Sandy Nessing, Managing Director, Sustainability & ESH Strategy & Design; American Electric Power Co. Inc.

Sandy Nessing has responsibility for managing sustainability strategy, corporate stakeholder engagement and annual performance reporting for American Electric Power (AEP). She oversees annual production of AEP's Corporate Accountability Report, including a dedicated sustainability web site and, new in 2013, an iPad app. This is the fourth year AEP has produced an integrated report that combines financial with nonfinancial performance.

She facilitates cross-functional collaboration on sustainability issues across AEP to raise awareness of the interdependencies of functions, resources and issues while providing guidance on externalities that could affect business results. She also develops and manages advocacy opportunities that support AEP's business strategy. In a newly added role, she serves as executive culture champion and strategist in collaboration with the Chief Administrative Officer and other senior executives to advance a culture shift within AEP that aligns business strategies with employee engagement and performance management.

She currently serves as 2013 Chair of the Electric Power Research Institute's Sustainability Interest Group. Nessing also serves on the Grange Insurance Audubon Center Stewardship Board in Columbus, Ohio and was president of the board for two years. She serves on the Board of Directors and the Board of Regents for NAEM and is a member of SustainAbility's Engaging Stakeholders and the Utility Environmental Benchmarking Forum. She also led AEP's participation in the Global Reporting Initiative's (GRI) Electric Utility Sector Supplement Pilot Program, an international project to develop electric utility-specific sustainability performance indicators.