Below is the program from the 2021 MIT Sustainability Summit.
Welcome to For Good Measure: Opening Remarks
Sam Walsh
Conference Co-Director,
Sam is a second-year MBA candidate at MIT Sloan co-directing his second MIT Sustainability Summit. Sam spent the past summer working in the Metropolitan Area Planning Council's Clean Energy group and with the Good Food Institute on their commercial operations team. Prior to Sloan, Sam worked in Strategy and Analytics at the National Basketball Association, helping teams improve their business operations. In Sam's spare time he enjoys cooking, playing basketball, reading and building community with his MIT peers. After graduation, Sam will be joining the Boston Consulting Group in Boston.
Christina Larson
Christina is a second-year MBA candidate at MIT Sloan School of Management pursuing the Sustainability Certificate. Prior to Sloan, Christina spent five years in Washington, D.C. working as an economic consultant at Cornerstone Research. She spent this past summer working on a sustainability project within Global Operations at Nike. In addition to being passionate about sustainability, Christina is active in Sloan Women in Management and enjoys traveling, cooking for friends, and teaching yoga in her free time.
Finding Common Ground: How Do We Measure Impact?
Measuring impact on people and the planet has become increasingly urgent as we overshoot several ecological boundaries while failing to provide basic social safety nets for civilians worldwide. There is pressure on companies and governments to make substantial positive change on both fronts, but what does this mean? How do we define sustainability and measure our progress toward or away from that ideal?
Jason Jay
Senior Lecturer and Director, SUSTAINABILITY INITIATIVE, MIT Sloan School of Management
Jason Jay is a Senior Lecturer at the MIT Sloan School of Management and Director of the Sustainability Initiative at MIT Sloan. His research focuses on how people navigate the tensions between personal, business, and social goals in sustainability efforts. His first book is Breaking Through Gridlock: The Power of Conversation in a Polarized World and he has published articles in the Academy of Management Journal and California Management Review. He teaches courses on strategy, innovation, and leadership for sustainable business at MIT, and engages students and alumni in hands-on projects with leading companies and organizations. Prior to MIT, Jason was a management consultant for Dialogos International, where he consulted on leadership development and organizational change for major international corporations and NGO's including BP and the World Bank. Jason holds a Ph.D. in Organization Studies from the MIT Sloan School of Management, and an AB and M.Ed from Harvard University. He lives in Newton, Massachusetts.
John Sterman
Director, MIT System Dynamics Group
John D. Sterman is the Jay W. Forrester Professor of Management at the MIT Sloan School of Management and Director of MIT's System Dynamics Group. His research includes systems thinking and organizational learning, computer simulation of corporate strategy and public policy issues, and environmental sustainability. He is the author of many scholarly and popular articles on the challenges and opportunities facing organizations today, including the book Modeling for Organizational Learning, and the award-winning textbook Business Dynamics. Prof. Sterman's research centers on improving decision making in complex systems, including corporate strategy and operations, energy policy, public health, environmental sustainability, and climate change. He has pioneered the development of "management flight simulators" of corporate and economic systems. These flight simulators are now used by corporations, universities and governments around the world. His research ranges from the dynamics of organizational change and the implementation of sustainable improvement programs to climate change and the implementation of policies to promote a sustainable world. Prof. Sterman has twice been awarded the Jay W. Forrester Prize for the best published work in system dynamics, won an IBM Faculty Award, won the Accenture Award for the best paper of the year published in the California Management Review, has seven times won awards for teaching excellence, and was named one of the MIT Sloan School's "Outstanding Faculty" by the Business Week Guide to the Best Business Schools. He has been featured on public television's News Hour, National Public Radio's Marketplace, CBC television, Fortune, the Financial Times, Business Week, and other media for his research and innovative use of interactive simulations in management education and policymaking.
