Becoming a better bank: Advancing sustainability and social impact initiatives for a global bank

A global bank operating in Australia was looking to improve the clarity and ambition of its existing sustainability and social activities and social impact initiatives. Nous was engaged to review and reshape its sustainability and social impact strategies. This involved conducting a gap analysis into the bank’s existing sustainability action plans and capabilities, and developing ambitious, strategically aligned sustainability and social impact action plans that would underpin the bank’s sustainability efforts.

From their financing of projects and businesses that impact the environment, to the social implications of their lending practices and the strength of their internal governance structures, banks increasingly recognise that sustainability is not merely a compliance or marketing exercise, but one that underpins their long-term strategic viability and social license to operate.

It was this recognition, as well as Nous’ sustainability expertise, that led the bank to reach out and engage us to help move them forward into the future.

“This project was an exciting opportunity to work closely with a bank’s leadership team to raise and realise their sustainability and social ambitions in line with their overall strategy,” says project manager Sophie McPhate. “Informed by an assessment community needs, and ideas from the client, our team developed a long list of practical actions the bank could take, as well as impactful social investments it could make.”

“We designed a set of ‘prioritisation principles’ with executives and developed detailed plans to help the bank implement actions and initiatives that were strategic, values-aligned, achievable, differentiated and – importantly – likely to deliver a positive benefit to Australian communities.”

The project was delivered in two stages. In the first, Nous undertook a comprehensive gap analysis of the bank’s 2024 sustainability strategy and action plan, as well as its other initiatives in the sustainability, and social impact spaces. This involved a complete desktop review of the bank’s current commitments and overarching strategy across five domains: strategy, governance and culture; operations; customer and brand; products and services; and compliance and reporting.

It also involved interviews with the bank’s executive committee and a comparison between the bank’s capability and resource benchmarks and those of comparable Australian banks. This latter effort was undertaken to ensure that the bank set itself ambitious and market relevant targets.

While the bank’s list of sustainability and social impact activities was well-defined, the gap analysis found that it could be improved with a stronger sense of how the activities contributed to longer-term impact. Similarly, while staff awareness of the bank’s activities and their importance was found to have grown over time, the analysis suggested that more could be done to entrench it.

”Our gap analysis showed there was room for improvement across five key ‘domains’,” says McPhate, “It was clear that bringing more intention and strategic focus to the bank’s investments was the biggest opportunity to make a difference.”

Following the gap analysis, Nous and the bank worked together to identify three medium-term outcomes for the bank to achieve, developing outcome statements to articulate its ambitions. Often times companies will set aspirational sustainability goals without including tangible targets linked to impact within a reasonable time horizon. Developing medium term outcome statements ensured that the bank’s sustainability strategy was realistic and impactful. We further developed decision principles to help filter and prioritise the bank’s broader raft of sustainability and social impact initiatives.​

We now moved into the second stage of the project, which saw us develop the bank’s new sustainability and social impact action plans, both of which were aligned to the bank’s future growth strategy.

This involved conducting community needs assessments, which were based on research into best practice and expert interviews, and prioritising initiatives to ensure their alignment with one another, community needs, and the bank’s purpose and values. These initiatives were drafted with input from the bank’s business units, which were tasked with implementing the sustainability strategy and action plan, and were prioritised on the basis of their potential to create positive environmental and social impacts. The proposed actions and initiatives were supplemented with guidance for the bank to uplift its key delivery enablers, including resourcing, leadership, data, and staff engagement.

“We were always conscious that the action plans needed to be practicable, not just ambitious,” says McPhate. “To help our client bring more focus to their efforts, we workshopped outcomes statements and helped the client to define what success would look like. This brought much-needed clarity early on and was a critical first step in shaping principles-led and outcomes-focused plans.”

The sustainability and social impact actions plans were further tested and refined in collaboration with the bank’s business units before being agreed to by its executive committee. Nous was ultimately effective in articulating a clear vision and path forward for the bank’s sustainability and social impact ambitions. The implementation of the plans will commence in 2025.

“In the end, we took our client on an important journey,” says McPhate. “We helped them identify opportunities for improvement, built consensus around the way forward, and finally delivered practical roadmaps to deliver a new strategic approach.”

“Ultimately, it will be Australian communities who stand to benefit from the needs-aligned sustainability activities and social initiatives the bank undertakes.”