This guest blog was written by Teddy Nyahasha, Chief Executive at ICMIF member OneFamily (UK). Our thanks to Teddy for his permission to share his article with other ICMIF members.

2020 was my first year as Chief Executive Officer of the mutual OneFamily. With any new job you anticipate some difficulties until things start to bed in but, as we now know, this was going to be a rather more challenging year than I expected.

Covid-19 had a significant financial impact on so many of our members as their lives were turned upside-down overnight. They needed our support to help them to find their feet again and I’m proud of everything that we did to help our community to recover. We were there for them.

And that’s how we look at the world – as far as we’re concerned our relationship with our members continues through good times and bad. We’re in it for the long-term – acting sustainably and responsibly is in everything we do. So that could be in providing Hardship Grants during the pandemic, to our determination to protect the planet with our new climate friendly investment funds that eschew any companies that don’t meet our strict environmental criteria. It’s also in our team, who have had tremendous resolve and positivity in the most testing of circumstances.

But I’m not going to list all the good things that we do or have done. It would take far too long and you can read our first ever Inspiring Better Futures report if you would like to know more about our mutual mindset and our vision for the future.

ESG might be the new buzzword that everyone is suddenly interested in, but it’s something that we’ve always done, because doing the right thing is at the very core of who we are. Yet, up to now, we’ve been fairly modest about it and in doing so we’ve not opened ourselves up to be challenged to do more. No matter how great an organisation claims to be on ESG, there’s always the next step that can be taken.

So, our Inspiring Better Futures report puts a stake in the ground. It states where we’re at right now, why I’m so proud of my team and all that they’ve achieved during an intensely difficult time, along with our hopes for the future. It’s not a smug, self-congratulatory pat on the back. Instead, it’s our starting point. We’ve laid strong foundations, but there’s so much more that we can and should aspire to do.

I’m looking forward to our next steps. This is about inspiring better futures for our next generation.