Speakers
William Arkwright - General Director ENGIE Green
A graduate of ENS and ESSEC, William joined the Engie group in 2012 in the strategy department before serving as chief of staff to the Group's deputy CEO. He evolved within GEM (Global Energy Management), the group's trading platform, before becoming Director of Renewable Energy at Engie Entreprises et Collectivités. He notably contributed to creating Réservoir Sun, a subsidiary dedicated to decentralized solar power, as well as to the development of the marketing of biogas.
William has been Managing Director of Engie Green since 2020, a subsidiary of the ENGIE group for solar and wind power in France, which operates and maintains the most wind and solar installations in France.
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Title : How to make France a welcoming land for renewables?
Abstract: Recently, France received the dunce cap of European class, from the EU, with regard to the deployment of renewable energies. How to explain it? Why, while in the rest of the world, wind or solar energy are not debated, is their development slow in France? Is the climate emergency poorly perceived? Are project leaders approaching territories in the wrong way? How can we understand this French exception? And, above all, how to speed up?
Françoise Carle, Deputy General Director in charge of Development of the Val d'Oise department
An ESSEC graduate, Françoise Carle is Deputy General Director in charge of development at the Val d'Oise Departmental Council, after having held positions as an associate consultant and general management in different public contexts.
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Title : The challenges of transitions for Val d’Oise (FR)
Abstract: The Department of Val d'Oise is a community with considerable assets and whose trajectories and territorial issues are multiple, like its territory which is both very rural in the west and very urban in the east. These Valdoisian dynamics, driven by local public authorities, are today affected by the urgency of ecological, sociological, digital and environmental issues. To provide responses that meet these challenges, the Val d’Oise Departmental Council is activating a whole series of levers in favor of sustainability and transitions.
These actions, structured around a strategy of attractiveness for residents, investors and socio-economic players in the region, are proof that the Department is an active and leading component in the transformations to be undertaken.
20240404 - Intervention FC ESSEC présentation ppt avec vidéo.pptx
Philippe Brochard - Former AUCHAN general director
Philippe Brochard, ESSEC (08), committed manager, specialized in restoring sustainable organizational performance in the world of industry and retail with international experience acquired at Renault, Alstom and Auchan.
Philippe is passionate about agriculture, positive impact and supporting essential transitions in businesses, whether economic, human, technological or climatic. It is particularly committed to issues of food and industrial sovereignty, inclusion and equal opportunities. Philippe has a global approach to subjects, simultaneously addressing issues linked to developments in society, corporate culture, data and technology, the performance of organizations and its talents, IS and Supply-Chain foundations.
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Consumer awakening and inflation: this great paradox accelerating economic, social and climatic transitions in our commercial areas and our consumption patterns
Abstract: Citizens have never been so alert, aware of the impact associated with their mode of consumption and their purchases on the economic, social and climatic transitions that are imposed on them. This is true for their health and their personal needs, but also, in their living area, for the societal impact that these expenses can represent in reducing their carbon footprint, on the links they help to forge, on the positive development of businesses and employment and its impact on the control of increasingly limited food and energy resources.
The acceleration of food and energy inflation phenomena has led to fueling this great paradox, that of an enlightened consumer who wants increasingly positive consumption, bringing meaning and progress but limited by an increasingly constrained personal budget. Thus arises the long and necessary adjustment of the structure of household expenditure, arbitrations between increasingly high incompressible expenses, leisure, telephony and food whose fair price must be accepted.
Major transitions are being organized in large-scale food distribution to respond to these challenges, planning a complete reconfiguration of commercial areas and their increasingly omnichannel and interconnected activities. Faced with these challenges, new companies are developing, addressing these transition issues and capable of reconciling positive impact, economic performance and changes in consumption patterns.
Eveil du consommateur et inflation.pptx
Mikäel Lemarchand - Director of Social, Territorial and Environmental Engagement (DESTE), SNCF
After a first professional experience in Germany, Mikaël Lemarchand joined the SNCF group in 2001. He first held Development and Marketing oriented positions within Voyages SNCF, before becoming Chief of Staff to Guillaume Pepy, from 2005 in 2008. His professional career then led him to occupy various positions within the Passenger activities: he was responsible for the development of Keolis' railway activities, then worked for five years at Eurostar, notably as Managing Director France. From 2017 to 2019, he was Sales, Marketing and Services Director of Transilien. Mikaël Lemarchand has been director of the Tous SNCF business project since January 2020.
Elisabeth Gaillarde - CSR Director at the Transition & Growth consulting firm
After 9 years working on taking environmental issues into account in the agricultural world, Elisabeth Gaillarde joined ADEME (Environment and Energy Management Agency) where she developed the Carbon Bilan, the first measurement tool of the impact of businesses on climate change.
She then spent 15 years within large private groups, where she built product and service offerings in favor of sustainable development, both on environmental and societal issues.
