Sympatex CEO award
The Club of Budapest’s “Planetary Consciousness Prize 2020” has been awarded to Rüdiger Fox for his “exemplary implementation of planetary consciousness”.
Mr Fox is the founder of the GCH Institute and managing director of Sympatex Technologies. The Club of Budapest said he is an “excellent turn-around manager that has led a series of large and medium sized companies to success through his employee- and sustainability-centred leadership”. His research in the field of employee motivation and corporate happiness is described in his book, The Business Case of Corporate Happiness.
The Planetary Consciousness Prize 2020 award recognises the “urgent necessity to evolve the consciousness of a critical mass of people in today’s societies in order to tackle the global challenges that the world faces today” and honours individuals who exemplify and act upon this urgency in a personal and professional capacity. Previous recipients have included Mikhail Gorbachev, Muhammad Yunus, Desmond Tutu, Kofi Annan and Nelson Mandela.
Mr Fox was praised for making Sympatex one of the first textile companies to join the circular economy, and for repeatedly and visibly challenging the industry’s status quo.
"There has hardly been a year in the still young history of globalization in which we have been made so clearly aware that we as human beings are part of one single social and ecological fabric that needs to be respected and preserved," said Mr Fox (pictured) during the award ceremony. "Artificial borders, whether in our minds or on the outside, do not protect us from the consequences that come with our global challenges.
“However, we can currently observe that we are capable of global action through collective insight, and that makes me very optimistic. It is a great honor for me to receive this award for my efforts to contribute to the expansion of planetary awareness worldwide, and I would like to dedicate it to all those who, like me, strive in their daily activities to promote dialogue on these essential issues.”
