animal rights and human rights and the impact basically on society and the environment, and so that's one thing to say. We can no longer treat ethics and integrity as just a question of legal compliance. We need to think in a bigger, a broader way and have a proper debate about what we think the role of business in society should be, which is a normative question. And then I'd really like your reaction to this, because something I observe out there in the discourse is and you certainly hear this from a lot of people is that a lot of pro-sustainability advocates and I can kind of quote them will say sustainability isn't about ethics, it isn't about doing the right thing, it's about evolving capitalism. It's just good capitalism today. It's not a guardrail, it's not punitive, it's a win-win.

Alison: 3:33

There's a business case and you and I, I'm sure, have both made those business case arguments for sustainability. And I understand why we're making those arguments, because they're not wrong, right. There are certainly arguments that if you innovate to tackle climate change, you will have a more resilient business over the long term. If you respect and treat your employees in an inclusive way, you'll have a more motivated and profitable workforce. I mean, you and I can make these arguments, but the problem is, everything in sustainability is a win win.

Alison: 4:08

There are some things, for sure, right, that have a direct growth impact on the bottom line. There are other things that really really help us to manage risk. So, you know, climate risk would be a very good example, but environmental risk in general, the risk of stakeholders turning against you. But there are a lot of areas where companies are having a negative impact and there doesn't seem a clear business case to addressing that impact. And that's where I think we need to have a conversation about what companies should do, what ethical guardrails they should put in place to address their negative impacts on human society and the environment.

Alison: 4:45

And so, while I understand the sustainability arguments, in that case I think we hit a bit of a wall if we try and make a big generic argument, and I think a lot of reasons sustainability programs fail is because companies are struggling to say, out of this broad range of issues we could tackle, which are opportunities, which are risks and which are impacts. And so from my perspective and I'd love to hear yours we're in a sort of era where the easy stuff has been done and now we're really kind of getting to the big dilemmas where there's not necessarily a win-win answer and we need to manage really difficult trade-offs and really difficult debate.

Jessica: 5:24

And I was so excited to have this conversation with you because you bring such a wide range of experience and knowledge to these topics that we're talking about now. And I think you're right. The younger generations are more aware of you know climate, obviously, climate change, but then just how corporations are not always transparent when it comes to their value chain. Let's say, we covered an article recently about the Kirkland brand wipes containing PFAS, baby wipes containing PFAS. Well, that PFAS is something that we are talking about a lot lately. So how do those corporations, you know, prioritize environmental and social responsibilities without compromising business growth? So what advice would you have for those companies?

Alison: 6:17

Wow. I mean, I think you know, I think in some cases you do need to make decisions to walk away from business growth. I mean, companies did not have a huge problem addressing their operations in Russia when Putin invaded Ukraine. There are some things that are moral imperatives. I would say that what you put in baby wipes would be one of those moral imperatives, and I think another kind of thing that I was thinking when you use that example is, as consumers, we've sort of become exhausted and confused.

Alison: 6:51

Perhaps you have this experience that I have in the supermarket. We're both supposed to know something about this topic of walking around and being like what kind of coffee am I supposed to buy? Should I buy organic and should I buy local, and can I buy vegetables and can I buy meat supposed to buy? Should I buy organic and should I buy local? And can I buy vegetables and can I buy meat?

Alison: 7:07

And these kind of, and the branding has become very flattened. We're all very concerned about greenwashing and its related ideas, but it's very, very hard, I think, as the average consumer, the average person, to know who is doing a good job and who isn't doing a good job, and so I think part of getting out of this mess is about accepting that sometimes companies should make compromises, at least on their short term growth, to build our trust, to have a more resilient business over the long term and to be more honest with consumers. Because I personally I'm exhausted by the hypocrisy and the over promising and the fact that, whether it's a good or bad company and I don't even like that idea but they're all using kind of the same branding and the same arguments and the same phrases and I think we've all kind of become exhausted and started rolling our eyes. So we need a more sensible, nuanced decision on this topic, I think.

