ClimateVoices Featuring Patrick Flynn

In this issue, I’m pleased to be speaking with Patrick Flynn , who has spent nearly two decades working at the intersection of environment, technology, and business, and brings a unique combination of boldness and pragmatism to the climate challenge. Until recently, Patrick led sustainability at Salesforce , where he spent more than seven years building the program that has become a standard-bearer in corporate climate action. Through his work, he helped Salesforce achieve net zero emissions and 100% renewable energy, and positioned the company in support of historic climate policy progress. He’s been in the trenches with many of the world’s leading companies, helping them craft lasting and impactful sustainability programs. He currently serves on the board of The Ocean Foundation and is an advisor to Generation Investment Management , Watershed , Topo Finance , and Humanitas .

We agree that business has a critical role to play in fighting the climate emergency. What do you think are the most strategic actions that Chief Sustainability Officers (CSOs) can take in our current environment?

With climate, we need big change fast. The most important thing CSOs can do is put as much of their resources – their time, money and support towards strategies that have a chance to reach gigaton scale. Those "big swing" strategies almost always have to do with using a company’s influence to change markets – by standing up for pro-climate policies and by creating market-moving demand signals for decarbonizing entire industries.

You’ve signed the LEAD statement* along with over 400 sustainability professionals saying that “it’s time” for companies to lead on climate policy. What can sustainability professionals and other concerned employees do to best support and encourage their companies (including executive leaders) to be more bold in backing climate policy?

Especially with policy, there’s safety and strength in numbers. I’m currently dedicating almost all of my time and energy towards strengthening the fabric of this beautiful community of corporate sustainability professionals. We are all here to help one another, even if we work for different companies. So to those out there looking to get their companies to be bolder on climate, find peers who have had success in doing just that, reach out to them, and follow in their footsteps. I guarantee you’ll find them (and me, for that matter) willing to help you with open arms.

Even more specifically, each professional needs to build a deep and trusted relationship with their internal colleagues in the government affairs function. Learn from them. Learn about them - what makes them tick, what keeps them up at night? Share your own motivations for your work addressing the climate crisis and guide them along their own, personal climate journey. Perhaps they need you for their journey just as much as you might need them for yours.

*https://www.weleadonclimatepolicy.org/

There are many forces blocking climate progress. What is your take on the intransigent influence of trade associations like the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, which has consistently taken anti-climate stances? How can their influence be countered?

Trade associations like the U.S. Chamber of Commerce support companies – and are aligned with those companies – on a wide array of topics. But when it comes to climate, for the thousands of companies with climate goals, that alignment simply doesn't exist at all. So there are two approaches to examine – first, leaders can lean into those trade associations and get them to reverse their stance on climate. Like we say in the sustainability profession, if you want to turn the car around you need to be in the car. I know many leaders have tried this with their trade associations for many years. It simply isn't working. So there must be a time when corporate climate leaders communicate that they'll leave unless that u-turn happens. I think that time is now, just like what you've communicated in the LEAD statement. So, perhaps what we need is a carbon-copy of the Chamber... just without all that carbon! I hope that smarter people than me are already working on exactly that. If they are, I'm here for it and here to help any way I can.

In Big Tech, they call me a “shit stirrer” – and I love that nickname. What’s your moniker??

Hah, well I love that you love it! I always tell people, “I work for Planet Earth.” Maybe that makes me a planeteer? ??

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