The Future of Sustainable Business Is...

Aron Cramer

President and CEO, BSR

Aron is recognized globally as a preeminent authority on just and sustainable business. In addition to leading BSR, which has grown substantially throughout his tenure as President and CEO, Aron advises senior executives at BSR’s 300+ member companies and other global businesses and partners on the full spectrum of environmental, social, and governance issues.

Aron joined BSR in 1995 as the founding director of its Business and Human Rights Program. He later opened BSR's Paris office in 2002, where he worked until becoming President and CEO in 2004. Aron has served on advisory boards to CEOs at AXA, Barrick Gold, Marks & Spencer, Nike, SAP, Shell, as well as the Erb Institute at the University of Michigan. He is also a director of the Value Reporting Foundation, the We Mean Business Coalition, and the Clean Energy Buyers’ Alliance, and he serves as a member of the Steering Council for the World Economic Forum’s Board of Stewards of its Future of Consumption System Initiative.

Aron speaks frequently at leading business and public fora and is widely quoted in top-tier media, such as the Financial Times, Le Figaro (France), The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, Axios, and Politico. He is co-author of the book Sustainable Excellence: The Future of Business in a Fast-Changing World, which spotlights innovative sustainability strategies that enable business success.

Prior to joining BSR, Aron practiced law in San Francisco and worked as a journalist at ABC News in New York. He holds a BA from Tufts University and a JD from the University of California, Berkeley.

Andrew Edgecliffe-Johnson

U.S. Business Editor, Financial Times

Andrew Edgecliffe-Johnson is a leading voice on how sustainability, ESG investing and stakeholder capitalism are changing and challenging today’s business landscape. As U.S. Business Editor of the Financial Times, he leads its coverage of how boardrooms are navigating an age of growing populism, policy upheavals and shifting expectations of corporate America.

In his reporting and commentary, Andrew has helped explain the emergence of a new corporate consensus around the role purpose-driven businesses should play in society, and the pushback from skeptics worried about corporate overreach, greenwashing and “woke capitalism”.

Based in the FT’s New York office, he manages a team of corporate reporters while writing commentary, CEO interviews and in-depth analysis. He has also helped develop new offerings for the FT’s core business audience such as Moral Money, its award-winning ESG newsletter.

Rajiv Joshi

Associate Dean, Climate Action, Columbia Climate School

Rajiv Joshi is an economist, community organizer, and instigator of business transformation and social change. 

As the Founder of Bridging Ventures, he forged a new model for radical collaboration to create a regenerative future for all. 

Raj joined The B Team at its inception in 2012 and was the organisation’s first Managing Director until 2019. In that position, he worked closely with Co-Founders Sir Richard Branson and Jochen Zeitz to redefine the role of business in society – alongside a global group of committed leaders, advisors, and supporters. He was also instrumental in advancing Principles of Responsible Tax Practice and driving corporate ownership transparency to end illicit flows of capital. In 2014, as a founding Board Member of the We Mean Business coalition, he supported efforts to mobilise corporate leadership and secure a universal commitment to phase out greenhouse gas emissions by 2050 outlined in the Paris Climate Agreement.

In 2019, Raj was appointed as an Executive-in-Residence at Oxford University Säid Business School to explore the future of the corporation, investigate innovative forms of education, and help businesses address environment, social, and governance (ESG) risk. That year, he also joined former UN Climate Chief Christiana Figueres as part of the Mission 2020 campaign to help establish the Net-Zero Asset Owner Alliance and lead the Decisive Decade Initiative – a global effort to imagine the future and inspire a Great Regeneration, underpinned by independent research focused on strengthening collaboration and building roadmap for collective action.

Prior to The B-team, Raj was Executive Director of the Global Call to Action Against Poverty (GCAP), the world’s largest civil society alliance working to end poverty and inequality launched by Nelson Mandela, Kumi Naidoo, and other civic leaders in 2005. He was a Trustee of Oxfam Great Britain and a Board Member of CIVICUS, based in Johannesburg. As part of the anti-poverty movement, he co-chaired the UN-Civil Society Steering Group for the World We Want, playing a pivotal role in the design of the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), building on his involvement in the UN Millennium Campaign, established by Kofi Annan in 2000.

