Human Resource Development Masterclass
Human Resource Development Masterclass
HRD & Sustainability
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In this final episode of Season 3, guests Dr. Matthijs Bal (University of Lincoln, United Kingdom), Dr. Laura L. Bierema (University of Georgia, United States), and Dr. Isabel Rimanoczy (The Sustainability Mindset Principles) discuss the relationship between HRD and Sustainability, including:
- What is meant by the term Sustainability?
- What is the connection between Sustainability and the concepts of work and the workplace?
- What is the relationship between Sustainability and HRD?
- To what extent does HRD have a significant voice on Sustainability within organizations?
- How can HRD and HRM work together on Sustainability?
- How can organizations measure their current state on Sustainability and use those measures to inform their Sustainability priorities?
- How can we develop a new consciousness on Sustainability, and what role could HRD play in its development?
- and much more.
For full details on the HRD Masterclass series, visit hrdmasterclass.com, and for the bios of the guest scholars visit allbypodcast.com/hrm.
For more information on the Academy of Human Resource Development, visit ahrd.org - by being a member of AHRD, you can access bonus materials from podcast episodes.
This episode is sponsored by The University of Georgia, Mary Frances Early College of Education, Department of Lifelong Education, Administration, and Policy, Program of Adult Learning, Leadership, and Organization Development. For full information, check out their website at https://coe.uga.edu/academics/concentrations/learning-leadership-and-organization-development .
The ultimate place that I would like to see HRD is that we are actually socially conscious and sustainable and mindfully and actively challenging policies and practices that detract from the ability to be sustainable.
SPEAKER_00Welcome to Human Resource Development Masterclass, the podcast series from the Academy of Human Resource Development, the organization that leads HRD through research. I'm your host, Darren Short, and here in our third season, we're exploring the relationship between HRD and other topics and disciplines, with the help of leading authors, researchers, and scholars. Today our focus is the relationship between HRD and sustainability, and our guest scholars are Dr. Matthias Bull of the University of Lincoln, Dr. Laura Beermer of the University of Georgia, and Dr. Isabel Rimanozi, author of the book The Sustainability Mindset Principles, all of whom join me for conversations recorded during August and September of 2022. Our episode today is structured into two halves. In the first 30 minutes, we look at what we mean by the term sustainability and its relationship to work, the workplace, and HRD. And then in the second 30 minutes, we dig deeper into that relationship between sustainability and HRD. You can find out all about the questions explored in the episode, the three guest scholars, and also the episode sponsor by visiting allbypodcast.com forward slash sustainability. Talking of sponsorship, Human Resource Development Masterclass is only made possible thanks to the wonderful support of our sponsors who cover all of the costs associated with the series and so enable us to release them free of charge to listeners like you. I encourage you to show your thanks by checking them out and letting them know just how much their sponsorship means to you. Today's episode is sponsored by the University of Georgia, Mary Francis Early College of Education, Department of Lifelong Education, Administration and Policy, whose program of adult learning, leadership and organization development equips learners to gain deep knowledge and skills to lead learning and change to help adults, teams and organizations thrive, with their blended and online Masters of Education, innovative hybrid executive doctorate of education, and world-class research training in their PhD program. They also have graduate certificates in organization coaching and transformative leadership. Using their unique framework that emphasizes the theory and practice needed to strategically and holistically develop healthy, sustainable organizations, learners gain a mastery of multiple areas. To find out more, check out their website by doing a Google search for UGA Space LLOD. You'll find them at the top of the search results. Right, let's dive into the episode. Welcome to our episode on HRD and sustainability. Let's start by meeting today's three guest scholars. And first of all, I would like to welcome Matthias Bull, who is Professor of Responsible Management at the University of Lincoln in the United Kingdom. Previously, Matthias has been affiliated to the universities of Bath in the UK, as well as Amsterdam and Rotterdam in the Netherlands. Matthias is a work psychologist with a PhD in human resource management. His special interest is in the psychology of work, and he's recently published around the psychology of climate anxiety and inertia and the need for more radical perspectives on the sustainable transformation of our economy and organizations. So welcome, Matthias. Thank you, Darren. It's very nice to be here. My second guest for the episode is Laura Beermer, professor in the College of Education in the University of Georgia's program of adult learning, leadership, and organization development. Laura's research interests include workplace learning, career development, women's development, organization development, executive coaching, leadership, and critical HRD. Laura holds both bachelor's and master's degrees from Michigan State University and a doctorate in adult education from the University of Georgia. She has over 160 publications, including 10 books and the award-winning text, Adult Learning Linking Theory and Practice with Dr. Sharon B. Merriam. Welcome, Laura.
SPEAKER_02Darren, thank you so much. And it's really great to be back again and looking forward to this conversation.
SPEAKER_00Excellent. So my third guest for the episode is Isabel Riminozi, who has over 17 years' experience working on the sustainability mindset, a concept she researched and developed based on her research at Columbia University. Isabel has authored numerous scholarly papers, book chapters, and books for a professional and academic audience, seeking to accelerate change by developing a mindset for a better world. She developed the Sustainability Mindset Indicator, which has been recognized twice by the International Forum Reimagine Education Awards, sponsored by Wharton University. Welcome, Isabel.
SPEAKER_03Thank you very much, Darren. I'm very honored to be invited to this podcast. I'm grateful for your initiative.
