ESG: Doing Well By Doing Good

As many of you know, my primary professional interest and focus has long been on the impact of information technology on insurance ecosystem transformation. But today I’m addressing a very different subject.

While the pandemic has had a number of enormous consequences, many of them horrendous, I would argue that it has also enabled several much more positive, longer-term changes in societal values and perspectives as we, the survivors, re-evaluate our higher-level purpose, priorities and concerns for our fellow man and our home, planet Earth.

The insurance industry is at the forefront of this movement, which one day may well be thought of as the beginning of the Second Age of Enlightenment.

One manifestation of this shift is the emergence of ESG. Some of you may not recognize this acronym, but you soon will.

The term ESG (environmental, social and governance) was coined in 2005 in a landmark study titled “Who Cares Wins,” published during a conference of the same name held in Zurich.