IPA Arms Agencies with 4-Step Sustainability Transformation Toolkit

A new IPA environmental sustainability report and accompanying toolkit, published today (19th September), identifies the barriers faced by the industry and provides tools and guidance to support agencies in their transformation planning.

The toolkit, Agents of Change: The Plan, provides agencies with a detailed and practical four-step model for action and is designed to give leaders the knowledge and support to formulate a sustainability plan that sits in tandem with their agency business plan.

The toolkit has been commissioned by the IPA Sustainability and is authored by One Planet Communications. It is informed by the findings of an accompanying report, Agents of Change: The Expert View, also published by the IPA today (19th September), which summarises the experiences of agency leaders and sustainability specialists, clients, coalitions working for change within the industry, external activists and other related membership bodies*.

Within the report, these experts define the environment that industry professionals find themselves in and discuss the pressing issues they believe should be tackled through a cohesive, open and collaborative industry-wide approach to sustainability. Crucially, they also identify five perceived barriers to change, which include:

   o   Business as usual taking precedence

   o   The sector not being cohesive

   o   No one telling the whole story

   o   Agencies underestimating risk

   o   Clients not demanding change

To address these barriers, and to set agencies up for future success, they identify key resources and the core steps of activity that form the basis of the four-step model.

A top-line summary of the four-step model for sustainable action:

1) Set your ambition

The first step of the model recommends that agency leaders should identify and be honest about where they want to take their business, in order to provide themselves with a north star when setting targets and taking action.

It identifies that agencies currently fall within three groups, according to their approach to sustainable business:

• Passives – taking no positive action outside legal compliance
  
• Participants – making incremental changes to reduce their negative impact
  
• Pioneers – setting out to embed a sustainable mindset and create a net-positive approach

To help those unsure of their position on the journey, the IPA has also produced a diagnostic tool.

2)  Build the foundations

The model explains how to build the foundations for change, including understanding context and risk, establishing a business case, leading the agenda and engaging colleagues.

3) Take action

The model encourages agencies to take action in two ways:

• In the work they do, which involves making clear choices on their clients, campaigns and in normalising behaviours
• In the way they work - to improve their efficiency and reduce the environmental impact of operations, production and delivery.
  

To help track progress, as an agency and an industry, the Plan proposes 10 top-line KPIs for the work agencies do, and two for the way agencies work.

4) Grow the movement

Finally, the model focuses on how agencies can help to grow a movement for change, through inspiration and collaboration.

Tom Firth, chair, IPA Sustainability Action Group and UK group managing director, M&C Saatchi London said, “For this to be useful for agencies is was essential that we understood where the industry is now - so thank you to everyone who contributed to this report; from clients, agencies, industry bodies and members of the activist community.

“It was clear from these conversations that advertising industry leaders must be clear eyed about the challenges they face and move fast to keep pace with clients, respond to changing legislation and regulation and react to the shifting expectations of talent.

"It is a time of both risk and enormous opportunity for the industry. This project is our first vital step in providing practical support to other IPA members to help them make sense of the agenda and begin to think strategically about the transformation required, and the practical steps needed to change”

Says Paul Bainsfair, director general, IPA, “As the report authors explain in the Expert View, while this practical advice is aimed primarily at those agencies that are at the start, or at an early stage of their journey towards sustainable practice, the principles it sets out are intended to be useful to all leaders, formal or informal, in businesses of all sizes.

“By harnessing our creative power and by working together, we can be a catalyst for change, helping build a more sustainable society for future generations.”

Agents of Change: The Plan and Agency of Change: The View are available to access free of charge from the IPA website.