Kate Raworth
Co-Founder, Doughnut Economics Action Lab
Kate Raworth is an economist focused on making economics fit for the 21st century. Her book Doughnut Economics: seven ways to think like a 21st century economist is an international bestseller that has been translated into 20 languages, and was long-listed for the 2017 Financial Times & McKinsey Business Book of the Year award. She is co-founder of Doughnut Economics Action Lab, working with cities, business, communities, governments and educators to turn Doughnut Economics from a radical idea into transformative action. She teaches at Oxford University's Environmental Change Institute and is Professor of Practice at Amsterdam University of Applied Sciences.
Fireside Chat with Howard W. Buffett
How can we encourage different sectors to productively partner in ways that will generate solutions to the most pressing social and environmental challenges of our time? Furthermore, how do we measure the impact of these collaborative approaches? Join us in an intimate fireside chat with Howard W. Buffett, Professor at Columbia University's School of International and Public Affairs, to explore these issues.
Howard W. Buffett
Professor, Columbia School of International and Public Policy
Howard W. Buffett is a professor at Columbia University's School of International and Public Affairs. He teaches courses on public management innovation, impact investing, and philanthropy, and he serves on the Advisory Committee on Socially Responsible Investing, which advises the university's $10 billion endowment on social and environmental investment policies. Buffett's award-winning research, Social Value Investing: A Management Framework for Effective Partnerships, introduces Impact Rate of Return—an innovative methodology to measure and analyze social and environmental impact. Previously, he was executive director of the Howard G. Buffett Foundation, which strengthens food security for vulnerable populations throughout Africa, Asia, and Latin America. Prior to that, Buffett oversaw economic development and stabilization programs in Afghanistan and Iraq for the U.S. Department of Defense. For his work in Afghanistan, he received the Joint Civilian Service Commendation Award. He was also a policy advisor for the White House Domestic Policy Council, and a member of the Technology, Innovation, and Government Reform policy working group for the 2008-09 Presidential Transition Team.
Buffett holds a BS from Northwestern University, an MPA from Columbia University, and executive education certificates from Harvard Business School. He advises or is on the boards of Case New Holland Industrial (NYSE:CNHI), Toyota Motor North America (NYSE:TM), Inari Agriculture, REEF Technology, and S2G Ventures. He also chairs the Advisory Council for Harvard's International Negotiation Program.
Laura Budzyna
Monitoring, Learning, and Evaluation Manager & Associate Director for Innovation Practice, MIT D-Lab
Laura Budzyna is a global development practitioner and evaluator committed to participatory, flexible, and learning-focused measurement and management for the social impact sector. Specializing in the evaluation of innovative pilot programs, she works hand-in-hand with teams to design measurement strategies that can adapt to evolving projects with emergent outcomes.
At MIT D-Lab, Laura leads the visioning and development of the organization's impact measurement strategy, has implemented evaluations on 20+ D-Lab inclusive innovation programs, and advises partner organizations on their impact measurement strategies. Prior to MIT D-Lab, Laura's evaluation work focused on initiatives promoting financial inclusion, including Triple Jump, NYC's Office of Financial Empowerment, the Microinsurance Centre, and the Corporation for Enterprise Development.
She holds an MPA in Development Practice from Columbia University's School for International and Public Affairs. She is the author of The Metrics Café, a framework that aims to bridge the divide between funders' and grantees' measurement needs.
Current State of Affairs: Global Policies for Sustainability & ESG
Governments are facing increasing pressure to standardize sustainability and ESG metrics for corporations and financial institutions. What are the current policies in effect in the US and the EU? Are these policies effective at measuring the impact of sustainability initiatives? What does the future hold? Join us for a discussion with policy-makers and implementers to understand the current state of affairs and consider policies we should strive towards in the coming years.
Robert Eccles
Founding Chairman, Sustainability Accounting Standards Board
Robert G. Eccles is a leading authority on corporate purpose and the integration of ESG factors in resource allocation decisions by companies and investors. Currently Eccles is a Visiting Professor of Management Practice at the Said Business School, University of Oxford and a Senior Advisor to the Boston Consulting Group and the non-profit Impact Management Project. He was the founding Chairman of the Sustainability Accounting Standards Board, and was one of the founders of the International Integrated Reporting Council. Dr. Eccles received an S.B. in Mathematics and an S.B. in Humanities and Science from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and an A.M. and Ph.D. in Sociology from Harvard University. He currently resides in Lexington, MA with his wife Anne Laurin Eccles and their two dogs Basil and Rowan.