In 2008, he was publicly appointed by the UK Government to the Equality and Human Rights Commission, where he helped to strengthen community relations, building on his experience working on race relations, community policing, equal opportunity and youth participation in Scotland, the UK, the EU and the Commonwealth. Raj was also an Advisor to the Scottish Commissioner for Children and Young People and a Member of the Glasgow Anti-Racist Alliance.

Raj originates from Gujarat, India and Kisumu, Kenya, and was born and raised in Edinburgh, Scotland. He currently lives between the UK and the US with his wife Shalini.

Erika Karp

Chief Impact Officer, Pathstone

Erika is the Chief Impact Officer at Pathstone. She joins the Pathstone team from Cornerstone Capital Group (acquired by Pathstone in 2021), the sustainable and impact investment advisory firm she founded in 2013.

Erika founded Cornerstone Capital Group to bring the disciplines of finance, economics, and sustainability to bear in pursuit of a more regenerative and inclusive form of capitalism. Over the course of her 25-plus years on Wall Street, she developed a deep belief in environmental, social, and governance (“ESG”) analysis as a critical input to investment decision-making.

Prior to launching Cornerstone, Erika was Managing Director and Head of Global Sector Research at UBS Investment Bank. She chaired the Global Investment Review Committee, served on the UBS Securities Research Executive Committee, and served on the Environmental and Human Rights Committee of the UBS Group Executive Board.

Her work has been featured by media including Bloomberg, The Guardian, the Financial Times, Investor Relations Magazine, and Forbes. Erika speaks on sustainable investing and finance at venues around the world including the UN Global Compact, the UN Principles for Responsible Investment (PRI), the Clinton Global Initiative, the Wharton School, the NYSE, the Organization for Economic Co-operation & Development (OECD), the Aspen Institute, the White House, and many other forums.

Erika holds an MBA in Finance from Columbia University and a BS in Economics from the Wharton School. She serves on the Boards of Conscious Capitalism and Jewish Women Invest.

Selected achievements:

• Founding Board member, the Sustainability Accounting Standards Board
• Current Board member, Conscious Capitalism
• Advisor to the Humanity United’s Know The Chain initiative
• Ambassador for the International Integrated Reporting Council
• Ambassador for the World Benchmarking Alliance
• Member of CECP’s Strategic Investor Initiative Advisory Council
• United Nations General Assembly Speaker and Global Compact Board Advisor
• Advisor to former Clinton Global Initiative Market-Based Approaches team; plenary speaker at 2014 Winter Meeting
• Served on World Economic Forum’s Global Agenda Council on Financing & Capital
• Served on Program Design Advisory Council, Harvard Business School’s Executive Education Program, Innovating for Sustainability
• Has been named among the nation’s “Top 50 Women in Wealth” by AdvisorOne, one of the “Purpose Economy 100,” the “Good 100” and one of 50 “Conscious Capitalists” who are “Transforming Wall Street.” Named by Worth Magazine’s “Groundbreakers 2020: 50 Women Changing the World.” Received Babson College’s 2019 Lewis Institute Centennial Social Innovator Award.

Sanda Ojiambo

Assistant Secretary-General and CEO, United Nations Global Compact

United Nations Secretary-General António Guterres appointed Sanda Ojiambo of Kenya as Assistant Secretary-General of the United Nations Global Compact in April 2022. For the past two years, Sanda Ojiambo served as the CEO & Executive Director of the UN Global Compact.

As the world grappled with the COVID-19 pandemic, Sanda Ojiambo launched an ambitious new UN Global Compact Strategy to accelerate and scale the global collective impact of business by upholding the Ten Principles and delivering the Sustainable Development Goals through accountable companies and ecosystems that enable change.

During her tenure, she has also promoted stronger business engagement with UN partners to deliver and finance the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development.

