Increasingly, company boards are expected to incorporate environmental, social and governance issues into their strategic choices and performance criteria. How, exactly, should they do this? One approach is to integrate the entire costs/benefits of the firm’s activities, including those which are currently unpaid-for externalities, into its balance sheet. But is that really possible? Or, even desirable?

In this episode I discuss this issue – and others! – with my guest, Helle Bank Jorgensen. Helle is an internationally recognized expert on sustainable business practices, with a 30-year record of turning environmental, social, and governance (ESG) risks into innovative and profitable business opportunities. She is the founder and chief executive of Competent Boards, which offers online climate and ESG programs that draw on the experience of over 150 renowned board members, executives, and investors.

Helle is also the author of the newly published book, Stewards of The Future: A Guide for Competent Boards. This book shows boards must have the insight and foresight to ask the right questions of management on complex issues such as climate change, ESG, corruption, cybersecurity, human trafficking and supply-chain resilience to realize long-term profits and sustainability.

Citations

• Jorgensen, Helle Bank (2022) Stewards of The Future: A Guide for Competent Boards. Barlow Publishing.
• Cornell, Bradford and Damodaran, Aswath (2020), Valuing ESG: Doing Good or Sounding Good? (March 20, 2020). NYU Stern School of Business, Available at SSRN: https://ssrn.com/abstract=3557432 or http://dx.doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.3557432

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