Jessica: 8:04

I couldn't agree. I couldn't agree more with you there, and it is interesting to see how different businesses handle news that breaks about. You know, chemicals found in a product or being dispensed in a waterway. Now how do you get that buy-in then from the shareholders? Because they want to know what the bottom line is. You talked about capitalism earlier. They want to know how their investment is going to grow over time without compromising the structure of the company. So how do you make that business case for them when you are saying maybe we need to not look at this short-term growth right now. We need to focus on re-evaluating the systems that we have in place and re-evaluating our value chain, our sustainability goals? So how do you get that buy-in from that?

Alison: 8:54

Right. So one of the things I want to say about this upfront right is that and I think it's a trap we all fall into is that there's a tendency to talk about shareholders and talk about investor behavior as if it's a trap we all fall into is that there's a tendency to talk about shareholders and talk about investor behavior as if it's logical and rational and like gravity. And so you and I are dealing with questions of norms and ethics and doing the right thing, and shareholders are just like these, objective, money focused people, and I think that's a problematic frame. And I think it's a problematic frame for two reasons. The first reason is that how companies create value has changed Arguably. This is the argument behind the rise of ESG and the importance of sustainability in general.

Alison: 9:42

So back in the 20th century, the vast majority of corporate value sat in what we might call tangible assets, and by that I mean things you can see and touch and feel Land, machinery plants, buildings, cash, bonds. So arguably right, and I would argue, it is easier to run a business you design a product, you build a factory, you make the product, you ship the product, you realize the returns. It's a bit more predictable Today, the vast majority of corporate value by some estimations, as much as 90% sits in intangible assets. So by intangible assets I mean things like IP and research and development, and network effects and branding and software and, ultimately, stakeholder perceptions and trust. So stakeholder perceptions the perceptions that you and I have about a brand or a company and this applies in the B2B context as well are far more important drivers of value, and that in itself necessitates thinking about these questions. And the example I give in class, which I'll just kind of share with you as well, because I think it's a really interesting illustration of this point as well is that what the average investor cares about has also changed during this era.

Alison: 10:56

So in 1989, I think it was 1989, hopefully people won't need to correct me, but there was the Exxon Valdez oil spill in Alaska in 1918. Horrific spill, enormous amounts of environmental damage that affected Exxon's share price about 2 percent. Fast forward to 2009, bp Deepwater Horizon very similar oil spill that killed the stock 60% and BP stock has never recovered. So we can see during that time that this supposedly rational, factual investor behavior what the reasonable investor thinks about a disgusting oil spill into the sea has dramatically evolved and so that, I think is part of the problem. We're wrestling with Traditional accounting systems traditional valuation systems don't necessarily tackle that and we're all, via the ESG conversation, the sustainability conversation, trying to draw these relationships between behavior and value and trust and intangible factors, obviously complicated, but we can see that our old way of doing things doesn't work anymore. So I think that's a big part of the challenge.

Jessica: 12:06

Now I can see that, and obviously technology has played a huge role in how we acquire our information and how we gather it and check information and just spreading news too. I could go on asking you a ton more questions about this, but I really want to get into the culture of different businesses. So how does culture play such a huge role in this transformation and building an organizational culture supporting values, and what lessons have you really learned from working with the different clients that you have over the years?

Alison: 12:41

Sure. So I mean, I think culture is a really, really interesting question, but I think maybe the bigger shift that we've had and it relates to what I just said about intangible value is that we've historically said a business thinks about internal issues and external issues some degree there you have some messaging, that's kind of externally facing and that's PR, and then you're talking to your employees in a different way and there's a clear distinction between internal and external. One of the things I think we can say for certain about culture today is that it's both internal and external. It's on full view as never before, and that's partly because of young people and their shift in values, and so young people are far more inclined than my generation at least to leak damaging information onto social media.

Alison: 13:31

We can think about the acquisition of Twitter and like Twitter, twitter employees are like tweeting and talking about everything that Elon Musk is doing in real time. We see what's going on in the culture in real time. What's going on in the culture in real time. Or we can think about there's been a recent trend, a quick talk, or people filming themselves being laid off and putting it on Twitter. And so it used to be. I think your culture was something that you could treat as internal and did not relate to the way you sort of showed up in the world. But now we can all peer into organizations. There are all these leaks. I say leaking is the new whistleblowing. So employees, young employees who really care about this stuff, are far more likely to try and hold companies accountable by putting the cultures on full view and saying this isn't good enough.

