Carol Cone:
I’m Carol Cone, and welcome to Purpose 360, the podcast that unlocks the power of purpose to ignite business and social impact.
If you aspire to be a CSO in a large or medium-sized organization in the future, then today’s conversation is one that will inspire you. And delight you as well. You’re going to learn so many insights. Today, corporate sustainability has reached an inflection point. The era of ambitious commitments and bold targets is giving way to something that it must go forward towards. And that is delivering on these commitments. And increasingly, sustainability leaders are being asked to demonstrate not only impact for people and planet, but real value for the business. I am thrilled today to have a marvelous conversation with Ann Tracy, Chief Sustainability Officer of Colgate-Palmolive.
Ann has had a front row seat to the evolution of the company’s purpose: We are Colgate-Palmolive, a caring, innovative growth company that is reimagining a healthier future for all people, their pets, and our planet. This purpose is inclusive of sustainability and extensive societal commitments, and how the company delivers these commitments to continually create value for the organization. In our exciting conversation, Ann offers a fascinating look inside what it takes to make sustainability work at scale. And why its most effective leaders speak the language of business.
How her win-win-win framework connects consumer benefit, business growth, and impact, and why knowing where to lead and where not to is essential to making meaningful progress. Ann takes us inside Colgate’s journey to reinvent the toothpaste tube and the remarkable decision by their CEO to share that technology with people across the industry, with competitors indeed, to help move an entire industry forward. She’ll also share the 35-year-old Bright Smiles, Bright Futures initiative that has reached over two billion children around the globe with toothbrushing education and hygiene.
So if you’re trying to turn your purpose and sustainability into meaningful business and societal value, this is a conversation filled with inspiration and insights for your personal journey. So let’s get started.
Welcome to the show, Ann.
Ann Tracy:
Thank you, Carol. And like you said, I’m surprised we haven’t done this before. I’m delighted to be here with you.
Carol Cone:
Well, I’m thrilled. And I have to start out by saying I am an inveterate Colgate Optic White user. I love the brand. It’s great. And also Hill’s and Murphy’s — you’ve got some wonderful, wonderful brands. So it’s great to have a 220-year-old company represented by someone who’s been with the firm over three decades.
Ann Tracy:
Yeah.
Carol Cone:
So that’s amazing. And also, I love the fact you’ve got — what, four kids, three cats — no, two cats, three dogs. So you are constantly probably testing the products and getting lots of smiles, ’cause in your new logo it’s about making more smiles.
Ann Tracy:
Yes, that’s what we’re all about, and we hope to continue to do that another 200 years.
Carol Cone:
And I know you will, because you’re — it’s such an amazingly thoughtful company. So I’d love to start out with just — what are the experiences in your background, your upbringing? I know that you are an engineer by your training, but some of the — that really molded you to go into this sustainability career.
Ann Tracy:
Yeah, and as you mentioned, I’ve been at Colgate a very long time, and I think those of you in your audience would know that sustainability has evolved over the years. Maybe a quick history — before Colgate, I actually worked in the defense industry for a few years. And what I learned was I didn’t like that, because depending on your clearance level, you really couldn’t see the whole picture of what you were working on, building, making. So I went back to grad school in engineering and then joined Colgate, and I was immediately drawn to fast-moving consumer goods — FMCG, as we call it, or consumer goods world — because you could go to the store and see what you made. I was in manufacturing for many years, to see what you made right on the shelf. And I love that.
And I love just the pace of change, the constant innovation, and — as you mentioned earlier — the iconic brands that we work on that are tremendous and fun. And I think we’re in an era now — and we’ll talk more about this — where now we’ve got to, we are in implementation phase. We are in action phase.
And we are understanding what it really takes to do that. And so sustainability as a profession has really been around for a good decade, but it’s really evolved and changed over that time frame. And we can’t ignore what’s going on in the world around us, including the emergence of AI. So we’re managing alongside all these other big geopolitical things. So it’s a fun place to be, because it’s always changing.
Carol Cone:
You have also traveled — you’ve worked all around the world, throughout your career at Colgate. And curious about being engaged with so many different brands, manufacturing, supply chain, different cultures — how has that shaped your high-level view of sustainability?
