Leafr

Who should the sustainability team report to? I've spoken with 100s of sustainability teams and seen sustainability reporting into nearly every function. Here’s a critical look at the options—and which one we believe is needed to ensure sustainability’s full potential is realised. Marketing: Risks becoming superficial—focused on campaigns, not strategy. Operations: Keeps it practical but limits influence to internal processes. Finance: Narrow focus on ROI misses broader value creation. HR: Shapes culture but lacks strategic reach. R&D: Innovates for the future but often neglects immediate impact. Legal: Focuses on compliance, not opportunity. The only reporting line that enables sustainability’s full potential is direct to the Board. This elevates sustainability to a strategic priority, ensuring it drives resilience, growth, and long-term value across the entire business. Do you agree? Repost and follow Gus Bartholomew (Leafr 🌿) for more insights on embedding sustainability into business strategy.

Net Zero is complicated. What defines a credible net zero strategy for a company? Fortunately, here is a great resource from our friends over at Net Zero Tracker. A side-by-side, comparison of the criteria from five initiatives on what 'good net zero' entails - covering pledges, transition plans, offsetting, hard-to-reduce emissions, and more. It highlights convergences in principles (the ‘what’ of good net zero) and specifics (the ‘how’ of good net zero). It covers: - 'Integrity Matters' recommendations by the UN Expert Group on Net Zero - Net Zero Guidelines by ISO - International Organization for Standardization - Race to Zero criteria by the High-Level Climate Champions - Corporate Net-Zero Standard by the Science Based Targets initiative - Corporate Climate Responsibility Monitor by NewClimate Institute - A landscape review of net zero standards by Oxford Net Zero Repost and follow Gus Bartholomew (Leafr 🌿) for more

Thanks for the feature Richard Lee and Innovators Uncensored!

Who should the sustainability team report to? I've spoken with 100s of sustainability teams and seen sustainability reporting into nearly every function. Here’s a critical look at the options—and which one we believe is needed to ensure sustainability’s full potential is realised. Marketing: Risks becoming superficial—focused on campaigns, not strategy. Operations: Keeps it practical but limits influence to internal processes. Finance: Narrow focus on ROI misses broader value creation. HR: Shapes culture but lacks strategic reach. R&D: Innovates for the future but often neglects immediate impact. Legal: Focuses on compliance, not opportunity. The only reporting line that enables sustainability’s full potential is direct to the Board. This elevates sustainability to a strategic priority, ensuring it drives resilience, growth, and long-term value across the entire business. Do you agree? Repost and follow Gus Bartholomew (Leafr 🌿) for more insights on embedding sustainability into business strategy.

75% of sustainability leaders don't believe they will hit their Net Zero targets. That's the reality we live in. Today we release our "True State of Sustainability Report" (Link in comments) We undertook in-depth, anonymised interviews with 50 Heads of Sustainability from leading companies across diverse sectors so that they could speak freely about the reality they face and supplemented this with an anonymous survey to hundreds more. Here's what we found: Resource Strain on Sustainability Teams: 75% of sustainability teams are under-resourced, leaving them isolated and severely limited in their capacity to drive meaningful change. Net Zero Doubts: Despite high-profile Net Zero pledges, the vast majority of sustainability leaders express doubt in their company’s ability to meet these targets. Lack of Commercial Alignment: While 80% of companies report a commitment to sustainability, only 29% of sustainability leaders feel these initiatives are integrated with core commercial goals. Leadership Awareness and Support: 89% believe their executive teams lack awareness of regulatory risks tied to non-compliance, often leading to last-minute scrambles and insufficient backing for sustainability strategies. Read the report now (link in comments) Please repost to share with your network and follow Gus Bartholomew (Leafr 🌿) for more on this topic.