SPEAKER_00Okay, so in terms of a good place to start, I was thinking it might uh help listeners if we begin by exploring the term sustainability so that listeners are clear on that, ready for when we dig deeper into the relationship between sustainability and HRD. So what do we mean by that term sustainability?
SPEAKER_03Well, it's interesting because uh 20 years ago we would ask what is sustainability, and people would look around and say, Well, something that sustains, right? However, there is an early definition of sustainable development that came from the Bruntland Commission in the late 80s. And the definition was that sustainable development is a development that meets the current needs without jeopardizing the needs of the future generation. And if we think of what it meant in 1986 or 87, we have a different understanding today. I think today, with all the daily impacts in our face about climate change-related events, um, pollution, social issues, we have uh we are hit every day in the news with so much information about what is going wrong that I think it is about time to review the definition. And I think today it's not just about meeting our present needs, it's also about revisiting what are our needs really and what is the difference between the wants and the needs. Also, not so much about uh making sure the needs of the future generation are met, but also how are we restoring? How are we mitigating? How are we addressing immediate needs? Like when we have a climate event, we have an immediate need that needs to be paid attention to, and also anticipate how can we mitigate uh future and the short-term events. So I think it uh has expanded our uh responsibility about what does it mean to work for sustainability.
SPEAKER_02I've been looking back and it started appearing in the HRD literature, you know, probably in the early 2000s. And you know, I think even 20 more than 20 years ago, we were beginning to realize that the world is in trouble. And I think that sustainability helps us try to restore uh, you know, not only environmental equilibrium, but uh hopefully economic and human um equilibrium in society. So I see it you know, kind of in a big view. And then how does that get translated down to the decisions and behaviors and interactions we make in organizations and in communities?
SPEAKER_01I remember the the Bruntland report, and going one step further back is uh we have of course had the Club of Roma report in the early 1970s, so also pointing to the relevance of a more sustainable approach towards um uh how we run basically global society. And it's interesting also always to go back to these early reports and see how some points have been picked up on, but others uh have not. And so uh I fully agree with Isabel that we I think we need an a new definition of uh sustainability uh in our present time, and uh but but we I think we can also learn a lot still from uh from from the Bruntland report and the especially the balancing of the the the different types of capitals so the the the environmental, financial, social, and so on.
SPEAKER_00So I'm I'm conscious that all three of you have got experience of working on sustainability in different countries and different parts of the world. So I wonder, based on your experience, have you found that the concept of sustainability is understood similarly around the world, or does sustainability tend to look a bit different in different parts of the world or different cultures?
SPEAKER_03I think to your question, Darren, the definition is based on the experience. I mean, yes, we have theoretical definitions, and when we can all agree at a scholarly definition, but when we go to the day-to-day, the experience of unsustainability is different, whether you are in the Philippines or you are sitting in Finland. And so what I see, for example, is that people in developing countries are dealing with pollution or also the typhoons, you know, that leave uh the people with the least resources, without shelter and uh losing everything that they have in countries that don't have an economic reserves to deal and help out people in such a distress. So that is a different reality than what I see, for example, in developed countries where people are more looking at research. What can we research? How can we innovate for the future? How can we do some in new innovative products that can help uh the SDGs or some of the aspects that are more critical, but it's more looking into the future.
SPEAKER_02I agree certainly with Isabel's um thoughts here. And and um, I think in terms of thinking about it globally, overwhelmingly, that we are trying to seek some kind of um balance in the world that doesn't create more injustice, um, whether that's you know social injustice or environmental injustice or economic injustice. So again, I think I think it would vary, but the principles stay the same. They are you know, trying to create some kind of maintenance of a healthy society.
SPEAKER_01I agree with with what has been previously said. And for instance, in my own business school, where I work a lot with people from across the world, in in many countries, in many so-called uh poorer countries, often there is an uh an imperative towards economic growth in order to lift people out of poverty. But at the same time, they're also confronted with uh growth of industry and so on, which comes at the cost of uh of lots of pollution. That's why also I think sustainability, even though we might have different interpretations of it uh globally, is also something that really um has a universal relevance, of course, because ultimately, of course, we live on the same planet, so we're all dependent collectively as a global society on on how uh how we sustain our planet. And it is, of course, uh quite tragic to observe that uh that often it is the poorer countries that suffer most from uh from, for instance, climate change.
SPEAKER_00That actually might be a nice segue into exploring sustainability in the in the workplace. Ultimately, I wanted to get us to a point where we're talking about the connection between sustainability and human resource development. So maybe a useful half step is to explore what the relationship is between sustainability and the concepts of work and the workplace. So so how do you see that relationship and potentially how how has that relationship changed over the years?