Since 2021, as CSR/ESG director, she has been building its sustainability strategy and trajectory with the company; it coordinates its operational deployment and employee engagement; it manages the measurement of its performance through its extra-financial reporting; it promotes the impact of the company with its ecosystem.
Elisabeth holds an Executive Master from ESSEC , a Doctorate in Socio-Economics and is an agricultural engineer.
Laurence Daures - ESSEC Professor
Laurence Daures (formerly Lescourret) is associate professor of Finance. His research focuses on the microstructure of financial markets. Laurence received the Thesis Prize in 2004 from the French Association of Finance and the National Foundation for Academic Teaching of Business Management (FNEGE), the “Joseph de la Vega Prize” in 2013 and the IFSID prize for the best article on derivatives in 2015. She received several research grants from Euronext Paris (2007), the FEI (2008, 2010, 2020), the National Research Agency (JCJC, 2011) and INEX (Initiative of Excellence, 2018).
She sits on the board of directors of Dassault Systèmes and LCL (Le Crédit Lyonnais). She sits on the audit committee of Dassault Systèmes (DS) and chairs the DS remuneration and nominations committee. She sits on the LCL Risk Committee and chairs the LCL Audit Committee.
Laurence holds a doctorate in Finance from HEC Paris.
Guillaume Placé - Deputy Director General, Cergy-Pontoise region
Guillaume Placé has been, since 2020, deputy general director of the Cergy Pontoise region, which brings together 13 municipalities and 215,000 inhabitants. In particular, he leads the teams in charge of territorial strategy, urban planning, built heritage, economic development, solidarity and employment.
Urban planner, territorial administrator trained at Sciences Po, he alternated between a career in local authorities and experiences overseas and abroad (Cameroon, Kenya). He was notably director of planning at Rennes Métropole, deputy general director of the Department of Guyana, general director of services for the City of Anglet, on the Basque Coast, and the City of Trappes, in Yvelines.
Pascal Trideau, ESG and Operational Excellence Director of SOFIPROTEOL
Member of the management board of Esfin Gestion since 2012; holder of a master's degree in economics, an MBA from ESSEC and a graduate of IAE Paris, he began his career in 1991 at Crédit Agricole; he then joined the Unigrains fund in 1999 as director of investments and at the same time held the position of director of the economic studies department for three years; he then joined the General Confederation of Scop from 2007 to 2011 as director of financial tools, then general director.
Edouard Dequeker - ESSEC Professor
Former student of the Ecole Normale Supérieure de Paris-Saclay, of the University of Oxford and of ESSEC (specializtion in the Chair of Urban Economics), I acquired academic skills these last years, as well as operational ones, within consulting firms in local and urban development (EY, Algoé) and public structures (City of Paris, Conseil départemental des Yvelines). I completed a PhD in geography and economic sociology in Sciences Po Paris, in cooperation with the London School of Economics, on the compared metropolitan dynamics of Greater Paris and Greater London, in mirror of their respective economic governances. I am currently Professor for the Chair of Urban Economics of ESSEC Business School and pedagogical responsible of the Advanced Master in Urban and Real-Estate Management. My areas of research relate to the drivers for the economic dynamics of cities and territories, as well as of their social and environmental balances, to location choices by firms and households, and of the role of economic (public/private) governance of cities in their dynamics.
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Companies and territorial adaptation to climate change
Abstract: Climate change is one of the greatest challenges of our time. Beyond the imperious necessity for mitigating its effects at a global scale, we must collectively start to adapt to its systemic consequences at urban and territorial levels, that will occur in the next thirty years whatever transition we launch now. This process of local adaptation to climate change relates to new economic models and investment strategies, as well as new ways for governing common resources that will increasingly rarefy, for which companies will play a crucial role. This presentation highlights research case studies that are being worked on at the moment, and argues that in any case we will have to come up with new forms of public-private coordination for governing our commons in the years to come.
Edouard Dequeker - Economy and Society - Companies and territorial adaptation to climate change - 04042024.pptx
Geneviève Zembri-Mary- CYU Professor
Geneviève Zembri-Mary works on how uncertainty and opportunities can change planning practices and theories in a context of environmental crisis and economic and social changes. Planning is understood as a process of going back and forth between the different phases of a project (planning, programming, design, consultation, etc.). Uncertainties can be environmental, social, political, financial, regulatory, etc.
Concepts such as opportunity, transitions, heritage development, densification, are particularly analyzed as a response to uncertainty. It is also about working on the way in which uncertainties and resources are identified, perceived, represented and used by public, private, associative and resident actors in the planning process.
This research is intended to provide a proposed theoretical framework for planning that can be re-examined in a context marked by new uncertainties. The case studies concern transport infrastructure, town planning and development projects, sports, leisure, cultural, tourist or commercial equipment projects. The sites studied are varied (urban, peri-urban, rural), located in France or in Europe (Great Britain, Greece). These can be small projects (housing for example) or mega-projects (large transport infrastructures, Olympic equipment).
