It's Time to Update How Your Company Talks About Sustainability

Harvard Business Review

2 days ago

As companies' environmental and social initiatives face increasing political pushback and legal threats, sustainability leaders have a difficult communications choice to make: stay quiet or speak up. It's easy to see why a growing number of organizations are choosing the former and intentionally under-communicating their sustainability efforts—or shutting down communications altogether. Businesses face pressure from all sides of the political spectrum—from conservative backlash against ESG and 'woke capitalism' to progressive scrutiny over unsubstantiated claims and greenwashing. In this highly charged environment, staying quiet can seem like the safest way to mitigate risk. However, this is a short-sighted strategy.
A recent survey by Pew Research showed that about seven in 10 Americans say large businesses are doing too little to help reduce the effects of climate change. Silence on these issues can further erode consumer trust. Moreover, the business value that can be generated by climate initiatives continues to grow and includes lowered costs through less waste generation, lower raw material costs by keeping resources in use, lower energy use, as well as risk reduction through stronger energy and supply chain resilience.
To build on this value, companies need a transparent sustainability communications strategy that's positive without being Pollyannaish, clear without being catastrophic, and committed without provoking unwarranted backlash. This requires deep strategic consideration of messages, language, and content formats. To do this, leaders need to implement three strategies:
Understand and address the expectations of your employees and customers.
Connect emotionally with your audience, using stories and facts to support your messages.
Move beyond the traditional sustainability report.
Our experiences show that leaders who follow these strategies have differentiated their brands. With personal, empathetic sustainability communications, supported by relevant data and delivered consistently across multiple channels, their organizations have taken decisive leadership positions—building investor confidence, employee engagement, and consumer loyalty.
1. Understand and address your employees' and customers' expectations.
Studies show that consumer expectations around the world, including in the United States, do not necessarily mirror political rhetoric. Consumers are increasingly demanding sustainable products, and they are showing it through the purchases they make. Across all socioeconomic strata, they are demonstrating a growing preference for sustainable goods, which has increased the market share of these products to 23.8% overall, despite a 26.6% price premium.
Likewise, employees increasingly expect the companies they work for to make a positive environmental impact, and they show it through their career decisions. Two out of three job seekers say they're more willing to apply for and accept jobs from organizations they consider to be environmentally sustainable.
While national and international data are informative, businesses that understand the specific concerns and expectations of their customers and employees can demonstrate responsiveness through their actions and communications. The most effective content makes audiences feel like they're heard and seen—as if the brand is speaking directly to their challenges, hopes, and desires. This can't be achieved with assumptions of what audiences need or want. And it certainly can't be achieved with company-focused messages that prioritize the organization's interests over the audience's needs. To create content that truly resonates, you need deep audience insights.
Boston Children's Hospital, one of the leading pediatric care systems in the world (and on whose board of trustees one of us, Vivian Lee, serves), conducted surveys of staff as well as patients and families to capture insights regarding their beliefs about climate change and their views about efforts of the hospital to reduce its environmental impact. That guidance has been shared widely and used to inform both staff initiatives and communication strategies both internally and externally.
Aligned with customer expectations, the hospital's staff survey also sparked a number of internal waste-reduction and energy-efficiency initiatives. The survey results overall were also consistent with those of a recent survey by the Commonwealth Fund of 1,000 physicians in the United States, which found that four out of five agreed or strongly agreed that it was important that their employers play a role in addressing climate change and minimizing its impact on the environment.
2. Connect emotionally with your audience, using stories and facts to support your messages.
It makes sense that some companies have taken pains to fill their sustainability communications with facts. After all, high-profile greenwashing accusations bring real risks from a legal, financial, and reputational perspective, and clear, specific, verifiable facts are the best way to combat these risks and create credible content. But if companies stop there, they miss an equally important opportunity to connect audiences to the why behind their what. This can't be done with facts alone. It takes storytelling to bring context, humanity, and empathy to the numbers.
Studies like Potential Energy's Later is Too Late global messaging report have shown that communications should tap into universal human values and desires and then support those messages with relevant data. The study found that the main reason people cited for supporting climate action was to 'protect the climate for future generations.' Narratives that lead with 'the urgent need to protect the planet for the next generation' prove more motivating than rational messages about the environmental impacts of 'carbon pollution' or an 'overheating planet.'
For B2B communications, the messages will inevitably be more targeted to the audience's specific business challenges. Another messaging study from Potential Energy, The Return on Responsibility, shows that, for corporate sustainability communications, framing climate action as a commonsense business strategy reduces the risk of pushback from climate skeptics.
