Sustainability Fundamentals for Boards and Executives

Board members, directors, executive committees, company leaders, senior managers, and governance officers.

Designed for board members, executive committees, and senior leaders, this in-house training offers a tailored learning experience co-created with experts from Solvay, the House of Training, and your teams. Adapted to your needs, the program is flexible to suit your strategic priorities, your organization’s maturity levels, and key sustainability aspects relevant to your business sector.
Leveraging an interactive and participatory approach, this programme enables participants to gain a solid understanding of the scientific, economic, and policy foundations of sustainability, while identifying relevant levers for business transformation.
An introductory cross-cutting session provides an overview of major societal challenges, clearly situating the organization’s strategies and actions within the broader context of the global transition.
The programme also offers a unique opportunity for peer exchange, aiming to develop a strategic vision aligned with sustainable transition challenges, with insights and perspectives shaped to the programme’s structure and duration.

• Raise leaders’ awareness of current sustainability challenges and their impact on business performance.
• Establish a common language and deep understanding of sustainability concepts, frameworks, and key indicators.
• Identify relevant frameworks and levers to guide governance decisions.
• Strengthen leaders’ ability to drive sustainable transformation within their organization.
• Provide a high-quality learning environment, adapted to the company’s culture and sector.

1. Welcome to the Anthropocene

• Overview of major planetary boundaries: ecological limits, minimum social standards, environmental, social, and economic interdependencies
• Critical resources for businesses, contextualization of risks and opportunities

2.  Socio-Ecological Systems

• Exploration of human impacts on ecosystems, focus on energy and food impacts
• Development of systems thinking to understand how strategic decisions affect the entire value chain and the global ecosystem

3.  Climate: From Science to Action

• Analysis of climate change and its economic and regulatory implications
• Understanding strategic levers to reduce the organization’s carbon footprint and align decisions with sustainability goals

4.  Sustainability Challenges

• Illustration of business dilemmas and trade-offs through case studies and simulations
• Identification of key governance obstacles and levers to embed sustainability into strategy

5.  Policy Perspectives

• Overview of key regulatory frameworks and public policies (CSRD, ESRS, carbon taxation, certifications) and their impact on business strategy
• Analysis of contrasting sustainable governance models and implications for board oversight

6.  The Role and Transformation of Companies

• Examination of strategic transformation pathways: flow optimization, sector coordination, circular economy
• Focus on business model choices and sustainable value creation, with concrete sectoral examples

7.  Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion (DEI)

• Positioning DEI as a strategic and governance factor
• Identification of challenges, legal and reputational risks, and levers to foster an inclusive and responsible culture within the organization

8. Leading Change

• Principles of sustainable leadership and strategic change management: resilience, vision, innovation, stakeholder engagement, and alignment with ESG objectives
• Approach to supporting leaders and boards in organizational transformation

Upon completion, participants can download a certificate of attendance from the learner portal, issued by the House of Training and Solvay Lifelong Learning.

This programme is customizable.
It is co-designed with the company to meet your specific needs: preliminary diagnosis, selection of case studies, integration of sectoral issues, flexible formats (two-day seminar, or multi-session programme).
Our approach emphasizes interactivity, strategic discussion, and grounding in the organization’s real-world challenges.