SPEAKER_01Again, here a very brief note to um history. Um the the first point where sustainability became really integrated into organizational life in in business was perhaps when when John Elkington coined the term uh triple bottom line in the 1990s, 1904. So the the three Ps of sustainability, so people, planet, and profit. Uh and and of course, that's quite a famous concept. But the the term and the relevance of sustainability, I think, has also been um has seen a quite a similar trajectory as uh as the literature and the use of uh a concept like CSR, so corporate social responsibility over the years, um, even though perhaps uh um with a very genuine and authentic concern for, uh, for instance, in the case of CSR, the the social responsibility of organizations, and in in the concept of the the triple bottom line, the a genuine concern for the well-being of the planet and the relationship of organizations to that. We we can also observe over the years how it's has become um instrumentalized in that sense. So sustainability has become a concept that has been, let's put it bluntly, in that sense, uh, abused by many organizations. So to claim that they engage in a wide variety of uh uh sustainability initiatives, so sustainable supply chains, uh sustainable production, um, and so on. And and the problem, of course, as we often see, is that it becomes some kind of rhetoric. And and John Elkington recently has also come back to his earlier work and criticizing himself. So that this was quite interesting in the sense that the idea, of course, of people, planet, and profit and the balance between concerns in business for uh the well-being of people and the well-being of the planet, and uh at the same time profit may also have some kind of mythical notion, and that's also where I'm interested as a psychologist, is that that there is also uh the fantasy that we can just continue business as usual and that we can create profitable business and uh save the planet and uh keep people healthy and uh engaged and uh not burning them out and so on. And so, in that sense, a wide uh variety of uh of sustainabilities um uh as part of uh the business as usual, and that's increasingly so in the literature by researchers across the world, has been problematized and uh and also sometimes exposed as as an empty term. So the the the that sustainability has really become an empty term that really doesn't have any meaning beyond rhetoric, PR for organizations. I think at the point where we are, and I think that also relates quite nicely to what Isabel was saying earlier, I think it's also time in organizations to really have a new definition, a new perspective on sustainability, so that we really have to capture the genuine value of sustainability beyond the the kind of instrumentalization of it towards uh um uh a PR or rhetoric and really uh retain the the idea, the notion of sustainability as something that every organization um should uh prioritize in the sense of uh the sustainability of of the planet, of environmental resources, of the environment itself, but also of course of people across the supply chain, so um suppliers, employees, and so on.
SPEAKER_03I like what you were saying, Matthias, about the thinking has to be upgraded a notch. And I think it is the revision of our paradigm, and this paradigm where we are swimming like a fish in the water without noticing is what is due for revision, even the language that is still used, natural capital, that is a totally economistic uh paradigm, right? Or human resources, are they really resources? Is it human capital? The terms that we are using without thinking uh are very telling about what is the paradigm that we are operating out, and if we are still agreeing on that, because we can see today what is the impact, the results, the consequences of an economistic paradigm shaping everything. That I think is where a gap is originating because we see what is happening, we see the impact. It's not no longer someone says, Well, you know, and 20 years from now we will have this and that. We can see it every day. And so to draw back uh the this connecting, uh connecting the dots and say, well, where does this come from? Oh, which of our behaviors are actually creating this? That I think is a big point of leverage, and in that sense, the human uh resource development or talent development uh uh departments and organizations, I think they have a very interesting opportunity because uh these are the professionals that are focused on what are the what do we need to develop in in our people, in our leaders? What type of mindset do we need for the world that we are living in? And so I think that that is a very interesting opportunity because all the others are busy doing, and they're not not paying attention, what is it that we need to know, how do we have to think? They are busy doing and just operating out of these worldviews that are in question.
SPEAKER_02Yes, I certainly agree. And you know, and I think that as we think about sustainability, you know, and and we really have to shift um, as uh Alan Skully Ross has written, um, into a new consciousness with a new epistemology to really embrace a sustainability mindset in the workplace uh and in of course society, because I think that organizations and you know, and I think specifically HRD is really stuck in modernity and performativity and the Levitardian sense that um it's all about profit and productivity and performance. And, you know, where are people in that? Where is the environment? And, you know, I think to shift our ethos is a huge challenge, not only for organizations but society, that we know really redefining uh what human sustainability means and looks like. And I think that's that's a huge challenge for us because it's a mind shift as much as it is a behavioral shift.
SPEAKER_00So I wonder if this is the right point then to start digging specifically into the area of human resource development and and what we see is the connection between sustainability and and HRD, and as part of that, the implications for education and for and for training.