Kristina Wyatt
Sr. Counsel for Climate and ESG , U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission
Kristina Wyatt is Senior Counsel for Climate and ESG to the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission's Director of the Division of Corporation Finance. Prior to joining the SEC, she was a Senior Counsel and Director of Sustainability at the law firm Latham & Watkins. She previously worked at the SEC in the Division of Corporation Finance and as a counsel in the office of Commissioner Roel Campos. She holds a BA from Duke University, JD from the University of Colorado, and MBA in Sustainability from Yale University. She has written numerous articles and book chapters on the topic of sustainability and ESG reporting.
Antoine Begasse
EU Financial Counselor, Delegation of the EU to the US
Antoine Begasse is the EU Financial Counselor at the Delegation of the European Union to the United States. Since 2018, he is working in Washington DC and in charge of financial services policy. Previously, he was a policy officer at the European Commission within DG FISMA (Financial Stability, Financial Services and Capital Markets Union). He worked on several files including sustainable finance and financial reporting. He was in charge of the Non-Financial Reporting Directive, Country-by-Country Reporting requirements, followed the work of the High Level Expert Group on Sustainable Finance and worked on the 2018 European Commission Action Plan on Sustainable Finance. Antoine holds an MBA from the Louvain School of Management and a Master in European Affairs from the College of Europe.
Lunch & Networking
Forming Sustainability Coalitions
This panel will explore how different actors come together to create greater progress on sustainability challenges faced today. Some questions we will answer are: What actors come together to form successful coalitions? How do members of coalitions keep each other accountable? What would make coalitions more effective in pushing sustainability goals? Our speakers will give the audience examples of coalition success stories and what made them succeed.
Seren Pendleton-Knoll
Associate Director, Berkeley Haas Center for Responsible Business
Seren Pendleton-Knoll is the Associate Director at the Berkeley Haas Center for Responsible Business. In addition to implementing the strategic vision of the center, she primarily oversees the Sustainable Innovation area of focus, looking at how industry is reinventing business to drive forward sustainability. She also spent four years overseeing Haas' work in sustainable and impact investing.
Outside of Haas, she is a Senior Advisor to the impact investing firm CNote, and on the board of the GivingFund. Prior to her role at the CRB, she spent five years in social services. She is passionate about looking at the intersection between business and community impact.
She holds a MS in Development Practice from UC Berkeley's College of Natural Resources, BA in Clinical Psychology and Applied Theatre from Whitman College, is a professional dancer, and is a proud Mom of two.
Shannon Bouton
CEO, Mckinsey.org
Shannon Bouton is a scientist, environmentalist, and business strategist, who has dedicated her career to creating a more sustainable future for people and planet. As the CEO of McKinsey.org, Shannon spearheads the organization's vision to have lasting and substantial impact on complex sustainability challenges. McKinsey.org's first initiative, Rethinking Recycling, focuses on developing systematic approaches and innovative platforms to put all waste to productive use for the benefit of communities and the environment.
Prior to joining McKinsey.org, Shannon worked for 15 years at McKinsey & Company, most recently as the Chief Operating Officer of the McKinsey Center for Business and Environment. As a consultant, Shannon served a range of public- and private-sector clients on buildings energy efficiency, transportation strategy, and greenhouse gas emissions reduction. She also helped to found McKinsey & Company's Sustainability practice and the Cities Special Initiative where she developed tools to enable cities to improve economic development, climate action planning, transportation, and organizational performance.
A field biologist by training, Shannon spent her early career working directly with grassroots communities on conservation in Brazil. A citizen of both the United States and Brazil, she holds a PhD in natural resources and the environment from the University of Michigan.