Sanda Ojiambo brings to the UN Global Compact more than 20 years’ experience in the public, multilateral and private sectors including as Head of Sustainable Business and Social Impact, Safaricom Plc in Kenya; and capacity development work in CARE International and United Nations Development Programme Somalia. Throughout her career, she has cultivated and managed relationships with key business entities and civil society organizations and led the implementation of several public-private partnership initiatives.

Sanda Ojiambo holds a Master of Arts in Public Policy from the University of Minnesota, USA, and a Bachelor of Arts in Economics and International Development from McGill University, Canada.

As a special initiative of the UN Secretary-General, the United Nations Global Compact is a call to companies everywhere to align their operations and strategies with Ten Principles in the areas of human rights, labour, environment and anti-corruption. Our ambition is to accelerate and scale the global collective impact of business by upholding the Ten Principles and delivering the Sustainable Development Goals through accountable companies and ecosystems that enable change. With more than 15,000 companies and 3,000 non-business signatories based in over 160 countries, and 69 Local Networks, the UN Global Compact is the world’s largest corporate sustainability initiative—one Global Compact uniting business for a better world.

David Opdyke

Artist

Born in post-industrial Schenectady, New York in 1969, David Opdyke makes artwork that explores globalization, consumerism, and civilization’s abusive relationship with the environment. His work is held in the collections of The Museum of Modern Art, The Brooklyn Museum of Art, and The Washington Convention Center in DC. In 2020, Monacelli Press/Phaidon published a book based on his large-scale postcard project This Land, including essays by Lawrence Weschler and Maya Wiley. His latest project Someday, all this was featured during Climate Week NYC 2022 at the Javits Center, and is now installed in a pop-up collaboration with The Climate Museum in Soho. He lives and works in Ridgewood, Queens.

Ari Wallach

Founder and Executive Director, Longpath

Martin Whittaker

Chief Executive Officer, JUST Capital

Martin Whittaker is a recognized leader with over twenty-five years’ experience at the intersection of global business, finance, philanthropy and social and environmental impact. He is the founding CEO of JUST Capital, the leading nonprofit in the stakeholder capitalism arena, and is responsible for the overall leadership of the organization. He is also a senior advisor to Edelman, a co-founder and Board member of the CREO family office investment syndicate, a member of the Forbes Finance Council and Forbes Contributor, a member of Harvard Business School’s Impact Weighted Accounts Initiative Advisory Council, and a Commissioner to the World Business Council on Sustainable Development’s inequality initiative.

Martin was recently named to the 2020 NACD Directorship 100 – the annual list of the most influential people in the boardroom and on corporate governance – and to Business Insider’s 2020 List of 100 People Transforming Business. Previously, he served as a board member of the Carbon Disclosure Project U.S., and as a member of the G7 Impact Taskforce’s Working Group on Impact Transparency and Integrity, an Advisory Council Member of PayPal’s Employee Financial Wellness Program, and a member of Robin Hood Foundation’s Taskforce on Racial Justice.

Prior to JUST Capital, Martin was a founding partner and investment committee member at Sonen Capital, an impact investing firm, where he led private equity, real asset and direct investing activities. Martin has also served as Director of MissionPoint Capital Partners, a family office-led private equity firm; Senior Vice President at Swiss Re, where he was part of the Environmental and Commodity Markets team; and Managing Director at Innovest Strategic Value Advisors, Inc., a pioneering sustainable investment advisory and ESG research firm.

Martin received his Ph.D. from University of Edinburgh, an MBA from the University of London, an M.Sc. from McGill University and a B.Sc. from University of St. Andrews.

Martin has also served as an Adjunct Professor at the University of Toronto, provided expert testimony on environmental markets to the U.S. Senate, consulted to multiple major corporations on sustainability- and impact-related matters, and been an invited speaker and guest lecturer at business schools including Yale, Columbia, Harvard and MIT, He is a published writer and has presented to audiences at, among others, the World Economic Forum, the White House, CNBC, The New York Times, Bloomberg, Financial Times, The Wall Street Journal, the Economist, and the BBC.