Jessica: 14:18

Excuse me, You're good and I you know it's something I was gonna bring up too is is the I can't tell you how many TikTok videos I've watched. You know the, the quitting, quitting, you know just. Or they get called in for a meeting and the employee doesn't understand why they're being called in for a meeting, so they automatically film it. It's happened in classes, too, and you know, if you talk about this with your students, you know I'd love to hear their perspectives as well on, you know just, culture, because when I was in school, I graduated college in 2005. So things were different then than obviously they are now, and I see that with family members of mine just filming in their classes or, you know, exposing things.

Alison: 15:09

So I think, yeah, the young people in my classroom think about their careers in a really different way. I certainly had the idea when I was young you go and get a job, you get told what to do. At some point you get promoted, you get to tell other people what to do. I don't think that's how the young people in my classroom think about leadership. They want to be mentored, they want to have people they can look up to. They want to have a voice, they want to have a say in decisions. They also really, really care about working somewhere aligned with their values and they care hugely about the culture.

Alison: 15:45

I hear all the time if I'm choosing whether to work somewhere, I look at the senior leadership team, I look at whether it's diverse, I look at whether this is a company I can feel good about working for, and then I think there's a really kind of powerful nose really for authenticity or lack of authenticity and for hypocrisy. So this again speaks to culture, because I think if employees see that hypocrisy, they see that the company's saying we're like a family and we really care about our employees and then are laying people off in a really horrible way. Young people want to hold companies accountable there, and so I think you've got to lead in a different way. I think you've got to understand that your culture is on full view as never before. In a different way, I think you've got to understand that your culture is on full view as never before, and I think you've got to give young employees more voice and agency in shaping decisions, because if you don't do that, it is going to play out in a really unpleasant way for you.

Alison: 16:35

The other thing I hear in the classroom a lot is like I don't have any agency, like I could vote and I'm sure we're both enjoying the US election as much as each other. I could vote. What good is it gonna do, frankly? Or I could get a job and I could pressure a brand. I could pressure my company to do something about the issues that I care about. So I think there's also all this kind of political frustration that's really showing up in internal cultures and showing up in the workforce.

Jessica: 17:03

Yeah, and actually my next question I was going to go into has to do with the social and political issues, but I do just want to say that the culture and I can tell you where for our company is, you know, as a mom, as somebody who needs to have a flexible schedule, even running a business, that you know we try, sarah, and I really try to foster that climate within our company where you know we are all, sarah and I really try to foster that climate within our company, where you know we are all moms, for the most part, that work here and we get that there are emergencies that come up and we trust our employees and we trust that they're going to do their job and if they have to leave to take care of a family emergency, that's always going to come first.

Jessica: 17:42

We will take care of that and I think, going along with what you said, that is what a lot of younger people are looking for is that flexibility and that understanding. And really I remember in my previous life I was a teacher for 10 and a half years and my daughter was so, so sick my last year of teaching and my principal didn't have kids at the time and she didn't understand why I had to not be at work and it was. It goes along. It was a toxic environment and you know, people are not especially younger people are not willing to put up with that anymore because there are so many other options. So, you know, jumping into these social and political issues. So, again, one of the trickiest areas for business leaders really is navigating the social and political issues and, as you mentioned, the American politics right now it's. We don't need to get into that because it's just a headache.

Jessica: 18:41

So when and how should CEOs speak on these matters? So when?

Alison: 18:45

and how should CEOs speak on these matters? Well, I think the first thing I would say about this question and it's a big question is we need to stop treating speaking up on topics that are values based and that employees care about purely on the basis of PR. We need to stop writing glossy sustainability reports that say look at all the wonderful things we're doing. We're just perfect, we're tackling these 40 things. Look at these happy, smiling children and isn't it great? We need to be more focused and restrained, as businesses, about the problems that we can actually address and we need to say you know, we would like, for example, we would love to get to net zero. The technology isn't in place, the regulations aren't in place, we're not fully sure we can do this. Here's what we can do. We need to have a more realistic conversation. We need to.