Sanjeev Chadha
Vice Chairman, Pacific Institute; Former Chairman & CEO, PepsiCo Asia Pacific, Middle East and North Africa
Sanjeev Chadha is a global business leader, with deep experience in the food & beverage industries across many countries, cultures, and businesses. In his last corporate role, he was PepsiCo's Chairman and CEO for Asia Pacific, Middle East & North Africa, and has served on the boards of several organizations. Sanjeev is passionate about water security, and was the recipient of the Stockholm Water Award for Industry on behalf of PepsiCo. In 2018, he hung up his PepsiCo boots to dedicate 100% of his time to the global water crisis, with a focus on the developing world. He sees his role as a 'water catalyst', leveraging his experience to help organizations and governments accelerate the scope, scale and speed of their work on water security & resilience. He advises various organizations, and is the Vice Chairman of the Pacific Institute, the global water think-tank based in California.
Walk the Talk: Implementing Measurement
"It is often easier said than done." This panel invites sustainability officers from a set of diverse industries to discuss how sustainability impact measures are implemented in their organizations. The questions we'd like to explore include: How do they measure sustainability? How reliable is the data? What is their strategy of driving changes in the organization? We hope our audiences will walk away with some good ideas on how to improve impact measurement in their own organization.
Patrick Flynn
VP Sustainability , Salesforce
Patrick Flynn is the Vice President of Sustainability for Salesforce, the global leader in customer relationship management (CRM), where he defines and leads the execution of Salesforce's environmental strategy.
Patrick has held impact roles in green building design, venture capital and immediately prior to Salesforce led sustainability for a data center colocation company. Flynn holds an MBA from MIT as well as a BS in Engineering from Stanford University.
Robert Coviello
Chief Sustainability Officer and Government Affairs, BUNGE
Robert Coviello is the Chief Sustainability Officer and Government Affairs of BUNGE. Robert Coviello assumed his current role in May 2019. As a member of the Bunge team for more than 15 years, he has held a variety of commercial leadership positions in Asia, Europe and the U.S. Prior to BUNGE, he served in trading roles at Cargill in the U.S.
He holds a B.A. from Dartmouth College and an M.B.A. from Harvard Business School. He also serves on the Board of Directors of Lamb Weston, a NYSE company.
Deanna Bratter
Head of Sustainable Development, Danone North America
Deanna Bratter is the Head of Sustainable Development for Danone North America, a public benefit corporation and a Certified B Corporation. Deanna drives the company sustainability strategy and programs to support the interconnectivity between the health of people and the health of the planet; and works to amplify the positive impacts of sustainability within business.
Deanna oversees the organization's nature and sustainability focus areas including commitments to advancing regenerative agriculture, water stewardship, carbon reductions, improving packaging, and supporting people and communities.
Prior to Danone North America, Deanna led Corporate Sustainability for WhiteWave Foods where she began in 2005 and was instrumental in creating and driving WhiteWave's sustainability initiatives. Deanna integrates her passion for making the world a better place through leadership, education and innovation with her dedication to transforming the sustainability ambitions of business into meaningful results.
Dara O'Rourke
Senior Principal Scientist, Amazon, Associate Professor, UC Berkeley
Dara O'Rourke is both a professor and practitioner studying the environmental, health, and social impacts of global supply chains. Dr. O'Rourke teaches environmental and labor policy at the University of California, Berkeley, was the co-founder and CEO of GoodGuide, and founded the Sustainability Science and Innovation team at Amazon.com. Dr. O'Rourke has consulted to the World Bank, the United Nations Development Programme, the United Nations Environment Programme, the OECD, and a wide range of non-governmental organizations. His report on Nike's labor practices in Vietnam in the 1990's led to a front page New York Times exposé and helped ignite a new era of corporate accountability and transparency. Dr. O'Rourke has published three books, and dozens of academic articles, including the award-winning Community-Driven Regulation (MIT Press, 2004) and Shopping for Good (MIT Press, 2012). Dr. O'Rourke was previously a professor at MIT. He holds an MS and Ph.D. from the University of California, Berkeley, and a BS from MIT.