Ann Tracy:
Yeah, I mean, living — the world, on the one hand, is a small place; on the other hand, it’s a big place, right? I feel so fortunate to have worked on or with almost every geographical division that Colgate is — well, we sell our products in two hundred countries, so we’re all over the world. But what you learn to appreciate is the difference in cultures, and particularly when it comes to sustainability — I think that’s where it’s come together for me. You have to meet them where they’re at. And there’s vast differences in how Asia thinks of sustainability, even how South Pacific — so, Australia — thinks about it, versus Europe, of course, versus Latin America.
So, what myself and my team do is we engage with each of those geographies and their leaders, and we meet them where they’re at and understand what their needs are, and that changes culture by culture, infrastructure by infrastructure. So having been on the ground and lived and worked in those places really gives me an appreciation for that. And I think you can’t replace that kind of firsthand knowledge.
Carol Cone:
Which is great — that’s how you’re so effective. So I like to start with your purpose, and your purpose statement: reimagining a healthier future for all people, their pets — my fave — and our planet. And can you share how the purpose integrates into the business strategy, and how you bring it to life? And then we’re gonna get into the specific sustainability initiatives.
Ann Tracy:
Sure, yeah. Our purpose — don’t underestimate the power of purpose. It’s incredibly important, and it’s not just lip service. And I would dare say every single person working — 34,000 people working at Colgate — if you were to walk up to them, they know that purpose. And I think they understand what that means. So: reimagining a healthier future for all people, their pets, and our planet. I mean, it’s a simple statement, but it really is the North Star for what I would call our business growth strategy.
And we build these kind of strategic frameworks in five-year buckets. We just sunsetted 2025, so we’re working on our strat plan for 2030. So our growth initiatives are kind of how we think of our superpowers, if you will — what’s special to Colgate that will enable that — and hone our key initiatives to drive our growth. And then, underneath all of that, is what we call transformative enablers. Sustainability is one of the transformative enablers, next to operational excellence and AI, of course. So that North Star sits right on top, and it is the guide for everything we do underneath.
Carol Cone:
So you talk about sustainability being now — it’s a transformative enabler of your business strategy. What happened internally? It didn’t just — one day your CEO didn’t just wake up and say, “Okay, sustainability, you’re now in the C-suite.” So I know you’ve worked so diligently in your career to move this from actions to strategy. So was there something that happened that you can share with our listeners, or a cadence of things that happened, that all of a sudden you were much more part of the business strategy?
Ann Tracy:
It was more of a build — moving from ambition, setting targets, to building the roadmaps to get there, to now action and implementation, and bringing those stakeholders along the way. Now, one thing that I think — I don’t know if I’d call it an aha moment or not, but I think that’s been very critical to helping us continually improve and move the needle forward on our targets — is the fact that we have this sustainability and social impact strategy. And I still remember, we started from a blank sheet of paper back when we were developing our ’25 strategy — completely blank sheet of paper, working with our CEO, with Noel Wallace. And the first go-around, there was a lot there, and he said, “You need to make it simpler.” And I really learned that making something simple is very hard.
So he pushed us, and I think we ended up in a better place. And even beyond that, I learned, somewhere along the way, the power of focus. And when there’s so much to get done, you have to help the organization focus, and you have to be relentless and repetitive around: this is what drives the business. These are the initiatives, the actions where we want to lead, and then these other ones we have to do, but we’re gonna be followers or fast followers. So I use a metaphor — people have heard me say this — it’s swords and shields. Swords are where we want to lead. Shields are what we have to do, because of taxes, fees, reputational risks, those types of things. So really getting the organization anchored behind the swords is critical.
Carol Cone:
And you’re consistent in terms of your writings and your CR report — talking about focus, which is great. I’d love you to go deeper into the swords and shields philosophy, and give an example of one of your favorite initiatives that does that, because it’s very powerful, and it is focused.
Ann Tracy:
Well, I guess the best example of all is in the first area, oral health. We have a very long-standing program called Bright Smiles, Bright Futures — it’s been around about as long as I have at Colgate, a little over 30 years. Basically, we aim to bring oral health and hygiene education — even, in some cases, treatment — to children and their families around the world. We do that through school programs, we do it through dental vans, depending on where you are in the world, and we do this all over the world, in communities all over the world, including the US. And there are so many kind of mythbusters around oral health, which is starting to come to light, which is exciting for us. But oral cavities, or caries, as we call it, is the number one disease in children around the world, and it can have devastating effects on children.
Ann Tracy:
And most recently — last December — we formalized a partnership with the World Health Organization Foundation to work alongside them to further promote — we’re escalating Bright Smiles, Bright Futures, that initiative around oral health. So I think, to me, that’s one of the best examples — and if you go back to kind of this era around value creation that we’re in right now, which we’ll get into in a minute, that’s the right place for us as a business to lead, because we are the leading oral health business in the world.
