Bob Langert led McDonald’s Corporate Social Responsibility & Sustainability efforts for more than twenty-five years before retiring in 2015. Currently, he is a columnist and editor-at-large for the GreenBiz Group and Senior Sustainability Associate,
The Context Network, the premier global and agribusiness consulting firm in advancing agriculture.
His first book, The Battle To Do Good: Inside McDonald’s Sustainability Journey, was published in January 2019.
Langert has been engaged in social responsibility issues at a global level since the late 1980s, leading environmental affairs, animal welfare, and Ronald McDonald Children’s Charities’ grants. He was appointed McDonald’s
first vice president to lead sustainability in 2006 with contributions spanning sustainable fish, coffee, palm oil, beef, packaging, extensive animal welfare progress, protecting the Amazon rainforest, nutrition strategy and CSR reporting, measurement,
and accountability. Langert also led the development of McDonald’s 2020 Sustainability Vision and Framework. As part of this work, Langert has worked with numerous organizations, including Conservation International, Environmental Defense Fund,
Greenpeace, and World Wildlife Fund.
Widely known as a subject-matter expert, Langert has spoken at numerous events for various organizations, including Aspen Institute, Global Roundtable for Sustainable Beef, Lewis University, National Research Council, the State of Green Business
Forum, University of Michigan, University of Oregon, and Yale University. He has been featured in a wide variety of media, including ABC News, AdAge, Christian Science Monitor, Crain’s Chicago Business, The Guardian, The Independent, The New York
Times, and The Washington Post. He and his work also have been cited in numerous publications, including Organizational Behavior by Don Hellriegel and John W. Slocum (Cengage, 2008), The Global Corporation: Sustainable, Effective and Ethical Practices
by Laura P. Hartman and Patricia H. Werhane, Eds. (Routledge, 2009), and Beyond the Bottom Line by Joel Makower (Simon & Schuster, 1994).
Langert received his BA from Lewis University and his MBA from Northwestern University. In 2007, Langert was named as one of the 100 Most Influential in Business Ethics by Ethisphere.