Laura Franceschini
Global Sustainability Strategy & OperationS, Google
Laura Franceschini has worked at the intersection of business and environmental issues for more than a decade. As part of Google's Sustainability Strategy & OperationS team, she drives development and implementation of the company's cross-functional sustainability strategy across its global operations, products, and supply chain. Previously, Laura launched the sustainability program for Stantec—a top 10 global design firm with 22,000 employees in more than 400 locations. Laura has also led sustainability programs for the Yale Center for Business and the Environment and other organizations and has been a sustainability consultant in various capacities. Laura received a Masters in Environmental Management with a concentration in Business from Yale University. Originally from Edmonton, Canada, she has lived in several countries and now lives in San Francisco, California.
The Institutional Push for Sustainability
Are the big banks taking sustainability seriously? With over a trillion dollars in assets under management today, how are institutional capital investors shaping corporate strategy, policy and innovation to push for sustainability? Do their LPs demand impact and what does impact even mean at such a large scale? Join us as we explore the approach to sustainability and impact measurement for banks such as Citibank and IFC while we unravel the investor's role in sustainability.
Roberto Rigobon
Professor of Applied Economics , Sloan School of Management, MIT
Roberto Rigobon is the Society of Sloan Fellows Professor of Management and a Professor of Applied Economics at the MIT Sloan School of Management. He is also a research associate of the National Bureau of Economic Research, a member of the Census Bureau's Scientific Advisory Committee, and a visiting professor at IESA. Roberto is a Venezuelan economist whose areas of research are international economics, monetary economics, and development economics. Roberto focuses on the causes of balance-of-payments crises, financial crises, and the propagation of them across countries—the phenomenon that has been identified in the literature as contagion. Currently he studies properties of international pricing practices, trying to produce alternative measures of inflation. He is one of the two founding members of the Billion Prices Project, and a co-founder of PriceStats. Roberto joined the business school in 1997 and has won both the "Teacher of the Year" award and the "Excellence in Teaching" award at MIT three times. He received his PhD in economics from MIT in 1997, an MBA from IESA (Venezuela) in 1991, and his BS in Electrical Engineer from Universidad Simon Bolivar (Venezuela) in 1984. He is married with three kids.
Michael Eckhart
Former Managing Director and Global Head of Environmental Finance, CitiGroup
Michael Eckhart is an Adjunct Professor at Columbia University's graduate School of International and Policy Affairs (SIPA), teaching Environmental Finance, and is under contract to write a book titled Climate Finance. He retired in 2019 from Citigroup in New York as Managing Director and Global Head of Environmental Finance, serving clients in renewable energy with corporate banking, investment banking capital market origination, and transaction services. He continues to be actively engaged in leadership work with the UN, OECD, IRENA, REN 21, IIF, the Atlantic Council, and other groups. Prior to Citi, he was founding President of the American Council On Renewable Energy (ACORE), a Washington DC-based 501(c)(3) non-profit organization. He previously led the SolarBank Initiative in Europe, India and South Africa, and earlier worked in power generation and advanced technology with United Power Systems, Aretê Ventures, General Electric Company and Booz, Allen & Hamilton. At Booz Allen, he led a three-year series of studies on the business prospects of the new energy technologies for President Jimmy Carter. He has received a number of awards including Renewable Energy Man of the Year of India in 1998, the Skoll Award for Social Entrepreneurship in 2008, and the International Solar Energy Society's Global Policy Leadership Award in 2013. In non-profit work, he is Vice Chairman of the Oyster Recovery Project in Maryland, which is an $8 million/year operation reseeding the Chesapeake Bay with approximately 1 billion oysters per year in sanctuaries and other areas seeking the ecological restoration of the Chesapeake Bay. He served in the U.S. Navy Submarine Service and holds a BS in Electrical & Electronic Engineering from Purdue University and MBA from Harvard Business School.
