Program

FEB 15 - 17, 2022 | SCOTTSDALE, AZ JW MARRIOTT CAMELBACK INN

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Stakeholders & Storytelling

Tuesday, February 15th, 2022

9:00am to 12:00pm

Tutorial: Finding the Story in Your ESG Numbers

Tutorial

Paradise Ballroom 1-2

You probably already “get it” that telling your ESG story can help your company build market preference, drive sales, attract investors and retain employees. But how? What are the right things to be doing — and saying — to drive those outcomes? This workshop will:

Go through the ABC’s of ESG — what you need to know about the terminology and standards, the reporting frameworks and the ratings agency game.
Make you aware of the watch-outs — the gaps that must be filled and the commitments that must be made to appease ratings agencies and investors, as well as employees and consumers.
Help you understand how to bake sustainability into your brand platform and frame your ESG story at different levels so you can speak to several different audiences in a way they can each understand, while staying consistent — including via your ESG reporting.
Give you time to interact with your peers and nail down several key takeaways, like which ESG ratings agencies matter most for your company, the most important “watch-outs” and story elements for your situation, and landing on a lead ESG message that resonates.

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.

3:30pm to 4:30pm

Engaging Your Employees on the Path to Net Zero

Breakout

Paradise Ballroom 1

You’ve set audacious carbon neutrality and renewable energy goals. Now what? If you are asking yourself, “How do we actually get there?” this session is for you. We will cover why employees hold the key to achieving net zero and how to engage them to unlock greater impact across the organization on scope 1, 2 and 3 emissions, including their personal footprint in hybrid workplaces.

12:15pm to 1:15pm

Roundtable Lunch: The Need for Equitable Climate Action

Roundtable Lunch

Sonoran Terrace

Across the globe, we see that no two communities are impacted by climate change the same way. That’s why equitable climate action is essential to sustainable change. Join Kristen Siemen, Chief Sustainability Officer and Vice President, Sustainable Workplaces at General Motors for a discussion about how, in the pursuit of achieving carbon neutral commitments, the public and private sectors can integrate goals for a more inclusive, sustainable world for all.

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 Lunch: Corporate Policy Engagement on Climate

Roundtable Lunch

Sonoran Terrace

Join this roundtable lunch for a conversation about how to engage more effectively on climate policy advocacy with senior executives and employees. We'll explore what motivates executives, and what is standing in the way of them lobbying more aggressively for climate policy.

1:30pm to 2:30pm

University Partnerships that Drive Innovative Corporate Sustainability Solutions

Breakout

Arizona Ballroom B-C

Partnering with universities can accelerate action on sustainability solutions in new and innovative ways. Hear specific examples of leading universities that are evolving how they collaborate to address our most pressing sustainability challenges. Cross sector partnerships have been around for decades, but universities are transforming how public, private, nonprofit, indigenous and other communities are working together to drive durable solutions. In this session we will hear from the leaders of institutes at ASU, University of Minnesota, and the University of Washington about corporate collaborations that are making a difference, and how their universities and others are changing and could be your next best collaborator. By catalyzing multi-disciplinary teams to work on applied questions in service of the SDGs, science based targets and the priorities of many corporate sustainability strategies, universities are adding value in new and interesting ways. Today, these partnerships are about more than guest speakers, technology transfer, and experimental pilots; they are rooted in shared goals and values and attract the brightest researchers and students to collaboration. They can last for decades and leverage a wide range of private and public resources. Learn how to leverage these relationships to achieve your sustainability goals.

2:45pm to 3:45pm

Full Spectrum Community Impact

Breakout

Paradise Ballroom 3

Corporations can have a positive impact on the communities in which they operate and that goes beyond donating philanthropic dollars and volunteer hours. Measurable impact results from an intentional approach to community engagement, whether it’s analyzing opportunities before moving operations to a new town, successfully partnering with NGOs and other non-profit organizations, and lessening impact when transforming operations. Representatives from three different industries will describe their approaches for effective community impact. During this session, Microsoft will discuss the use of analytics to quantify community prosperity and measure the impacts of the company’s investments on community prosperity and total cost of ownership of their datacenters, Kohler will describe their microgrant program with DigDeep, a human rights non-profit working to bring clean water to families living on the Navajo Nation, and DTE will share how their “Retire With Pride” strategy helps ensure employees and communities are taken care of during the transition to clean energy.