SPEAKER_02You know, when I think of HRD, the roots of HRD really were grounded in humanism and doing no harm. And I think it shifted in the latter half of the 20th century to this performative mindset that productivity and profit and performance, as I mentioned before, kind of the three P's are primary and that whatever happens beyond that is secondary. And certainly I agree with Isabel's point about the term human resources. Um, I find it cringy myself because I think you know, I would prefer to our color field human development. And if you look at the discourse in human resource development, you know, you'll you will see things like unleashing human productivity or human performance, which is uh Dick Swanson at Holton quote. And you know, performance is not bad, but I think if if we aren't attaching it to greater good for a holistic picture, it's difficult. Uh in 2000, actually, I was reflecting back on my work in this area. Um, I wrote a book chapter for the Handbook of Adult and Continuing Education. HRD. And at that time, I actually wrote about globally responsible HRD and the notion that maybe corporations and organizations shouldn't own learning and development. Maybe it is something that should be under the accountability of a community and that it would be less attached to only serving profit. And then I worked with uh Michelle DeBundo in 2004 and we we tried to define what levels of socially conscious HRD looked like. And very briefly, socially unconscious HRD, I think is the first and lowest level, is where organizations are probably complying with the law, but there's not any awareness or ethical commitment to how their actions and interactions create inequity or lack of sustainability. And then there's the compliance mindset that's like, okay, well, the law requires us to do this. And so we will do the bare minimum to stay out of the news, keep ourselves out of trouble. And then, you know, I think we see a lot of what I would call enlightened self-interest HRD, where it's compliance with the law, but it's the PR optics. And, you know, almost every organization now has a, you know, a sustainability statement of something, and you go to their website and it's peppered with the right language, but I think often not followed with consistent behaviors. And then the ultimate uh place that I would like to see HRD is that we are actually socially conscious and sustainable. And that is the notion of doing the right thing and mindfully and actively challenging policies and practices that detract from the ability to be sustainable. And so, you know, that's where I really think that we need to go. It's interesting too that, you know, and some of the people in HRD who've written about um corporate social responsibility, sustainability, and so forth, and that would be certainly I mentioned of Scully Ross, Darlene Russ Eft, Garavan, and Maguire are people who come to mind. A very consistent theme is the ethical perspectives and the responsibility that we have and this idea that we really do need a change in consciousness. I think in every um piece of HRD specific writing I've looked at, it's you know, looking at the triple bottom line of you know, people, economy, and the environment. And um it's called different things. I think that um in my own work, I really started with corporate social responsibility. But I think that, you know, again, that's a little bit too maybe beholden in the enlightened self-interest mode of we will do what looks good and will keep our customers and markets happy, but maybe not because it's right by our people and our community. And then I think we the discourse shifted at some point into corporate sustainability, is something that Garavan and McGuire wrote about, which is I think a different mindset about sustainability, and then shifting into we see here about certainly sustainability, our main topic today, but organization health and green HR. And again, I think these are aspirational um states of being. So, you know, as I think about where I hope we go, is that it becomes part of our essence. You know, I don't find a lot of curriculum in HRD programs when I review them that look at these issues. You know, there might be a stray course on diversity, equity, and inclusion. I know, I don't believe I've seen a course on, for instance, sustainable or socially conscious HRD. And I think those are the kinds of curricular changes that we need to be looking at in terms of training HR people, but I think we have a long way to go to really elevate um the consciousness about HRD and how we teach about it and practice it.
SPEAKER_00Thomas, you you've taken a look at sustainability through the lens of human resource management and HRM. Um, having heard what Laura just talked about on sustainability in HRD, do you see a similar picture when you've looked at sustainability and HRM?
SPEAKER_01Yeah, perhaps in human resource management, there is a little bit more attention in over last years towards the issue of sustainability. So we have the concept of sustainable HRM and also a concept like sustainable careers. What we see in those literatures is that it's it's often focused on um individual sustainability. So or uh so in the case of sustainable careers, whether a career of an individual is sustainable over time, but it it's it's totally unrelated to uh any kind of notion of environmental sustainability, for instance. And in our in our analysis of sustainable HRM, we see again um a lot of uh uh greenwashing there, um, use of uh of concepts such as sustainable HRM that is not really any different from existing dominant uh or mainstream uh conceptualizations of HRM. So ultimately, as also Laura uh indicated, very much uh driven by um by uh uh uh the imperative of uh productivity. So in my work that that we are doing with in my business school in Lincoln, we tend to prioritize at the moment a focus on uh the unsustainability, which is uh in that sense a much more illuminating uh concept because if we focus on the unsustainability of HR practices, for instance, in terms of uh the well-being of employees, we can highlight actually what how how unsustainable organizations often are. And so ultimately the notion of sustainability, environmental sustainability, is uh is quite incompatible with uh with uh a performance uh uh logic. Um so at in the end, uh when the more radical choice has to be made, it's often at the expense of sustainability and that and where profit is being prioritized. I I remember, for instance, um uh the Dutch uh English oil uh uh giant shell um did not even meet its own targets for green investments last year because it was simply not profitable enough. So even they did not even meet their own uh green targets. Uh so it's the that makes it quite difficult to get it really integrated into the daily functioning of organizations and in uh alike in in in uh in in in human resource management.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, thank you, Matthias. And and you know, I think that part of the shift in the mindset and consciousness also needs to be away from the stockholder or shareholders mentality to stakeholder. And research for another project that I was doing over the summer was um basically allegiance to stockholders has historically been unquestioned by corporate leaders. And Milton Friedman, a Nobel Prize-winning economist, wrote a book, um, actually a 1962 book called Capitalism and Freedom. And he stated in that book there is one and only one social responsibility of business to use its resources and engage in activities designed to increase its profits. And more recently, though, um Bauer and Payne, this is 2017, actually traced the rise of the shareholder mentality to the 70s, 1970s. And um they basically argued that um, you know, the error at the heart of corporate leadership is to maximize shareholder value. And it's they continued, it is not. Um this was a Harvard Business Review in 2017, and that basically um, you know, I think there that we do see some shifts in high-platform um publications like Harvard Business Review. But um I also want to point out that in 2019, nearly 200 CEOs of major companies like Apple and Pepsi and Walmart signed a pact that shareholder value is no longer the only purpose of a corporation and that they should also invest in people, be environmental stewards, and engaged in ethical business practices. And yeah, I think that's a huge shift. Now, I think time will tell if they will hold true to that pact because I think as you point out, Royal Dutch Shell couldn't even make its own uh environmentally sustainable um investing goals. So there's a lot of work to be done. But I think there's hope on the horizon that we may be seeing a shift. Of course, I think our hand is being forced by environmental and social crisis.