Alison: 19:38

I would argue and it's somewhat controversial in the sustainability community that I would argue that businesses need to have a strategic focus on one to three issues that are core to how they make money and stop box ticking on 40 issues, and to be more strategic about how they treat these sustainability topics.

Alison: 19:59

I worry greatly that we've evolved into an era of over-promising and really treating all this stuff as stealth PR, and when you look at the guts of the business, there are questions about what's really being done and how, and so I think, collectively, we need to say we need to hold companies' feet to the fire a little bit more, but we also need to start pushing companies to do more and more or make more and more empty promises on more and more things, and really get to the core of each company's business model. And I think what you see in sustainability is a lot of hand-waving about issues that are important and that some stakeholders might care about, but they're not core to the business model, they're not core to the company's externalities, they're not core to how it makes money. So I think that in the chapter 12 of my book, I have a set of questions executives should ask before they decide whether to speak up. But I think part of it is evolving from this era of sustainability as PR and moving to an era of sustainability as corporate strategy.

Jessica: 21:05

You know I don't have anything to add to that I was going to say. The only thing I was thinking of is when you mentioned that you know focusing on smaller aspects of the sustainability strategy. How, then, do you address the CSRD and the SEC rules that are coming down, where companies are going to have to really examine every aspect underneath those, and CSRD is definitely more comprehensive than SEC. So I know from talking to clients in the United States that they are really focusing their efforts on making sure everything under CSRD they're hitting that because they know that that's going to be covered when it comes to the SEC.

Alison: 21:47

Right, no 100%, and you know, the future of the SEC rules is somewhat in question due to a variety of other developments we're not going to get into. But yes, I mean, you know, I think disclosure is positive, I think these regulations are well-intentioned, but, yes, I am worried that one of the unintended consequences of these reporting frameworks will be that leaders and CEOs that maybe do not understand these topics very deeply will be like huh, this used to be a PR problem. Now I think it's a compliance problem. We'll give it to the compliance people, we'll get the assurance people involved.

Alison: 22:21

This is a reporting issue and I think that's a tension and that's a risk, which is why I placed so much emphasis in my last answer on how this needs to be strategic. So, yes, there might be pressure to report on a number of issues. That's not the same thing as saying we're going to focus on these few issues. We're going to bake this into our operations, our incentives, how we run our business, how we make our products. That's not a reporting exercise. So let's just be clear that, yeah, the reporting might be helpful. I have some concerns, but you should not report at the expense of doing something and this is not an excuse to shift this in compliance and put out a load more data and spend the whole year gathering the data, to the neglect of the strategic priorities you really should be focusing on.

Jessica: 23:11

Yeah, I couldn't agree with you more there, and you've mentioned your book a couple of times, so I do want to thank you for taking time off of your book tour to be here with us today to do this. But your book Higher Ground it does offer vivid stories and examples on how leaders rethink their practices. So for those who have not read the book yet which, by the way, has incredible reviews on Amazon just I wasn't sure if you've looked recently, but it does Can you share maybe one of those stories? You know that is in your book and you know I'd love to know what your favorite chapter was to write.

Alison: 23:45

Oh my gosh. So there are lots and lots and lots of stories in the book, but let's just say, kind of the book opens and closes with the story of Starbucks, and Starbucks is a fascinating company to illustrate many of the things that we've been talking about already in this conversation. Because Starbucks has done everything that you're supposed to do to run a good sustainability program. It's widely acknowledged to be a leader, as we both know, has had enormous amounts of flack over its anti-unionization stance, which is also not unusual in corporate America. And if you look at something like Just Capital rankings, starbucks actually, on questions of inclusion, employee benefits, employee pay, employee flexibility, does the best in its sector and that has not protected it from enormous reputational risk over its union busting. And so this, I think, is an example of how ticking the box on 40 things does not protect you from reputational damage. And it illustrates, I think, and I think we tend to in the sustainability community, make these arguments like just have a good sustainability program and consumers will love you and investors will love you and stakeholders will love you and it'll all be great, whereas actually, if you look at the organization's NGOs and activists target, they target the best performers, they will target the Starbucks, because if you can get a Starbucks to move on labor rights, the whole sector will need to move as well. So if you're an NGO or an activist, it behooves you to target a leader, which is fine. You're trying to move the whole sector. That is a perfectly logical strategy. It's not fine if what we're telling CEOs is just do a great job and you'll have a better reputation. So to me, this is a really, really interesting story about the limits of box ticking and also the necessity of putting your impact on human beings and treating human beings with dignity and respect at the center of your efforts.