Net Zero is complicated. What defines a credible net zero strategy for a company? Fortunately, here is a great resource from our friends over at Net Zero Tracker. A side-by-side, comparison of the criteria from five initiatives on what 'good net zero' entails - covering pledges, transition plans, offsetting, hard-to-reduce emissions, and more. It highlights convergences in principles (the ‘what’ of good net zero) and specifics (the ‘how’ of good net zero). It covers: - 'Integrity Matters' recommendations by the UN Expert Group on Net Zero - Net Zero Guidelines by ISO - International Organization for Standardization - Race to Zero criteria by the High-Level Climate Champions - Corporate Net-Zero Standard by the Science Based Targets initiative - Corporate Climate Responsibility Monitor by NewClimate Institute - A landscape review of net zero standards by Oxford Net Zero Repost and follow Gus Bartholomew (Leafr 🌿) for more

Net Zero is complicated. What defines a credible net zero strategy for a company? Fortunately, here is a great resource from our friends over at Net Zero Tracker. A side-by-side, comparison of the criteria from five initiatives on what 'good net zero' entails - covering pledges, transition plans, offsetting, hard-to-reduce emissions, and more. It highlights convergences in principles (the ‘what’ of good net zero) and specifics (the ‘how’ of good net zero). It covers: - 'Integrity Matters' recommendations by the UN Expert Group on Net Zero - Net Zero Guidelines by ISO - International Organization for Standardization - Race to Zero criteria by the High-Level Climate Champions - Corporate Net-Zero Standard by the Science Based Targets initiative - Corporate Climate Responsibility Monitor by NewClimate Institute - A landscape review of net zero standards by Oxford Net Zero Repost and follow Gus Bartholomew (Leafr 🌿) for more

75% of sustainability leaders don't believe they will hit their Net Zero targets. That's the reality we live in. Today we release our "True State of Sustainability Report" (Link in comments) We undertook in-depth, anonymised interviews with 50 Heads of Sustainability from leading companies across diverse sectors so that they could speak freely about the reality they face and supplemented this with an anonymous survey to hundreds more. Here's what we found: Resource Strain on Sustainability Teams: 75% of sustainability teams are under-resourced, leaving them isolated and severely limited in their capacity to drive meaningful change. Net Zero Doubts: Despite high-profile Net Zero pledges, the vast majority of sustainability leaders express doubt in their company’s ability to meet these targets. Lack of Commercial Alignment: While 80% of companies report a commitment to sustainability, only 29% of sustainability leaders feel these initiatives are integrated with core commercial goals. Leadership Awareness and Support: 89% believe their executive teams lack awareness of regulatory risks tied to non-compliance, often leading to last-minute scrambles and insufficient backing for sustainability strategies. Read the report now (link in comments) Please repost to share with your network and follow Gus Bartholomew (Leafr 🌿) for more on this topic.

Big congratulations to Joseph Kivengere for being awarded a Climate Career Pathways Scholarship through Leafr and Dream.Org's partnership!

Very cool to have another session on Practical Sustainability for SMEs at the latest Goldman Sachs 10k SMEs programme in Saïd Business School, University of Oxford. Always a privilege to spend time with small businesses from across the UK and hear their stories. It’s clear lot of business owners are starting to feel the pressure from coming regulations, supplier carbon accounting requests and consumer preferences, but many don’t know to take the first step to respond. A million different frameworks, certifications and regulations don’t help either. More pressure on greenwashing may also be having the effect of holding back well-intended actions, as businesses fear being accused of greenwashing if they make innocent mistakes, and so don't do anything at all. Plus with energy prices / inflation as high as they’ve been, there needs to be an extremely clear business case for small businesses to invest in sustainability, which there has not always been. Thanks to everyone in both sessions for the questions and engagement. And above all to the peerless Sarah Moneypenny for co-facilitating 🙏 We used Adam Bastock’s Small99 Action Cards - super fun, well designed, and action oriented. Highly recommend if you want to run a similar workshop. We’ll be doing more of these workshops at Leafr. Please reach out if you’re interested!