In May 2022, the Shared Value Initiative and FSG published the Centering Equity in Corporate Purpose guide with input from more than 80 experts from around the world. This guide was developed to help leaders reflect on the critical practices needed to design and implement strategies that advance equity within and outside their companies, as well as the enabling conditions required to support that effort in the long term.

We asked our community how we could support them in activating the guide and lifting the learnings off the page and the resounding reply was a request for smaller, peer-to-peer learning discussions. So last month we brought together a group of about 20 corporate leaders from 10 industries, all dedicated to advancing equity and social impact through their work, for a virtual, off-record conversation on the opportunities and challenges they navigate as they work to advance equitable outcomes in their companies. We focused on the first three practices in the guide – (1) New materiality and being in relationship with the problem, (2) choosing which equity domains to create change within, and (3) equity alignment and defining how to deliver change. In the spirit of learning, the group agreed to share some insights and breakthroughs from this experience.

  1. No company has it fully figured out and progress takes time.
  2. Establishing internal learning and development opportunities and other support mechanisms can help build empathy, bring others along the journey.
  3. Companies can’t make progress without being in relationship with the problem.
  4. Companies need to dedicate resources, leadership, and technology to monitor and track progress and use data to set goals and tie results to concrete business metrics and performance scorecards. 
  5. External partners can help drive impact, offset risk and create critical mass in improving systems.

Read the full article about advancing equity by Georgina (Hurst) Eckert at FSG.