At a moment of unprecedented attention, investment, and opportunity for the emerging field of ESG, leaders are asking: Who is best preparing their organization for the society of the future? Who is innovating today to meet decades-long environmental and social goals? Who is setting standards that catalyze their industry’s change for the better? Who is defining what bold and aspirational look like — and how best to advance that work in practice? 

Enter NationSwell’s ESG Next, an exemplary group of investors, executives, authors, philanthropists, social sector leaders, academics, and field builders who are helping to shape business as a force for social and environmental progress, advancing — and even pioneering — the most forward-thinking and effective programs, initiatives, technologies, methodologies, practices, and approaches. 

For this installment, NationSwell interviewed Caitlin Morris, Vice President of Social + Community Impact at Nike, about this moment in ESG, the intertwining of people and planet, and the unique power of measurement not to gauge impact,  but actually facilitate it. 

Greg Behrman, CEO + Founder, NationSwell: How did your personal and professional journey to the field of ESG begin? 

Caitlin Morris, Vice President, Social + Community Impact, Nike: My journey to this field began almost by accident. I graduated from the University of Virginia during a recession, and I didn’t really know what I wanted to do next. I went to Hungary to teach English my first year out of school. 

My second year there, I worked for a consulting firm as the only native English speaker in the office, where I had some high-profile accounts. I specifically recall my secretary saving all her money to buy a pair of Levi’s, highlighting the power of American business as a force for good. But like any situation where you think you’re giving something, you get more than you give. I learned a lot from Hungarians about a diversity of worldviews, and about not taking things for granted.

After returning to the U.S. from Hungary, I worked at a consulting firm focused on capital markets development. I was drawn to the idea that we could make a difference by changing government structures to be more open and democratic through capitalism. My path was set early on, and it would eventually lead me to Nike. 

I joined Nike because of their first Community Impact report — it wasn’t because of Michael Jordan or any great sports moments, but because of the innovation they were driving around corporate responsibility. 

Behrman, NationSwell: How do you define this moment in ESG? 

Morris, Nike: I don’t really think ESG is a framework. It’s more of a collection of letters that roll nicely off the tongue. But the environmental piece of ESG is critically important, and at the same time, it often gets elevated over social without people recognizing the strong intersectionality between the two. 

I don’t disagree that we need sharp measurement on environmental factors, but people and the planet are two intertwined issues. If you don’t solve poverty and other challenges that communities are facing in their daily lives, we’re going to continue to make decisions that aren’t good for the planet. My team sits in social and community impact, so we lead with the people piece. That doesn’t mean we don’t see the intersectionality with the environment. It’s part of why we launched the Community Climate Resilience Fund, where we’re directly investing in intersectionality with the Trust for Public Land. 

My team has never been in more demand from the brand. Community used to be a “nice to have”; now it’s “table stakes” for companies. As you look at the Edelman Trust Barometer, consumers expect companies to solve problems more than they expect governments to. So, we have to have a clear point of view on which issues we take a stand on and how we’re addressing them. I feel proud that we have a team that can stick with long-term change around physical activity and supporting leaders who are working to address social justice issues. 

This moment in ESG brings so much excitement, but that excitement also brings challenges. Everyone grew up in a community, so the passion for thinking about the community component of social factors can feel quite outsized. That passion comes from an authentic and honest place, but it can be noisy, and the noise makes it difficult to maintain focus on the strategy, all while giving it enough space to

constantly evolve and emerge. The challenge is to balance the desire to keep people focused and to be flexible and responsive to current issues. 

Behrman, NationSwell: What are some initiatives you and your team are driving at Nike that you think are noteworthy, or that show promising signs of advancing the field? 

Morris, Nike: Nike has a mission, vision, and purpose — and the purpose part is relatively new for the company. This guiding principle has made our work central to the company’s operations, which is exciting. 

One of our most important initiatives began with a big framework: believing the world needed to understand the global cost of inactivity. We created Designed to Move, an advocacy play that we hoped would catalyze a movement around physical activity. For Designed to Move, the theory of change is supported by science. We collaborated with scientists to understand the various benefits that come from sports, and we learned that it’s a uniquely efficient investment — it pretty singularly combines physical literacy, emotional intelligence, and cognitive function. As the nexus of all of those things, it has been undervalued. 

So, for Designed to Move, our theory of change had two key focuses: one is integrating physical activity back into everyday life, the second is providing kids with early positive experiences in sports and play. 

