John Elkington

There are few colleagues I have felt as close an affection for as Richard Northcote, who I first came across at ICI Polyurethanes in the 1990s, then worked with at Bayer MaterialScience and then at Covestro, where he was latterly Chief Sustainability Officer.

Flew to Glasgow yesterday with his former Covestro colleagues Rachel Owen and Patrick Thomas, for his funeral. his was held at the Holmsford Bridge Crematorium, Dreghorn, Irvine, and was one of the most glorious funerals I have taken part in.

Profoundly impressed by his family, his wife Meabh, his sons Alex and Callum, and his daughters Catriona and Roisin.

Aiming to fly back to Heathrow in the evening, Rachel, Patrick and I had to leave the reception early, only to have the flight cancelled out from under us – after a fire alert at the Heathrow control tower.

Queued for hours, but managed to get beds in a nearby hotel – and then caught an early flight back to London City.

Magic moment was standing on the beach, overlooking Arran, watching two seals swimming leisurely by. The grief is less pacific, coming in waves.

Delighted to appear in ‘The New Ism’, a podcast by social entrepreneur superstar Mel Young and Alex Matthews. My only regret in the podcast‘s 47 minutes running time is that I said that the optical experiments in Hannover mentioned by Thomas Kuhn were from the 18th century – when I meant 19th. But what’s a century between friends?

Across to Köln with Louse (Kjellerup Roper) and Richard (Roberts) for a stunning handover ceremony  between former Covestro CEO Patrick Thomas and incoming CEO Markus Steilemann.

Stonkingly hot evening in converted warehouse, but wonderful fireworks – and a great session the following morning with Eric Bischof and Burcu Unal of Covestro. I first met Burcu in Shanghai a few weeks ago, with the late lamented Richard Northcote.

Much saddened to hear yesterday from Tom Burke of the death of Tessa Tennant on Saturday. We really did all squeak it in under the wire with the celebration of her lifetime achievement award on 28 June, courtesy of Aviva.

More details on the evening can be found here.

The videos are great – and I get to say a couple of things in the middle one, ‘Highlights from the Video Corner’.

In one way or another, all of us were saying the same thing. We loved Tessa, we deeply wish she had been with us longer, but we feel deeply privileged to have known her – in my case since the days when the Green Alliance was still in Chandos Place.

Also served on her advisory board back in the day at the Merlin Ecology Fund and NPI.

Very keen to help with the world’s first sculpture symbolising the transformative power of green finance.

GreenBiz just published my latest blog as part of The Elkington Report, this time reviewing the worldwide reactions to the Harvard Business Review post I did – proposing a product recall for the Triple Bottom Line.