Financial Services

Back to the Blueprint?

As the sustainability profession stands at a pivotal crossroads, Back to the Blueprint explores what’s next. This forward-looking report brings together insights from global industry leaders and Acre’s own experts to examine the changes in the sustainability industry. This spans political and regulatory headwinds to sector-specific shifts and future talent demands.

Through commentary from leading voices across EMEA, APAC, and the Americas, the report offers a sharp, honest look at the barriers and breakthroughs shaping the profession. Whether you’re navigating the complexities of ESG regulation, building teams equipped for systemic change, or striving for real-world impact in decarbonisation and nature-based solutions, this is essential reading.

Meet the Financial Services Team

Alex Westacott

Senior Recruitment Consultant

AmericasFinancial Services

Allegra Andreacchi

Principal Recruitment Consultant

AmericasFinancial Services

Gloria Mirrione

Executive Director, Head of Financial Services - Americas

AmericasFinancial Services

Helen Pradas-Page

Client Director, Private Markets & Real Assets, EMEA

EMEA

Jenny Han Simon

Senior Research Consultant

Americas

Kate O'Rourke

Director, Professional Services, Banking & Insurance - EMEA

EMEA

Katy Quicke

Head of Investment Management

EMEAFinancial Services

Lucy Chapman

Principal Research Consultant

EMEAFinancial Services

Nick Georgiou

Head of Private Markets & Real Assets

EMEA

Peter Vos

Associate Director

EMEAFinancial Services

Zac Cinnamond

Senior Recruitment Consultant

Asia & PacificFinancial Services

Meet the Team

Financial Services Insights

Consumer Markets

Back to the Blueprint?

Andrew Cartland

Consumer Markets

Future of the Sustainability Professional: Executive Summary Report

Acre convened 150+ CSOs and senior sustainability executives for a digital event in April that explored the future of our profession and what it will take to thrive in it. Now we’ve distilled those insights into a free resource designed to equip sustainability professionals and leaders with practical foresight and perspective.

Our panel of leading experts - John Elkington, Angela Jhanji, Michael Kobori, and Catherine Harris - tackled some of the most urgent and complex topics facing the sector today. From the shifting role of sustainability functions and the impact of AI, to leadership in the face of global uncertainty, the conversation was both candid and catalytic.

Catherine Harris

Earlier this year, Georgina Sell, Principal Consultant, EMEA - Industry & Infrastructure, shared a paper ‘The Green Recovery and Beyond: How exactly are industries working to combat climate change?’, inspired by Project Drawdown’s roadmap.

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Providing clarity around sustainability and AI for a brighter future

Recently, Georgie spent time with Lorenzo Saa, Chief Sustainability Officer at sustainable technology company Clarity AI, to learn about the key tech drivers accelerating sustainability and yield a better understanding of AI and the opportunities associated with its ability to address climate change.

Can you tell us a bit more about Clarity AI?

Lorenzo: We provide sustainability data and insights to investors, consumers and companies to bring societal impact to markets.

Our approach is evident in our name: Clarity. The intention is to bring transparency to the traditional black box ESG data and insights offering, to ensure there is a level of traceability regarding data and the underlying methodologies, so investors can focus on driving their own sustainability investment choices. In fact, compared to when I started my career 20+ years ago, investors today are much more competent and knowledgeable on sustainability and make decisions by looking at the underlying data rather than just relying on an external service provider’s ratings.

As for AI, which is also reflected in our name, we recognised that it could be a powerful tool for enhancing scale and speed while addressing the complexities of sustainability data. AI is not the end goal but a means to achieve it, complementing a data-driven approach rather than relying solely on analysts.

Why do you think AI could be a significant force in addressing sustainability?

The world has made some big sustainability commitments. However, we're very far from the Paris Agreement goal of 1.5 degrees today as we are currently on the trajectory of a 2.8 degrees world compared to pre-industrial times. Moreover, only 15 per cent of the SDGs achieved. Finally, we are quite behind the Global Biodiversity Framework “30 by 30” conservation target, with only 17 per cent protected area on the terrestrial side and eight per cent protected area on the maritime side.