At an individual level, it’s crucial to give children the ability, confidence, and desire to be active, as this sets them up for a lifetime of activity. The cycle is intergenerational — inactive adults are two times more likely to have inactive children. When we provide kids with positive early experiences in sports and play, they continue engaging in these activities. We began with a high-level macro approach, and then shifted to more programmatic work, testing innovations on the ground to gather proof points and inspirational stories. 

Another initiative I’d like to spotlight is the Nike Community Ambassador Program. This initiative excites me because it demonstrates the power of measurement and using the company’s full resources. The program involves training retail athletes to be coaches in local community organizations. What I love about this is that it was driven by insight. For instance, in Seattle, a group of Nike retailers were volunteering

at a school when the PE teacher left them in charge of 50 kids, assuming they could handle a PE class since they were associated with Nike. 

This experience highlighted the need for our teams to be better equipped as coaches in the field. The program began as a way to rally teams around the cause of getting kids active and walking our talk. We believe that quality trained coaches are critical to a child’s experience, so we can’t have untrained employees volunteering. What we didn’t expect was the incredible impact this program had on the employees and their connection to the brand. Some Nike employees may have grown up in the local Boys and Girls Club and now are returning to volunteer at a place that was meaningful to them. Others might have a master’s degree in sports science and are working retail because it was the available job. 

These employees didn’t necessarily see a future for themselves in retail, but now they’re able to use their knowledge and apply it in the community. This has unlocked a different reaction regarding their longevity with the brand. The program allows us to test our coaching materials, authentically engage with communities on a larger scale, and drive an employee engagement strategy that delivers returns to the brand. 

Behrman, NationSwell: How are you measuring and evaluating the success of your initiatives? 

Morris, Nike: Nike’s power lies in innovation and inspiration, and when we are at our best, we utilize the full power of the brand along with my team’s work on the ground. About seven years ago, we transitioned from a separate mission-based team to the company’s philanthropy center. As the company’s budget grew, so did ours, allowing us to do some exciting things. 

We’ve invested in digital tools for scaling our reach, providing resources such as coaching guides and inclusive coaching tools. We adopted a collective impact approach, focusing on local partnerships and place-based investment. This enables us to align our efforts on a city or neighborhood level and measure the impact of our work. I do think that this power of partnership at a local level is absolutely profound: You can’t get scale without first making a hyperlocal impact and measuring it properly.

Speaking of measurement, our increased budget gives us more tools to better measure our efficacy, ensuring our work is genuinely effective. With a smaller budget, you want to spend all your money doing good work. As your budget grows, you can be more honest about assessing your performance and asking, “Well, we’re doing it, but is it really working?” 

Effectively measuring our progress is new territory for us. We’ve been good at selling inspirational concepts and catalyzing movements, and now we’re prioritizing holding ourselves accountable by leveraging both internal and external tools to measure our reach. 

We’re also getting granular with measurement, even measuring the effectiveness of our tools. We’ve historically built things in partnership with experts and gained insights from users, and now we have experts examining how well our tools are being used. 

Behrman, NationSwell: To which leadership practices do you most attribute your success? 

Morris, Nike: Stakeholder engagement has been the connecting thread of my career. I make a dedicated effort to actively listen. Great leaders are excellent communicators, and communication starts with listening. That, for me, is probably my connecting thread and belief. People often ask why I stay at Nike. I stay because of our commitment to innovation and the people. I am fortunate to lead and partner with a team of 70 incredibly intelligent individuals, and my job as a leader is to be a multiplier for them, helping them do their best work. 

Behrman, NationSwell: Who are some leaders who inspire your work? 

Morris, Nike: My first choice is Shelly Omilade Bell, founder of Black Girl Ventures. Shelly is entrepreneurial, creative, and authentic in everything she does. She radiates energy and possesses the wisdom to lead her organization forward while recognizing that her role may need to change over time. It is not easy for founders to do this, and she is doing it brilliantly. 

Charlie Brown, CEO of Context Partners, also comes to mind. I’ve known Charlie for a long time and admire his work, starting at Ashoka, where the power lies in believing in individual game-changers. Charlie’s philosophy centers on the idea that no one achieves success on their own — we always do it in a community. I have learned a lot from Charlie, who has not been afraid to reinvent himself. As someone who has been consistent in my career, I am always impressed by people who take risks and change things up. 

