For the 49th St Gallen Symposium we have introduced our new format – the Interactive Sessions – to foster more interaction and ideation space among our participants. Each session focussed on a central issue related to this year’s symposium topic “Capital for Purpose” to develop solutions within a short time. In a specific design thinking setting our participants produced different approaches to solve the challenge they had been facing. 

We have prepared the completed results of four Interactive Sessions to give you some insights. Each of the concept posters consists of a solution to the issue or a way to foster and enable impact. After seeing several of our communities’ outstanding ideas coming into action in the last years, we look forward to inspiring many more in the future. Become part of this initiative by sharing your brilliant ideas.

Better World Talent

The „Better World Talent“ concept describes a recruiting platform (an online tool) for university students and fast-growing startups. In order to gain access to the platform, the startups first have to commit to the Entrepreneurial Impact framework. The recruiting platform then combines different stakeholder who care about more than purely financial return. This idea can provide tremendous value to students who want to find their first employer. Furthermore, it can greatly benefit the companies that take part because they gain access to a new talent pool that is purpose driven. This will vice-versa also contribute to establishing an ESG awareness within the startups because they are recruiting talent that cares about the ESG impact of their employer. 

Impact Accelerator

Within the workshop, we developed the concept of the “Impact Accelerator,” which addresses two major needs startups have concerning the implementation of ESG into their business processes. First, many founders do not have the know-how of how to implement ESG-measures appropriately. Second, to facilitate the adoption of ESG within the startup ecosystem, founders need to be incentivized.
 
Our solution approaches these challenges by building up a community around an accelerator program for early-stage startups, helping them with the implementation of ESG and verifying their improvements. In the accelerator, a startup goes through different stages and for each step receives an ESG-certificate (lowest=bronze, mid=silver, highest=gold).  Only proven startups with financial success as well as an established ESG-measurement receive the gold certificate.
 
Besides the accelerator program, community events are organized to connect the startups from the multiple stages with each other as well as investors and other institutional partners. Last but not least, the certificate is also useful signaling. On the one hand, to hire better talent (sign for better corporate responsibility and culture) and on the other hand, to boost fundraising (sign for a sustainable but financially successful business model).