It was a privilege and joy for our Director Shaun Deverson to be invited by Richie Williams to present an overview of the United Nation’s Sustainable Development Goals to his University of Newcastle Business Students.

The students of today are our leaders tomorrow hence the importance of driving new types of thinking that confronts the emerging challenges of climate change, consumerism, waste management and energy, utilising the UN SDG framework as a guide, is crucial to achieving the targets we have set to make our planet and communities more healthier and prosperous for future generations to enjoy.

Principles such as shared value, human factors, open system, systems thinking and complexity theory were discussed and it was fantastic to see the engagement and level of interest from these future business leaders. Leaders of tomorrow will be required to set new conversations with their employees and stakeholders but, more importantly, with themselves.

Our planet and its inhabitants need new ‘thinkers’. People who are prepared to declare that their mission is to ‘change the world for the better’. People who are prepared to see themselves and others as Planetary Stewards rather than Profit making Robots. People who are resilient and prepared to attract the criticism and backlash from others whose only motive is to ensure the unsustainable status quo is maintained. And ultimately people who are prepared to be leaders that recognise that what we did yesterday will no longer shape our destiny.

 

Leave a Reply