Alison: 25:49

You also asked about my favorite chapter. I think the chapter's in the second half of the book. So the chapter on transparency was the hardest to write, because I think we would both agree transparency is a good thing, but it doesn't solve all problems. So I try and make a very nuanced argument about transparency. And then the later chapters. I talk about culture and speaking up and leadership and that kind of thing, and so, yeah, the book was hard to write and I complained the entire time. Having done it is a better feeling than doing it.

Jessica: 26:21

Well, and I think transparency is still a newer term in this world, in our world now, because there wasn't this sharing of information and there wasn't, you know, companies weren't I don't want to say forced, but they weren't willing to share information necessarily in the past. And now they are sharing it because of regulations, but also because of stakeholder demands, for consumer demands. We want to know.

Alison: 26:48

Control the narrative in the same way anymore. In the 20th century you could put a PR message out there. The media wasn't going to call you out. They needed the advertising. We didn't have social media and so there was more control over your reputation. Now you know whether it's the strategic leaking, whether it's stakeholder demands, whether it's the regulation and the requirement to disclose more information. You would be crazy if you're running a company today, if you don't assume that anything you say or do internally could become public knowledge, if you behave as if you can still keep secrets. Good luck to you.

Jessica: 27:25

Exactly Good luck. And everything is dissected down to the word, the tone, body language, from you know, from anything that comes out about your company, so you have to be aware of that. Well, we've talked about many, many different topics but, you know, I really want to talk a little bit more about you and your background and what moments in your career led you to focus, you know, on business ethics, on corporate responsibility, and led you to where you are today.

Alison: 27:53

Oh, thank you for that question. So I suppose I would say I mean I won't go through my full career because I'm pretty old, but I spent 12 years working in anti-corruption investigations. So in that job you work with general counsels and law firms and ethics and compliance officers and bankers, and it's legal risk, it's high stakes, it's crisis management, it's bribery, it's corruption, it's fraud, it's political risk. And so I had a certain idea of business ethics, kind of based on that experience. And one thing you learn when you're an investigator is that the facts don't matter, like how a company I mean I'm exaggerating but how a company responds to your reports and your findings and what you're telling them about what's going on really depends on the leaders and the culture. So I started asking a lot of questions about leadership and culture and social norms and human behavior and those kind of questions.

Alison: 28:53

I did a master's in organizational psychology at around this time and then I went to work for a well-known sustainability nonprofit because I was like, well, the legal stuff has its limits, I need to go and find out about a different. You know, maybe I should go and work in corporate responsibility, maybe the arguments are there. And so I entered the kind of sustainability and corporate responsibility field in 2015. And then I was like, wow, these sustainability people aren't talking to the ethics and compliance people. Here's a completely different vision, an idea, an approach to what it means to doing the right thing, and I became kind of super fascinated by how these different functions and these ideas and these concepts didn't really hang together and what was really going on.

Alison: 29:38

And in a way, my book is kind of designed to answer those questions. And then more recently I've moved to being a professor at NYU Stern. So now I spend all my time in the classroom, I spend all my time with young people, and I think that's the more direct inspiration for the book is what do those people think about what it takes to be a good business? What kind of questions are they asking that maybe aren't answered by the books and the literature and the discussion out there? And how can I write something that one of my MBA students who's not deep in the weeds and the jargon of either sustainability or ethics and compliance could use and could think about and could be practical? And so that was kind of why I wrote the book. And it's really that work with young people and spending time in the classroom with young people.

