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The SustainabilityX® Magazine Global 50 Women In Sustainability Awards 2022: #RedefiningPower - Laura Franceschini, Corporate Sustainability Leader, United States
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"As the world deals with evolving crises like climate change, COVID-19, and global conflict, leadership is more important than ever. In particular, women’s leadership is critical as women and other marginalized groups are disproportionately impacted by environmental, health, and geopolitical challenges, so their voices need to be heard and leveraged when building solutions." - Laura Franceschini, Corporate Sustainability Leader, United States
Laura Franceschini is a corporate sustainability leader that has worked at the intersection of business and environmental issues for more than 15 years. As part of Google’s global sustainability team, she drives development and implementation of the company’s cross-functional sustainability strategy across its worldwide operations, products, and supply chain.
Previously, Laura launched the sustainability program for Stantec—a top 10 global design firm with more than 400 locations. Laura has also led sustainability programs for the Yale Center for Business and the Environment* and several other organizations and has been a sustainability consultant in various capacities. Laura has served on various advisory committees, has been an instructor/ guest lecturer for graduate-, and executive-level sustainable business classes, and co-founded the Net Impact Edmonton chapter. Laura received a Masters in Environmental Management with a concentration in Business from Yale University. Originally from Edmonton, Canada, she has lived in several countries and now lives in San Francisco, California.
Q: What is the importance of women's leadership in today's society plagued by the triple crises of COVID, Climate, and Conflict, and their deadly consequences?
As the world deals with evolving crises like climate change, COVID-19, and global conflict, leadership is more important than ever. In particular, women’s leadership is critical as women and other marginalized groups are disproportionately impacted by environmental, health, and geopolitical challenges, so their voices need to be heard and leveraged when building solutions.
Q: What role do you believe women in leadership positions have to play in helping companies and brands transition towards sustainability and circularity, and why is this important?
Women in leadership positions have a key role to play in helping companies and brands transition towards sustainability and circularity. Achieving the global sustainable development goals will take everyone working together, regardless of their role, industry, or sustainability expertise.
Q: What can be done to improve women’s participation in corporate and leadership positions? How do we achieve this?
To improve women’s participation in corporate and leadership positions, we need to ensure first and foremost that we’re building inclusive organizations, workplaces, and teams where diverse voices are in the room and are being heard. Everyone needs to play a role in lifting up those with less privilege than themselves by learning how to recognize bias and make data-driven decisions.
Q: What does this award mean to you and what significance does it hold to you personally and/or professionally, and your company?
I’m grateful to The SustainabilityX® Magazine for recognizing my leadership in the corporate sustainability field. I appreciate the magazine’s focus on social inclusion and gender equity, both of which intersect with sustainability.
*The Yale Center for Business and the Environment is a campus-wide platform for creating innovative and sustainable solutions to challenges facing the human and natural systems upon which the world relies. The center educates and inspires interdisciplinary leaders through business solutions to systemic environmental problems, building world-class resources to address pressing global issues. Learn more.
The SustainabilityX® Magazine Global 50 Women In Sustainability Awards 2022
The SustainabilityX® Magazine proudly announced the release of The SustainabilityX® Magazine’s inaugural Global 50 Women In Sustainability Awards™ 2022 on Oct 4th, 2022, an inaugural annual list celebrating the powerful work of women in sustainability leadership around the world.
The non-profit digital magazine’s Global 50 Women In Sustainability Awards™ high-level, invite-only program graciously sponsored by the award-winning Canadian construction and engineering firm Belnor Engineering Inc., recognizes achievements of the world’s powerful, groundbreaking female sustainability leaders who’re bridging the gender gap by breaking barriers, shattering traditional stereotypes, and taking the world of sustainability by storm. This campaign is in line with the magazine’s third pillar of sustainability upon which SustainabilityX® is based: social inclusion, which involves marginalized populations and vulnerable communities such as women, persons with disabilities, unemployed youth, LGBTQ+, the elderly, and BIPOC minorities.
“As both a female and one of Canada’s Top 30 Under 30 In Sustainability Leadership myself, I know how important this is,” says Supriya Verma, founder of The SustainabilityX® Magazine. “The number of women in positions of leadership – from business to politics – are relatively few. With society plagued by the triple crises of COVID, climate, conflict, and their deadly consequences, how can the world advance and achieve the United Nations’ Sustainable Development Goals without having women in decision-making positions at major organizations, political parties, and academic institutions?”
In The SustainabilityX® Magazine’s quest to ‘redefine power’, this is the first international power-list bringing together women around the world involved in sustainability celebrating the power of their work – not their position. This list brings together a diverse group of accomplished women across business, entertainment, academia, law, politics, and beyond ranging from some of the world's leading companies, to independent unsung heroes with one thing in common: using their power with purpose –the power to create change and influence lives to make the world a better place. After all, that's what sustainability is all about. The meaning, or ‘the power’ of one’s work matters, not one’s position in a corporate hierarchy, particularly during this crucial era.
View the full list: The SustainabilityX® Magazine Global 50 Women In Sustainability Awards 2022
About The SustainabilityX® Magazine
The SustainabilityX® Magazine is an award-winning, digital, female-founded, and female-led non-profit initiative bringing the environment and economy together for a sustainable future through dialogue. Founded on May 8, 2016 and inspired by the United Nations’ Sustainable Development Goals by Canada’s Top 30 Under 30 in Sustainability Leadership awardee, Supriya Verma, the digital media initiative focuses on approaching the world’s most pressing challenges with a holistic, integrated, systems-based perspective as opposed to the traditional and ineffective siloed approach with a single lens on interdisciplinary topics like climate and energy. This initiative ultimately seeks to explore how to effectively bring the environment and economy together through intellectual, insightful dialogue and thought-provoking discussion amongst individuals across sectors taking an interdisciplinary and integrated approach to untangling the intricate web of sustainability.
The SustainabilityX® Magazine is based upon the four pillars of sustainability: Environmental Stewardship which emphasizes improved environmental health, Economic Prosperity which emphasizes economic growth without the element of capitalism, Social Inclusion which emphasizes EDI for BIPOC and LGBTQ communities and marginalized, vulnerable populations, and Just Governance which emphasizes the equal rule of law via responsible political leadership to create fair systems for all. Identifying the diverse factors involved in sustainability, how they interact and how the disciplines are interconnected will help accelerate local, national, and international sustainability goals – in simpler words, aligning with The SustainabilityX® Magazine’s mission of bringing the environment and economy together for a sustainable future through dialogue for a sustainable future. Whether you have a background in science, engineering, business, law, politics, media and entertainment, or beyond, your voice matters.
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The SustainabilityX® Magazine is a proud member of the Sustainable Journalism Partnership, serves as a cause-based media partner for various events such as Circular City Week New York, and officially delivers remarks at international conferences such as UNESCO’s annual World Press Freedom Day Conference. SustainabilityX® is a brand of the non-profit social business SPSX Group.
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