How do we solve billion-dollar climate equity problems with $5-$25M budgets? Whether your focus is developing climate solutions or solving for worker wealth inequality, this interactive tutorial is designed to invite participants to shift their mindset and develop the sources of financial capital to solve the climate equity solutions of our time. Participants will learn about both Full Spectrum Capital and how you can leverage Full Spectrum Capital by mixing and matching it with other capital within and outside the company. Stephanie and Antoinette will provide an overview of Full Spectrum Capital and outline strategies you can implement to partner with your other divisions to increase impact, increase return, and reduce risk to achieve your goals.
The information and strategies from this tutorial can be applied to:
Developing financial products to support your suppliers achieving their sustainability goals
Developing financial products to attract and retain the workforce by refinancing debt, increasing wages, and providing wealth-building opportunities via asset ownership
Developing a social enterprises strategy
Developing a Full Spectrum Capital corporate education strategy using Impact Investing Giving Circles
Tutorials are intensive half-day sessions held prior to the start of the conference. These are designed to offer participants an opportunity to dive deeper into a topic of interest and develop tangible knowledge and skills. In addition, attendees will have a greater opportunity to network with their peers in these interactive sessions. An all-access pass is required to participate.
CSO, Meet CFO: Collaborating with the Finance Function
Breakout
Paradise Ballroom 2
CFOs are in a unique position to redefine leadership in business and finance; they are critical change agents within their businesses and are the bridge to the investment community and financial markets. Forward-thinking CFOs want the financial system to adequately reward sustainable business practices. Engagement and collaboration between the sustainability and finance functions could not be more important. This collaboration will drive change, ensure that sustainable business transformation plans are embedded within organizations and properly financed, and, that the capital markets properly recognize and reward a company’s sustainable business practices. Join this session to learn:
How the sustainability function can effectively engage and collaborate with the finance function.
How leading companies have overcome internal barriers and external challenges to drive collaboration between the two functions.
What the future role of the CFO might look like, and the implications for the sustainability function.
ESG factors have increasingly become a crucial component in the capital allocation process for both investors and issuers. Though fewer individuals today debate the importance of ESG and its impact on value creation, most still struggle to make sense of the standards, disclosure requirements, and various ESG ratings associated that help drive long-term sustainable financial performance. In this session, we’ll run through best practices for utilizing ESG initiatives to increase market valuation for your company. We'll explore how to effectively communicate your company’s ESG strategy to ESG-integrated investors; how to align with the best ESG framework based on your company, industry, and investors; why ESG scores from widely used rating agencies are critical and how to maintain strong standings; and why continuing to improve on material ESG topics will enhance your company’s long-term performance. Our panel of experts will also highlight their real-life success stories, showcasing how revamping their ESG strategies and programs resulted in stronger financial valuation.
Roundtable Lunch: Prioritizing Your ESG Strategy for Risk Management and Growth
Roundtable Lunch
Sonoran Terrace
More companies are setting decarbonization goals. With various options available to reduce a company's carbon footprint, let's discuss the hurdles to implementing an enterprise-wide strategy and how this ultimately enhances brand, mitigates risk, and drives revenue.
Roundtable Lunches are interactive lunch discussions, moderated by an expert or thought leader, held at roundtables of up to 10 participants. These are freeform discussions, so bring your own challenges, questions, and ideas to talk through and get to know your fellow conference participants. All roundtable lunches are first-come, first-served.
Roundtable Lunch: Employees Want To Take Climate Action. How Can We Help?
Roundtable Lunch
Sonoran Terrace
All of us can admit to sometimes feeling overwhelmed given the scale of the climate crisis. However, many of our employees know that even small actions - taken by many - can make a difference. There’s a hunger for knowledge by our employees to live more sustainable lives – at work, at home and in the community. How can employers help? Join us for this exchange to share and learn best practices to engage employees - creating impact and driving employee satisfaction.
Roundtable Lunches are interactive lunch discussions, moderated by an expert or thought leader, held at roundtables of up to 10 participants. These are freeform discussions, so bring your own challenges, questions, and ideas to talk through and get to know your fellow conference participants. All roundtable lunches are first-come, first-served.
Roundtable Lunch: Financing the Net Zero Transition
Roundtable Lunch
Sonoran Terrace
COP26 put a new emphasis on the importance of private sector finance to accelerate the transition to a low-carbon economy. Financial institutions are taking steps to work with clients, and Wells Fargo has committed to support clients in their climate transitions on the path to net zero by 2050. The company will deploy $500 billion in sustainable finance by 2030. Join Ramsay Huntley, Sustainable Finance Strategist at Wells Fargo, for a discussion on ways to direct finance to sustainable businesses and projects.
Roundtable Lunches are interactive lunch discussions, moderated by an expert or thought leader, held at roundtables of up to 10 participants. These are freeform discussions, so bring your own challenges, questions, and ideas to talk through and get to know your fellow conference participants. All roundtable lunches are first-come, first-served.
SEC Chair Gary Gensler has been unequivocal in his intention to bring transparency and credibility to ESG investments in the U.S. How might companies be able to adopt the new disclosure requirements into existing frameworks, and what needs to be done to meet new climate disclosure requirements?
What New EU Reporting Standards Mean for North America
Breakout
Arizona Ballroom D-E
Significant changes are coming to sustainability reporting in Europe. From 2022, the Corporate Sustainability Reporting Directive (CSRD) will bring in mandatory ESG disclosure for all large or listed companies operating in the EU – expanding current non-financial reporting requirements from 11,000 companies to more than 50,000. As a result, many North American companies who do business in the EU will be included. This session will review the incoming changes and updates on the new sustainability reporting standards that will apply, for which GRI has been appointed by the European Commission to co-construct. Requiring double-materiality reporting of impacts and building on the widespread adoption of the GRI Standards, these developments will have a significant role in the global convergence of sustainability reporting.
Sponsored: Leveraging Technology to Streamline Your ESG Program
Breakout
Paradise Ballroom 6
Once your organization has set sustainability goals, net-zero climate commitments, and committed to sustainability reporting, how should you streamline your processes? In this session, we’ll cover how to leverage technology to accelerate your ESG program and initiatives, automate data gathering for reports, and bring scale to your mission to have the highest potential impact.
Sponsored sessions are sponsor-created and hosted breakouts, created independently by the sponsor without input from GreenBiz.
Investors globally are looking to make informed decisions on sustainability-related risks and opportunities, and 2021 has seen the logo soup of ESG disclosure begin to drain. Most recently, the VRF and the CDSB merged to form the ISSB. What should companies expect to see come out of the ISSB, and where are we now in the evolution and consolidation of sustainability standards setters?
The S in ESG has continued to rise in importance for companies and investors, and is increasingly contributing to assessments of corporate value. What does it take to develop and implement a robust social strategy?
Green, social and sustainability bonds have become increasingly important in the global fixed income market as investors look to align their portfolios with their financial goals. How are leadership companies utilizing these bonds, and what are the best practices and nuances between the various instruments?