Carol Cone:
And you’re using your scale for tremendous impact — you’ve reached over two billion. I see that you’ve kind of set a goal, 2.7 billion by 2030. And I’d love to know — because the best initiatives have longevity, if you’re really gonna get to scale — how did it stick?
Ann Tracy:
Well, no one’s ever asked me that directly, but I can give you my point of view. I think “what’s not to like about it” is the simple answer. I mean —
Carol Cone:
Great answer, great answer.
Ann Tracy:
But it’s — I think we all show up for work every day, and we underestimate — we don’t always think about it, maybe a better way to say it — we take for granted the fact that the products we make are good for people. They’re all about health. And that’s a great place to work. That’s a great organization to be part of.
And this just takes it to another level. And we may get into my win-win-win principle, but it clearly is the best demonstration of win-win-win, because you’re helping people — you’re engaging children and helping them have a healthier mouth, and giving them product to take home, enough for their family to use, and helping their family learn about the importance of oral health. Now you’ve done something for them that’s gonna add to longevity, make them more comfortable, whatever the case may be. And that’s very positive — that’s positive for the consumer.
Carol Cone:
You must be reading my notes, because first I was gonna ask about swords and shields, which you did. And now the win-win-win framework — how long have you had the win-win-win framework?
Ann Tracy:
Well, I most actively started talking about that as we were developing and rolling out our 2030 strategy. I honestly don’t want people running around saying, “Oh, I just did this and improved my Scope 2.” I want people to say, “I did this and improved our efficiency in the business,” or “I protected the resilience of the supply of this material, whether it’s corn, soy, whatever it is.” And, by the way, as an outcome, we reduced our emissions, and that was a good thing. So we’re driving impact at scale, but we’re doing it by bettering the business first.
So that’s kind of how the win-win-win thing works. It’s win for the consumer first — that builds brand trust. If the consumer has brand trust, then you build brand loyalty — that’s a win for the company, for the business. And only if you do those two things well do you have a healthy flywheel from a business standpoint. Then you drive impact at scale for the planet. And I’m not going to name names, but there are examples of companies out there that have struggled as a business, and that’s had a negative effect on their impact at scale for the planet. So I think it’s so important to put business first, always with in mind that we have the initiatives in place to reach our targets — and that helps us be more successful.
Carol Cone:
Yeah — it is astounding. So I’m sure you’re a tiny bit frustrated — I’m frustrated for you — because it’s not on the balance sheet. It’s not like a brand is on the balance sheet, and then you assume that brand value. You specifically got this amazing result. So how are you discussing that with your finance colleagues internally, first, so they at least recognize it?
Ann Tracy:
We’re now being much more deliberate about tying everything we do to value drivers. And I even go so far as to say, if we can’t articulate the value driver, we shouldn’t be doing it. Now, avoidance can be a value driver. I have a great CFO who embraces this and understands that avoidance should be a decision-maker in a project. And it comes up in a few places — like you mentioned, as we drive more efficiency, we use less electricity, we avoid energy costs. Another example — I don’t know how many in your audience would be familiar with these things called EPR fees. It’s a terrible acronym — extended producer responsibility — but it’s the fees that companies like us pay for the amount of plastic we use. And these fees are going up exponentially around the world. They’ve been in Europe a long time, but now they’re all over Canada.
And if we can improve the design, use less plastic, use less virgin plastic, make things more recyclable — all of these things help us avoid EPR fees. So these are things that should help us make decisions when we decide whether or not to do a project. It’s a very simple template — the lead value driver, or value creation category — and then there’s, as you can imagine, a framework they have to fill out to get them there, and put it in more of the business language that our finance community can relate to. In some cases, particularly under dollars protected, it could be directional, it could be qualitative, as we say, not quantitative. In other cases, it can be very hard dollars — there are savings projects. But a lot of times, particularly with products, when you introduce new products that are in some way more sustainable — maybe using a less carbon-intensive material, because that material we’re sourcing hasn’t scaled yet — it’s probably more expensive.
And so there’s a perception, not wrong, that sometimes more sustainable products are more expensive. But once you scale — and we know how to do that, we know how to scale things and cut costs — we can improve that. So it’s kind of managing these trade-offs, but then articulating the benefits of some of the projects we have through this value creation framework.
Carol Cone:
And I love that. Can you please share the recyclable toothpaste tube journey?
Ann Tracy:
It is truly a journey, one that started, honestly, around 2015, when we first said we were going to make all of our packaging recyclable. And, as you can imagine, toothpaste tubes are a huge part of our business, and a huge part of our packaging portfolio. But the toothpaste tube was multilayers of plastic — different types of plastic — with an aluminum layer in the middle to protect the fluoride and the flavor. And, as you can imagine, that’s not recyclable, because it’s got all kinds of things mixed together.
So our own internal engineer set about to design a tube — the goal was to make a monomaterial plastic tube, one type of plastic that was already kind of readily accepted in recycling, and so he chose HDPE, which is the No. 2, or rigid plastic, that’s in milk jugs or fabric softener bottles. And he had to make it feel like a tube — that’s a very rigid plastic — and he had to protect what was inside, first and foremost, because that’s why the aluminum had been there. So it took him several years to get it right and go through all the testing. And he didn’t do that in a vacuum — we worked with the Association of Plastic Recyclers, APR, who were, at least in the US, kind of the global authorities on what is or isn’t recyclable. And even some suppliers were working on something similar at the time. Anyway, we were the first company — because we make a lot of our own tubes — the first tube to get accepted by APR as recyclable.
And since then, other suppliers have followed. It was a very important moment and step for us. And then we made the commitment to roll that out across every brand, sub-brand, that we make around the world. So that process, by the way, took five years — we got done a little early, but it was really right up until 2025 that we got them all rolled out, for the most part. And we did take the decision, to your point, very early on, that if Colgate toothpaste tubes were the only tubes that were recyclable —
now you’re getting into the infrastructure side of things — we wouldn’t be able to enjoy tubes that would be recyclable in practice and at scale, because the MRFs, Materials Recovery Facilities, would be like, “Well, I’m not going to sort this tube from that tube.”
Carol Cone:
Right. Too difficult, right, yeah.
Ann Tracy:
So we really needed all tubes to move together. So, with lots of oversight from our legal team, we like to say we inspired — or we developed — a technical deck that we could share with lots of different tube producers around the world, and encourage — we couldn’t tell people what to do, of course — but encourage others to move to an HDPE tube. Many did adopt that format and agreed that was the right thing to do.
But at least in 2025, I could say that ninety-five percent of all toothpaste tubes had moved to this new format, and 75% of all tubes, so not just toothpaste. The importance of those figures in the US is the fact that we have an interesting recycling infrastructure in the US.
Carol Cone:
So that’s a tremendous story. And the fact that, psychologically, you’d have a coalition, you’d make it open source — that’s a big statement.
Ann Tracy:
Yeah, we like to say — we shared the technology. That’s what we call it. Yeah.
Carol Cone:
So, kudos to you. I would love to ask — of other CSOs, or people wanting to be a CSO, who need to change — I was gonna say “one sentence,” but that’s really hard — maybe a bit about the communication with your CFO and/or your board. What would that be?
Ann Tracy:
whether you’re engaging with your senior team, the leaders of the company, the operational leaders, or the board, the most important thing is to articulate the long-term commercial growth opportunities, or how you’re managing risk for the company, and the long-term resilience — whatever the story may be — always start with that, because they can relate to that, they understand that language. And only then come back to: this is how it contributes to meeting our targets. Always lead with the business case. It sounds simple, but it isn’t simple. And my lifelong mission now, at least in my remaining time here, is to help my team — my young team, I have a very terrific, amazingly talented younger team — help them understand and learn that principle, and make them better business partners. That’s what I want to do, so they can do the same thing. And that’s just — you have to — that’s what win-win-win is. So you have to start with that.
Carol Cone:
That’s great. I also want to talk about a couple of characteristics that have made you successful, in your own words. And you mentioned that being empathetic is among the most important characteristics of being a CSO. Why?
Ann Tracy:
I can’t emphasize enough that empathy, to me, is one of the most critical leadership characteristics, at least to this work. And we’re having a lot of discussion right now, in this world, that you can’t do a podcast without mentioning AI at least once — so I’ll mention it. All companies are trying to understand how to adopt, learn, and leverage AI, and that requires significant change management. I think the work I do also requires some change management.
