Sustainable Business Magazine speaks to Alyssa Auberger, Chief Sustainability Officer at leading global law firm Baker McKenzie, about how the Firm is preparing for a future where sustainability is not just ethically important but legally ubiquitous as well.

Baker McKenzie is a global law firm with significant legal expertise in sustainability, offering support and advice to its clients on how to approach sustainability in their organizations in light of the rapidly evolving regulatory landscape in jurisdictions throughout the world. Its expertise in advising on sustainability issues across all sectors, including consumer goods and retail, and healthcare and life sciences, makes it a prominent figure on the global scene.

Baker McKenzie’s scale and reach are central to how it approaches providing advice to clients on sustainability, particularly in a regulatory landscape that differs across markets but increasingly pushes in the same direction. And because the Firm has adopted a sustainability strategy similar to that of other multinational organizations – including many of its clients – this allows it to apprehend sustainability challenges organizations are facing and incorporate its own operational sustainability experience into its outward-facing advice. Alyssa Auberger, the Firm’s Chief Sustainability Officer (CSO), tells Sustainable Business Magazine about why the Firm decided to take this approach and why she believes it enhances its advice to clients:

“Baker McKenzie is a full-service law firm, with over 12,000 people and a presence in over 45 jurisdictions. Our extensive geographic reach is a great advantage when advising on sustainability matters because, it puts a global lens on the legal advice we give. 

“When you’re trying to map different and sometimes conflicting regulations and how they’re going to play out for an organization with a global presence, having such a large footprint is essential because it allows us to provide clients with a solution that “works” wherever they operate. In addition, because sustainability issues don’t fit neatly in one practice and because we are a full-service law firm, that allows us to provide clients with legal solutions that are holistic, pulling in expertise across multiple practices. Finally, the fact that we are approaching these issues for ourselves just as our clients are, gives our advice a practical perspective that is really important. I believe that all of these points are clear differentiators in this space.”

A New Path

Ms. Auberger joined Baker McKenzie in the late 1990s and practiced as a partner in the Firm’s M&A practice. Her desire to move to the sustainability space was triggered when, as Global Chair of the Firm’s Consumer Goods & Retail industry group, she saw firsthand the challenges organizations were facing regarding sustainability and how the topic had moved from an essentially operational subject to one that was relevant to the C-Suite and the board – and why that meant that the legal department needed to get involved. After spending time with clients on the topic, she also developed a keen interest in Baker McKenzie’s own relationship to sustainability.

“In 2020, Baker McKenzie decided to rethink the way it looked at sustainability and brought the Firm’s internal sustainability efforts and the way it was taking its sustainability legal advice to market under one roof and elevated its position within the Firm. At this point in time, it was decided to create a Chief Sustainability Officer position, an innovative move for a law firm – no other global law firm had a CSO at the time. Ms. Auberger expressed interest in the role and after the Firm carried out a hiring process, she was offered the role in November 2020.

“There are three pillars that sit under the umbrella of the sustainability function and my role. Firstly, working with our practitioners on the go-to-market strategy for our legal advice on sustainability-related issues, developing the messaging in a way that helps clients understand how to embed sustainability across operations. Secondly, the Firm’s internal sustainability efforts, including setting a decarbonization strategy to meet our emissions reduction targets and reporting on our emissions and strategy. Thirdly, our relationships with our third-party partnerships – the World Economic Forum, the World Business Council for Sustainable Development, the United Nations Global Compact – to amplify our impact. 

Data, Targets and Decarbonisation

Ms. Auberger explains how Baker McKenzie started its sustainability journey by focusing on its greenhouse gas emissions and getting its own house in order:

“For every organization, the starting point is understanding how you generate emissions and how to measure your emissions – only then can you determine how to reduce them. As a professional services organization, we are very different than, say, an organization that manufactures products – which means that because we don’t need raw materials or packaging to provide our advice, we cannot look to reduce emissions by changing product or packaging composition as a manufacturer might. Having said that, we’ve already started transitioning to renewable energy across the Firm,” the CSO says. “That’s something that we’re going to continue to do, with an objective of moving to 100% renewable energy by 2030. It’s good for our business. It’s good for our clients. It’s good for the planet. It’s good for meeting our emissions reduction targets. We are also moving to green buildings as leases come up for renewal. Greening our real estate portfolio and moving to renewable energy are key to reducing our Scope 2 emissions. 

From this foundation, Baker McKenzie is also able to support its clients’ decarbonization efforts practically through its own emissions reduction – something clients are placing importance on – and through its advice.

“What we are seeing today is that sustainability is a business issue – it’s about how different sustainability challenges affect the resilience and economic viability of a business and about how the business is prepared to face the challenges raised by, for example, physical risk or transition risk. It’s no longer about sustainability for sustainability’s sake, or compliance for compliance’s sake,” Ms. Auberger says. 

“If you think about renewable energy, for example, transitioning to renewable energy has business benefits; it is a way to reduce cost, and reduces external dependencies to ensure autonomy and security. So understanding what your current energy profile is, and understanding where you have room to improve energy efficiency and transition to renewable sources, that builds resilience and is potentially very cost effective in the real world – a positive impact. On the other hand, when it comes to estimating and disclosing potential risk, if you’re not properly identifying your vulnerabilities related to physical risk, or planning for transition risk in your business, it’s like a financial black box – a potential negative impact. 