With all this in mind, we need the right level of speed and scalability to address these complex problems hence the importance of technology and AI.

We believe any consumer, company or investor makes decisions along the ‘knowledge pyramid’. Data is at the bottom of the pyramid and as you move up there is information, knowledge, wisdom and action. We drive action by bringing AI and subject matter experts together at each step of the pyramid.

How can we use AI to help strengthen ESG data?

I think there are four elements - the first is coverage. AI can collect data on web pages or PDF documents and read free text, graphs, and images; combining humans and AI can simplify and expand this process and significantly expand data coverage.

The second element is reliability. Ensuring the quality of the data is still a huge challenge, but machine learning reliability models can perform specific checks to drastically enhance accuracy.

The third one is alternative data sets. When reported data is not available, we have different alternative data sets to leverage on. In this context, AI enables us to transform unstructured data (like satellite data or news streams) into structured data, providing deeper insights.

Finally, estimates play a crucial role. Finally, when data just isn’t there the estimation capabilities of AI are particularly strong: Estimation helps investors move ahead on climate issues which is important from a scope 3 perspective. These indirect emissions represent around 70 per cent of the average corporate value chain’s total emissions. As 42 per cent of companies report on scope 3 and usually on only one of its factors, estimation is a critical element to address a significant part of the transition to net zero.

Where do you feel ESG data estimations and AI may not work?

That's a great question and I think we should be first and foremost encouraging the market to drive the reported data. The fact that companies are still not reporting certain issues is a challenge and I think there's a lot of initiatives to drive that change.

However, when data is not available, you need to ensure that using estimation is appropriate by assessing a few key elements: Firstly, looking at the methodology and how critical that estimation is and secondly, evaluating the assumptions behind the estimation - are they transparent and do you fully understand them?

The third is the confidence level of that estimation. Whether it’s high, low or medium, this will help you determine if using a lower-confidence estimate might be too risky.

The final point is ensuring estimations start from a validated data set for comparison. I think sometimes there's this feeling of ‘let's not do estimations, it's not the right thing’. The reality is estimations are used a lot in financial accounting and we don't see why we shouldn’t look at them from a climate perspective.

Once these aspects are critically reviewed, then we should remind ourselves that the issues that we're trying to address are so significant that an 80/20 rule should be used to move forward. Like we do in financial accounting, estimations are not perfect, but they can still be close enough and practical to take action against them.

How does this fit with the needs of SFDR/CSRD for asset managers and corporates?

As the reporting landscape becomes more complex, with directives such as the CSRD and SFDR, AI can help simplify the process. For example, in the case of the SFDR (Sustainable Finance Disclosure Regulation), which mandates that market participants report on the sustainability impacts of their investments, Clarity AI offers a tool that allows you to automatically generate your Article 8 periodic reports using a simple questionnaire, our data and previous reports.

This is important to us as it allows investors and corporates to focus on the ‘doing’ versus the ‘reporting’.

How do you think AI can make life easier for investors, companies and consumers to help them report and progress on their own sustainability journeys?

Transition plans are critical in climate and require a lot of review to see if they are credible. We are now capable of looking at these reports through AI and assessing if the targets they set are accompanied by quantifiable measures that can achieve those targets.

We recently found for example, that only 40% of the higher emitting companies have these credible transition plans.

Additionally, AI assistants, like the one we’ve developed at Clarity AI, use advanced algorithms to interpret and contextualize ESG data, providing insights and trend analysis. This enables investors to “converse” with their portfolio, finding sources, trends and potential areas of improvements in a much easier and efficient format. These are just two examples of how life can be much easier with the leverage of AI.

How can we counter risks associated with AI?

