Chapter 11

Measuring results and defining success

As any large organisation knows, we need to measure our progress towards our vision as a set of results that indicates the extent to which we are making headway as desired. The SDGs themselves are accompanied with a set of measurements that will serve this purpose for world leaders and associated institutions. There will also be those amongst us who will find roles as monitor-evaluators. These people will be able to use such data to encourage, lobby, cajole or celebrate as they see fit. But results are very left-brain, logical and rational, as indeed they need to be. Success, however, is more right-brain, more creative and inspiring. Success is both an outcome and a feeling. It is a felt-sense of progress. This can be at any level: individual, partnership, team, community, organisational, national, even humanity. The more that success is shared and celebrated, the more there is hope and inspiration. We therefore have an important role, as advocates of the SDGs, to celebrate progress and encourage more of the same. This role will be played by some more than others according to their particular sense of purpose. But no celebration is insignificant. Rather it is the cumulative effect of millions of celebrations, small and large, that will create a movement that feels successful and delivers the goals.

Reporting on global progress at the United Nations

The goals, sub-goals and specific targets relating to the SDGs are most easily accessible through the UN Sustainable Development Knowledge Platform at https://sustainabledevelopment.un.org/sdgs. These are necessarily detailed and provide the opportunity for the UN and member states to hold one another to account. They also provide an opportunity for citizens to hold their governments to account and many readers of this book may well see their personal role as being one of “monitor-evaluator” watching carefully for progress and lobbying government to do “the right thing”.

Pursuant to General Assembly resolution 70/1, the Secretary-General of the United Nations, in cooperation with the United Nations system, submits the report on progress towards the Sustainable Development Goals. The first such report was issued in June 2016 and this level of reporting will repeat each year. The report is available to the public at the United Nations website.

Activity 11.1: Progress on my favourite SDG

Check the particular goals and targets for the SDG you are most interested in. Also search the Internet for progress reports at the global, national and local levels. How are we doing?

In addition, a comprehensive, in-depth report will be produced every four years to inform the high-level political forum convened under the auspices of the General Assembly. The next report will be published in 2019.

In order to strengthen the science-policy interface at the high-level political forum convened under the auspices of the Economic and Social Council, scientists who work on the report are invited to provide scientific input into the discussion, including on the theme of the forum.

The UN Secretary-General received over sixty nominations of experts in the natural and social sciences from across the world for membership in this prestigious panel. The final selection of fifteen experts was made with a view to providing balanced coverage of the various topics that could be expected to feature in the Global Sustainable Development Report (GSDR), 2019, while also respecting regional and gender balance. The GSDR will promote a holistic and science-based approach to policy measures that will advance the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) and Agenda 2030.

Measuring progress at national and local levels

Notwithstanding the targets and measures that will made at a global level, I’d like to reaffirm what was said earlier in this book about fractals (principles of self-similarity). Just as measures taken at a global level need to be appropriate for monitoring world progress, there also needs to be measures at the national and local levels to make sense of progress on the SDGs.

For example, here in the United Kingdom, the Office for National Statistics (ONS) is responsible for the official reporting of UK SDGs data. This includes:

• submitting UK data for SDG indicators to the UN to inform the global reporting framework (as defined by the UN Statistical Commission) and making these data equally accessible to all;
• working with official and non-official data producers to identify supplementary, UK focused indicators; and
• exploring and developing new data sources and methods to enable ONS to report data at the various levels of disaggregation.

The measurements need to be done in a thorough manner to make sure we are also complying with the wider spirit of the SDGs. Increased disaggregation of data by sex, race, religion, geography, disability, ethnicity, migrant status, age and income quintiles is critical to the “Leave No One Behind” agenda which is integral to the SDGs.

At the time of writing, when we zoom in to the local scenario, there is much less monitoring of action and progress on the SDGs. That isn’t to say that nothing is happening. Many cities are doing a great deal under the banner of “sustainability” but haven’t made the link to the SDGs. This is a missed opportunity but one that could still be taken. Raising awareness of staff, citizens and other stakeholders at a city level is a tremendous opportunity to help people make the connection between progressive work and a truly global agenda.

Activity 11.2: Monitoring the results of government and others

Where does your curiosity lie? Is it with local government, national government or the United Nations? See what you can find out about the progress they are (or are not) making towards the SDGs. What, if anything, do you feel inclined to do about it?

Measuring corporate progress

The same can be said in organisations, whatever sector they’re part of. CEOs like Paul Polman at Unilever and Elon Musk at Tesla are very clear that the work of their businesses is part of the SDG agenda. Around the world, many organisations have signed up to the Global Compact, with many of these making the link to the SDGs.

I truly believe that most organisations make significant contributions to the SDGs through their principle activities. The sad thing is that very few of them do this consciously. Even the obvious contributions are rarely linked to the SDGs and celebrated as such. How many schools have made a link to SDG 4 and told the world how many children they’ve provided education to; or to SDG 8 and provided data on how their students have found employment and in what disciplines? How many pharmaceutical companies have taken stock of the lives they’ve saved through their products and linked it to SDG 3? How many engineering companies have devised amazing solutions for sustainable cities, better water supplies, cleaner energy or contributions to a better climate? Do they make the associated connections with the SDGs? Imagine the inspiration they would provide to all stakeholders and what this would do for their businesses? The list is endless and in almost every case, there is a significant win-win to be had.