“Beyond the organization itself, without clear and transparent disclosure standards, for the markets, it’s really complicated, because they have absolutely no idea of how you’re measuring risk. And from a financial regulatory and planning perspective, it’s problematic, because you’re not evaluating and taking into consideration physical and transition risk the way you would any other risk to your business.”

That focus on data also shapes the way Baker McKenzie views preparation for the “disclosure tsunami” Ms. Auberger sees coming through regulatory frameworks such as the EU’s CSRD and the ISSB standards:

“In terms of what organizations can be doing now so that they are prepared when it comes time to disclose, they absolutely must get a handle on their data. No matter what we’re talking about, whether it’s assessing risk, decarbonizing, complying with disclosure obligations, or providing transparent information to your customer base and the markets, it’s all about the data. Beyond that, for organizations that have set emissions reduction targets, they will need to make sure that their targets are realistic and achievable and re baseline if needed.

Deux Ex Machina

Ms. Auberger sees technology as a tool for reshaping supply chains and meeting the demands that new sustainability standards will place on businesses, both in terms of emissions and productivity:

“We’re going to see a focus on the supply chain and Scope 3 emissions. New technologies offer opportunities, as well as challenges. Using those technologies to make your supply chain more efficient may also require you to upskill your workforce any may also change the way you engage with your suppliers. 

“As you look to reduce your Scope 3 emissions, you need to engage with your supply chain because you need your suppliers to reduce their emissions – but it isn’t so much about having a stick for non-compliance, as it is about bringing the supply chain along for the journey. It’s about helping suppliers understand their emissions impact and understanding how to decarbonize their own operations. I suspect that it will be similar when it comes to using new technologies; we’ll see companies helping their supply chain embrace new technologies to help them be more efficient because that raises the bar for everyone.”

Social impact and governance

Another topic that is demanding attention is the risk of litigation on sustainability-related topics. That litigation risk places a focus on fiduciary duty and reputation as powerful drivers of robust governance at board level:

“Once you start seeing the threat of litigation, everybody pays attention because the risks – reputational and financial – are so great, and no organization wants that. That means that boards are paying close attention to their fiduciary duties and how specifically they relate to climate related and sustainability related metrics.

“I think we’ll see a lot more attention to making sure that there is a clear agenda item on sustainability, and that every project – geographical expansion, product development, new advertising campaigns, or new ways of positioning products – will need to be looked at through a sustainability lens. That may not have been the case previously. It’ll be essential to have a complete documented file prepared in the event of litigation that sets out the factual basis for decision making and the supporting evidence.

“The first piece of advice when it comes to avoiding climate litigation is, do not do anything or say anything that cannot be substantiated. What organizations need to remember is that even if the litigation claim is unsuccessful, the reputational risk an organization can suffer by virtue of the claim simply being brought in the first place can be catastrophic – so avoiding litigation altogether is the objective When it comes to greenwashing claims, your best defense is being able to demonstrate that what you said was backed up by factual evidence. Again – it’s all about the data.”

Sustainability for Baker McKenzie also runs through its relationships with peers and the wider legal profession, such as the Net Zero Lawyers Alliance, or the UNGC’s Legal Council, both of which the Firm was a founding member.

“We believe that our relationships with partners is essential to upskilling the profession and leveraging our sphere of influence,” Ms. Auberger states. “We’re one of the founding members of the Net Zero Lawyers Alliance, which allows us to use our expertise for the greater good, whether it’s providing pro bono legal advice or raising awareness and upskilling lawyers. We believe our sphere of influence is how we make the most impact and something we will continue to expend energy on. This includes our work advising our clients, and in the way we embrace and advance sustainability in the legal industry as a whole.”

Staying the Course

Looking ahead, Ms. Auberger’s vision for Baker McKenzie is less about radical course changes and more about disciplined execution: reviewing data and data sources, looking at ways new technologies allow for faster decarbonization, deepening supplier engagement, maintaining strong internal engagement and continuing to focus on partnerships that amplify impact.

“For us, I think the future is about continuing on the course that we’re already on,” says the CSO. “We had our science based targets validated by the Science Based Targets initiative in December 2024, and we’re on our way to achieving them. It’s about always making sure that we are constantly improving our data, staying on top of advancements in decarbonization technologies, engaging with our suppliers proactively, and working with them to help them raise the bar. Sustainability is a team sport where to succeed, everyone needs to work together and do their part.

“We’ll continue to ensure that everybody in the Firm understands what we’re doing and why we’re doing it. We are really fortunate to have a lot of people across the Firm who are passionate about sustainability and who engage internally and with their local communities, but I think that within any organization, in order to be really successful, you’ve got to make sure that everybody in the organization understands the why and the how, so that’s something we’re going to continue to focus on.

“In terms of our own strategy, it’s easy to get distracted with everything going on in the world and the speed at which sustainability evolves, but we are keeping a laser focus on what we need to do so that our business will be going strong decades from now. That’s what sustainability is all about, right?”