Senior Vice President, Operations , International Finance Corporation
Ms. Stephanie von Friedeburg is IFC's first Senior Vice President, Operations. She most recently stewarded the institution in the midst of the pandemic and led the implementation of IFC's strategy to create projects, attract private investment, and ultimately support a resilient and inclusive recovery in emerging markets. She currently leads all IFC investment operations and advisory services and manages IFC's $60 billion debt and equity portfolio in more than 100 countries. Her priorities include increasing opportunities for women, scaling up investments to fight climate change, and promoting digital development. Her career spans almost three decades in the World Bank Group. She started at IFC, where she also served as the first Chief Operating Officer, and has spent more than two decades in investment operations, developing strong expertise in Africa and Central and Eastern Europe and in sectors such as telecom, manufacturing, and a wide array of technologies. In addition to an MBA from the Wharton School, she holds a Master of Arts from the Lauder Institute at the University of Pennsylvania and an undergraduate degree from the School of Foreign Service at Georgetown University.
Hugh Lawson
Partner, Global Head of ESG & Impact and Institutional Client Strategy, Goldman Sachs Asset Management
Hugh is a member of the leadership team for Goldman Sachs Asset Management's Client Business with global responsibility for Institutional Client Strategy and the division's Environmental, Social and Governance and Impact strategy. In addition, he is co-chair of the Asset Management Sustainability Council. Hugh was previously co-head of Alternative Capital Markets and co-head of Hedge Fund Strategies. He joined Goldman Sachs in 1997 and was named managing director in 2003 and partner in 2012. Prior to joining the firm, Hugh worked in New York for the Rockefeller Brothers Fund and the Boston Consulting Group. He is a member of the Council on Foreign Relations and of the Columbia College Board of Visitors, and serves as a trustee and Investment Committee chair of the Rockefeller Brothers Fund. Hugh earned a JD from Yale Law School and a BA from Columbia University, summa cum laude, Phi Beta Kappa.
How Much is "Sustainable" Enough for Investors?
With no universal definition of the word sustainability, how do investors, consultants, startups, and established corporations find a way to speak the same language? How do they define, measure, and monitor the impact of each project or investment? Do we need new technologies or certifications to make this process easier and finally bring transparency? Join us for a discussion with many of the leading investors and thought leaders in the world of sustainability, that believe in the importance of having an impact and a corporate social responsibility, as they share the challenges they face in assessing and monitoring impact while providing possible solutions for a more sustainable future.
Gita Rao
Senior Lecturer, Finance , Sloan School of Management, MIT
Founder & Chief Pollinator, Volans Ventures
John Elkington, Founder & Chief Pollinator at Volans, is one of the founders of the global sustainability movement, an experienced advisor to business, and a highly regarded keynote speaker and contributor, from conferences to boards and advisory boards.
John tackles some of the world's most challenging problems, helping key actors move from the responsibility agenda through resilience to regeneration. He has inspired a number of Volans' inquiries, including Project Breakthrough, Tomorrow's Capitalism Inquiry and the Green Swans Observatory. He has worked with an A-to-Z of businesses worldwide, now helping the Volans team guide multinational companies to transform towards a regenerative future.
Greg Snyders
Partner, Dalberg
Greg Snyders is a Partner with Dalberg based in Seattle. He works on a range of issues including financial inclusion, strategic planning, and long-term corporate sustainability.
As co-lead of the firm's impact investing advisory practice, Greg advises investors, development finance institutions, and private foundations on the strategy, structuring, and implementation of new funds and financing initiatives across a variety of sector areas. This includes the design and launch of new financing vehicles, the development of tailored strategies, and the assessment of new investment opportunities. In addition, Greg supports clients to design and incubate new programmatic initiatives, typically at the intersection of markets and government.
Greg holds an MBA from MIT's Sloan School of Management, an MPA in International Development from Harvard's Kennedy School of Government, and undergraduate degrees in Operations Engineering and Economics from the University of Michigan.
Anne Park
CEED Director, SEAF
Anne is the Global Director of Impact at the Small Enterprise Assistance Funds (SEAF) which is an impact investing firm which invests in small and growing businesses (SGBs) in emerging and frontier markets. She is also the Deputy Director at the Center for Entrepreneurship and Executive Development (CEED) which is a business unit within SEAF which supports entrepreneurs in their growth through know-how and networks. In this role, Anne has developed the impact measurement strategy at SEAF and works closely with her team to integrate these practices into the organizations investment processes.