SPEAKER_03I work in sort of two ends with educators, which are our generation, and with younger associate professors that are just coming in uh into higher education with their first courses and with their students. And what I notice is that uh the difficulty to let go or notice our paradigm and then consider an alternative is higher in people of our age because obviously we grew up in a world that seemed that could work like this forever, and it was good for us, so why change? Um talking from a privileged uh developing side, right? What I found is that uh younger professors don't take this so easily, they are more prone to question because also they have their whole life ahead and they say, Well, this is not working, so what do we need to change? Uh they are more open to question and change behaviors, and not to mention the students or the siblings of the students that are not even in higher education but are enrolled in or follow some of these uh children's movements. So I think that we are getting closer to a tipping point where those that are making the decisions based on short-term on profit uh maybe other people, and that may bring a faster change than we can uh see now if it would just be incremental changes.
SPEAKER_01In that sense, I think um I totally agree with with what has been said earlier about this need for a revision of our paradigm for a new consciousness, and I think that's I think that's that has a quite a radical um uh meaning, this this new consciousness. I think we really need to more radically uh break away from this idea of uh um the business uh case, the business logic, so the the the prioritization of profit beyond uh everything else. And I see that also very quite clearly uh often among my own students. So sometimes students who just come from from a secondary school into university, they're already uh they have already internalized um this idea of that business functions as a machine for productivity and profit. But the task that is upon us to contribute to this new consciousness, new mindset is quite an enormous one.
SPEAKER_00We'll be back in a moment with more from Isabel, Laura and Matthias as we dig into the relationship between HRD and sustainability. First though, here's an important reminder that this episode is brought to you thanks to the wonderful sponsorship support of the University of Georgia, Mary Francis Early College of Education, Department of Lifelong Education, Administration and Policy, whose programme of adult learning, leadership and organization development equips learners to gain deep knowledge and skills to lead learning and change to help adults, teams and organizations thrive, with their blended and online Masters of Education, innovative hybrid executive doctorate of education, and world-class research training in their PhD program. They also have graduate certificates in organization coaching and transformative leadership. Using their unique framework that emphasizes the theory and practice needed to strategically and holistically develop healthy, sustainable organizations, learners gain a mastery of multiple areas. To find out more, check out their website by doing a Google search for UGA space LLOD. You'll find them at the top of the search results. Right, let's return to our discussion for the second half of the episode. So welcome back to our episode on HRD and sustainability, where I'm joined by Matthias Bolt from the University of Lincoln, by Laura Beermer of the University of Georgia, and by Isabel Riminosi, author of the book The Sustainability Mindset Principles. And here in the second half of the episode, I'd like to explore some of the concepts that we touched on earlier. And to start, I'd like to continue our discussion about the connection between sustainability and HRD by exploring the extent to which HRD currently has a significant voice on sustainability within organizations. And if it doesn't have a significant voice, how it could have greater influence in the future. Well, what are your thoughts on that?
SPEAKER_02In my work over the years and a recent scan of the literature, there aren't a lot of scholars writing about sustainable HRD. So I worry we don't have a voice. And as I mentioned earlier, we are not really integrating sustainability into HRD curriculum. And I think that even though there was a 2007 survey by SHERM, it was called the Green Workplace Survey, and that survey reported 50% of survey respondents having a formal environmental policy in place. I think that is, if we see it in practice, it is less. And Sally Sandbrook actually noted that as critical HRD matures, there will be an increase in the promotion of CSR, corporate social responsibility in our field, and that there's an opportunity for us to transform workplaces into more democratic workplaces. I think some research that I also took a look at, Cosby's work at trying to define a framework for sustainable leadership in HRD, noted that HRD has taken a supportive role, if any. And I think that would certainly align with some of the earlier research I talked about that I did with Tara Fenwick on trying to actually find HR people who could really be conversant and understand the role of HRD in sustainability. Interestingly, we're so well positioned as a field to develop a sustainability strategy and developmental learning and culture change roles. I think it's been noted that it's at the core of organizational culture change, which is what we live and breathe in HRD. So I do think there's opportunity, but I actually don't think we have taken advantage of it in practice research or in curriculum.
SPEAKER_03Well, I just participated yesterday in an interview of a person who was doing his uh doctoral research on uh sustainability training for coaches. And uh, as part of that uh interview, he shared with me a document that I was unaware of, which is a joint statement of 11 institutions, 11 organizations that are either coaching training, coaching certification, facilitators training, you know, all in those areas. And I found it fascinating. And it is a two-page uh statement where they start well saying, okay, we have a short window of opportunity, and then they say, okay, what uh what is our role in supporting and creating and accelerating this awareness, committing to an increased awareness and knowledge help to reflect on the role of us as coaches, facilitators, and trainers in uh what is our practice, what is it or how can we support our clients? And as I was reading that this morning, I thought it would be very interesting if the uh uh HRD associations or networks also sign up something like that. Uh, it goes to this uh question uh how can we develop more awareness and uh and what are the tools? And obviously, there are not many, but the foundation, as you said, Laura, of uh being having a supportive role is very much in the DNA of HRD.
SPEAKER_02Oh, Isabel, I want to jump right back in here, and I'm so glad you said that. I'd love to see it. And I did actually uh have in my notes here to mention uh climatecoaches.com, which is an organization that that helps executive coaches spark uh thinking about climate change in their coaching process. So I think there are interesting ways, and I think we have to think about it at the individual one-on-one coaching level organization, the educational levels, whether it's institutions like universities or the corporate training and development, and then of course societal. So climatecoaches.com is also something I would recommend people to look at if they are interested in in ways they can individually take this on.
