Working towards a workshop – getting closer

I have been refining the core purpose, audience and content for the workshop. It has taken some time, in part, because it is also an assessment what services I aim to provide in my new advisory firm, Strabo Rivers.

I have been mapping out the elements of the workshop (see photo below) as I develop the workshop structure, participants and content. More importantly, I am refining my current essence (i.e. what is valuable about my services).

At this stage, my essence is ‘anchoring challenges within the capital markets’. It’s my understanding of both the complexity of the challenges facing society and how these challenges interact with the capital markets. I sit as a bridge between the challenge and the market. I am using the word ‘challenge’ rather than sustainability or ESG issue

The workshop is about raising the visibility of these skills and then making an ask for next steps such as ‘Hire me’, ‘Join my group’, or ‘Let me into your organization’.

The elements of the workshop that I am settling on include:

• Purpose: Show how I integrate challenges (such as climate change, income inequality, diversity etc) into the capital markets as medium to long term trends (tools and examples) – ‘How I came to respect the market’
• Audience: Investment professionals with career interests in ESG and long term investing, not-for-profit who are looking to better understand how their challenges might benefit from an interaction  with the capital markets, and sustainability professionals within companies who are looking to engagement more effectively with investor relations and the broader investment community
• Shared purpose: For the participants to understand that the issues affecting them can be anchored in the capital markets by understanding the timing of investments, learn a set of tools and approaches that enable a stronger engagement with the capital markets, and then discuss between each other.

I have developed a set of three myths to anchor the discussions:

1. Impact investing leads to under-performance
2. All sustainability issues are important all of the time
3. Investing that accounts for sustainability issues should largely focus on risk

Another evolution that is important is the development of predictive tools rather than purely reporting. A tool is useful if it provides the ability to better predict the outcome. Therefore, the process that I propose is an additional component of standard capital markets processes. I have not yet developed an set of tools that focus on sustainability and ESG issues which negates the need for standard financial analysis if the goal is to generate returns.

There will also be a set of accompanying case studies in areas such as :

• Data privacy
• Waste
• Renewable energy
• Animal protein production
• Water

I am now seeking to lock in a date and secure the venue so that I can begin the process of marketing the workshop to relevant people.