Jessica: 30:24

That gives me hope and gets me out of bed is to expose younger people to as much as possible and really set standards for the next generation and be an inspiration. We both have sons, but we both have daughters and really knowing, setting that example for our daughters, that you can do more and ask those questions and really put yourself in those positions. And you mentioned mentorship earlier, and from all of the interviews that I have done for this podcast, the webinars that we've done and different people in this space, is that people are willing to be mentors, people are willing to make those connections, which is not always the case. It's not, does not happen in every single field, but it's something that I really do. Value about being in this space is that there's always somebody to talk to and there's always somebody there to mentor the next generation. So those students of yours that maybe don't know how to take that next step to find a mentor, what advice do you have for them?

Alison: 31:37

That's such a good question. I mean, I think you know, when I was young, I didn't have a mentor. I didn't have anyone that helped me, and I also worked in very, very male dominated environments where I didn't see I didn't look up and see somebody that looked like me and I didn't see a path for myself to become senior. So I think the first thing to say is like having the confidence, believing you're senior, believing in yourself. And then I think you, you need to find somebody that you can talk to and you need to ask them to help you. I mean that sounds so simplistic, but the young people that I work with are my. I don't I hesitate to call myself a mentor. They're my friends. I enjoy talking to them. I learn as much from them, I think, as they learn from me.

Alison: 32:26

It's very, very clear to me that young people think in different ways. They're much more sophisticated on a bunch of topics than I was when I was their age. So if I'm a young person looking for a mentor, I don't think it's just about how can you help me. I think it's about setting up a kind of mutual two-way exchange, because I think you know, I'm 51. I like to learn from young people. I have a lot to learn from young people and I think the world would greatly improve if today's C-suite leaders would spend more time listening to young people, having more young employees on their boards, making their decisions, shaping their sustainability commitments. So the advice I would give is think about this as a two-way relationship, not just how can that senior person that seems to have it all down can help me? Which?

Jessica: 33:15

is so nice to hear from somebody in your position because that's as you mentioned, that's not always the case with C-suite executives. So how do you change that mentality? How do you help guide C-suites into realizing the younger people at your organization do have a valid voice.

Alison: 33:37

I mean I've got to be brutal and say I don't know that our current crop of C-suite leaders are ever going to get it. Some of them are, some of them will listen, but I don't know. It's not where I focus my efforts, partly because I think there's a lot of shallow board level ESG training, partly because I think it's a bit more complicated than that and partly because I just think the mindset's pretty fixed. But millennials are in their early 40s by now and they do think differently. So I'm very, very encouraged now by there's a new crop of leaders emerging, new crop of CEOs. Ceo job descriptions have dramatically changed. There are more leaders of a different kind coming through and with more and more millennials running companies and more and more Gen Z employees reporting to them, we're going to see some of those shifts.

Alison: 34:28

It's like the Exxon Valdez and BP example. It's easy to feel hopeless. It's easy to feel like nothing will change. Boards aren't supposed to turn over quickly. It's easy to think it's hopeless. But I think, if we take a big picture perspective, things are changing. How companies are run is changing, and so what I focus on is helping young people to be empowered to say you don't have to do things the same way that they did them.

Jessica: 34:55

You can think differently, you can trust your employees, you can work in a different network way, you can provide accommodations for people with family responsibilities, you can have trust and teamwork, and so we've just got to work on all that yeah, we definitely do, and and I do want to appreciate the time that I tell you how much I appreciate that you being on with us today, and I really hope this is not the last conversation we have, because I would love to have you back on and I'd love to be able to speak to you more over than over the years absolutely, jessica.

Alison: 35:24

Well, thank you for your work and thank you for running such an impactful business and thank you for a wonderful conversation.

Jessica: 35:30

Absolutely love talking to you. Yes, and our animals did not get involved in this conversation today, Amazing. So all right. Well, thank you so much and look forward to speaking soon. In the next 60 seconds, ask yourself how can I contribute to a brighter, more sustainable future, not just personally, but professionally? Let's embark on this journey together and shape the landscape of sustainable leadership for tomorrow. Take the first step now and make a commitment to lead with sustainability in mind. That's all for this episode of Sustainability Unveiled. Join us next time as we continue exploring the forefront of sustainable business practices. Until then, stay informed, stay sustainable.