The ICRS Exchange 2025: Inspiring Reflections from Independent Sustainability Adviser, Lucy Hagger

On an oddly foggy and muggy October morning, I headed into the City of London for the ICRS Exchange. The theme of the day’s event: Sustainability on Trial: Time to Prove the Payoff. I will say, as a sustainability professional, I found the theme a bit confronting – is it on trial? Am I on trial? Oh no, maybe I should be worried?!

One day on from the event, as I sat down in a café on a similarly muggy afternoon, I considered what I wanted this article to be about. I sifted through my notes, highlighter in hand, and reflected on the conversations from the day. There was so much content and inspiration to attempt to boil down into one coherent story – I started to scramble. Then I found myself coming back to the same word over and over: community.

Amid all the sessions, stats and chats over tea and biscuits, it wasn’t the numbers that struck me most – it was the energy of people coming together, of peers sharing experiences, of realising we weren’t alone. Community, I realised, revealed itself as the unspoken theme of the conference.

And there it was. The hook to bring this story together.

Sustainability has been caught in the crossfire of political battle. Increasingly, sustainability agendas are being weaponised as political talking points to create division, rather than sustainability being treated as a shared necessity. Some people may want us to believe that it’s a waste of time, money and resources. That the fight is over, the battle lost. But as Jennie Galbraith put it in the opening session “sustainability is absolutely not dead.”

Google’s Adam Elman then brought the facts to back Jenny up, stating that a whopping 92% of global organisations are standing firm on their net zero deadlines, and 82% plan to increase their sustainability investments in the next 12–18 months.

So maybe we’re not on trial then, huh?

These stats were a powerful reminder that sustainability is very much alive. The global sustainability agenda continues to drive forward regardless of the shifting political crosswinds. But there is a catch… what emerged from the speakers and attendees is that although companies aren’t walking back on sustainability, the job is just much harder.

Wates’ Cressida Curtis summed it up well: “sustainability professionals need to deliver more with less, under more pressure.” As these words rippled through the keynote hall, I felt and saw feelings of relief and understanding around the room, a collective sense of people feeling seen and understood.

In that moment, we weren’t solo sustainability professionals taking this behemoth challenge on alone. We were a community of peers on a mission to solve some of the biggest challenges of our time, under more pressure than ever before.

For stretched teams, this is exactly why community matters – when resources are thin, support networks and shared learning become lifelines.

Some politicians and press may be pushing for division, but it’s in the coming together – across sectors, organisations and communities – where real progress happens.

Outside of the main agenda sessions, people began swapping stories, divulging worries, sharing tips, and offering encouragement – the fruits of community beginning to ripen within the conference walls. And it didn’t stop there.

Moving into a breakout session, Diageo and CARE International demonstrated how communities of organisations, not just individuals, can create real change. Drawing on their 10-year partnership tackling gender inequalities in Diageo’s supply chain, the speakers shared testimonials from the communities involved – highlighting less violence, more independence and stronger families. Their stories were proof that sustained collaboration can genuinely shift lives.

In a time of division, we lean into community.

After a superb session on building your professional brand, led by the brilliant Karin Mueller, all attendees were brought back together in the keynote hall for a closing session by the Curiously Liminal’s Louisa Harris. Her brief: ‘to add a dollop of inspiration and optimism’ to close off the day. And boy oh boy, did Louisa deliver.

I could do an entire article on Louisa’s session, but once again the importance of community and connection came through fiercely. She spoke of radical collaboration in the face of our greatest threat to progress, coined poignantly in a quote from the British Polar Explorer and environmentalist, Robert Swan: “The greatest threat to our planet is the belief that someone else will save it.”

In a time where powers are seeking to divide us, she encouraged us all to be brave and lean into community. Not to cower away from those who may have different opinions or beliefs to our own, but to build bridges and connections. To bring a mindset of curiosity, not conflict.

She reminded us that the Latin root of the word ‘competition’ is ‘to seek or strive together’. This sounds a lot like the power of community to me.

One small step

As Louisa came to the close of her session, and the day’s agenda, she wasn’t going to let us leave simply thinking about what she’d said. She asked us to act on it, requesting that we all write down one small step we can take in the next week to take ownership for safeguarding our planet and society.

Mine was to open up conversations with people in my life with differing views from my own on politics and the environment, instead of pulling away from them. That makes me nervous, but hard things aren’t meant to be easy.

Now, imagine if all our small steps connected – each conversation, collaboration, or initiative adding to a wave of community action. So, in the ethos of ‘striving together’, I challenge you, reader: what one small step will you take this week to turn intention into impact?

Lucy Hagger is an independent sustainability adviser with 12+ years’ experience helping organisations shape credible sustainability strategies, deliver transparent reporting, and communicate impact. She has worked with FTSE 100s, global brands and purpose-led non-profits — always bridging strategy, storytelling and action. You can connect with her on LinkedIn here.