Former Unilever CEO Paul Polman Says Aiming for Sustainability Isn’t Enough. The Goal Is Much Higher

Former Unilever CEO Paul Polman Says Aiming for Sustainability Isn’t Enough. The Goal Is Much Higher 19 Nov 2021 --- Paul Polman, who now chairs Imagine, challenges business leaders to ask themselves if they care about the world’s problems — and if they do, how far are they willing to push their companies to help solve them? HBR editor in chief Adi Ignatius sat down with Polman, whose new book is "Net Positive: How Courageous Companies Thrive By Giving More than They Take" (https://www.amazon.com/Net-Positive-Courageous-Companies-Thrive/dp/1647821304) to talk about: • How leaders can drive ambitious sustainability agendas • The importance of corporate transparency in building trust • How employees can force change from within, as customers and society apply pressure from without. Aiming for sustainability is not enough, Polman says. “Companies are starting to understand that you need to be restorative, reparative, regenerative.” This interview is the fourth in a new video series called “The New World of Work,” which will explore how top-tier executives see the future and how their companies are trying to set themselves up for success. Each week, Adi will interview a leader on LinkedIn Live — and then share an inside look at those conversations and solicit questions for future discussions in a newsletter just for HBR subscribers. If you’re a subscriber, you can sign up for the newsletter here: https://hbr.org/my-library/preferences?movetile=newworldofwork. Follow us: https://hbr.org/ https://www.linkedin.com/company/harvard-business-review/ https://www.facebook.com/HBR/ https://twitter.com/HarvardBiz https://www.instagram.com/harvard_business_review Sign up for Newsletters: https://hbr.org/email-newsletters #HarvardBusinessReview #FutureofWork #PaulPolman Copyright © 2021 Harvard Business School Publishing. All rights reserved. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices