Sustainable solutions
Thank you Coaching at Work for a courageous and inspirational response to the challenges of climate change through:
- Coaching at Work’s pledge to step up activity and increase coverage of this topic
- Climate Coaching Action Day on 5 March and leading by example in the recent decision to go digital to reduce your carbon footprint.
As Greta Thunberg sailed into the UN Climate Change conference in Madrid, her challenge to world leaders is to listen to the science. The Intergovernmental Science-Policy Platform on Biodiversity and Ecosystem Services (IPBES), the most comprehensive report ever completed based on a review of 15,000 scientific sources, previously reported that:
- Since 1980 greenhouse gases have doubled
- Nature is declining at rates unprecedented in human history with around 1 million animal and plant species now threatened with extinction
- Three-quarters of land-based environment and about 66% of the marine environment have been significantly altered by human actions.
The UN’s Global Assessment report concluded that the current global response is insufficient and ‘Transformative changes’ are needed to restore and protect nature.
Transformative change can expect opposition from those with interests vested in the status quo but such opposition can be overcome for the broader public good and the UN report provides a list of policy tools, options and exemplary practices.
These are shocking trends and statistics, with major implications for us all and our clients as organisations
seek sustainable solutions or risk damage to their brand
and profitability with the growth in public awareness
and pressure.
Alison Whybrow, Zoe Cohen and Linda Aspey in a really interesting article in Coaching Work, vol 14, issue 5, call on the coaching community to consider our response.
If you have not already done so please consider signing and sharing: ‘Open Letter to Coaches, the Coaching & Coaching Psychology Professional Bodies and Coach Educators’: http://bit.ly/2PttE0v
- Martin Down
- www.executivecoachingpartnership.com
Scandal in the making
Prior to completing the Advanced Practitioner programme at the Academy of Executive Coaching in 2010/11, I was a corporate lawyer including working as general counsel and head of ethics & compliance for many years. Possibly for this reason, I was alarmed by the suggested interventions in this piece and wanted to bring a different perspective.
The situation described is a corporate scandal waiting to happen. Warning signs should be flashing for several reasons. The jurisdiction is obviously one where money laundering is a big issue. The reporting officers are working in isolation and apparently report to local management. Dani’s budget is low, which indicates the company does not take the importance of the function seriously. She is only a mid-level manager and may have limited influencing skills as well. One only has to think about recent events at the Danske Bank [money laundering scandal] in the Baltics to see this is the perfect storm.
My suggestion would be to focus the coaching on Dani initially to support her in influencing the central compliance/legal function to allocate more resources and change the reporting lines. The local people need to report to a central senior person who will support them when they need it, for example, when they are under pressure not to report something.
My guess is she is worried about her position – if something goes wrong she will be the scapegoat. She needs to insist (effectively) that given the potential for misconduct she be given adequate resources to do her job. If she doesn’t get them, she should leave. Once this is resolved I would start team coaching or team learning, whichever is appropriate.
- Ruth Steinholtz, AretéWork
- Co-author, Ethical Business Practice and Regulation (Hart Publishing, 2018)