Andrew Winston

ESG, GigaTrends, and the Drive to Net Positive

The days of companies focusing solely on short-term shareholder profits are behind us. Companies are under incredible pressure to play an active role in solving our most urgent challenges, such as climate change and inequality, and help build a thriving world. Why is this happening, and how are companies responding? Renowned strategist Andrew Winston helps companies understand this new world. Based on his book Net Positive, Andrew’s inspiring talk will explore…

• The existential challenges and massive trends which are reshaping how we live, work, eat, travel, and much more.
• How and why key stakeholders – such as investors, customers, and employees – are applying immense pressure on business
• How to build companies that thrive by solving the world’s problems, not creating them
• What leadership looks like using concrete examples of companies around the world profiting from sustainability

Andrew’s message is clear: business has the tools and skills to help build a thriving world. This talk will leave listeners with a fresh understanding of business today and inspired by the scale and urgency of our shared challenges and opportunities.

Global megatrends -- such as climate change, the rise of the clean economy, fast-moving technology shifts, and generational shifts in values as Millennials and Gen Z come of age -- are dramatically changing how we live and do business. Investors, consumers, and employees are all demanding that companies have a clear purpose and help people and planet thrive. Andrew's talk will give executives an overview of this new landscape for business and provide a vision for how to profit in a volatile world. 

Innovation and Value Creation in a Hotter, Scarcer, More Open World

Andrew Winston, a globally recognized speaker and business strategy expert, lays out a new vision for how to succeed in a volatile world. Rising pressures on business create enormous risks, but offer unprecedented opportunities as multi-trillion-dollar markets are in play. The race for the new, clean economy is on, and the winners profit mightily. In a unique and entertaining way, Winston’s talk:

• Lays out the critical mega-trends that are quickly redefining “business as usual” such as global demographic changes, intense resource constraints, a changing climate and extreme weather, new expectations from Millennials and Gen Z about how a business should operate, and radical transparency driven by new technologies that connect us all;
• Offers many “a-ha” and “wow” moments backed by surprising data about our world;
• Describes the simple but profound mindset shift – the Big Pivot – that companies must make to go beyond merely coping and actually navigate and solve the world’s toughest challenges;
• Provides crucial tactics and strategies for executives and managers to profit from this new, volatile reality;
• Inspires audiences to think about the true purpose of their business and their jobs, to ask deeply heretical and innovative questions, and to connect with their customers in new ways.

With concrete advice and stories from the companies like Apple, Coca-Cola, Dow, Ford, GE, Nike, Unilever, and Wal-Mart, The Big Pivot provides a blueprint for creating more resilient, flexible businesses that profit from building a healthier, more sustainable, more prosperous world.

An entertaining and enlightening overview, without too much jargon, of the phenomenon of climate change, including: the basic science and why the consensus on human-driven climate change is so strong, the level of risk from inaction, the costs to society thus far and going forward, the business case for action, and how big companies are managing climate risk and opportunity for profit.

An overview of the world’s largest industry and how business leaders can shift their thinking from energy as a cost center to a strategic asset, including: exploring how different regions of the world use energy, the fundamental tensions between energy use and climate change, the rapidly shifting economics of clean energy, and the deep interconnections between energy, food, and water.

Andrew will explore the environmental pressures and powerful stakeholders driving companies to go green. Winston demonstrates how leading companies create business value in 4 fundamental ways: lowering costs, reducing risk, increasing revenues, and enhancing brand value (such as employee and customer loyalty).

In this speech, Winston will explore how companies can use environmental thinking to survive the downturn by getting lean, thrive during an upturn by getting creative, keep employees engaged, and dominate their industries for years to come.