sustainability Archives

Sustainable Development Week: a crucial moment to acculturate your employees to the ecological transition

From September 18 to October 8, the European Week for Sustainable Development is held. This year’s theme is “Acting Everyday”. The motto: all actions count, including everyday gestures, to deeply transform our societies.

In companies, it’s the same thing. It is by planting small seeds that we can transform an organization. This is why our clients have been able to offer their learners the opportunity to become acculturated to the ecological transition through a playlist of 5 courses, in order to become an actor in sustainable development. And if we talk to you about planting seeds, it is also because at the end of this animation, a tree will be planted for every 1000 questions answered on each platform. We explain below.

“The Earth is now the one and only shareholder of Patagonia”. On Wednesday, September 14, Yvon Chouinard, the founder of the American outdoor clothing brand Patagonia, announced that he had transferred 100% of his company’s capital and voting rights to two structures responsible for “protecting the planet,” a mission endorsed by the company since 2018. The company’s dividends now fund actions to combat global warming, to the tune of $100 million a year.

Record temperatures, drought, mega-fires: at the end of the summer, the need to invent new models is more obvious than ever. Patagonia’s choices are pioneering, but everywhere employees’ expectations are changing drastically. Indeed, according to a CSA study, for an equivalent offer, 78% of employees prefer to join a company committed to the ecological transition.

The same study reports that 68% of employees have already expressed the wish to be better trained on issues related to the ecological transition. However, only 17% of employees claim that their company offers training on issues related to the ecological transition. Offering training on environmental issues is at the heart of the strategy of companies, which feel a duty to raise awareness and train employees on the ecological transition and, above all, to involve the entire organization in an environmental approach.

This is why our clients wanted to seize the opportunity of the Sustainable Development Week to reinforce the skills development of their employees around the ecological transition, by launching an animation on the platforms Coorpacademy by Go1!

Understand, Imagine, Act

If we had to remember 3 words to understand why training is essential to transform the company, we could remember the following: Understand, Imagine, Act. Indeed, understanding the stakes is key to be able to imagine the actions to be implemented within one’s own company or industry, and these two steps are crucial to take action.

It is in this context that we have suggested to our clients the animation “Become a Sustainable Development Actor”. This animation offers to the learners to train themselves through a playlist of 5 courses allowing them to develop “green” skills, which can help them to act daily in favor of the environment.

The objective being that as many employees as possible play the lessons in the playlist, several emails were sent to learners throughout Sustainable Development Week.

At the end of this animation, trees will be planted in honor of the users who participated. From then on, 1 tree will be planted for every 1000 questions answered, to encourage employees to complete all the courses in the playlist!

These trees that we are going to plant are part of a global project of reforestation of the French forest, in partnership with the company Naudet. Created in 1876, its main activities are the production and planting of young forest plants and the production of Christmas trees. More than 4,000 hectares are reforested each year for public and private owners and more than 20 million young plants are produced. Naudet Reboisement’s projects are managed from the production of the seedling to the planting, follow-up and maintenance of the plantation.

Why plant?

In the 1990s, 110 million trees were planted per year, today it is less than 30 million (Ministry of Agriculture). French forests are subject to fires, whether from natural or criminal sources. The environmental impact of a fire can also be considerable. And as we have witnessed in recent months, forest fires are increasingly numerous and devastating.

In addition to landscape modifications, there is the destruction of environments that are followed by biological losses (fauna and flora usual to wooded areas), the loss of soil quality and the significant risk of erosion, due to the increase in runoff on bare soil. Following these fires, species will regenerate naturally and come to dominate the open environment. It is important to reintroduce improved forest varieties by planting to restore production capacity. Therefore, large areas must be regularly replanted following these disasters.

With our partner, we are proud to be able to participate in our own way in the reforestation of our forests, while increasing the impact of training to change our behavior in a sustainable way!

Do you want to initiate the ecological transition of your company? Let’s talk.