Last but not least, there’s Maria Bobenrieth, CEO of Women Win. What I love about Maria is her constant joy. She has a saying, “Don’t get angry, get curious.” She leads with joy and innovation, changing how we support women and girls through sport. We have collaborated on our first participatory grant-making initiative outside of our employees: the ONSIDE Fund, funded by us and Puma. While there has been good collaboration on the labor rights side, there has been less collaboration on community impact. The Onside Fund and the participatory grant-making initiative, as well as the ability to co-fund with others in the industry, are fascinating. 

Alongside those leaders, I’ve also become a big podcast fan. I keep going back to “No Off Season,” a Nike podcast that features Megan Bartlett from the Center for Healing and Justice through Sport. I highly recommend it. 

To learn more about how our ESG Next honorees are shaping business as a force for social and environmental good, visit the series hub. Nike is a NationSwell Institutional Member. To learn more about membership in NationSwell’s community of leading social impact and sustainability practitioners, visit our site.

At a moment of unprecedented attention, investment and opportunity for the emerging field of ESG, leaders are asking: Who is best preparing their organization for the society of the future? Who is innovating today to meet decades-long environmental and social goals? Who is setting standards that catalyze their industry’s change for the better? Who is defining what bold and aspirational look like — and how best to advance that work in practice?

Enter NationSwell’s ESG Next, an exemplary group of investors, executives, authors, philanthropists, social sector leaders, academics, and field builders who are helping to shape business as a force for social and environmental progress, advancing — and even pioneering — the most forward-thinking and effective programs, initiatives, technologies, methodologies, practices, and approaches.

For this installment, NationSwell interviewed Lata Reddy, Senior Vice President, Prudential Financial Chair, The Prudential Foundation, about the importance of place-based impact, the power of anchor institutions, the next frontier for ESG measurement, and the importance of tried-and-true approaches alongside newer, more disruptive technologies.

Greg Behrman, NationSwell CEO + Founder: Tell us about how your personal and professional journey led you to ESG work.

Lata Reddy, Senior Vice President, Prudential Financial Chair, The Prudential Foundation: While I was finishing my first year of law school, I had the life-changing opportunity to work and intern with Bryan Stevenson, who is now Executive Director of the Equal Justice Initiative. I was in Atlanta at the time, and Bryan was a young lawyer right out of law school. I spent the next couple of years working with the organization he was working with, which represented people on death row and people who had been incarcerated. 

During the experience, I had the opportunity to speak with those on death row and learned how their experiences were so indicative of structural racism. It raised my consciousness and helped me understand, even as a law student, how the legal realm played a role in perpetuating these inequities, and that one day I could use my experience to address these historic and systemic injustices.

Behrman, NationSwell: How is the work you’ve been leading unique in the social impact and the sustainability field? What distinguishes you from others working in ESG?

Reddy, Prudential: Prudential started this work early, we take more risks with our capital than others do, and we stay in the work longer.

Our organization has been ahead of the curve in that we’ve thought about the work we do from an impact lens for over 50 years. Our ethos was formed in Newark, New Jersey. It’s where we were founded almost 150 years ago, and it’s where we’ve stayed, where our headquarters are to this day. 

We’ve learned so much while operating in a community that has ridden so many waves of this country’s history — and that includes the good, the bad, and the ugly. We’ve had the opportunity to engage in the community of Newark, which is our front yard, backyard, all around. 

Early on, the company bundled our resources together. It started with philanthropy, other cash giving and corporate contributions, employee volunteerism, and impact investing — long before anyone was calling it impact investing. We were spending the capital anyway, so we wanted to make sure we did it in a way that maximized impact. It morphed over the years, and we grew exponentially: about two years back, we had reached a billion dollars in impact assets under management on the impact investing side. And that, by the way, was all Prudential balance sheet money, so our own capital that we had invested in that way. We had doubled the size of our philanthropy, which for us is $35 million annually, and our total cash giving is more than that.

We do it in a place-based way in Newark, and we continue to be deeply engaged in a broader set of issues because we know that these systems are interacting with each other; through Prudential’s deep history and commitment to Newark residents, we’ve helped redefine the place of an anchor institution in its community. That effort has been transformative. We now have a larger set of institutions working together in a very concerted way, and so I think there’s a lot of stickiness to that and people are really taking to that, which is exciting to see.

It is a function of being the kind of corporation we are. We’re in the business of managing risk and pooling risk, and thinking about it over the long term. I think we all need to be taking more risks, and I would argue that it’s imperative for us as businesses to engage a broader set of stakeholders, and the only way we’re going to do that is through nontraditional stakeholders, and that inherently will involve a little bit of risk. It’s informed risk, or it can be, and you can mitigate the risk. So there’s the business imperative which is clearly a moral imperative for us to do more with our capital.

