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A team of professionals, including a focused woman, discusses Environmental, Social, and Governance (ESG) strategies using a laptop presentation in a bright office.
  • Case Study
    Sustainability

Principles and Behaviours for Delivering Sustainability

Anglian Water worked with BSI to establish and implement a standard to confirm and challenge its commitment to environmental and social well-being.

Testimonial

“BSI helped us to identify areas where our decision-making processes could be improved even further to bring sustainability to the forefront.” 

Andy Brown Chief Sustainability Officer, Anglian Water.
Modern urban wastewater treatment plant.

Anglian Water: the largest water and recycling company in England and Wales

The region Anglian Water covers is particularly prone to flooding and drought, which has been exacerbated by the ongoing impacts of climate change.

Its leadership spotted an opportunity to cement its approach to creating public value. This involved adopting a new purpose to bring environmental and social prosperity to the region it serves.

The Challenge

Aligning Anglian Water's business practices with business purposes

Work had already started on embedding this purpose into its operations, but it sought a standard for self-evaluation of its impact on the organization, its culture, and decision-making processes.

Anglian Water sought to assess the alignment of its current business practices and the key goals outlined in its ‘Strategic Direction Statement 2050’ against an independant set of Responsible Business Principles. The company aimed to foster sustainable economic and housing growth, collaborate with partners to enhance the ecological quality of catchments, and remain resilient to the risks of drought and flood. It sought to work with trusted partners to accelerate its sustainability journey and become a carbon neutral business.

The Solution

PAS 808 – Purpose-Driven Organizations for Delivering Sustainability

The resulting standard was developed by a Steering Group of independent experts convened by BSI, including Anglian Water, JLL and KPMG, and representatives from a range of industries.

The PAS sets out seven purpose-driven principles for businesses to follow when embedding purpose and executing their strategies, regardless of the sector they operate in. Anglian Water's implementation began with a self-assessment of its maturity against these principles, before its Sustainability Centre of Excellence made an evidence-based challenge to this. Finally, an external audit from BSI recognized Anglian Water had embedded the principles of a purpose-driven organization and made recommendations for further alignment with the PAS.

Accelerating positive operational and cultural change

Anglian Water has unlocked several positive changes to its operations and culture by formally aligning its purpose with PAS 808.

GLA Building and Thames river at sunset, London, UK
  • Icon description

    Its commitment to purpose makes it easier to attract and retain top talent.

  • Icon description

    Enshrining purpose in its constitution supports its mission to become a sustainability leader.

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    To encourage more purpose-driven organizational change, the standard was made free to download.

    Find out more
  • Icon description

    Implementation of PAS 808 supports efforts to raise capital through green bonds.

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    ‘Purpose prompt card’ encourages staff to consider the ESG-related impact of their decisions.

Demonstrating a commitment to purpose-driven business

Collaboration with BSI to develop and adopt PAS 808 has accelerated Anglian Water's journey toward a sustainable future.

  • 64%

    less carbon is used in assets built today compared to 2010.

  • 389,000

    customers received financial support from Anglian Water this year.

  • £4bn

    will be invested to double environmental recovery efforts.

Testimonial

“From SMEs to large-scale organizations, this standard allows organizations to embed purpose and position themselves as leaders in sustainability.” 

Andy Brown Chief Sustainability Officer, Anglian Water.
Why BSI
Why BSI

Building trust as the UK's National Standards Body

As the UK government's appointed standards agency, we're your trusted partner in innovation.

We help organizations to drive business growth and improve quality, safety and well-being through standardization. We also provide solutions to support government policies and deliver trust for the benefit of all sectors and society.

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Evaluating purpose through shared experiences

Organizations come together in our vibrant LinkedIn community to share experiences and ideas, and offer feedback on future revisions of PAS 808.

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