I like to think there is an ESG of AI. Governance is probably the critical starting point and a good way of looking at it is how we manage our controversy solution. It runs on discriminative AI, not generative AI, to avoid hallucinations, it removes names of companies at the beginning of the process to avoid any bias towards certain names, and any controversy deemed at a high severity level must go through one of our subject matter experts to ensure that we best manage the combination of AI and humans in the loop.

On the environmental side, there's a need to consume electricity to run the algorithms and to cool facilities, which uses a lot of water consumption. These issues need to be addressed, starting by using renewable energy, but also by designing efficient models better aligned to their use cases, and investing in further hardware efficiency innovation.

There are different ways to look at the social aspects, for example in terms of what's going to happen regarding labour. As in climate, AI will also require a just transition, with companies and governments taking their part in addressing it.

How do you believe AI can help empower consumers to accelerate the transition to a more circular economy?

We're working with ING Spain to provide over four million customers with the possibility to see their carbon footprint on their banking app based on their activity.

How you act as a consumer to ensure that your footprint gets reduced will become part of the way we think of our activities, if we have something in our pocket that informs us of our sustainable actions.

What do you foresee as the most essential skills to drive what is needed in AI?

I would argue everyone will need to have a balance of technical, analytical and soft skills, and - depending on the role - the weighting of these will change.

Not everybody needs to know the details of NLP machine learning (cloud computing), but a general understanding will probably be needed by everyone. How to use these tools will be quite critical alongside wanting to continue to learn.

A great quote that I heard was that AI is not going to take your job, but someone that knows about AI will take your job.

And so being open, willing to see where the world is going and wanting to learn new things will make a difference in terms of success.

But you don't all need to be technicians – we have a huge data science team, but we also have a significant number of subject matter expertise. The ability to collaborate between data scientists and sustainability expertise is what we believe drives our success.

Clarity AI recently won the Impact Investing Platform of the Year, you were also selected as technology pioneer by the World Economic Forum and named one of the most innovative companies. Why do you think Clarity AI is so award-winning?

We are very honoured by these recognitions and most recently, we were also named a leader in Forrester's Q3 2024 ESG and analytics provider assessment. We are driven by two things: One is the desire to stay on top of innovation, which is critical in today's world. I think being able to know how to leverage tools and technology to drive scalability is what investors are particularly keen to see. We are creating waves in the sustainability space, and we're excited about that, but we don't just offer data, methodologies or tools, we combine the three which is quite unique in the market, so we find players extremely excited to work with us.

What is your biggest call to action?

Three things spring to mind. The first is we are all a force of change and have a role to play, so it’s important to recognise this, take responsibility, and act.

Secondly, I think the world has this simplistic view of how to address climate change with black and white approaches. I think a more nuanced engagement with companies, governments and people will make the difference.

And the last thing is embracing technology. There's no way we will meet the Paris Agreement target if we don't use our intellect, creativity and innovation to drive change. A lot of the solutions are out there but they need to be scaled.

Instead of thinking of AI as the Terminator that's going to inform us, the way I look at it is that we're all Skywalkers and the Force is with us. But Skywalker had R2D2 with him.

And that's what AI is for us.

Georgina Sell

The Power of Partnering with Indigenous Peoples within Climate Finance

Indigenous communities are the stewards of biodiversity and cultural heritage. They possess invaluable knowledge and practices that contribute significantly to global sustainability. Yet, despite their vital role in maintaining 80% of the Earth’s remaining intact ecosystems, less than 1% of climate finance reaches Indigenous communities - a funding gap that threatens both environmental and social stability.

Why this matters

Direct funding to Indigenous communities enables them to pursue self-determined development and fosters economic stability, cultural preservation, and environmental stewardship. However, structural barriers in the global climate finance system often prevent funding from reaching these communities directly.

During London Climate Week in June 2024, Acre’s Georgina Sell, Associate Director, hosted a workshop in collaboration with Rainforest Foundation UK, New Animal, and Nia Tero titled:

“Shaping the Future: The Power of Partnering with Indigenous Peoples in Climate Finance.”