5 essential courses to sustainably transform the company through training

The ecological transition is an important axis of transformation for us, but also for the rest of the world. On the occasion of the Sustainability Week, which took place from 20 to 24 September 2021, discover the 5 essential courses to initiate the ecological transition of your company.

To learn is to understand

The causes of the ecological crisis are the first basics to acquire in order to understand the extent of the problem. Climate, pollution, biodiversity: the world’s ecosystems are in danger, and this is largely due to our social and economic system. The sustainable transformation of a company can only be effective if we also transform our personal and professional habits. The course “Understanding the ecological crisis“, co-edited with the College of Sustainable Development Directors (C3D), aims to provide the keys to understanding the ecological crisis, to enable professionals to understand the mechanisms at the origin of the ecological crisis, their interactions and their consequences.

Understanding the environmental crisis

Biodiversity, an often neglected natural capital

After understanding the extent of the ecological crisis, it is important to identify what the ecological crisis is jeopardising. Businesses need biodiversity to operate smoothly and sustainably. Yet businesses affect it as much as they depend on it. Biodiversity is essential to the proper functioning of all ecosystems, yet it is threatened by the ecological crisis. It is therefore time to act to protect it. Thus, the Coorpacademy course “Protection of biodiversity: an asset for companies“ transmits the best practices to preserve and enhance this natural capital, and allows all employees to be initiated into the challenges of the ecological transition.

Protecting biodiversity: an asset for companies

Transform in order to last

Are you up to date on the origins of the ecological crisis and its impact on biodiversity? It is time to learn how to transform the company. Our contemporary economic system, which is based on a model of infinite growth, is no longer viable. It is therefore crucial to understand how the company can reinvent itself to become sustainable? Thanks to the course “Preparing the company for the environmental transition“ co-edited with the College of Sustainable Development Directors (C3D), you will be able to guide the transformation through essential tools for the transition and by adopting the right reflexes in the face of change.

Preparing the company for the environmental transition

From a straight line to a virtuous circle

To go further and really revolutionise the current economic model, we recommend the course “The circular economy: from a straight line to a virtuous circle” co-edited with MySezame. Indeed, if we evolve in a world of finite resources, it has its limits and we are beginning to see these limits. It is therefore time to rethink our linear economy in order to transform it into a virtuous and above all, sustainable circle.

The Circular Economy: From a Straight Line to a Virtuous Circle

What does this mean in practice?

Once you have developed and tested your theoretical knowledge of sustainable transformation, it is time to look at CSR approaches. Starting a CSR approach depends on each company. Each company can act on its own scale and have a greater or lesser impact on its sector, but how do you start or transform your own CSR approach? To guide you, discover through the Coorpacademy course “Sustainable transformation: success stories and business cases“ 3 very different companies that have integrated CSR into their strategy based on the UN Sustainable Development Goals. A course to give you the keys to action to positively impact society.

Sustainable Change: Success Stories and Business Cases

Large-scale training is essential to transform the company. By massively training employees on crucial sustainable development issues, and by raising awareness of the consequences that our human activities can have on ecosystems, we are gradually changing the rules of the game; and it is by sustainably transforming the company that we will be able to play longer. To go further, discover Coorpecology, the online training platform dedicated to sustainable transformation!

Are companies prepared to deal with short-term environmental disasters?

On Monday, August 9, the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) presented the first of three reports expected by 2022 as part of its sixth climate assessment cycle. This new report presents the current state of knowledge on the climate crisis, its origins, causes and impacts, and on possible actions to respond to the environmental emergency. The findings of this report represent a final warning to individuals, but especially to governments and businesses around the world.

“Life on earth can recover from major climate change by evolving into new species and creating new ecosystems. Humanity cannot.” – IPCC report

The urgency is not new, but it has never been so current.

