Sustainability and entrepreneurship

Our approach to entrepreneurship

In our Code of Conduct, we have made two commitments relating to the corporate value ‘entrepreneurship’, namely to:

• Fostering an entrepreneurial spirit and encouraging our employees to take the initiative.
• Demanding a strong sense of responsibility and seeing mistakes as learning experiences.

As an SME, we don’t have the same human and financial resources as large companies. We are deeply convinced that every employee can be a source of ideas. That’s why we don’t talk about job descriptions and specifications, but about roles and responsibilities, to cultivate this entrepreneurial spirit. In practical terms, hierarchical layers are limited, silos do not exist and cross-functionality is strongly encouraged.

So, how is this reflected in our approach to sustainability?

The creation of a ‘sustainability’ task force

The pioneers
From 2021, under the impulse of a colleague coming from the impact investing area and with the support of our CEO, ONE embarked on a journey towards the B Corp certification and joined the Swiss Triple Impact programme, two initiatives overseen by B Lab Switzerland.

Their contagious enthusiasm led to other colleagues joining them, not only because of their interest in the topic but also because they were convinced that sustainability is an essential strategic issue. Three of them even went back to school to complete a training course at the ISFB – Institut Supérieur de Formation Bancaire.

The relays
At the end of 2023, ONE decided to hire an internal person devoted at 50% of her time to sustainability. I’m proud to take on this role, but of course there’s no question of dissolving the sustainability task force! Some pioneers have stayed on and other colleagues have joined us. The great thing is that the last three members spontaneously came to me and asked to join. What a motivational boost!

Today, there are eleven of us, and each of us makes his or her own contribution. All the bank’s departments are represented, which is an undeniable asset for a certification process such as B Corp covering five impact areas (governance, employees, community, environment and clients) or for the implementation of our action plan communicated in our Sustainability Reports. This task force is a pool of entrepreneurs with a wide range of skills.

A daily learning process

Even if the topic ‘sustainability’ is on everyone’s lips, we can never claim to do everything perfectly and without pitfalls. It’s a long-term learning process. We advocate transparency, mutual support and the right to make mistakes. We experience moments of frustration when we have to re-order our priorities, but this is sometimes a necessary evil. Yes, we should have honoured all the deadlines in our action plan communicated in 2022. Yes, although we are not subject to the requirements of the Code of Obligations on transparency relating to non-financial matters, our initial ambition was to produce a double materiality matrix. However, after due consideration, our pragmatic side prevailed, due to limited time and resources, opting instead for an impact materiality matrix, which we already consider to be a great step forward for ONE.

Our strength lies in our ability to bounce back and find alternatives collectively. This is where our DNA as a family bank comes into its own. We make mistakes, we learn from them and we keep moving forward.