The workshop brought together senior decision-makers and organisations to explore the intersection of:

Nature-based Solutions
Human Rights
Climate Finance

This was a pivotal opportunity for Indigenous representatives and corporate leaders to engage in a robust dialogue about what effective climate action looks like — and to identify actionable solutions for increasing direct funding to Indigenous communities.

Key insights from the workshop

Indigenous peoples sustain at least 80% of Earth’s remaining intact ecosystems — yet less than 1% of climate finance reaches these communities.
Direct funding is essential for fostering economic resilience and environmental stewardship in Indigenous communities.
Collaborative models between Indigenous communities and corporations present a unique opportunity to accelerate progress in the fight against climate change.
Alternative funding mechanisms — such as blended finance and community-based funding — are emerging as promising solutions to close the funding gap.

“We wanted this workshop to be as dynamic and impactful as possible, and for our Indigenous representatives to be actively involved in curating the event. This was a vital moment for knowledge sharing between corporates and Indigenous representatives — a powerful event where we explored alternative funding mechanisms and nature-based solutions to see if we could expedite funding to the front lines quicker and, in doing so, accelerate progress in the fight against climate change.”

Georgina Sell

Associate Director

Acre

Why you should download the write-up

Following the workshop, we compiled a detailed write-up — “Mobilising Direct Funding to Indigenous Peoples: Strategies for Global Sustainable Development” — to capture the essence of the discussions and provide a resource for continuing these important conversations.

Understand why direct funding is critical for Indigenous-led climate action.
Discover practical opportunities to strengthen partnerships with Indigenous communities.
Explore innovative funding models to increase the flow of capital to Indigenous communities.
Gain insights into best practices for building more equitable and effective climate finance systems.

Georgina Sell

Thought Leadership

Insurers, thematic and impact funds drive sustainability hiring

^{Featuring Acre's Paddy Balfour for}AsianInvestor, published on 10.06.2024, Original Source: Insurers, thematic and impact funds drive sustainability hiring, Author: Indira Vergis

Some roles in the sustainability arena are seeing demand even amid broader economic and job market uncertainty, according to recruitment and investment industry experts.

Demand for sustainability-focused hires is growing in some parts of the financial services industry in Asia, even as sustainability became a politically charged term in other parts of the world such as the US.

Hiring for certain sustainability roles remains robust in Asia even amid broader job market uncertainty, according to recruitment and investment industry experts.

“Insurance as a sector is experiencing significant growth having been slower to develop adequate levels of expertise internally and now seeing both the imperative and opportunity”, Paddy Balfour, Singapore-based executive director for Asia Pacific at Acre, a sustainability hiring consultancy, told AsianInvestor.

Insurers such as AIA, Ping An and Prudential have told AsianInvestor over the past six months that they are actively increasing their sustainability investments.

“We are also seeing huge growth in specialist funds. This includes thematic funds around decarbonisation, sustainable infrastructure, energy transition, natural capital and climate, as well as more specialist impact funds,” he added.

RISING REGULATORY PRESSURES

The main driver of ESG [environment, social and governance] adoption in the Asia Pacific, nevertheless, is still an increasing web of regulations.

“Financial institutions now have mandatory disclosure requirements in various jurisdictions across the region,” said Jules Bottlaender, Head of Sustainable Finance for APAC at BNP Paribas Securities Services.

“Most of them are related to climate financial disclosure aligned with TCFD, which require specific teams to collect climate data and analyse the related risks and opportunities.”

This has resulted in the creation of numerous reporting roles, although mostly for traditional buy-side clients.

“The alternatives can often avoid those regulatory requirements by justifying non materiality of these risks due to their strategy (high frequency, FX, long-short, derivatives, etc). There is no sign of easing as new regulations coming in will extend to broader sustainability topics (ISSB) or other reporting requirements (taxonomy, fund labelling, etc),” Bottlaender told AsianInvestor.

He also noted the emergence of specific investment strategies such as thematic investing and impact investing, both of which require investment managers with sustainability expertise.

The world’s largest climate finance fund, Green Finance Fund, also told AsianInvestor recently that it plans to invest in up to 40 investments in 2024, and Asia is expected to play a key role in that.

Other specialised entities focused on decarbonisation and nature-based solutions operating in the region include GenZero and Pentagreen Capital.

Family offices have also emphasised the importance of impact investing and how they see that as investing for profit and doing good.

TRADITIONAL INVESTOR’S DEMAND

Many financial institutions are increasingly also integrating ESG factors into investment decisions.

“This is driven by fiduciary duty and other frameworks such as the UNPRI [United Nations Principles of Responsible Investment]. This task requires both ESG data roles and ESG analysts.

“Traditionally, ESG factors have been integrated for equity investments since the relationship with risk/return is more obvious. However, the practice has been broadening to other asset classes such as corporate bonds, real estate, infrastructure and private equity,” Bottlaender said.

Gabriel Nam, partner leading the ESG, strategy and transformation practice in Asia for Page Executive, said the recruitment consultant recently helped a private equity fund find a sustainability expert for the real estate portion of the fund’s portfolio.

While the market is a little uncertain right now, companies continue to hire at junior levels for data crunching and data analysis or some reporting and coordination/alignment work (which is also a core part of sustainability function).

“Many people are starting to show a passion for sustainability and the barriers to entry are lower at this point,” said Singapore-based Nam.

Shortlisted candidates for sustainability roles can have very different backgrounds – from communications and accounting to marketing research, Nam said.

“Picking up the skills required for reporting is not considered very hard so it’s not a must to have prior functional background in finance, accounting, compliance or legal (that are traditionally strong in compliance, reporting) etc.”

Increasingly they also have a certification qualification, which can range from a CESGA [Certified ESG Analyst], CFA ESG Investing, Master’s degree in sustainability related subjects or at least some short-term sustainability-related courses offered by renowned organisations, he added.

“However with certain specialised topics like climate change or nature-based solutions, candidates tend to have a stronger academic background in certain subjects like environmental science, environmental engineering, geography etc.”

TALENT SHORTAGE AMID GREENWASHING

All three experts that AsianInvestor spoke to said there is an ongoing talent shortage in this space.

The financial sector is seeing a proliferation of ESG-related roles, such as sustainable finance investment bankers, green bonds specialists, and ESG portfolio managers and chief sustainability officer, said BNP Paribas’s Bottlaender.

He noted that due to the talent gap, some companies are offering premiums for individuals with ESG expertise.

Negative publicity around greenwashing has resulted in organisations in some cases reducing their sustainability commitments, yet “the regulations, risk and opportunities are only increasing and therefore we don’t see a reduction in roles,” said Acre’s Balfour.

“Teams are undoubtedly being asked to deliver more with less as part of the challenges experienced more broadly in the economic outlook.”

“The key trend that we are seeing in sustainability hiring in Asia-Pacific is a focus on value.

“Large, costly, centralised teams are being repositioned to be better aligned with business needs resulting in a smaller number but a higher value of hire.”

This includes professionals that can generate alpha through research, coverage and sector bankers who can drive deal flow through as part of the transition, and product specialists who can bring knowledge and expertise to the LP discussion.

“If anything we are seeing more specialised senior hiring from firms looking for real commercial value from their sustainability teams that they weren’t getting from larger but less qualified teams,” Balfour added.

Paddy Balfour

👉 Listen to The Sustainable Finance Podcast and gain insights from industry leaders today.

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Exploring Sustainable Finance Talent: Acre x The Sustainable Finance Podcast

Acre has partnered with The Sustainable Finance Podcast to deliver a thought-provoking six-episode series that provides deep insights into the evolving sustainable finance talent market. Hosted by Paul Ellis, the podcast features expert voices from leading global organisations—including Schroders, FTSE Russell, The London Stock Exchange Group, Gitterman Wealth Management, and more.

Each episode unpacks critical challenges and opportunities in sustainable finance, covering themes like the transition to a sustainable economy, nature-based solutions, and climate risk management.

Meet the Experts

The series features some of the most respected professionals in the field, including:

• Andy Cartland – Founder & Interim Managing Director, APAC at Acre

• Gloria Mirrione – Executive Director, Sustainable Finance & Impact Investing, Americas at Acre

• Ellen Rutherford – Managing Director, Americas at Acre

• Paul Ellis – Host of The Sustainable Finance Podcast

Together, they discuss the latest trends shaping the sustainable finance industry and the skills required to drive meaningful impact.

Episode Breakdown

Episode 1: Talent and the Sustainable Economy

Talent is at the core of the sustainability transition. In this opening episode, Andy Cartland and Gloria Mirrione explore the vital role that financial services—and the professionals within them—play in accelerating a more sustainable economy. They discuss:

• How organisations can attract and develop top sustainability talent

• The skills needed to lead change in the financial sector

• The increasing importance of sustainability expertise in investment strategies

“We know that the more impact we can catalyse, the more successful we are going to be. We also know that to succeed commercially in this market, you have to be passionate.”

– Andy Cartland, Founder, Acre

Episode 2: Nature-Based Solutions Combine Science & Investment Strategy

Nature-based solutions (NbS) offer significant opportunities for net-zero strategies and climate resilience. In this episode, Gloria Mirrione speaks with:

• Charlotte Kaiser (Head of Impact Finance, BTG Pactual Timberland Investment Group)

• Chris Larson (CIO, Alder Point Capital Management)

They discuss the intersection of investment and conservation, focusing on how NbS can provide financial, social, and environmental returns.

Episode 3: Investing in Water Propels Prosperity and Climate Resilience

Access to clean water and sanitation is a global challenge—but could financial markets be the key to a sustainable solution?

This episode features Paul O’Connell, President of WaterEquity, and Gloria Mirrione, as they explore:

• How capital markets can drive water infrastructure investments

• The importance of sustainable finance in ensuring global water security

• The role of investors in tackling one of the world’s most pressing issues

Episode 4: Leadership in Sustainability Joins the C-Suite

Sustainability leadership is becoming a core component of corporate governance. In this episode, Paul Ellis speaks with:

• Chrissa Pagitsas, a strategic advisor and author on ESG & sustainability

• Gloria Mirrione, Acre’s Head of Sustainable Finance & Impact Investing

Together, they discuss how sustainability has moved from a niche concern to a boardroom priority, influencing corporate decision-making, risk management, and long-term business success.

Episode 5: Capital Meets Purpose in Community Economic Development

Financial inclusion is a critical part of sustainability. This episode explores how Community Development Financial Institutions (CDFIs) are playing a crucial role in ESG-aligned investments.

Paul Ellis is joined by:

• John Holdsclaw IV (President & CEO, Rochdale Capital)

• Harold Pettigrew, Jr. (President & CEO, Opportunity Finance Network)

• Gloria Mirrione, Acre

They discuss how CDFIs are enabling economic growth, reducing wealth inequality, and driving impact investment strategies.

Episode 6: Ownership Works & Private Equity Join Forces for Employee Opportunities

Can shared ownership models create financial security for employees while driving better business outcomes?

In this final episode, Paul Ellis speaks with:

• Anna-Lisa Miller (Executive Director, Ownership Works)

• Gloria Mirrione, Acre

They explore how private equity firms and corporations are integrating ownership models to empower employees, improve productivity, and enhance financial well-being.

Why This Series Matters

The world of sustainable finance is rapidly evolving. Businesses and investors alike are facing increasing pressure to align financial strategies with ESG principles—and finding the right talent is crucial to making this transition a success.

At Acre, we understand that people drive impact. Our expertise in sustainable finance recruitment ensures that organisations can find and develop the leaders, strategists, and innovators needed to shape a more sustainable world.

This article is optimised for Acre’s website, providing a professional and engaging breakdown of the podcast series. Let me know if you’d like any refinements!

Gloria Mirrione