SPEAKER_01Thank you, Laura, also for your uh reflections on the lack of awareness among HD as scholars uh of uh the importance of sustainability. And um, I agree very much with that. Uh and and to to add to that, I also think it would be good to also think about the uh the broad meaning of sustainability, because of course there is the environmental sustainability side, which I think uh, such as the climate coaches, which I think is uh is important, but sustainability can also, of course, be understood in a much broader sense, um, for instance, including social sustainability and sustainability of people's careers in organizations, and there I think there's a lot to learn still, which HRD as a as a as a scientific field, as an applied uh practice uh can have a lot of uh contributions to. And also I think in in terms of uh when we talk about financial sustainability of organizations, um, I'm not exactly aware to what extent it's also playing out in uh in the US, but what you see, for instance, in Europe a lot is now uh a lot of public sector employees going on strike. And here we are faced with a typical uh case of the question of financial sustainability of organizations. So, on the one hand, there's huge inflation, so uh employees asking for pay raises to uh to match up with uh with uh the inflation and of course the the increased energy bills that uh that we are facing, but at the same time, um the the question then is immediately about the sus the the the financial sustainability of uh of organizations. So this is also an enormously complex uh issue. How can we actually uh achieve this? Which is uh of course uh typically an era of an area that uh that HRN also uh uh works on. So I think there's also a lot to be gained in terms of uh um having this broad idea of sustainability in mind.
SPEAKER_00Listening to your answers there makes me feel as if HRD certainly is positioned to have a more significant role, that there's plenty of potential there, and and there's clearly there's clearly different players within organizations that HRD can work with to have a greater impact. And earlier in the episode, one of those functions that we touched on was HRM. And so I'm wondering what when you look forward, can you see HRD and HRM working together more on sustainability to have this greater impact within organizations?
SPEAKER_01I certainly agree with that. Um, that HRM and HRD together can play an important role in promoting the sustainability of organizations. And in my own work, I've used the concept of workplace dignity, of human dignity at work, and also called for a rethinking of HRM into HDD. So basically, from human resource management into human dignity development, which is perhaps somewhere in between, or or forming also a link between HRM and uh HRD. So the idea that uh um if we talk about sustainability, uh we also have to distance ourselves from the idea of uh people as being human resources and uh and think about the ways through which we can actually promote uh the dignity of people in and beyond organizations. And when we are talking about the sustainability of organizations and the sustainability of people in organizations, this is, I think, a typical HRD question. So we we need to learn to organize differently in order. To create more sustainable organizations. And often organizations are very much driven by the business case. So any kind of uh behavior or decision within organizations should be leading to better organizational performance. So there should be a business case for any type of decision. And so then we end up with something like uh a business case for diversity, for instance. But if we talk about sustainability, we will ultimately uh um be stuck with the business case for sustainability. So this means we have to really learn to find new ways of organizing, how to structure and organize organizations. And I think that is precisely where HRD, HRD practitioners and scholars can work with HR and uh scholars, for instance, focusing on this new way of organizing our workplaces, how to more collectively organize among employees to make this happen, and also in terms of um HRM and HR practices. This also has a lot of uh implications uh um in terms of how um HR practices are designed and how they are distributed in organizations. So at a very plain level, you could start to think of how uh sustainable behaviors of employees in organizations are rewarded and how people are uh developed in order to be able to contribute to greater sustainability of the organization, in terms of, for instance, uh recruitment and selection. There can be uh a lot of links with recruiting and selecting the right people or people with the right mindsets to contribute to more sustainable organizations. So, uh, in all, I think there's a lot of areas where HRM can jointly work with HRD scholars and practitioners towards greater sustainability.
SPEAKER_02Matthias, may I just say I absolutely love HDD, uh human dignity and development as a new way to think about the work we do and how we could better meld HRM and HRD. So I've written that down as an important change to the discourse as we think about doing this work.
SPEAKER_03I uh want to pick up on uh the base that you were mentioning, Matthews, and really reflecting on uh this very current concern that the financial sustainability is sort of uh raising the volume and saying, well, we need to pay attention to this. And at the same time, um it makes me think that it's more important than ever to review what is the mindset that got us here. It was just our short-term thinking, our individualistic approach, our either or mentality, um silo thinking, not understanding the interconnectedness and how everything has an impact in a systemic way, what got us here, this sort of myopia. Now we are seeing the consequences, and we cannot come back to focus again on what is the financial sustainability of the firm to focus on that if we don't change our mindset. And I was presenting uh uh with the University of Uppsala yesterday. Um, they were launching five masters in different areas of sustainability, sustainable tourism and wind farms. And I was thinking when by the time from the time I did my research, so much has changed. So, what I did is I just presented a few of the picture. What is the world today? The world of COVID, the world of war, the world of uh uh uh flooding in Pakistan, etc. etc. And then what was the thinking that got us there? What has been the mindset? These are not acts of God that are happening onto us. So I think that uh this more than ever is an urgency to see what is the mindset that got us here so that we can build new ways of organization, at use, as you say, a business case, but a business case that is based on collaboration that is including the long-term impact of what we are doing in our decisions, and otherwise, it will just be a reinforcing negative loop.