Established in 1988 at the request of the G7, the 7 richest countries, by the World Meteorological Organization and the United Nations Environment Program, the IPCC synthesizes and assesses research conducted in laboratories around the world. Its fifth report, released in 2014, had already concluded that the human influence on climate systems was clear. But the new report, the sixth since 1990, allows the organization to be even more incisive about the direct link between human activity and current global warming.

If these reports provide essential elements to limit the extent of global warming and the severity of its impacts, it is up to governments, businesses and individuals to collectively organize and take concrete action in the face of the facts highlighted.

What is currently happening in the world, such as the megafires all over the planet from California to the Mediterranean basin or Australia, are the direct consequences of climate change. And as the IPCC report concludes, directly linked to human activity. The consequences exposed by scientists for several years are a strong argument for action, yet this sixth report still has the effect of a bomb. Today, humanity does not have time for a seventh report, we already know the conclusions, but we can contribute to write a few lines, if we act now.

The ecological crisis: a risk for companies

In our model of infinite growth and exploitation of (limited) natural resources, only a radical transformation of our modes of production, consumption and lifestyle can limit the catastrophic consequences for which we are responsible.

“Our current mode of development, based on a linear economy, is not sustainable.” – Célestine Julien, Inter-Company Pathway Manager (GR20²°) at MySezame – In what world do we want to live in 30 years?

In business, environmental risk refers to the possibility of an accident occurring in a company, which would have harmful repercussions – direct or indirect – on the environment, people, company employees and the company’s objectives and reputation. Today, not only is this environmental risk unavoidable, but it also impacts the environment in which the company operates, i.e. the external factors that influence the proper functioning of a company, such as political, environmental, societal and economic aspects. The company’s strategy must then identify the climate emergency and evaluate how it impacts and threatens its activity. If the ecological transition is so necessary, it is because companies will not be able to exist in a world that is disappearing, or at least will not be able to survive if they do not accelerate their adaptation to climate change, the consequences of which we are already seeing.

The IPCC report is clear. If global warming is limited to +2.0°C instead of +1.5°C, sea levels will rise by +30cm to +93cm, impacting more than 10 million people and the number of people affected by drought will increase by +410 million. Through these impacts, climate change is already influencing migration worldwide, and the United Nations predicts 200 million climate refugees by 2050. The impact of the migration crisis on the political and economic environment is obvious.

And internal consequences

Our modes of production are not sustainable. If the resources on which we depend are finite, it is not a shortage that we will face, but an impossibility to produce at all. Already following the pandemic, traders and businesses have faced a major shortage of raw materials, as in Canada where accumulated droughts and heavy rains have caused a drop in production and a rise in wheat prices. But in a few years, shortages may prove much more difficult to overcome. Reduced production, higher raw material prices, loss of personnel, the consequences of the ecological crisis on the production cycle is a risk that companies cannot ignore.

Beyond the political, economic and logistical aspects, the ecological crisis also impacts a resource that is essential to business: people. On a personal level, we are all witnesses to this catastrophe, and we can sometimes feel even more helpless in the face of the emergency. Of course, we can each participate in the collective effort, but we are also aware that the emergency requires a radical and global change in our society. Thus, the anxious and cataclysmic environment in which we evolve every day with a feeling of powerlessness, has an impact on our personal well-being – not to say our mental health. In addition, the expectations of employees – and particularly of the new generations – have changed. To flourish, their work must have meaning and their values must be in line with those of the company.

The world as we know it today will no longer exist in a few years. To keep existing, companies will have to reinvent themselves, adapt and train in order to avoid the risks they face. If the ecological crisis has direct impacts on the company’s environment, it also has indirect consequences on its internal functioning. The strategy must therefore be aligned with this new reality, and the entire organization must adapt in order to anticipate certain now inevitable repercussions on their activities and businesses.

Because the problem is complex, the solutions will be in essence innovative. To act now, discover Coorpecology, the first training platform dedicated to the ecological transition. To quickly train all employees and give them the keys to build a viable future. Sustainable transformation can’t wait any longer, click here to learn more.

Tag: sustainability