Behrman, NationSwell: What initiatives are you leading that exemplify your approach?

Reddy, Prudential: Somebody once said to me, and I love this phrase, people live their lives horizontally, not vertically. Systems interact, and you have to think holistically about a place.

Years ago, Prudential wanted to redefine what it means to be an anchor institution in Newark. So we did that by casting a wider net: We brought in cultural organizations, other corporations, universities; really, all facets of the community writ large. It was a core group of about six, and it’s grown since then. We commissioned some research to look at opportunities for us as anchors, to do some fact-finding around small businesses, like what would a procurement initiative look like, and the realization that if we just allocate an additional percentage of our spend to Newark businesses, we can exponentially impact the local economy.  

And then it grew to a hiring initiative around hiring local Newark residents, and then living initiatives — meaning, how do we get more of our employees to live in the city and have that take hold? That approach is what we’re still managing today. It started about five years ago or so, and we’ve had some great success working with Mayor Ras Baraka; we’ve actually helped him achieve some of his goals around making sure that 2,020 Newark residents had jobs at anchor institutions by 2020, which we did — and we well surpassed that number. 

That success also impacted Gov. Phil Murphy and his work with the CEO collective that our CEO is part of, especially as we looked at post-Covid recovery strategies for the state of New Jersey. So some of what we did in Newark is now a part of the state’s strategy, so we were able to grow it there.

Berhman, NationSwell: What’s your take on ESG as a framework, what’s your read on this moment? How do you make sense of the field, where are we, and where we’re going?

Reddy, Prudential: This all began with negative screening. Many of us remember the time when the prevailing sentiment was, “First, do no harm.” We avoided investing in programs, initiatives, or really anything that had the potential to cause harm. 

Now, it’s moved more into a conversation where we’re mitigating risk against Environmental, Social, and Governance factors. That’s an important shift, but I’ve still yet to hear very many conversations about impact — especially around proactively and affirmatively trying to create impact in whatever we do. 

I’m hoping the shifts that brought us to this current moment will accelerate us towards that. We’ve certainly talked about it in the impact investing space, where there’s an intention to create impact alongside financial returns, so I’m hoping that other players in the social impact and sustainability field will think about it as well.

Behrman, NationSwell: What are your aspirations for the field? Where do you think it’s going, and what will drive its progress, its evolution?

Reddy, Prudential: For me, the next frontier is tying it to business value, like how do we measure the impact we’re creating in a way that’s also demonstrating business value? I believe deeply you can create business value by going after societal impact, but it’s on us to prove that out. And the more we can prove it, the more baked in to our business strategy it will be. Our field will evolve when businesses make it core to what they do, rather than something they keep on the sidelines.

Behrman: How has your leadership evolved?

Reddy, Prudential: One lesson I’ve learned, which I think every leader learns, is that you can never overcommunicate. Try to communicate the same message in different ways because it will resonate with different people at different times in different ways. It’s an obvious but important one. The other thing is, leaders look around corners — that’s our job, and we get paid for it. But doubling back to bring people along is usually necessary in helping people to move forward. Helping people to see it on their own so that they have the buy-in and taking the necessary time to do that is really important as well.

I’ve found that having a “true north” for what you’re trying to get to is what has helped cut through the noise, this audience today, the messaging, so that at the core, it’s the same, and it’s based on what you believe and what you’re trying to execute against. And then on the margins you can modulate to the particular audience.

My true north is about leveling the playing field. That’s what I think about when I think about my personal purpose.

Behrman, NationSwell: What is one thing you think folks are really missing? Anything you would move people a couple degrees over on?

Reddy, Prudential: I think in some ways people are often looking for the next shiny object, the next innovation, the next disruption. That’s very intellectually exciting, but when you talk about a specific place, it’s quite often the tried and true. It’s building authentic relationships. It’s engaging the very people who know best about what’s needed, it’s about an asset framing — so not talking about the problems, but framing it all through what a community has, and the opportunities to make that even better.

Behrman, NationSwell: Who are some leaders you really admire in the space?

Reddy, Prudential: Paul Polman, author of “Net Positive” and former CEO of Unilever. I think he’s done so much for this notion of purpose, and really having purpose as a core part of your business as your brand. Under Ajay Banga’s leadership, Mastercard did some really great work, and they were very clear about the purpose, clear about the fact that change needs to be brought about through business. When you have the vision and the clarity, everything else just falls into place.

To learn more about how our ESG Next honorees are shaping business as a force for social and environmental good, visit the series hub.