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About Us - old

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The Sustainable Investor - bridging the gap between financeability and sustainability, one blog at a time. We demystify, simplify and navigate.

We all know that if the planet is to achieve its decarbonisation and transition targets, we need to engage the private sector. Just to deliver net zero, we need to invest $4-5 trillion every year out to 2030. This is over double what we invest now. On top of this we also need to invest to preserve and rehabilitate our environment, social systems and biodiversity. Governments and society have an important role to play but they cannot do this on their own.

One massive challenge is that sustainability and finance sit in very different silo's. They not only use different words, the think differently, often very differently. And we need to bridge these gaps. We need to transition sustainability into mainstream finance.

So how do we do this ? We learn to speak each others language, we learn each others culture - we learn new perspectives.

Finance people think in detail. They look at market size, competitive advantage, supply chains, production processes, investment needs, risks and potential financial returns. If we want them to fully buy into the required transitions, we need to pitch investment in a way that they relate to. Sustainability professionals, lobby groups, and civil servants need to learn the language and perspective of finance.

Plus investor relations professionals and asset owners need to learn how to connect sustainability with business objectives and strategy. This is not going to be easy, the transitions will impact nearly every aspect of our economic system, from agriculture, through industry, transport, and energy systems to health and human rights.

This is where we come in. We demystify the changes our financial systems will go thorough, reducing the noise and the greenwashing. We simplify, so you can see how to apply the lessons to your work, your investing, your engagement with companies and governments, and your local community. We help you navigate - what is investible now and what needs to change to make the key transitions investible in the future.

How do we do this? Through a series of blogs that draw together the bigger picture, with the important detail. That explain the tradeoffs, risks and compromises as well as the potential returns.

What can you Subscribe to? We have three tiers.

The first one is FREE. With a free membership you receive the following delivered directly to your inbox every week:

‘Bridging the gap’: Weekly summary of what paid subscribers are reading plus a few from the archives.
‘What caught our eye this week’: Developments that we found particularly interesting and why.
‘Sunday Brunch’: Our personal perspective and lateral thoughts on a sustainability and finance theme.

The next one is our Premium offer, this works out at less than £1 a week. With this you get full access to everything on the free tier, plus all of our Quick Insight blogs, and the ability to join our global community through posted comments. Our Quick Insights do exactly what the name says, quick to read insights into the key issues that you need to know about on sustainability and finance.

And if you want more, our top tier is Professional. This tier gives you full access to all of our blogs, including all of our "Quick Insights", plus our 'Perspectives' and "Deep Dives", as well as the ability to post comments and join our global community of sustainability and finance professionals.

Plus, you get the chance to shape the debate by suggesting topics for future blogs. Maybe something you care about that doesn't get properly covered elsewhere, or a topic that you know is important, but that you don't fully understand. There are no stupid questions here. Sustainability and finance is a new area and we are all learning as we go.

Who we are

Steven Bowen - sustainable investing and strategy. One of the co-founders of The Sustainable Investor. After starting as an engineer, he has built nearly 30 years' experience in the finance and investing world, including periods in corporate finance, debt markets, broking, and as a buy side portfolio manager. His focus is on the importance of company strategy, and how to construct investment cases in an uncertain world (and the transitions are the biggest uncertainty of all), plus he is a massive advocate for active engagement.

Steven is a qualified engineer (Canterbury University NZ), with an MBA from London Business School & the post graduate FT Non-Executive diploma. He is also a columnist at illuminem.

Sandy Jayaraj - experienced C-Suite executive and leader. The other co-founder of The Sustainable Investor. He had a 25-year career in financial markets at PricewaterhouseCoopers and Morgan Stanley enhanced by four years as COO, then CEO building Curation Corp into a trusted sustainability intelligence enterprise. He brought that experience to bear in founding Perspectrum Advisors in 2022.

By employing lateral thinking, evaluating methods and an ability to communicate complex topics in a concise, relevant and understandable way, Sandy enables organisations to find new perspectives, garner new insights and make more sustainable decisions.

Sandy is a published journalist having written on emerging themes and sustainability for various publications including IR Magazine, Illuminem and Energy World, a publication of the Energy Institute. Sandy is a Fellow of the Royal Society of Arts and studied Engineering and Management Studies at Queens’ College, Cambridge University.

Ffiona Rowland Devasabai is a business psychologist whose specialisation is in applying psychology to accelerate sustainability transitions. She partners with investors, business and public sector leaders to do so. Her work tends to involve helping leadership teams define and align on their strategy, strengthening board and team effectiveness or ensuring organisations have the right skills and mindset in place to achieve their sustainability plans. For the past 5 years she has been working as a leadership strategy consultant and coach at YSC Consulting, partnering mainly with FTSE 100 corporations as well as private equity investors.

Kristina Touzenis is a human rights lawyer and a recognized leader in the effective and concrete operationalisation of international human rights standards and principles in complex settings worldwide requiring long term engagement with a multitude of stakeholders, from both the public and private sectors. She has more than 20 years of experience in advocacy, human rights reporting, monitoring, and evaluating as well as in policy making and negotiating at national, regional, and global levels. Kristina created the International Law Unit at the International Organization for Migration - IOM, the UN Agency for Migration, and served as Head of the Unit from 2011 to 2020.