ESG is increasingly being tested not only in boardrooms and policy frameworks, but in the lived reality of everyday work. As organizations navigate growing pressures around sustainability, they are also contending with a parallel challenge inside the workplace itself: rising levels of burnout, mental health strain, and a general erosion of human resilience. These internal dynamics are no longer separate from ESG priorities, they are central to them. If sustainability is to be truly meaningful and lasting, it must include the sustainability of people: their capacity to remain well, connected, and engaged in environments that are increasingly complex, hybrid, and demanding.

Adopting ESG principles means that organizational strategy is guided by three interconnected pillars: environmental, social, and governance considerations. ESG places emphasis on creating lasting benefit and making a positive contribution to society and the planet.

These principles establish standards for organizational behavior, policy, and accountability, while also providing measurable indicators used to evaluate sustainability and long-term impact.

ESG for Lasting Benefit to Society and Planet

ESG offers stakeholders a framework for understanding how organizations manage risks and opportunities related to environmental, social, and governance concerns. Ultimately, it is about creating practical, actionable strategies that generate lasting value for both society and business.

As of mid-2026, however, the global ESG landscape is itself undergoing significant change. Voluntary, marketing-driven initiatives are increasingly shifting toward mandatory, data-driven compliance frameworks. At the same time, a stark divide has emerged between more stringent European and Asian regulatory approaches and the political backlash against ESG seen in parts of the United States.

In response, many organizations are rebranding or moving away from the term “ESG” altogether due to political controversy and concerns about greenwashing. Terms such as “responsible business,” “sustainability strategy,” or more specific impact metrics are increasingly being used instead. Yet despite these shifts in language, the underlying practices and concerns remain highly relevant. Organizations are still being called upon to demonstrate meaningful social and environmental accountability, transparency, and long-term stewardship.

In this context, empathy offers something important: a way to ensure that sustainability efforts remain connected to lived human experience rather than becoming purely compliance-driven exercises.

In the following sections, I explore a few of the many ways empathy can support social cohesion within ESG practice, particularly within the social and environmental dimensions.

Empathy and the Social Dimension

The social pillar of ESG is perhaps the most obvious starting point for the application of empathy.

This dimension focuses on the human aspects of organizations: the relationships people have with themselves, with one another, and with the communities around them. It includes both internal and external stakeholders.

Many of the issues addressed within this dimension are directly supported by empathic principles and practices. One way to strengthen employee wellbeing and build meaningful connection, for example, is through the cultivation of empathic behaviors. Interestingly, empathy benefits both the giver and the receiver.

Imaginative empathy is particularly relevant to issues of equity, diversity, and inclusion. It involves taking an “imagine-other” perspective in order to better understand the lived experience of another person.

In an increasingly polarized world, empathy offers a pathway toward mutual acknowledgement, understanding, and respect for differing perspectives. When empathy is left to chance, people are more likely to empathize only with those who resemble themselves, while projecting assumptions onto those perceived as different. Yet empathy is not fixed; it is a trainable capacity that can help overcome in-group and out-group dynamics.

Empathy and the Environmental Dimension

Traditionally, the environmental pillar of ESG evaluates how organizations act as stewards of the natural world. This includes how companies use resources, manage waste, and understand their broader environmental impact.

However, when considering sustainable social cohesion, it is equally important to consider how people within organizations experience and relate to environmental policies. In this sense, a feedback loop exists between empathy and ESG.

When policymakers apply empathy in the design of ESG strategies, they are better able to create policies that genuinely reflect the experiences, concerns, and values of stakeholders. Listening to and understanding multiple perspectives helps bring people into meaningful participation with environmental initiatives rather than positioning them as passive recipients of policy decisions.

Environmental issues are also closely tied to personal values. Ensuring alignment between organizational policies and stakeholder values can strengthen both engagement and wellbeing (Branson, 2008).

Empathy and the Physical Space

The physical spaces in which people work are another important consideration at the intersection of the environmental and social dimensions.

Human beings have a lived, embodied experience of space, and this experience affects wellbeing. Researchers have increasingly explored the relationship between the built environment and emotional states, behavior, physical wellbeing, and social interaction.

Although the field is still emerging, studies in neuroarchitecture have already highlighted meaningful connections. One review examining the effects of neuroarchitecture on human wellbeing identified impacts across emotional, physiological, psychological, and cognitive dimensions (Assem, Khodier & Fathy, 2023). Interestingly, certain design elements, such as natural textures like wood , were shown to reduce heart rate and stress responses, even when participants were not consciously aware of these effects.

Empathy can therefore be applied both in researching user needs and in designing spaces that support wellbeing, connection, and psychological safety. Each of the five dimensions of integrative empathy offers useful insight into how environments can be designed to foster presence, listening, collaboration, and mutual understanding.

Empathy with the Natural World

Empathy can also extend beyond interpersonal relationships to include the natural world itself. Organizations such as the Organization for Networks of Empathy explore how empathy can be cultivated not only toward people, but also toward non-human life and even objects within museum and environmental education contexts. Both the Seattle Aquarium,and Two Oceans Aquarium, for example, uses empathy-based approaches to educate visitors about aquatic life and environmental stewardship.

In this way, empathy becomes a valuable tool for understanding environmental impact, designing human-centered environmental policies, and helping stakeholders meaningfully engage with sustainability initiatives.

Toward a Culture of Empathy

A culture of empathy contributes to social cohesion on many levels. As a set of principles, empathy can be integrated into organizational policies. As a process, it can underpin organizational routines. As a daily practice, it shapes how people engage with and relate to one another.

Perhaps most importantly, empathy helps soften rigid top-down structures and creates bridges across silos. In collaborative, multi-disciplinary, and transdisciplinary environments, cultivating a culture that empowers people to care for their own wellbeing while also listening to, understanding, valuing, and integrating the perspectives of others is essential.

In a fragmented and rapidly changing world of work, empathy may no longer be a peripheral “soft skill.” It may instead be one of the foundational capacities needed to build resilient organizations, sustainable workplaces, and healthier societies.

Assem, H. M., Khodeir, L. M., & Fathy, F. (2023). Designing for human wellbeing: the integration of neuroarchitecture in design–a systematic review. Ain Shams Engineering Journal, 102102.

Branson, C. M. (2008). Achieving organisational change through values alignment. Journal of Educational Administration, 46(3), 376-395.

Martingano, A. J., & Konrath, S. (2022). How cognitive and emotional empathy relate to rational thinking: empirical evidence and meta-analysis. The Journal of Social Psychology, 162(1), 143-160.