Prior to joining SEAF, Anne was an Investment Officer with USAID's, Private Capital Group for Africa and a Presidential Management Fellow at the Department of State's Global Entrepreneurship Program. During pandemic times Anne has rediscovered her love for playing the piano, hikes with her two kids, and has learned the lyrics to almost every Pixar and Disney song from the last 10 years.
Lissa Glasgo
Manager, Global Impact Investing Network
Lissa Glasgo serves on the GIIN's IRIS/Impact Measurement & Management team, leading the development of thematic content for IRIS+ through the Navigating Impact Project process, acting as an advisor on the GIIN's Impact Performance Studies, and driving development of technologies to enable greater integration of IRIS+ into third-party data platforms. Prior to joining the GIIN, Glasgo's professional experience included work on education, gender, mHealth, and reproductive health through the Institute for Reproductive Health at Georgetown University and the US Peace Corps in Benin, and on impact measurement strategy for solar- and tech-focused social enterprises in the Philippines and South Africa. Glasgo holds a Masters in Global Affairs with a focus on social enterprise, research methods, and gender from the Jackson Institute at Yale University and a BA from Rice University.
Advocating from Within: Building Capacity and Measuring Personal Impact
After a day of exploring diverse perspectives in the world of metrics & measurement, we close out our summit by focusing on individual activism within organizations. How do you channel your personal concerns and knowledge into collective action that addresses sustainability issues? How do you measure that progress? This panel will bring together emerging voices to help us reflect and discover the path ahead for capacity building.
Aithan Shapira
Founder, Tilt
Aithan Shapira (MFA PhD) is an established artist, Lecturer at MIT Sloan, and founder of Tilt, a culture design and leadership transformation firm focused on change-ability. As facilitator and developmental coach, he draws on 20+ years of transforming creative process into cultural practice that he is applying with global leaders taking on the UN SDGs as well as a range of organizations including NASA, Google, and Roche. Aithan serves on McKinsey's think tank for Learning Innovation and has pioneered progressive curricula at the edge of leadership and skills retraining for the future of work at MIT Sloan, Harvard iLab, Stanford d.school, and the Berklee Institute for Creative Entrepreneurship. Over the past 5 years Aithan has trained more than 12,000 leaders, given over 100 keynotes, consulted for governments working with circular perspective, and more than 30 Fortune 500 through organizations in health, technology, finance, and energy.
Ame Igharo
Project Manager, Resilient Food and Forests, EDF+Business, Environmental Defense Fund
Ame works with leading food and agriculture companies to improve the sustainability of consumer goods products. Her primary areas of expertise include sustainable agriculture, deforestation, green supply chains and sustainable development. Prior to her time with EDF+Business, Ame spent over a decade as a business strategist and marketer in the beauty industry where she built and grew several brands.
Viviana Alvarez Sanchez
Former Head of Sustainability, North America Unilever
With 15 years of experience in the Consumer Goods Industry, Viviana is the former Head of Sustainability for Unilever North America. Prior to this, she was the Head of Corporate Strategy in the US. She has also been part of the Global Corporate Strategy team in London supporting Unilever's company medium-long term plans at a Global Level, with an emphasis in Inclusive Capitalism and supporting the CEO and Executive team in further integrating sustainability into Unilever's Corporate Strategy. Viviana has an Executive MBA from ESADE Business School in Barcelona and BSBA in Business Management. She recently completed her executive education at Harvard Business School and University of Oxford on Circular Economy, Sustainable Development, Leadership and Scenario Planning. She is currently finishing an Executive course on Sustainability Leadership in Yale with WBCSD and INSEAD on Leading Organizations in Disruptive Times. Viviana is the Co-founder of H2H ("Help to Haiti") since 2010, an NGO in Haiti. She is the Advisory Board Member of 3 organizations: The Centre of Responsible Business for Berkeley University, Sustainable Brands and The Recycling Partnership. She is the recipient of the 2019 SDG Media Award - United Nations.
Session descriptions
© Copyright 2014-2016 MIT. All rights reserved. Questions, comments, or suggestions? Please contact us at sustainabilitysummit at mit dot edu.