Environmental, Social & Governance (ESG)
Understand the importance of ESG in a comprehensive economic development strategy
Environmental, Social, and Governance (ESG) considerations in today's business landscape have become paramount for companies across industries. Economic development organizations (EDOs) are pivotal in fostering business growth and sustainability within their communities. To meet these evolving demands, Hickey Global is launching an ESG Strategy Development service to help EDOs get ESGReady℠. Through this offering, we’ll help communities build robust ESG strategies that tell dynamic attraction stories for prospective businesses and benefit those already established in the community.
Comprehensive ESG Strategies:
Create a Competitive Advantage: Companies with robust ESG strategies enjoy a competitive edge in a global marketplace. Our consulting service assists economic development organizations in creating strategies that can attract businesses seeking sustainable practices and responsible governance.
Help Mitigate Risk: Effective ESG strategies can help organizations identify and mitigate potential risks related to environmental, social, or governance issues. This proactive approach safeguards companies against financial and reputational damage.
ESGReady℠ Services
Hickey Global will meet your community wherever the beginning of your ESG journey is. Our approach is crafted to ensure a comprehensive understanding of what environmental, social, and governance initiatives encompass, then design an approach that meets your local needs.
Training
Developing a program of work around a topic that may not be widely understood is a challenge. Hickey Global can help you navigate the early stages of ESG-related thinking by introducing the concept of ESG work for economic development organizations and begin erecting the framework under which communities can think objectively about what it will mean to become ESGReady℠.
Data & Organization
For many communities, the challenge isn’t about doing work that qualifies as ESG-related but finding the ability to capture those efforts in ways that connect with an ESG-focused audience. Hickey Global can help you rethink your data collection, take inventory of the work you’re already doing tied to ESG, and then organize your work to translate to a powerful ESGReady℠ marketing and awareness campaign.
Focus-Specific Initiatives
Marketing & Attraction – Data surrounding the corporate focus on ESG tells us that major global corporations are paying attention to ESG progress within their companies. Therefore, we can deduce that having an economic development ESG story is an important aspect of your business recruitment approach if you’re targeting major global companies and firms that are part of major corporate supply chains. This Hickey Global service provides strategic guidance for telling an ESG attraction story. Get ESGReady℠ by capturing the right data, crafting industry-specific ESG messaging, and promoting local efforts to create a sustainable community for corporate and individual residents.
Business Retention & Expansion – The old rule of thumb is that roughly 80% of the new business activity you experience comes from repeat or existing customers, which is essential to remember in your ESGReady℠ work. Rolling ESG work into a Business Retention and Expansion approach is a powerful way to connect with your local business base. It is another value-add from the community to the corporate customer. Hickey Global can help you build ESG into your regular company interactions, leading to better EDO alignment with the business community and a stronger BRE ecosystem. Allow our team to help your community think strategically about how to engage local companies on topics important to the corporate bottom line.
ESG Strategy
The most holistic way to ensure that your community is ESGReady℠ is to develop a comprehensive strategy demonstrating local commitment to Environmental, Social, and Governance policies and practices in your EDO and community. In addition to the services listed above, a complete ESG strategy would include the following components:
Community Values – ESG strategies aren’t one size fits all, and some may not prioritize all aspects of the initiative equally. For example, some communities may choose to emphasize their focus on the People (Social), while others prefer to lean into the Place (Environment) aspect of ESG initiative development. Hickey Global understands that all communities are different and will work with you to identify your ESG Community Values and build a body of work that complements them.
Economic Development Capacity – With all strategies, setting goals aligned with what can be accomplished is essential. Hickey Global helps communities consider the availability of technical assistance, site infrastructure, opportunity sites, small business activity, and more. Once these defining components are identified, our team can address how new ESG initiatives, investments, or partnerships can be created.
Stakeholder Engagement - Effective ESG Strategies aren’t built in a vacuum. Allow Hickey Global to help guide your community through identifying and engaging the stakeholders necessary to bring your planning to life. In addition to identifying and helping you engage the right players, our team will assist you with developing reporting mechanisms that proactively share information about ESG progress and help keep the community at the core of your work.