SPEAKER_00Clearly, this as a topic matters to people. When I think about what matters to organizations, what we tend to see is if something matters to the organization, they measure it, they put numbers to it to see current performance and to track performance over time. I'm wondering if we're seeing that with organizations. So if you think about an organization and sustainability, how can an organization measure its current state on sustainability and then use those measures to inform their sustainability priorities going forward?
SPEAKER_03As you know, my focus has been on the mindset. So um, while uh many different angles of sustainability have been developed and have been growing in research and in instruments, how to measure carbon footprint, uh ESG, different indicators, I have been focused in my little corner on the mindset. And it has been a concern for over the years: how do we measure what is the impact and how do we measure when and if a mindset is changing? So finally, after many years of uh looking from different perspectives, I came up with an indicator with a colleague, Beatrick Lingenberg, in Germany, and we developed a uh it is called a sustainability mindset indicator. And it is focused on uh mapping and providing where an individual is on their journey because that uh developing a mindset is not like a light switch that is either on or off. We are on a journey, and even there are uh different levels playing at the same time: the cognitive, the behavioral, the affective. You know, we may know something and not necessarily be acting upon it, and that is very common. So we had really to consider these different uh levels and the interplay of this and different dimensions. So we we use the framework of the 12th sustainability mindset principle because it provided the foundation to structure the indicator around. It provides a very interesting map. And the indicator is an assessment, but at the same time, it's a personal development tool because it uh while showing we all are in a place because that place works. For example, I was talking to a professor recently and he said, I'm a short-term thinker, and that is he teaches economy and see, but that's how I see the world, and that is what I teach, and in the long term we are all dead. So he has a good rationale for that. However, at some point he said, you know, I'm realizing I am the problem because the students in my classroom they have to think of the long term, and I have to think of the long term because they will be on the longer term than me. So it really made him think how can I balance this short-term thinking? And that is exactly what we try to do with the indicator, that we highlight the benefits of a short-term thinking and also shine a flashlight into what may be the downside and how maybe thinking of the short-term only have an impact on our unsustainability, or how are we creating more unsustainability because of that? So, this measurement is more an assessment than a measurement, but it provides uh questions and alternative perspectives for the individual and also for the coach, because the the coach or the trainer they can see how they aggregate this and see which are the areas where these individuals may need more support to develop uh certain aspects, maybe more the cognitive, maybe more the behavioral or the effective. All these are different ways of entering a developmental journey.
SPEAKER_02I think we need more of this in HRD. And you know, I would probably like to see something. This looks like it's an individually oriented assessment. And it seems like really HRD practitioners could also use this, maybe it maybe retooled to think about what is a stability mindset for an HRD practitioner or scholar, and then how do we measure a sustainability mindset at the organizational or societal level? I think are also things that we need to be thinking about because you know raising awareness can happen at all of those levels, and really we need all of those levels because I think I'm I'm a believer, as much as we can change the individual, we also must change the organizations that they're functioning in and the you know, the mindsets of the leaders, the mindsets of communities. So I think that this is really an important instrument and tool that we can use, and also to think about how we can expand it into helping organizations develop a collective mindset around sustainability.
SPEAKER_03A month ago, I was approached by some people from a university in Chicago, and uh they said, Well, you know, we are committed to uh sustainability and inclusion in our school. That is our new strategic anchor. However, we would like to see if there is a way to assess how we as faculty are doing. And I said, Well, if we do it with individuals, I guess we can also have a group picture. So uh that's a similar question, like the one that you just raised, Laura, took me to uh formulate. They did their individual, and then we did an aggregate for the group and showing, okay, as a group, where are we? And which are sort of our blind spots or which are our uh areas where we are not so strong, and also as they compared it with their individual ones, they would say, Well, you know, as a group, we are not very creative, but my creativity is of the church, so maybe I can be a resource to the group. So I think there are interesting possibilities there, but this all is very new.
SPEAKER_01Thank you, Isabel. I I really like the uh sustainability mindset indicator because it also points to the importance of changing our minds about what is important in organizations and and how we can uh change to more sustainable organizations. So I think an indicator can really help in in workplaces in organizations to get an indication of of where we are now and and where can we make improvements.
SPEAKER_00So so far in the so far in the episode, we've looked at uh where we are and how we got here and also how we move forward. So for a final question, I'd like to focus in on that forward look by considering how we develop a new consciousness on sustainability, which is a term that that we talked about briefly in the first half of the episode. So, how do you think that could be built and what role could HRD play in creating a new consciousness on sustainability?
