The long view: 15 years of the UNGC Accenture CEO sustainability study

Gauging the state of sustainability in business

2023 marks the halfway point for the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) - and the world is falling behind.

At Davos this year, there was much discussion about what all stakeholders need to do in order to achieve the SDGs with a much stronger performance in the second half. One of the fundamentals of this stronger second-half performance will be a good knowledge base, which explores our successes and failures so far. At Accenture we've worked for many years with the United Nations Global Compact to survey CEOs globally on their attitudes toward sustainability and their organizations' performance.

Taken as a whole these studies form an important source of longitudinal data. But until now they haven't been easy to find together. So I placing links to all of them here in hopes that others will find them as useful as I do.

Many thanks to all the team members who have helped to put these together over the years, and to all the CEOs who have given their time to take part.

2023 - Reimagining the Agenda

• Our largest-ever survey - more than 2,600 CEOs across 128 countries and 18 industries
• Launched at the 2023 World Economic Forum Annual Meeting in Davos
• Sustainability as resilience in an uncertain world came to the fore

2021 - Climate Leadership in the Eleventh Hour

• Launched at COP26 in Glasgow
• Special focus on the Global South
• Nearly half of respondents said their supply chains were already affected by climate change

2021 - Gender Equality, Diversity and Inclusion Spotlight

• Focused cut of 2021 data
• Diversity and inclusion remained firmly on CEOs' agendas, despite the challenges of the pandemic

2019 - Call to Business Action: The Decade to Deliver

• Launched during the UN General Assembly
• Only 21% of CEOs surveyed believed business contributions to the SDGs were on track
• But 99% said sustainability was crucial to the future success of their organization

2018 - Special Edition: Transforming Partnerships for the SDGs

• Special edition looking specifically at views of UN Leaders
• Deep dives into specific partnerships, including UNHCR-Vodafone, UNIDO-Naledi3d Factory and ILO-Mars

2018 - Insights from Indian Business Leaders

• As the UNGC said that more than 50% of the progress towards the SDGs needs to come from India, this was a timely look at Indian CEO’s commitment and assessment of progress
• On each question asked, Indian CEOs answered more positively than their counterparts globally

2016 - Agenda 2030: A Window of Opportunity

• Launched at UNGC Leaders Summit
• 87% of surveyed CEOs saw UN SDGs as opportunity to address global challenges, redefine competitiveness and transform business

2015 - Special Edition: A Call to Climate Action

• Released to coincide with COP21 in Paris
• 74% of CEOs at companies with $1b+ in annual revenues saw a long-term agreement in Paris as critical to unlocking private-sector investment in climate solutions
• CEOs identified five key policy measures to unlock further private-sector investment: legislative and fiscal mechanisms; financial instruments to stimulate R&D; Performance standards on emissions; carbon-pricing mechanisms and removal of fossil-fuel subsidies

2014 - Special Edition: The Investor Study: Insights from PRI Signatories

• Focused on respondents whose companies were signatories to the Principles for Responsible Investment
• Looked at how companies and investors can better collaborate to unlock the potential of the private sector in tackling global sustainability challenges
• 88% of investors and 79% of CEOs saw sustainability as a route to competitive advantage

2014 - Special Edition: The Consumer Study: From Marketing to Mattering

• In this companion report to the 2013 CEO study, 30,000 consumers across 20 countries gave their views on their quality of life, expectations of business and governments and attitudes towards sustainable brands
• Conducted in collaboration with Havas Medi RE:PURPOSE
• Survey showed that most brand-initiated dialogue on sustainability failed to connect with the priorities of consumers

2014 - Special Edition: Regional Insight: Africa

• Focused on 50+ CEOs from across Africa, giving an in-depth perspective on the views of business leaders in a region critical to the development of a more sustainable global economy
• Just 24% of African CEOs believed that the global economy was on track to meet the demands of a growing population within global environmental and resource constraints, and 58% did not believe that business was doing enough to address global sustainability challenges.
• Still, 96% of African CEOs believed sustainability issues were important to the future success of their business, compared with 93% globally

2013 - Architects of a Better World

• 67% of CEO respondents did not believe that business was doing enough to address global sustainability challenges
• The percentage of CEOs who said sustainability would be ‘very important’ to the future success of their business fell to 45% from 54% in 2010
• 1,000+ survey respondents and 70+ interviewees

2010 - A New Era of Sustainability

• Looked at the impact of the financial crisis on sustainability
• 80% of CEOs said that the economic downturn had raised the importance of sustainability
• The percentage of CEOs who said that sustainability issues had become part of their strategy and operations jumped to 81% from 50% in 2007
• 750+ survey respondents and 50 interviewees
• Separate industry-specific cuts for: automotive; banking; communications; consumer goods; energy, infrastructure and transportation; and utilities.

2007 - Shaping the New Rules of Competition

• Initial edition of the survey
• 391 survey participants and 38 interviewees