sport that is thinking beyond ......

Sometimes you forget to celebrate and share progress and successes and are so focused on what else needs to be done and the fact the “to do list” is not getting any shorter. I was reminded it has been a pretty exceptional month for a several of our long-standing clients who we continue to support on their sustainability or purpose journeys. Not to say others are not also doing amazing things – but a few highlights…..

SailGP won the Environmental Sustainability award at Sport Industry Group FEVO Sport Industry Awards. These awards are heavily contested, and the event saw over 1600 individuals from the world of sport come together to celebrate amazing achievements from both organisations and individuals. At the end of last year, they won the inaugural BBC Sport Ambition and Impact Award. It has not been plain sailing to get to where they are, it has taken several years embedding a different ethos and purpose into the organisation and the grit and determination of Fiona Morgan and her team to keep the challenges moving. We set out writing the strategy back in 2018 and SailGP have continued to challenge themselves and we challenge them to be different – think differently – the Impact League, just one example. Set up to address the challenge of “how do we engage the teams and athletes?”. The teams have risen to the challenge and their purpose partners benefits at every event from the impact they deliver. Carbon management is a core part of their “Better Planet” strategy, and we are supporting them prepare to make their second disclosure to the Carbon Disclosure Project CDP – joining corporates in public disclosure and looking at engaging their supply chain through this mechanism. They are the first sports organisation to have disclosed publicly through CDP. But they mean business and are driving the investment in low carbon innovations for their on-water support fleet amongst other programmes.

Liverpool Football Club have topped the Sport Positive Environmental League Table for the second year running. Establishing a strategy is one thing, embedding it into well established operations, another. Building the sustainability management system to the international standard ISO20121 has been fundamental to success, they don’t hide from the big challenges and they hold themselves to account. It’s not just the club saying they are doing a good job – they are the only Premier League club that has been third party certified to this international sustainable event standard. They continue driving change and are the first and only Premier League team to require their team bus operator to convert their buses to HVO, making them install a dedicated tank – here’s hoping other teams follow suit. Climate, biodiversity, diversity, community a comprehensive approach to delivering more than just sport. Driven forward by Claire Callinan, Hannah Simpkins and Ben Latty, they are open to ideas, suggestions and are steadily making fundamental slides to build on the positive impact the club already has.

And World Athletics – taking on the challenge of how to deliver their Sustainability Strategy which we helped them develop back in 2019 through the world class events that they own and sanction. They have embedded sustainability into the bidding through to supporting delivery, establishing their own benchmarking standard to drive performance and delivering training to 300 events. Like SailGP and Liverpool Football Club, we have helped embed the strategy into the organisation using ISO20121 international standard and achieved external certification for the management system this month.  The World Championships in Budapest this year recently launched their sustainability programme and their mascot YouHuu who shows how the area has been transformed. They have embraced the opportunity to be a flagship championship working closely with Petra Schmitt driving sustainability forward, working closely with World Athletics and Bob Ramsak .  

Each organisation is passionate about going beyond sport and each organisation we challenge to thinkBeyond and change the world. My thanks to you all for making my world fascinating, challenging and definitely not dull! If you are in the sport and sustainability space, follow these organisations, they have done and will continue to do amazing things, trying to change the world for good and deliver authentic impact.

thinkBeyond is a social impact and sustainability consultancy working with and through sport - change the world, thinkBeyond.

Sam Shave, Radha Balani, Nick Keller, Ellen Salter, Thomas Wells, Joanna Leigh, Lauren Keller, Tamsin Miles, Mieke Evans, Peter Speight, Rowena Luscombe, Sam Paine just a few of our amazing team.