The evolution strategy

With the clock change comes that lower, sharper light that shifts perspectives and forces us to see things differently. Autumn has always had a curious effect on me: not melancholic, but clear-headed. It’s the season when nature shows us how to change with grace without losing ourselves. Leaves don’t die; they transform, and in that transformation they remind us that life is made of passages, not ruptures. It’s an almost philosophical thought, yet tangible: we too, as human beings, are called to renew ourselves continuously.

Today more than ever, change is measurable: 2024 was the warmest year ever recorded (+1.5 °C compared to the pre-industrial average, European Environment Agency) and, according to the International Monetary Fund (IMF), about 60% of jobs in advanced economies will be exposed to artificial intelligence and its effects by 2030, with a profound impact on the structure of professions. We live in an ecosystem that evolves in real time, where climate, technology and habits influence one another, and speed is no longer an advantage but the new condition of our time.

Change runs through us and shapes us, asking not only that we react but that we actively participate in steering its direction. And so I think sustainability, whether personal, social, or corporate, is precisely the ability to move through these changes without losing our sense of direction. Like trees that, even as they shed their leaves, remain rooted. Because to truly change does not mean adapting to survive, but evolving to keep creating meaning.

SAP Co-Design Workshop: for the new Milan headquarters, employees co-designed flexible spaces and ways of working, becoming key players in an inclusive and sustainable transformation.

If we shift our gaze from the transformations of the external world to those within organizations, the picture doesn’t change much. According to the World Economic Forum (Global Risks Report 2025), over 70% of European companies have undergone an organizational transformation in the last three years; yet only one in three calls it a success. The reason? Not technology, but corporate culture.

And here the connection becomes clear again: sustainability and change management speak the same language, the language of conscious transformation. Both require time, participation, long-term vision, and the ability to put people at the center, just as nature requires balance in order to regenerate.

It’s no coincidence that the UN describes sustainability as the balance between the needs of the present and the ability of future generations to meet their own: a principle that, in light of environmental and technological crises, takes on an even more concrete and operational meaning. But perhaps, if you think about it, we can go beyond this definition, viewing sustainability as a form of dynamic balance: a constant tension between stability and transformation. Not just a pact between generations, but a collective competence of listening, adaptation, and vision.

For organizations, this means much more than ensuring continuity: it means knowing how to evolve without squandering meaning, maintaining coherence while everything around is changing. A change is sustainable when it succeeds in combining innovation and memory, when it regenerates value instead of chasing it, and when it leaves room for the unexpected as an opportunity for learning.

The LEGO Group has presented a prototype LEGO brick made from recycled plastic, the latest step toward producing LEGO products with sustainable materials. The new prototype uses PET recycled from post-consumer bottles.

“Instead of extracting value from nature and turning it into wealth, we’re using the wealth Patagonia creates to protect its source. We’re making Earth our only shareholder. I am dead serious about saving this planet.” - Yvon Chouinard.

Patagonia. The outdoor company founded by Yvon Chouinard is a contemporary example of how change can be born from an ethical principle. The decision to transfer ownership to a foundation to fund environmental projects represents a new paradigm of sustainable governance. Patagonia has shown that a regenerative model can be economically sound, with a customer loyalty rate higher than its competitors.

In all these cases, the common factor wasn’t only strategic change but the ability to translate it into a human and methodological process. Resilient companies don’t merely adapt; they learn to regenerate and this happens only when the people who make them up feel part of a shared project. If guided with vision, trust, and training, employees become multipliers of change: they make it concrete in day-to-day choices, fuel it with ideas, and consolidate it through collaboration. These are open systems that combine method and vision, innovation and memory, showing that true organizational sustainability is born from the courage to change while remaining consistent with one’s identity, and from recognizing in people the generative force of change itself.

Change management is not a one-off project, but a continuous process, a life cycle that regenerates at every organizational step.

The most effective models share the same logic: prepare, support, consolidate, but today a fourth verb is added, crucially: measure. Because a change that isn’t observed and evaluated risks being merely perceived, not real.

• Kurt Lewin’s model (1947): Unfreeze - Change - Refreeze. Loosen old habits, introduce the new, stabilize it over time. It’s a simple model but still current, especially when enriched with digital tools for monitoring performance and behaviors.

• ADKAR (Prosci, 1998): Awareness, Desire, Knowledge, Ability, Reinforcement - five stages to build a sustainable, people-centered change. Today many companies combine it with continuous training and online learning platforms to ensure that knowledge becomes lasting action.
• Kotter (1996): eight steps, from creating a sense of urgency to consolidating results. In today’s context, the sense of urgency means the ability to read weak signals, climatic, social, technological and to anticipate crises before they become systemic.

Alongside these are more recent approaches such as the Sustainability Change Model, which links organizational change to ESG principles and the ecological transition. Within this framework, companies build environmental, social and governance indicators into their change plans. A change is truly sustainable when it integrates these dimensions into everyday decisions and when transformation is not just operational improvement but also cultural evolution.

Some companies are even adopting hybrid practices inspired by design thinking and the agile approach, to make change more inclusive and measurable.

According to Deloitte’s “Global Human Capital Trends” report, CEOs widely recognize the importance of culture and the human factor for business success and adaptability. Yet only 41% of workers say their organization is promoting social sustainability in some way within the company.

The reason is simple: change requires inner work.

We need to teach awareness, cultivate empathy, and restore value to listening. Organizations that work today are learning communities, not production machines.

The most mature companies in sustainability follow the same logic: they create distributed leadership, promote continuous learning, and value well-being as a lever of productivity.

Because, as Peter Drucker reminded us, “culture eats strategy for breakfast.”

Change management is not just an organizational approach but a way of thinking about the future. It’s the ability to read change as a collective responsibility, to recognize that every choice, individual or corporate, impacts broader systems: social, environmental, cultural. To change does not mean to react, but to anticipate, regenerate, create new balances.

Being sustainable today means this: accepting that there is no longer a straight line between cause and effect, but a network of connections to understand and guide. It means learning to manage uncertainty with method, but also with imagination. It’s a form of adaptive intelligence, where data, intuition, and human sensitivity intertwine to guide transformations.

And so sustainability becomes a daily exercise in courage and curiosity, a construction that accepts imperfection as the natural condition of all growth.

As the American sociologist Alvin Toffler emphasized:

“The illiterate of the future are not those who can’t read or write, but those who cannot learn, unlearn, and relearn.”

Perhaps this is precisely where the key to sustainable change lies: in the ability to remain curious, never to become rigid. Because change is not an act of rupture, but of understanding and, ultimately, of trust.

I’ll sign off this time with the great Vasco.

See you soon.

Chiara Pontoni

Sustainability Manager