Free · six sessions · read now, hear it weekly from 5 October
Six sessions on strategic behavioural change
The EVA³ series in course form — the same arc the podcast will walk weekly from Monday 5 October. Each session: the argument, the three things to keep, and the chapter of the white paper that carries the detail. Strategy describes the destination; behaviour determines whether you arrive.
The 2030 finish line is not a target. It is an audit.
Global emissions reached 57.7 gigatonnes of CO₂e in 2024 — up 2.3% on the year before — and the world is tracking towards 2.3–2.5°C this century. More than 11,000 companies have set or committed to science-based targets; around 2,200 hold validated net-zero commitments; very few are on track to deliver them. If the strategies exist, why is the gap widening? Because the constraint is rarely strategy — the constraint is behaviour. Most boards have a defensible decarbonisation plan. What they lack is a behavioural compact strong enough to survive three CEO transitions and four budget cycles.
- The carbon budget is a balance sheet that can only be drawn down once — every quarter of delay makes the next quarter more expensive.
- More sustainability strategy will not close the gap. The gap is structural: incentives, mandates, data and language are not aligned.
- The 2030 finish line is an audit of corporate behaviour. Boards should plan for it as one.
Read: white paper Foreword, Chapters 1–2 · get the paper →
Three E's. Three lenses. Nine cells you can score.
Why is there no fourth E? Because three is the number of distinct ideas a leadership team can hold simultaneously and act on consistently. ESG is kept for its substance and reorganised for action: the loosely defined S becomes Equity, Environment gets tighter and operational, and Economy is named explicitly — a programme that is economically unsustainable is unwound at the first downturn. Then the lenses: a principle is something you sign up to; a lens is something you look through. Evidence-based, Institutionally focused, Systemically aware. Three E's by three lenses gives the nine cells — each scored on a four-point scale. If every answer comes out "established", the diagnostic was performative.
- Governance is not a fourth pillar — it is the institutional lens applied to all three E's.
- A decision examined through one lens is partial. A decision that satisfies fewer than three is not yet ready.
- The matrix is a diagnostic first, then a decision filter, then an accountability map across CPO, CSO, CFO, CHRO and General Counsel.
Do: score your nine cells — the 3×3 Scan → · Read: Chapters 3–5
Procurement is the lever. True Carbon Count™ is how it gets pulled.
Roughly three-quarters of a typical company's footprint sits in Scope 3, and purchased goods and services alone is typically 35–40%. Procurement has the most leverage on the corporate carbon curve — and has historically been measured on cost, quality and delivery, never tonnes. The reason carbon doesn't land in sourcing decisions is simple: the should-cost model cannot see it. True Carbon Count™ adds the parallel carbon layer so the buyer sees should-cost and should-carbon side by side. The worked example: Supplier A at $10.00 and 6.70 kg CO₂e; Supplier B at $10.30 and 3.15 kg. At $120/tonne, TCC-adjusted costs are $10.80 and $10.68. B was already cheaper — the buyer just couldn't see it.
- TCC needs no new technology, standard or authority — just the decision to make carbon visible at the moment of choice.
- The internal carbon price doesn't need to be precise; it needs to produce decision-relevant differentiation ($50–150/tCO₂e typically does).
- If TCC-adjusted savings are on the buyer scorecard, adoption follows. If TCC stays advisory, it stays optional.
Read: Chapters 1, 7 and 9 · Download: the one-pagers →
2026 to 2050 — and the first three horizons are non-negotiable.
A roadmap that goes only to 2030 will not get you to net-zero; one that begins at 2050 will never get there. EVA³ segments the 24 years into six deliberately unequal horizons: H0 Diagnose & Disclose (2026), H1 Validate & Activate (2027–28, in step with SBTi V2.0 becoming mandatory for new targets from January 2028), H2 Deliver the Halving (2029–30), then Compound, Transform, and Settle Net-Zero. The early horizons are short because the early years are decisive: an honest baseline this year, validated targets and changed procurement KPIs by 2028, delivered and externally assured tonnes by 2030. Companies that try to do everything at once typically do less, less well.
- Treat 2026–2030 as the credibility window — the first three horizons are not optional, and they are the shortest.
- Every horizon needs one metric that matters. A programme tracking twenty is tracking none.
- Sequence beats simultaneity: invest properly in each horizon rather than lightly in all of them.
Read: Chapters 10 and 13
"Committed. Aligned. On a path to." Three words to worry about.
The next standard does not reward aspiration. SBTi's Corporate Net-Zero Standard V1.3.1 has been in effect since April 2026; V2.0 becomes mandatory for new targets from 1 January 2028 — with a dedicated Scope 1 target, verifiable zero-carbon electricity for Scope 2, stricter supplier-engagement expectations in Scope 3, a mandatory transition plan for larger companies, and independent baseline verification. The era of self-reported claims is closing. The shift is from advocacy voice to evidentiary voice: not "we are leading" but reduced this, validated by that, assured by someone with a signature. And the audit-committee test: does the story the company tells the market match the story it tells its own employees? Discrepancy is the earliest signal of credibility risk.
- Aspirational verbs are a disclosure risk. Replace them with numbers, validators and signatures.
- Learn the five greenwashing patterns — hidden trade-off, no proof, vague language, irrelevance, lesser of two evils — and the counter-discipline for each.
- Run the two-story test: market story vs employee story. They should be the same story.
Read: Chapters 13–14
Strategy describes the destination. Behaviour determines whether you arrive.
The three-layer behavioural model under the whole framework: at the individual layer, capability, motivation and identity — nobody becomes competent in carbon-aware procurement by reading a deck. At the team layer, norms, decision rights and rituals. At the institutional layer, KPIs, governance and contracts — what the organisation makes easy, expected and rewarded. Invest in one layer and assume the others follow, and they don't: done together they reinforce, done separately they cancel. And it is not one function's work: CPO, CSO, CFO, CHRO, COO and General Counsel each carry a portion, the board carries the integration, and suppliers sit in the coalitions as members, not audience. A coerced supplier reports. A partnered supplier reduces.
- Behaviour is downstream of design — if you want different decisions, design different decision processes.
- Drift to a single function is the most reliable failure path. Joint CPO–CSO–CFO sponsorship is the minimum, and it cannot be delegated.
- A 100-day plan does not deliver the transition. It delivers the conditions under which the transition can be delivered.
Read: Chapters 8, 11, 12 and 15
Then make it yours
Score the nine cells, measure your pledge-to-delivery gap, and bring both to a 45-minute working session — the compact drafted for your hardest pledge, the first quarter agreed.
The 3×3 Scan → The Readiness Assessment → Book a session →STORYC LTD (company no. 17293375) · EVA³™, True Carbon Count™, the AI Augmentation Line™ and AI-Augmented Consulting™ (UK TM application UK00004409146) are trade marks of StoryC Ltd. Session content is drawn from the EVA³ white paper by Dr. Madeleine Joubert; figures as cited there (UNEP, GHG Protocol, SBTi). This course is a management framework, not assurance, legal or investment advice. Privacy · storycltd.co.uk