As a child, Lennart Stackebrandt learned how to grow bacteria in a petri dish – today, as Head of Sustainability at DZ Bank, he is designing strategies to make the institution climate resilient. Since December 2024, 35 year old Stackebrandt has been the bank’s Head of Sustainability, serving as the central point of contact for a strategic issue that is shaping the bank’s future. The position had been vacant for some time.

„The relevance of sustainability is obvious," he says. „We see the impact worldwide – whether floods in Southeast Asia or droughts in Africa. Such events often trigger large domino effects – from harvest failures to migration flows.“

Stackebrandt brings a decade of consulting experience to the role. From 2014 to 2024, he worked at McKinsey, initially advising on classic banking topics before later helping companies build ESG strategies and sustainable business models – among them DZ Bank itself. His first major encounter with sustainability came in 2021, when he helped set up the group’s overarching sustainability program. Now, he is responsible for further developing and implementing the bank’s sustainability strategy from the inside.

Born in Braunschweig, Stackebrandt studied economics at the University of Mannheim. His connection to nature and the environment runs deep – not least through his parents, both biologists. „As an eleven-year-old, I was already tasked with filling a petri dish with bacteria“, he recalls. Nature and exercise still play an important role in his life today – in his free time he enjoys road cycling.

As Head of Sustainability, he is active not only within the bank but also externally. Stackebrandt is a member of the Association of Public Banks’ (VÖB) sustainable finance commission, where he exchanges views with industry peers on regulatory developments and market trends. One crucial policy instrument, he argues, is a rising price for CO₂. „Only when the costs of emissions are internalised can an effective market and steering mechanism emerge", he says.

DZ Bank itself has firmly embedded ESG and sustainability in its governance. CEO Cornelius Riese is directly responsible for the issue, which is coordinated group-wide via the Group Sustainability Committee as well as an operational sustainability roundtable. In its 2024 sustainability report, the bank reports for the first time under the European Sustainability Reporting Standards (ESRS) as part of its group management report. Topics such as materiality analysis, physical and transition risks, and the integration of sustainability risks into existing risk categories, form an integral part.

Stackebrandt appreciates the thematic breadth of his new role at the cooperative central institution: „Hardly any other issue touches as many areas of a bank – including strategy, business divisions, risk management, compliance, and communications", he notes. At the same time, the ESG expert warns against shifting too much responsibility for sustainability onto financial institutions: „Banks have an important role to play, but too much of the burden is being placed on them. Much of it is, in fact, the responsibility of policymakers," he says.