Activity 11.3: Shining a light on corporate contribution

Think about the organisation you are part of or most familiar with. How does it contribute to the SDGs? What measures indicate its progress? Make some kind of assessment and note it below. Now that you have this information, what will you do with it?

More and more measurement raises consciousness and creates alignment

Imagine the power of more and more nations, governments, organisations and communities being aligned and measuring progress to the SDGs. This is something I truly believe will happen progressively between now and the target date of 2030. As it becomes a way of uniting the world in the delivery of the future we all want, it will surely transition beyond 2030 as the “global way”. Who knows it may even help the world to focus on a new “middle ground” that will temper the polarities of consumerism on the one hand and radical extremism of any kind on the other.

Measuring progress in the supply chain

The obvious thing for organisations to manage is the direct contribution their products and services make to the SDGs. However, it’s important to recognise the immense and perhaps even greater value that can be gained by measuring SDG contribution in the associated supply chain. How sad would it be for a manufacturing company to make an amazing contribution to the goals through the products they produced, only to discover that the materials used in their manufacturing process caused severe environmental degradation or involved child labour in their production.

The second massive impact of measuring supply chain contribution is that it multiplies the gain several fold. Measuring the direct operations of a company only impacts the work of one company. Measuring what happens in the supply chain impacts several operations and, if they take it seriously, there is a further multiplier in their own supply chain – and so on.

Of course, once an organisation begins to take this kind of measurement seriously, they will probably also feel inclined to communicate with their suppliers and customers why this is so. This further spreads the engagement around the SDGs as discussed in the earlier chapter on this topic.

Families and individuals

We can even measure our progress at a family or individual level. For example, the World Wildlife Fund provides a simple but effective carbon-footprint calculator which can be found at: http://footprint.wwf.org.uk/home/calculator_complete. When I first measured my carbon footprint, I was staggered to see that I was making a footprint that was larger than the world could withstand. I’ve redressed this through a switch to totally renewable energy, an electric bike and using public transport more often. I now appear to have a much smaller and more sustainable footprint and the very act of measuring this has made me realise where I could be even more prudent.

Activity 11.4: My progress on the SDGs

In the space below, consider as many of the SDGs as you wish (you could try them all if you’re feeling ambitious) and list the actions and activities you’re engaging in that will help to deliver them. Think what measures you may use to test your progress. If you wish, perhaps you could make a note of your own carbon footprint.

Results or success?

As previously mentioned, results are a tangible, rational measure of our progress towards our vision, which in this case is the world portrayed by the SDGs. Success is very different than that. In Designing the Purposeful Organization, I describe success as both an outcome and a feeling. At its most basic level, success is something that we feel as individuals. We will feel success according to who we are, what has happened and how that resonates.

A shared sense of success

However, when people share their sense of success as individuals with each other, something very special happens. We become inspired by the success as described and shown by others. Our empathy for their feelings means that we feel some of what they feel. We see this happening when a crowd responds to a sporting event or an audience to music. The response to a perceived success becomes infectious.

In organisations, I encourage people in teams to think about success in the work they do and to share how this makes them feel. I ask them to then share what inspires them about what they’ve heard from their colleagues. As this conversation progresses, you can sense a new sense of success emerging, not at the personal level but instead at the collective or team level.

I have noticed a similar behaviour on our SDGs Facebook Page. There are certain posts that I and the other editors of the page make that attract lots of interest and likes from readers. Speaking personally, this affects my publishing actions consciously and subconsciously. Readers seem especially to like posts that describe progress towards the goals, particularly those that are associated with innovation, high achievement or personal heroism. We still post stories about the “other side of the coin” that describe things that are going wrong in the world. These are necessary reminders about why this work is so important. But I think that since we started, there has been a shift to stories that show positive progress.

Activity 11.5: Stock-take of success

Make another list of the SDGs that concern you. List as many as you like. Now think of your greatest achievements associated with each one. Make a note about how you feel about these and about how your feelings inspire you to do more.

My personal sense of success

The greatest senses of success I feel relating to my SDG journey are twofold. They are either to do with personal success gains or the gains of others.

For me, I get a real buzz out of changing my habits and measuring the difference this makes. I take great delight when I clock another hundred miles on my electric push bike instead of driving. I confess to feeling just a little smug when I sit back on the train where I would previously have travelled by car. I take great delight when I see my electricity meter running backwards due to the electricity I produce at home (this will stop when my meter is replaced with a digital one). I feel joy when I see the great work of the Open Arms Infant Home in Malawi or the gains made by Kusamala in permaculture. I was also over the moon when Good Energy put the SDGs at the heart of their brand of energy supply. I don’t know how much of these last few “successes” were supported or influenced by my own actions. I suspect it was a drop in the ocean. Nevertheless, this doesn’t diminish the delight I take in progress I have been part of.

Shared success

My felt sense of success, however, goes to a new level when I hear of the successes shared by others in my network. The most obvious are the successes we share at UNA and on the SDGs Facebook page. It is early days yet, but I have absolute confidence that the more we share and celebrate our SDG journeys, the more we will be encouraged to do even more.

Now that you are also part of this journey, I trust you will share your successes with your family, friends, colleagues and with me and the SDG community in whatever way makes sense to you.

Chapter reflection

Score the following statements out of ten where:

• 0 = not at all
• 2 = a little
• 4 = moderately
• 6 = mainly
• 8 = significantly
• 10 = completely