But that doesn't mean B2B brands should simply publish their data and stats. Instead, they should use specific examples and tell relevant stories to discuss the business issues their audiences care about, such as the financial risk of inaction, the opportunities to lead and innovate, and the responsibility to care for customers. By focusing on stories, not just facts, brands can make abstract ideas more concrete, relatable, and memorable.
Specific language choices matter too. As U.S. companies back away from politically charged acronyms like DEI and terms like 'net zero,' it's a good time for organizations to evaluate all the language they're using to communicate sustainability. This action shouldn't be taken just to avoid political and regulatory scrutiny but also to translate the technical, complex language of sustainability into simple, human language—so more people can hear the message, understand it, and take action.
This means shifting away from polarizing language like 'climate change' and insider terms like '1.5 C warming' and instead using universally understood language like 'extreme weather.' It means writing clearly about the climate outcomes that affect us all, such us wildfires and floods. It means talking about things like 'eliminating pollution' rather than 'decarbonizing.' And it means avoiding stock sustainability clichés like 'our sustainability journey' and instead getting very specific about the topics that matter to audiences.
One of the world's leading sustainable brands, Patagonia, doesn't even use the word 'sustainability' in its external communications. Instead, it acknowledges that 'everything we make has an impact on the planet.' And then it addresses very clearly and specifically how it is changing the way clothes are made. Even better, it invites its audience to be part of the solution, showing them how to demand recycled, organic, and fair-trade clothing.
Organic soap maker Dr. Bronner's also avoids the 's word' in its communications. Instead, its All-One Report discusses its 'cosmic principles' of caring for customers, employees, the broader community, and the earth. The result is a report that sounds like the brand and reflects its unique values.
Reformation, the sustainable fashion retailer and lifestyle company, is another brand leading the way in sustainability communications. Using clear, human language—written in the unique voice of the brand—it explains complex concepts like circularity as 'make stuff that lasts, wear it a lot, don't throw it away.' For audiences who want to dive deeper, relevant details and statistics show exactly how it is achieving its goals.
3. Move beyond the traditional sustainability report.
Releasing an ESG report once a year is not a sustainability communications plan, but for 70% of companies, these reports are the only sustainability communications they do all year. And now, with new mandatory reporting requirements and increased standardization of reporting frameworks on the horizon, organizations may feel even more boxed in by reporting compliance issues—leading to report content that's increasingly technical, data-driven, and uninspiring. This makes it a good time to expand communications beyond the report and explore new formats and channels for sustainability storytelling.
This starts with rethinking the report itself, which can do much more than simply check compliance boxes. By moving away from the typical static report to digital report formats—which can include multimedia elements like video and animation—organizations can make complex content easier to consume and more interactive. Besides improving engagement and accessibility, this approach can also provide deeper insights into how audiences are consuming the content.
However, few brands are taking full advantage of digital formats for their reports. One notable exception is farmer-owned dairy co-op Tillamook County Creamery Association. By moving from a static PDF to an interactive web format, the organization served the needs of its shareholders while also telling its story to consumers, customers, and partners. With an engaging, interactive format, written in Tillamook's playful brand voice, the report connects with people on a human level. And with detailed scorecard data just a click away, technical audiences can easily find the information they need.
Whatever format a report takes, the key is to extend the storytelling beyond the report and create a steady drumbeat of content throughout the year. Boston Medical Center does this with a multi-channel content strategy that keeps its health equity and environmental messages front and center all year long. Its content includes everything from highly visual posts on TikTok and other social channels to in-depth health equity articles on its own digital platform, HealthCity, to people-centered video stories covering innovative programs like its rooftop garden and its Clean Power Prescription.
Not every sustainability department has the resources to create a comprehensive, cross-channel communications plan. Budgets are increasingly tight, and in-house marketing teams often have competing product and sales priorities. Nevertheless, the sustainability report itself is a treasure trove of content that can be repurposed into smaller, standalone pieces—without additional budget or headcount. Turn key report metrics into a visual data story. Take an employee quote in the report and repurpose it into an Instagram spotlight. Through this lens, the report presents a myriad of efficient, cost-effective ways to extend storytelling and impact beyond the report—and build stronger relationships with all audiences.
. . .
As ESG undergoes a forced rebrand in 2025, companies should do more than merely change the terminology they're using, hunker down, and ride out the storm. Instead, they should use this time as an opportunity to rethink how they communicate sustainability altogether.
Buried within every organization's energy-efficiency metrics, waste-diversion data, and healthy-workplace policies is a wealth of human stories just waiting to be told. And when they're told well, these stories aren't just feel-good marketing fluff; they're a vital business strategy. With strong sustainability narratives—told everywhere that audiences go—organizations have the power to bring new talent to teams, turn picky consumers into brand loyalists, and improve business results in the process.