John Elkington

 

A delightful team away day in Greenwich, at least for those who could make it. We kicked off at The Old Brewery, then went for a wander to the top of Observatory Hill, then back to play what Astrid told us was Viking Chess – but which we were forced to adapt heavily, because we didn’t have the right utensils. So we used bottles of water as the relevant pieces, to the sound of slightly faltering operatic arias from the nearby building – and by the end of the game we were thinking of trademarking the wondrous Bottle Battle. Afterwards, Sam and I boarded a river boat back to Embankment. Wonderful views of the city, but it would be great if they would wash the windows.

 

Flew into Mumbai first thing this morning and was then taken to the wrong Taj hotel before arriving at the Taj Mahal Palace Hotel. Laster in the day, I spoke at a Tata sustainability event this evening, with people like Tata & Sons Chairman Cyrus Mistry.

I referenced the fact that our new ‘player,’ The Stretch Agenda, features a Chief Stretch Officer who is also Indian and also called Mistry, though, as it happens, this was coincidental.

Wonderful to see something of a friend and former colleague, Shankar Venkataswaran, now Chief of the Tata Sustainability Group. Over lunch, he told me he is now in the dream job, at least for him.

Then out to the airport for the trip back to London – where I am due to shower at Heathrow and head directly across to Docklands for a session with Tesco CEO Dave Lewis. The store we due to meet at is in the old Surrey Docks, where way back in 1976 a bunch of us contrived to create an alternative version of the UN Habitat Conference then happening in Vancouver, ours called People’s Habitat.

Ever since I was small, I have been fascinated by military history, from the Crusades (something that began when we were in Cyprus and Israel in the 1950s), through the religious wars in Europe (where my interest began in Northern Ireland, again in the 1950s, and continued at Bryanston, where at times I created my own history course on religious and civil wars) and then the World Wars in which various family members had been embroiled, including my namesake John Elkington, the extraordinary Lieutenant Colonel whose dire misfortunes in 1916 are chronicled here, and after whom I was named.

At the same time, particularly since I was doing my M.Phil in city planning at UCL in the early 1970s, I have been fascinated by the collision and integration of old and new styles of building. Indeed, this was a key theme on my thesis, which landed me in much trouble when it came to the final assessment – the underlying message being at total odds with the approach of Lord Llewelyn Davies, who bestrode the institution at the time.

All of which made a couple of images in today’s Financial Times jump off the page. They showed details of Daniel Libeskind’s extension for the Military History Museum in Dresden, illustrating a piece by Marcus Binney.

Here are some samples from an interview I did on the future of sustainability reporting, and related issues, with Nelmara Arbex.

Quite a day, kicking off with a Megatrends session at the NEXUS Europe Youth Summit at One Whitehall Place, where I had come last night for an International Integrated Reporting Council (IIRC) event. I spoke alongside Anne Lise Kjaer and John Straw, and met some fascinating people, both known and new, including Benjamin Hennig of Worldmapper – who did the world map featured on the front cover of our new report, The Stretch Agenda: Breakthrough in the Boardroom. We owe him quite a debt of gratitude.

Then raced back to the office, at one stage literally running through the streets of Covent Garden after our taxi got stuck in solid state traffic, for a UN Global Compact webinar on ‘Board Adoption and Oversight of Corporate Sustainability.’ This was part of the Global Compact’s Board Programme, where I am now involved. The other speakers were Martin Reeves of the Boston Consulting Group and Dianne Dillon-Ridgley, former Board Director at Interface. A huge new agenda emerging here – and our Stretch Agenda seems well placed to be helpful.

Next, after some work on things like my latest round of columns/bolgs and my Tata presentation for Mumbai next week, I travelled across to the Royal Exchange for my first meeting as Chair of the Social Stock Exchange‘s Admissions Panel. Great people, fascinating discussion – and a reminder of some of the challenges that this field faces in reaching true scale, both in terms of revenues and social impact.

Then home for quiet dinner with Elaine and Jane Davenport, a friend from the early 1960s. As I walked back past Barnes Pond, a woman pointed me towards a pair of swans sitting on the Green, like bookends on either side of four fluffy cygnets. Delightful.