Economic success and environmental responsibility are fundamentally connected, and companies that focus on sustainability as a long-term goal will perform better financially than those that don’t, businessman and author Paul Polman said March 26 during the Peter M. Wege Lecture on Sustainability.

Citing climate change, nature loss, inequality and supply chain disruptions as issues being faced by companies, Polman said CEOs have a choice to get on board with developing more sustainable business practices now, or risk falling behind and facing the financial consequences of not adapting later. 

“The financial market is already rewarding companies that are positioning themselves to this greener, more inclusive, more sustainable future that we all aspire to,” Polman said. 

Polman was the chief executive officer of Unilever from 2009 to 2019, where he focused on purpose-driven leadership. After his departure from Unilever, he became active in sustainable finance and impact investing, and was a co-architect of the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals, or SDGs. 

Companies that are “building this flywheel of sustainability,” Polman said, are seeing equitable growth that is resulting in greater efficiency, cost reductions, more innovations and new revenue streams. They are also creating more resilient organizations that attract and retain top talent, he added.

More than 250 participants attended the 24th Wege Lecture, U-M’s premier sustainability lecture series, at Robertson Auditorium in the Stephen M. Ross School of Business. It was co-sponsored by the School for Environment and Sustainability and its Center for Sustainable Systems. Additional sponsorship for the Polman event was provided by the Erb Institute.

Referencing his 2021 bestselling book, “Becoming Net Positive: How Courageous Companies Thrive by Giving More Than They Take,” Polman said he co-wrote it as a way to shift the mindset of leaders on how to run their businesses in a “restorative, reparative and regenerative” way that profits from solving the world’s problems, not by creating them.

“At the end of the day, it’s an issue of leadership and putting humanity back at the center and doing what we know is instinctively right,” Polman said. “But that’s hard to do, and it takes courage.”

Following his talk, Polman answered questions from Andrew Hoffman, the Holcim (US) Professor of Sustainable Enterprise and professor of management and organizations in the Ross School, and professor of environment and sustainability in the School for Environment and Sustainability. 

Polman ended the discussion by noting the urgency of the world’s problems and the inequalities that exist among different populations, as well as the need to be of service to others. “This is still a world where 95% of the people are not in the positions where we are,” Polman said. “They might not have access to food. They might not have access to clean drinking water. They might not have a toilet at home. Their children might not make it past the age of 5 because of infectious diseases. They don’t have access to education. 

“So, if you belong to that 5% that has won the lottery ticket of life, then I think it’s your duty or obligation to put yourself to the service of the other 95%.”

Read the article in the University Record.