The need for corporate leadership has never been more acute. We are grappling with large scale global challenges – think climate change, social cohesion and economic inequality – that require a new type of leadership from truly global entities. Governments appear unwilling or unable to lead. Civil society, while highly engaged, does not have the scale or infrastructure to deliver the required change. Despite low levels of societal trust, all roads lead to more committed and effective leadership by business … “The Strategic Importance of Recognized Leadership”
GlobeScan partnered with BT to hold the second Better Future Forum at the start of July. The online dialogue hosted 300 sustainability and technology experts, from 29 countries, and provided a hotbed of discussion and rich insights. Our objective was to bring people from across the world together to determine the state of current thinking around “big data” and how this relates to sustainability and consumer behaviour change, with a view to moving the debate forward and crowdsourcing ideas for … “BT Better Future Forum: Collaborating on the Role of Data for Social Good”
Over the past two years, GlobeScan and its colleagues at BBMG have tracked the emergence of a market segment that is driving sustainability toward a tipping point. It is one where consumer motives are shifting away from obligation to do the right thing to desire to consume both differently and better. Choice frameworks are transitioning from “Or,” the trade-off model, to “And,” the co-benefit model. We call this important market segment the Aspirationals. In this edition of Proof Points, we ask which brands will be … “Why Companies Must Win the Trust of Aspirational Consumers”
When you assemble 2,500 (is that all of us?) or so of the world’s leading corporate sustainability and brand innovation folks for a week, one expects the unexpected. Sustainable Brands 2014 in San Diego last week lived up to (un)expectations. Prior to the conference, our colleagues at HP got in touch with GlobeScan’s James Morris and Eric Whan with an exciting idea in hand. The plan was to teleport a seven-by-seven metre glass house into the centre of the main exhibition, dining and … “Living Progress at Sustainable Brands”
We recently held our first roundtable event in South Africa where attendees from a mix of industries including extractives, food & beverage, forestry, healthcare, financial services, tobacco, telecommunications and IT came together to discuss stakeholder engagement and its place in the South African market. GlobeScan’s South African representative Anneke Greyling, presented new research findings on the current state of stakeholder engagement in South Africa which showed that the landscape is clearly changing but it is questionable whether corporates are adapting … “Stakeholder Intelligence is Crucial for the Long Term Success of South African Companies”
How did we lose the room? This is the question facing the sustainability community as GlobeScan’s latest Radar data shows a decline in how serious the global public considers environmental issues to be. With ample scientific evidence to the contrary (see the latest IPCC report), how do we explain the decreasing public concern in environmental issues? And, on World Environment Day 2014, what does this mean for organisations trying to make headway on sustainability? GlobeScan’s recent Radar public opinion survey asked … “Enough of the Doom and Gloom: Amidst Declining Environmental Concern, Real Leadership is Needed to Re-Engage the Public”
In sustainability circles, the results of GlobeScan’s and SustainAbility’s just-released 2014 Sustainability Leaders Survey are not surprising. Unilever remains by far the most lauded company by our expert panel of respondents, with fully 33 percent singling it out from others. Taking a longer view, however, the report is notable in showing how thoroughly Unilever has captured the attention of sustainability professionals globally. It also documents how much has changed within the leadership landscape since GlobeScan and SustainAbility initiated this tracking program in 1997. Unilever … “Unilever Maintains Sustainability Leadership Amid Change”
In light of the recent global debate on the morality of mass surveillance programmes, GlobeScan has teamed up with the BBC World Service to ask over 17,000 people what their perspectives are on freedom and the right to privacy. In previous blog posts, we have used this data to show that Peru, Australia and Canada represent the freest democratic states (as indicated by our Perceived Freedom Index), and that an individual’s sense of freedom is not determined by socioeconomic or … “Freedom is in the Eye of the Beholder: Trust in National Governments is Associated with Perceived Freedom of Speech”
Following the release of the 2014 Aspirational Consumer Index, BBMG and GlobeScan today announced they will co-host a free webinar to help companies understand the latest data points and what they mean for driving growth and positive social impact by engaging Aspirational consumers. The webinar will feature Chris Coulter, CEO of GlobeScan, and Raphael Bemporad, co-founder and chief strategy officer of BBMG. Jennifer Kho, U.S. editor for The Guardian Sustainable Business, will moderate. Discovered in 2013, Aspirationals are a powerful new … “Webinar: The Aspirationals: Shifting Sustainability from Obligation to Desire”
National governments must lead the transition to sustainable development, our experts say. Yet the latest GlobeScan/SustainAbility Survey confirms what we all know: Governments are failing to deliver, resoundingly. What’s new about these latest findings is just how low the performance of national governments has fallen in the eyes of observers. Virtually none of our expert panel that was surveyed rates government performance as excellent, and just 3 percent give it a positive score of 4 out of 5. In the context of … “How Governments Fail to Lead on Sustainability”