SPEAKER_02Yeah, I think we have a lot of opportunity here to develop a sustainability mindset and consciousness. And as I think about this, you know, I came across some very interesting articles as I was preparing for this. And Ellen Scully Russ, for instance, talks about how if we were able to combine strategic HRD, critic critical HRD, and holistic HRD, that they have some great possibility to help us rethink our mindset related to sustainability. Um, Dana Casby actually offered a sustainability leadership model in 2014. And this was aimed at leaders, but I think to think about how do we integrate sustainability values, mindsets, and actions into strategic visioning and how can HRD help align systems and organizations? And I'm thinking of economic systems, environmental systems, human systems to better support the vision. Employee engagement is a really important aspect of according to Cosby. And then how do we measure and evaluate how we're doing? You know, as I think about this, though, maybe more broadly than just leaders, it seems to me like we really do need a definition of what sustainable human resource development is. And I believe that Isabel underscored the need for a maybe a newer definition, other than the um the one that I think came out in the late 80s, uh, Bruntland Commission, I believe. And so thinking about how could we get that idea of human dignity and development into sustainability or notions of organization health. And then I think that again, picking up on that idea of HDD is you know, how do we talk about sustainability? And I think that it still is often couched in very performance-oriented language, yeah, or the mindset behind it is for good public relations or to stay out of legal trouble and you know, shifting, how do we talk and think about it in ways that it's the right thing to do? And I think that that consciousness, you know, really does come through a lot of these things, how we define it, how we talk about it. And then, you know, how we're training human resource development practitioners becomes really important, how we're training and developing organizations and how we're implementing HR policies from recruitment all the way through the career lifespan that are grounded in sustainability. And I do think that this is where this uh we talked a little bit about needing a new epistemology last time. And I think that again, coming back to how are we educating HRD practitioners about sustainability and their role in it, and then how are HRD practitioners helping educate an organization about sustainability? I think finally I would just think about measuring um sustainability in terms of how do we measure it? I think that the sustainability mindset is a great tool. What other ways can organizations be accountable?
SPEAKER_03There is this triangle that you may be familiar with from Joanna Macy, who has uh uh has been very active in creating uh engaging people and working towards sustainability, also from in from the inside out, but also in the outside. And she has this triangle where she said there are three areas consciousness development, which is the me area, how do I uh become the better me that I can be, how do I scrutinize my values or how how I develop myself. The other one is activism, how do I become an activist, educating others, informing, communicating, uh, creating supportive places where people can uh do things. And the third one is uh inquiring about the systems and processes, because the systems and processes are the it here. We cannot talk to a person, it's a system, and it's the system that many times becomes the blockage and the wall against which we hit our head. So identifying which are these systems and processes that are being an obstacle and suggesting alternative or questioning them becomes a very important role of HRD. I think if I would say, do I start with the activism exploring the system or the process? I would say it has to start with the language that we can have in common so that we know what we're talking about, and the vision, because the vision also can come from within. I remember many years ago I was at a conference and uh the presenter said, What is the vision that you have of a world? How you would you like it? And it was so difficult to think because the cynical part came into my mind is oh yes, but this and this. And I said, Oh my god, if I am a champion of sustainability and I cannot even articulate a vision of the world that we want, that's terrible. And so since then it has been haunting me. Thanks, God, we have now the SDGs and there are other ways. But I think we need to create that vision. What is the organization that we want to promote? How is this organization serving dignity and development, serving the world, serving the real needs, you know, serving the urgencies of our time? We need to craft that vision, and because then that is something like a North Star that can guide us. Okay, are we going towards this or not?
SPEAKER_01Thank you, Isabel. That's that's uh I was thinking very much along the same lines, and I was thinking also when I meet a new group of students, I never have to explain the importance of sustainability because the youngest generation is very well aware of the need and the importance to um do something about the environmental unsustainability. And so, in that sense, a new consciousness is already rising among the younger generations. What I think all of the questions that we have asked here today and try to answer is uh are about normalizing uh climate action in in organizations and or perhaps normalize sustainability debates and discussions in organizations so that it becomes really an a normal uh part of our everyday functioning in our workplaces to ask ourselves and each other the question okay, how can we become a more sustainable organization? What can we do in our everyday life and um our work? And so, as a way of also creating a new uh consciousness about our own roles as uh as employees in organizations, to look in order to normalize um sustainability within organizations and then in a in a meaningful way, of course, in a way that it really translates into our uh daily actions. Uh in order to do so, we need stories of how sustainable organizations actually look like, how they function, how people work there, uh, what kind of priorities are there, and so on and so on. So I think such stories are are also lacking, I think. And we we can we should and could um also collect and tell and create many more of such stories of sustainable workplaces.
SPEAKER_00Well, unfortunately, we've run out of time for today's conversation, but this has been really fascinating. I I've really enjoyed our time together today. So thank you all so much for being a part of the episode and for exploring HRD and sustainability. Thank you so much indeed. Thank you, Devin.
SPEAKER_02You're welcome. Indeed a pleasure, all of you.
SPEAKER_00Thank you so much for joining me for this episode. It was wonderful spending time with Matthias Bull, Laura Beermer, and Isabel Riminosi. If you enjoyed this episode, check out all of our others. We've released 33 episodes in our first three seasons, and between them, they provide access to conversations with over 75 leading HRD scholars from around the world. To learn more about the series, check out HRDmasterclass.com. And to learn about the Academy of Human Resource Development, check out ahrd.org. By becoming a member, you can access extra bonus materials. Also, don't forget to look into our sponsors, the University of Georgia Graduate Program in Adult Learning, Leadership, and Organization Development. Check them out by searching for UGA Space L L O D. You'll find them at the top of the search results. Unfortunately, this was our final episode in season three. I hope that you've enjoyed our conversations. It means a lot to us that you've joined us for this wonderful season of exploring HRD and its relationship to other disciplines and topics. I can't wait until we're back together again for season four in 2023. Until then, stay safe. This is Darren Short signing off from the Human Resource Development Masterclass.com.