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What if uncertainty wasn't an obstacle to planning ? (EN)
Abstract: Uncertainty is often considered a handicap, an obstacle. Can we have a positive view of uncertainty?
Territorial planning is carried out through a plan aimed at guiding or framing urban development, the location of facilities, infrastructure, economic activities, and housing. It can be driven by a political project and take the form of an urban project, involving both private and public actors, with the objective of increasing the attractiveness of a city or metropolis. It may also involve infrastructure or mega projects. However, the planning of urban projects and infrastructure projects faces numerous environmental, financial, regulatory, social, political, and demographic uncertainties. We will consider that these uncertainties can be a source of new opportunities for the project if the actors leverage the resources of their "agency," such as the ability to access and mobilize individual and collective resources. But this agency to act and create opportunities implies freedom and responsibility in decision-making and choices to be made.
présentation ppt G. Zembri ESSEC-VF.pptx
Elise Gourier - ESSEC Professor
Elise Gourier received a doctorate in finance from the Swiss Finance Institute at the University of Zurich in 2013. She spent two years as a postdoctoral researcher at Princeton University and then was appointed assistant professor at Queen Mary University of London . She is also a researcher affiliated with CEPR. Elise’s research interests include theoretical and empirical asset pricing and financial econometrics. She is currently working on several projects aimed at better understanding the returns of publicly traded indices and stocks, as well as private equity funds. Elise has published in top academic journals in finance, presented at major financial conferences, and taught asset valuation and financial economics. She has supervised theses at the Master and PhD levels.
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Greenwashing: How does it impact financial markets?
Abstract: The mounting pressure from activists, investors and government agencies to tackle climate change has led some firms to provide misleading information about the environmental soundness of their practices. This phenomenon is often referred to as ‘greenwashing’. Does greenwashing have an impact on financial markets? We use artificial intelligence to show that it does. First, we find that the media has been reporting increasingly about greenwashing since 2015. This increase is driven by concerns about green assets, i.e., assets developed by the financial sector to incentivize and help companies to become greener. When the volume of media reports increases, investments into green funds slow down. Firms that are really green therefore suffer from less investments as well. Second, greenwashing induces uncertainty on how exposed firms really are to climate risk. The measurement of this exposure is crucial to guide green investors in their asset allocation. The second part of our project seeks to achieve a more granular understanding of the effects of greenwashing at the firm level. The main challenge to detecting greenwashing, however, lies in the ability to verify firms’ claims. The many communication channels that can be used for greenwashing make manual searches extremely resource-intensive. We develop an AI-based detection method which compares the communications of firms, through press releases and their websites, and matches them. Our method raises a red flag when the contents of these communications are related to sustainability, and do not match. The next step will be to analyze whether firms that are greenwashing more, according to our algorithm, are the firms that are the most impacted.
Greenwashing_index_ESSEC_EGourier.pptx
Felix Papier - ESSEC Professor
Felix Papier is a Supply Chain Management Professor in the Operations Management Department at ESSEC Business School since 2011 and Holder of the ESSEC Global Circular Economy Chair. His research and teaching focuses on supply chain and operations strategy, sustainable and socially-responsible operations, circular economy, supply chain due diligence and information sharing in supply chains, and humanitarian operations. He has been the Academic Director of the ESSEC & Mannheim Executive MBA (2015-2017) and the Dean of ESSEC Pre-Experience Programs (2017-2022).
He has published in several academic and professional journals such as Operations Research (OR), Manufacturing & Service Operations Management (MSOM), Production and Operations Management (POM), Transportation Science, European Journal of Operational Research (EJOR), and Harvard Business Review Germany/France and presented his research at international conferences in Europe, Asia, and the United States (INFORMS, EURO, MSOM, POMS). In 2001, he completed part of his graduate studies at the University of Illinois at Chicago, and in 2006, he visited the Hong Kong University of Science & Technology as a Research Scholar. In 2022/23, he was Visiting Faculty at the Anderson School of Management at the University of California, Los Angeles.
Before joining ESSEC, he worked for several years as a strategy and operations management consultant for McKinsey & Company. He has performed numerous assignments in strategy formulation, purchasing management, and supply chain management, serving international clients from the automotive, pharmaceutical, and agricultural industries.
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The Role of Operations & Supply Chains in Transforming Companies and Communities
Abstract: Operations and Supply Chains are among the most important parts of organizations to reduce the impact of companies on the planet, on communities, and on society. We look into three important questions: (1) How can operations help a company improve its own environmental footprint? We consider the example of closed-loop, circular supply chains to reduce waste and carbon emissions? (2) How can companies manage other companies in its supply chain, such as suppliers or partners, to improve its social impact? We discuss supply chain due diligence to combat forced labor in global value chains. Finally, (3) are there supply chains that are truly good? We talk about humanitarian supply chains whose only mission is to improve the well-being of disaster-striken or otherwise affected communities.
20240404 ESSEC Science & Society Conf_F Papier_v4b.pptx