For example, on average 21% of UK and USA CEOs and 24% of Chinese CEOS are focused on making their businesses sustainable, whereas only 13% of Australian CEOs are pursuing this. Building on this, just 7% of Australian CEOs, compared to 15% of UK and 13% of USA CEOs, are concerned about ESG policy and a lowly 4% of Australian CEOs, relative to 13% of UK and 8% of USA CEOs, about a diverse and inclusive workforce. Thus, Australian CEOs have some way to go in moving towards the norms of the rest of the world.
This lack of focus of on diversity and ESG policies might be because the approach to value creation favored by Australian CEOs is acquisitions and improved efficiency to reduce costs, wherein 31% of Australian CEOs favored these approaches to creating value relative to just 22% of CEOs from the rest of the world. Overall, Australian preferences indicate a leaning towards a conventional mindset, that is increasingly being challenged as the business world moves towards a stakeholder orientation. In this context, it is perhaps of little surprise that Australian CEOs are the least likely relative to CEOs from the UK and USA to be accelerating the development of a corporate purpose. Across the UK and the USA over two-thirds of CEOs (67%) are accelerating their development of a corporate purpose that is about more than money, whereas only half (51%) of Australian CEOs consider this a priority.
As we head deeper into the 2020s and the challenges of the coming decades, Brandpie is working with Prof. Nick Barter and Prof. Chris Fleming who believe that companies that can link their purpose to their teams and their business ecosystems are going to enable meaningful transformation that the world needs and in so doing deliver long-term stakeholder value. If you would like to be part of this conversation, please get in touch.