Let’s Talk Climate Policy: How to Lead and Why It Matters

Breakout

Arizona Ballroom B-C

A growing number of companies are stepping up their advocacy on climate policy, as they recognize the critical role policy plays in meeting both national and enterprise-level climate targets. At the same time, companies are facing increasing pressure from investors, employees and other stakeholders to put their lobbying muscle behind their climate commitments. In this session, we’ll discuss what’s driving corporate engagement in climate policy and explore what leadership looks like today, with concrete examples and compelling stories you can use in your own organizations. Come hear from EDF, Cummins and Microsoft about why climate policy is essential to meeting business goals, how to be an effective advocate, and top climate policy priorities for 2022.

Broaden Your Scope: Engaging Your Suppliers to Drive Action and Transparency Throughout the Value Chain

Breakout

Paradise Ballroom 1

For years, businesses have focused on tracking, measuring and reducing their own direct carbon emissions — and for good reason. That’s where change starts. But in this vital decade of climate action, it’s imperative for companies to accelerate progress by looking beyond their own walls. To achieve a net zero future, today’s companies must use their platform to build a more sustainable business ecosystem. This means not only leading by example but providing partners, suppliers and other stakeholders with the tools to activate data-driven climate action strategies of their own. This session will explore how companies can broaden their scope by driving climate action and transparency throughout the entire value chain. Executives from Salesforce and other leading companies will explore the growing importance of the customer-supplier relationship in fighting climate change and share insights and learnings from leading supply chain solutions like Salesforce’s Sustainability Exhibit, a newly launched program that integrates climate commitments into supply chain contracts.

4:15pm to 5:15pm

When to Lead with ESG in Your Storytelling (and When Not To)

Breakout

Paradise Ballroom 4

Communicating environmental, social, and governance (ESG) practices has never been more business-critical. With investors, customers, suppliers, employees and other stakeholders demanding more ESG disclosure than ever before, companies are struggling to effectively translate their strategy into stories that engage multiple and disparate audiences. Some companies are finding that they don’t always need to lead with “ESG” terminology to communicate these issues to certain stakeholder groups. With no handbook to follow, many companies are unclear when it’s best to lead with ESG, impact, sustainability or other buzzwords in their communications. In this panel discussion, ESG leaders from four consumer-facing brands will discuss their strategies for effective sustainability communication.

Packaging Policy Brief: The Current Landscape

Breakout

Arizona Ballroom D-E

Over the last four years, recycling programs across the United States have struggled under the weight of COVID-19, China’s National Sword policy and an underfunded patchwork of laws and regulations across cities and states. The time for dramatic change is now: President Biden has made fighting climate change and boosting environmental protection a crucial focus of the new administration. The EPA has set a recycling goal of 50 percent by 2030 and recently appropriated $1.5 million to collecting detailed data on the recycling system nationwide.

At the same time, two states – Maine and Oregon – were the first in the country to pass extended producer responsibility laws covering packaging and California passed a labeling law that will change the way recyclability can be communicated to consumers in our largest state. And the legislative efforts are just beginning, with new bills under consideration and debate, the state of packaging and recycling policy at the state and federal levels is in flux. Join this session to uncover the state of national policy, its implications for industry now and how your company can engage in the policymaking process and advance our national recycling system in the future.

Thursday, February 17th, 2022

7:45am to 8:45am

Rethink Engagement to Embed ESG in Your Culture

Breakfast Session

Lincoln Restaurant

ESG is becoming a top focus for company strategy & outcomes. Your employees are critical to that transformative impact. If you are looking to accelerate this journey to bring your environmental, social, and governance programs together, this breakfast will discuss what is ESG engagement, why it is essential to your business and career, and how sustainability is primed to lead the revolution. So you can drive sustained engagement, culture change and business impact.

9:00am to 10:00am

Program

Stakeholders & Storytelling

Tutorial: Finding the Story in Your ESG Numbers

Sponsored: Teaming Up To Tackle Plastic Waste: How Cross-Industry Partnerships Can Ignite Long-Lasting Change

Engaging Your Employees on the Path to Net Zero

Roundtable Lunch: The Need for Equitable Climate Action

Roundtable Lunch: Employees Want To Take Climate Action. How Can We Help?

Roundtable Lunch: Corporate Policy Engagement on Climate

University Partnerships that Drive Innovative Corporate Sustainability Solutions

Full Spectrum Community Impact

Let’s Talk Climate Policy: How to Lead and Why It Matters

Broaden Your Scope: Engaging Your Suppliers to Drive Action and Transparency Throughout the Value Chain

When to Lead with ESG in Your Storytelling (and When Not To)

Sponsored: Aligning Health and Prosperity with Decarbonization Strategies

Packaging Policy Brief: The Current Landscape

Rethink Engagement to Embed ESG in Your Culture

Sponsored: Protect, Regenerate and Restore: Improving Sustainable Land Use in the Food Supply Chain