3 tips for engaging your employees on sustainability

Many people want to work for a company that contributes something to the world. This especially goes for Millennials, who are sometimes called ‘The Purpose Generation’. The data backs this up: nearly 40% of this generation have chosen a job specifically because of company sustainability. Then there's Gen Z entering the labour market, and they too want to see companies be good corporate citizens. Therefore, companies need to include topics like climate change, diversity and inclusion, and employee wellbeing in their strategies.

Sustainability is (not just) a top-down deal

But the sustainability strategy is usually formed by the Sustainability office and the Board, higher in the organization. Of course, top level support is one of the key success factors of sustainability performance. Sustainability should structurally be on the boards ‘agenda. And yes, the ‚hard‘ factors like targets and governance structures to be in place, pinpointing the people who will formally have a responsibility to achieve the strategy. A lot of the time employees don’t know about the sustainability goals and strategies of their company. Organizations communicate about this topic to external stakeholders, such as investors, via their Annual Sustainability Reports. Employees don’t read those. In other words, sustainability is not ‘marketed’ internally. So how do we get all people in the organization to be involved with sustainability? How do we make them enthusiastic? How do we engage them, so that they are more engaged?

Next time a sustainability strategy is developed, think about the following ways to involve, activate and create intrapreneurship amongst your employees:

1. Involve employees by asking for their input

The phase of sustainability strategy development is the perfect moment to involve employees. In the same way that companies often involve external stakeholders to define the so-called ‘material issues’ that should be on the agenda, ask employees for their input. What do they think are relevant sustainability themes? You can also use this opportunity to ask them about culture aspects that are relevant for strategy-development, such as what employees are proud of in relation to the company, and what they see as the purpose. When such inputs are in used in the new strategy or the narrative around that strategy, you will have more support from the start.

2. Activate the strategy with internal communications

Becoming a sustainable company starts with a vision, also called the ‘why’ or purpose. No matter what name you give it, we are talking about the future that a company envisions for itself, its customers and society. The big picture of what the world will look like some years from now, if it were up to the company.

This type of North Star is where the story of your organization and the societal role it aims to play begins. And storytelling is key. Stories appeal to people and can set them to action. Stories by default are also about change, and so are new strategies. Thus, here it is important to develop a communications approach in which a narrative is created around the new strategy and goals. This can, for example, be in the form of a corporate story or strategic narrative.

At the same time, honest communications about current performance is needed, including talking about those things that are not going well. If you don’t, the critics will zoom in and talk about them anyway, thereby undermining all efforts to get ‘all noses in the same direction’.

Also make sure that the different types of content are structurally present, or at least for a longer period of time. A one-off event to present the new strategy with some fancy slides and a series of blogs or vlogs will not create a shared vision and understanding about sustainability.

Finally, don’t forget about the work environment. One of the key elements of organizational culture is having so-called artefacts which embody the ‘North Star’ - concrete symbols that show ‘who we are’ / ‘where we want to go’. If you are that company that will is going to be known (in the market) as the premier company when it comes to circular products, then you are going to have to make sure your internal stakeholders believe this as well. So, they need to see it, not just hear about it.

3. Create a culture for sustainability ideas

One of the key drivers for engagement is a sense of autonomy, being able to ‘steer your own ship’. So how do we get people to come up with such autonomous actions? Intrapreneurship. Simply put, that means people with an entrepreneurial mindset taking initiative around new ideas and ventures, from within a company. Focused on social or environmental change, it’s usually called social intrapreneurship. This not only contributes to employee engagement on sustainability (because: autonomy), but also helps achieve the company sustainability goals, if employees know what the sustainability strategy and goals are.

There are 3 things leading companies are doing to create an ecosystem for intrapreneurship: making funding available, providing training for intrapreneurial skill development and stimulating internal networking. This should obviously not be implemented in silo but be part of the overall innovation strategy. As such, a more lowkey way to start is implementing a ‘20% project’, where employees can spend 20% of their work time on their own projects.

Another way is by setting up “Dragon’s Den” type competitions where employees can pitch their idea and obtain funding for it. By organizing such an event, employees are literally activated. It’s definitely an engaging way to load a new sustainability strategy or direction.

The above three tactics can be used individually but using all three of them will make sure your strategy and goals become everyone’s strategy and goals. Don’t just develop a strategy to only write about it in your Annual Report, make sure you let your employees know!