Driving sustainable growth through positive impact

Tom Wolsey, Director & Co-Founder

As we reach the end of 2021, it seems an opportune moment to reflect on the past year. 2021 has been a year of growth for us as a company. Despite various challenges (the persistence of Covid-19, ups and downs in individual circumstances etc), I’m pleased to say we not only delivered but exceeded revenue and headcount growth objectives. However, over the next 12 months our focus will increasingly be centred around how we grow the positive impact we are having towards climate change mitigation, and the achievement of the UN’s 17 Sustainable Development Goals ... our raison d'être as a company.

An interesting post I recently read by Anna Alex, one of the co-founders of the climate-tech company Planetly, which was recently acquired by OneTrust, stated that their ambition was to achieve their objectives through the following equation: Impact = Purpose + Scale. This really resonated with me and got me thinking about the impact we have as a company, and how we can increase this moving forward.

Whilst running through some 2021 figures, a few in particular jumped out to me:

206 candidates placed

We facilitated the growth and development of a diverse range of purpose-driven businesses; from sustainability & environmental consultancies, high growth renewable energy developers, energy optimisation and flexibility specialists, as well as large corporations seeking to become net zero.

5 new Climate17 staff hired

We introduced new staff, allowing us to continue to expand our offering across our core areas of Sustainability, Energy & Environment. All were female staff, of different ages, ethnicities and religions, increasing our diversity, challenging our existing points of view and bringing more value to our business and our clients' businesses.

5 staff promoted

We maintained a 100% staff retention rate, continued to invest in our existing staff and supported them to progress their careers as we grew. Essential market knowledge and experience was retained, allowing us to continue to offer real value to clients.

1 new office

We renovated an old disused bank, into a bright, modern, new low carbon home for our growing business. We tried to create a unique environment that encourages collaboration, as well as individual productivity, whilst offering social spaces for our staff to unwind. Importantly, we tried to do this in a sustainable way.

Considering these, I started to appreciate our impact and realised that hopefully we have impacted the lives of our staff as well as our local environment in a positive way, whilst also adding value to the clients we work with, and in turn, the purpose-driven sectors in which we choose to operate. 

I am immensely proud of the team we are building here and the impact we are having, however, this journey is only just beginning. Over the next 12 months, we have ambitious plans to increase our impact. This includes increasing the value we offer to our clients through the expansion of our service offerings, increasing our investment in our people through focused training and development, additional investment into our new office, carbon offsetting and fundraising and charity initiatives, both local and international.

Through focusing on impact, we will ensure our business continues to grow sustainably and in a way that achieves the common goals that we share with our clients.

- Tom Wolsey, Director