What does change management really mean? Well, at the core of it, empathy has to be one of the core values and characteristics that one brings to a change management culture, if you will, because you have to meet people where they’re at. And I think, when you’re trying to drive change, that’s fundamentally critical — not just to understand what makes them successful, but also to understand what the barriers are, and why, and then hit them head on. And you can’t do that unless you have empathy. So — why is something a challenge or a problem for someone? You have to dig into that, and to me, that’s what empathy is.
Carol Cone:
That’s great, thank you. Well, since you brought up AI — this is a whole other podcast, but I’ll just ask one question — how will AI significantly impact sustainability?
Ann Tracy:
Yeah, oh my gosh, this question comes up every day, every discussion. On the internal side, how we use AI — there are some really exciting developments we’re exploring, even outside, on accelerating material science. So what does AI do? AI is so powerful in taking reams of data and making sense of it very quickly, and helping you get to new solutions exponentially more quickly than you would with lots of trial and error and lab work. So we’re looking at that for plastic solutions, for instance. It can be very powerful.
And, of course, it can be very powerful in the wrong way, too, but the world is gonna have to work on the governance of it all. So it’s interesting times, it’s scary, but I think, if we can all build the right values-and-trust foundation to use it the proper way, I think it’s very exciting.
Carol Cone:
But we can offer our listeners that we actually wrote a guide called Purpose and AI, to really say that purpose is the real selector of everything an organization does — like your values and trust — and then AI can fill from that. We’re getting to the bottom of this conversation, but I love it, so we’ll have to have a part two. But I always love to end with a few of the fast, simple answers — the lightning round. So, what’s the one word that best describes your work?
Ann Tracy:
I thought about — I think partnership. Just, internally and externally.
Carol Cone:
Okay. What keeps you hopeful when the days — this work feels heavy, and I’m sure it does a lot?
Ann Tracy:
I think you’ve gotta keep yourself grounded — we said values and trust, but pragmatism. You have to be pragmatic. And, ironically, in a world where we seem to be swaying one way or the other, just try to stay pragmatic.
Carol Cone:
Great, that’s excellent. Okay. What’s one lesson you’ve learned from your work you couldn’t have learned anywhere else?
Ann Tracy:
Well — and that’s where I — I mean, this has always been part of my leadership style, empathy, but I think it really honed my empathy leadership skills. I think it’s just critical to drive change, and to see things from other people’s point of view.
Carol Cone:
Super. That’s really lovely. What’s one small action people can take to advance purpose or to create impact in their own communities?
Ann Tracy:
Everybody’s different — they have their own passions, spaces for passion. I think, pick one, whether it’s recycling, conserving water, turning off the lights, and build your own deep awareness around it, and then become an advocate. So I guess the one thing people can do is: if you’re passionate about something, become an advocate and educate others.
Carol Cone:
And that’s lovely that you didn’t say “brush twice a day for two minutes.”
Ann Tracy:
Oh, that’s true. Do that too.
Carol Cone:
No, I would do that. Okay. And then, if you could leave our listeners with one idea or feeling today?
Ann Tracy:
Just — win, win, win.
Carol Cone:
So that’s great. I always like to give the last word — I give the mic over to you. And I’m sure there’s lots of things you could say, but is there one additional sign-off, or a thing you want to emphasize, that I’d just like to let you share?
Ann Tracy:
Brush twice a day? No, just kidding. No, I think — I learned something about myself along the way, that I guess I’m an eternal optimist, because you can’t not be and be in this role. But I guess I think we all have to get back to the foundation of our values and trust, and always try to look for the good in others — that’s the empathy thing — and try to understand where they’re coming from. And we kind of already said it, but, in this world today, just getting back to core foundation and trying to work through these things together is absolutely fundamental.
Carol Cone:
That’s wonderful. This has been a marvelous conversation. You are so inspirational in so many areas. I would say you’re perfect for Purpose 360, because you are 360-degree — you’re an empath, you’re an engineer, you talk about values and trust and collaboration and value creation. You’re just terrific. So I know this is going to be a wonderfully shared podcast, and hopefully, in the future, we can have you back for some additional conversation.
Ann Tracy:
Yeah. It was fun. Very fun. Thank you, Carol.
Carol Cone:
This podcast was brought to you by some amazing people, and I’d love to thank them: Anne Hundertmark and Kristin Kenney at Carol Cone ON PURPOSE. Pete Wright and Andy Nelson, our crack production team at TruStory FM. And you, our listener — please rate and review us, because we really want to be as high as possible, as one of the top business podcasts available, so that we can continue exploring together the importance and the activation of authentic purpose. Thanks so much for listening.
