How Leeds alumni are making the case for sustainability.
Working in financial risk management gave Ralph Drabic a larger perspective than, say, what he might consider in doing due diligence on a proposed loan or deal.
āUltimately, if thereās no planet, there are no financial services,ā said Drabic (Fin, Mgmtā07), a vice president and senior manager of the environmental and social impact audit team at Wells Fargo. āIf we donāt get this right for our planet, for our environment, none of what we have matters.ā
Many professionals feel a sense of urgency and responsibility in adopting better business practices that benefit the environment. But because Leeds weighs environment, equality and sustainability as heavily as finance, marketing and accounting in creating academic programs, alumni often find themselves in corner officesāor just outside of themāwhere they have opportunities to advocate for practices and policies that create meaningful change.
For Megan Lorenzen (MBAā21), the idea that her work can make a difference brought her to Salesforce, where sheās senior manager of sustainability. Her work involves collaboration with partners in various business units to understand needs and create impact.
āWe believe we have a responsibility to help bring the entire community with us,ā said Lorenzen, who was named to GreenBiz Badass Women, a power list of key players in environmental justice, in the spring. āIf we reach our company targets and get to the finish line alone, we will have failed to actually impact climate change.ā
āAccountants are going to save the worldā
The good news, she said, is leaders are listening when it comes to not just setting targets but also the strategies that help companies meet emissions pledges and climate goals.
āI always say that accountants are going to save the world,ā Lorenzen said. āYou are increasingly seeing accountants who are now ESG professionals. And our business partnersālegal, government affairs, financeāare critical to our success.āLorenzen and Drabic pointed out that a lot of leadersā actions are being driven by changing regulations, whether from the Fed or SEC. That outside pressure has helped Drabic find a ready audience when he presents ideas to his team and stakeholders.
āIt makes it easier for an audit team to have credibility when it comes to what regulatory activities are taking place and what needs to happen,ā he said. āWhen youāre a bank, the last thing you want to do is run afoul of regulators, so their work is pivotal for teams like ours.ā
And while Lorenzen said that growing credibility has made now āan incredible time to work in this industry,ā that wasnāt always the case. Just ask Kathryn Wendell, executive director of Leedsā Center for Ethics and Social Responsibility (CESR).
āWhen I graduated from college back in 2000, I was very interested in corporate social responsibility and sustainability, but there was no clear career path to get there,ā said Wendell, whose work experience includes corporate responsibility roles at Chevron and World Bank.
āToday, this whole field is evolving so fast that even people like me are struggling to try to stay on top of whatās happening. But itās exciting beĀcause, as we rethink risk, weāre seeing sustainability take on a stronger focus for private-sector leadership.ā
An ESG portfolio
CESR plays a key role in helping prepare students to lead those conversations. In addition to student competitions, the center supports students enrolled in the social responsibility and ethics certificate and CESR Fellows organization for undergrads, as well a new MBA pathway in ESG and sustainability.
Wendell said the centerās programming is an outreach of the clear strength in sustainability and ESG coming out of our faculty research.
āThis deep caring about the environment and society is what brings a lot of people here to Boulderāboth faculty and students. Itās a shared passion and expertise that cuts across our school and makes us unique.ā
In fact, that helped bring David Drake, associate professor of strategy, entrepreneurship and operations, to Leeds. Before moving into higher education, he was a director at Random House, where one of his projects was recommending whether to print books with recycled paper.
It turned into a much more involved project as Drake worked to understand the hurdles with partnersālike paper mills and customersāand internal stakeholders. Ultimately, he advised the CEO to use recycled paper, though the economic case was unclear.
āIt was a harder sell, at the time, because customers purchase based on the content of the book, not the paper it is printed onāif they want the new John Grisham, they generally want the new John Grisham whether or not it is printed on recycled paper,ā Drake said.
Random House went forward with the initiative, he said, because the cost was reasonable, the impact was significant, āand we were a privately held company whose owners cared about doing better. We felt the economic upsideāif there was oneāwas through an improved potential of landing book deals with authors who shared that ethos.ā
Drake has brought lessons from that project to his research. He studies innovative business models that improve quality of life through resource preservation and greater access to products and services. His current focus is mobile money, which gives people in rural and underdeveloped areas access to banking services.
āItās another example, like cases in health care and education, where people innovated in unique ways to bring products and services to people who havenāt had access to them,ā Drake said. āIf you design that business model well, it can be profitable as well as beneficial for society.ā
Even alumni who arenāt yet in leadership roles are finding ways to influence the C-suite. In his role as a deal advisory senior associate with KPMG, Alex Freimuth, CPA (Acct, Finā18; MAcctā19) has carved out a niche in the energy space; āat first, I was seeing more traditional oil and gas deals, but a couple years later, the majority of my work tends to have a renewable focus,ā he said.
Economics, environment ācan go hand in handā
Freimuthās deal book tends to follow larger energy market trends. So oil and gas deals may be more prevalent as prices rise, while renewable energy deals are driven by a favorable regulatory environment and the associated tax incentives for those investments. Heās also seen traditional oil and gas companies spend more time analyzing and executing clean-energy investments.
āProfitability and sustainability do not have to be mutually exclusive. They can go hand in hand.ā
Alex Freimuth, CPA (Acct, Finā18; MAcctā19), Deal Advisory Senior Associate,ĢżKPMG
āThe main thing for leaders right now is balancing how to make decisions that promote sustainability while still remaining financially responsible to shareholders,ā Freimuth said. āThis allows executives to address stakeholders and communicate that these decisions are founded in the interest of our business and but that also accomplish something in the interest of the broader community.
āProfitability and sustainability do not have to be mutually exclusive. They can go hand in hand.ā
Thatās the same hopeful tone Drabic struck when thinking about how his teamās work could help leaders and decision-makers set the course for the future.
āThatās what I like about this audit teamāweāre the last line of defense,ā Drabic said. āThis is the influence we can have on a major bank that ultimately plays a role in driving this transition.ā