Pia Heidenmark Cook (Mrs)

Pia was named top 10 female leaders in sustainability by WBCSD in 2018, and top 5 influencers on climate change agenda by the Climate Group, as well as top 100 climate influencers on twitter in 2020.

Pia Heidenmark Cook is a senior advisor to Ingka Group/IKEA, where she held the position as Chief Sustainability Officer (CSO) between 2017-2021. She is also a non-executive director in several boards across non-profit and for-profit organizations across several business sectors (e.g., materials innovation, restaurants, hospitality). She is also a frequent keynote speaker on  sustainability and business transformation and lecturer at e.g., Cambridge.

IKEA is the world’s leading home furnishing retailer aiming to become a people and planet positive business. In 2019 (for  second consecutive year), IKEA’s business grew its business (by 6.5%), while reducing its absolute value-chain carbon footprint (by 4.3%). Pia joined IKEA in 2008 and held several senior sustainability positions at the company, and for the last 8 years she was member of the executive retail management team, the largest business division in Ingka Group. During her time as CSO, Pia led a team of sustainability professionals in the global Ingka Group office, as well as sustainability experts integrated  across the retail, shopping Centre and customer fulfilment business across over 30 markets in Europe, Asia Pacific and North
America.

She was for several years (ended in 2017) co-chair of REAP, Retailers Environmental Action Programme, together with the EU  Commission. Prior to IKEA, Pia worked as Vice President Corporate Social Responsibility at the Rezidor Hotel Group, operator of hotel brands Radisson Blu and Park Inn (300+ hotels in 50+ countries). During this period, Pia chaired the tourism branch of Prince of Wales Business Leader's Forum, a membership organization for all major international hotel brands.

Pia holds both a Technical Licentiate degree and a M.Sc. in Environmental Management, from the University of Lund, Sweden, and a M.Sc. in International Business Administration and Economics from Uppsala University, Sweden. She has lived in France and Belgium, but today lives in southern Sweden, with Canadian husband and two daughters.

Pia has worked with, lectured and studied CSR/sustainability related topics since 1996, across academia, consultancy and business, mainly across tourism and retail sectors.