Climate change, diversity and the future of business

Our vision for Ireland Inc 2.0 was top of the agenda at our latest Thought Leaders Council in May, bringing together the key challenges of climate change, innovation, diversity and inclusion to drive our future competitiveness.

With Marie Donnelly, Chair of the Climate Change Advisory Council, and Caroline O’Driscoll, International Tax Partner, Deloitte and co-founder of iWish speaking, there was deep insight delivered into how climate change, technology and diversity will shape the future of business.

Marie Donnelly emphasised that we should make sure we reap the full benefits of our renewable resources, especially offshore, pointing to the need to “not just export electrons” from our planned offshore windfarms but build industries in Ireland around this resource to add value to the clean energy we are going to generate. The dispersed nature of offshore wind also means that a more balanced national economy spread around our coasts could be created from the tapping of offshore renewables.

Marie said in terms of businesses’ climate journey, companies really needed to first focus on energy and how they use it as a starting point on their journey to decarbonisation and cost savings, and make it core to their strategy.

On innovation and the tech industry in Ireland, Caroline O’Driscoll illustrated how recent layoffs in the sector were a tiny proportion of the massive hiring undertaken in Ireland over the last number of years. She also illustrated how there was no end in sight to the massive corporate tax bonanza Ireland is experiencing from the transfer of intellectual property.

Caroline pointed to inclusion and diversity barriers as holding Ireland back, with the lack of STEM subjects available for girls in many secondary schools a key barrier to building the Ireland Inc 2.0 we need. She showed how support and work was needed to change mindsets, to make sure that girls believed they could be successful as an engineer or a physicist and pursue that career.

Her key question to the audience was ‘what is our vision for Ireland Inc 2.0’ with the world changing at a rapid pace and a constant need to innovate?

Increasing the speed of change with which we move to both tackle climate change and diversity in Ireland was an overarching take-away from both speakers, and real progress on climate change and diversity was central to an Ireland 2.0 which continues to thrive on the global stage.

There was huge engagement in the Q&A that followed with the two speakers demonstrating how both the priorities of climate change and inclusion and diversity are now core to their operations and future success.