{"id":818,"date":"2008-10-28T01:00:07","date_gmt":"2008-10-28T06:00:07","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/ietransfer.wpengine.com\/?p=818"},"modified":"2019-04-26T07:56:49","modified_gmt":"2019-04-26T14:56:49","slug":"sustainability-reports-who-reads-them-and-why","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/inspiredeconomist.com\/articles\/sustainability-reports-who-reads-them-and-why\/","title":{"rendered":"Sustainability Reports: Who Reads them, and Why?"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><a href=\"http:\/\/inspiredeconom.wpengine.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2008\/10\/1748342315_6a6b5fa102.jpg\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignleft size-medium wp-image-819\" src=\"http:\/\/inspiredeconomist.com\/files\/2008\/10\/1748342315_6a6b5fa102-300x237.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"300\" height=\"237\" srcset=\"https:\/\/inspiredeconomist.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2008\/10\/1748342315_6a6b5fa102-300x237.jpg 300w, https:\/\/inspiredeconomist.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2008\/10\/1748342315_6a6b5fa102.jpg 500w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 300px) 100vw, 300px\" \/><\/a>An open question to our readers: do you read annual sustainability reports?<\/p>\n<p>Well, it turns out that the Global Reporting Initiative (<a title=\"GRI\" href=\"http:\/\/www.globalreporting.org\/Home\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">GRI<\/a>)\u00a0were curious as well. So, they went ahead and hired a few consulting companies (<a title=\"consulting\" href=\"http:\/\/www.sustainability.com\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">SustainAbility<\/a> and <a href=\"http:\/\/www.kpmg.com\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">KPMG<\/a>) to go ahead and <a title=\"GRI survey\" href=\"http:\/\/www.globalreporting.org\/survey\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">survey<\/a> sustainability report readers.<\/p>\n<p>While some of the responses were not all that surprising, the survey\u2019s results did speak to the trends within the reporting industry.<\/p>\n<p>SustainAbility Chairperson Sophia Tickell <a title=\"QUote\" href=\"http:\/\/www.sustainability.com\/researchandadvocacy\/reports_article.asp?id=1489\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">discussed<\/a> the strategic use of sustainability reports.<\/p>\n<blockquote><p>Reporting was once a way to get sustainability issues onto the corporate agenda. Today the situation is reversing as a growing number of companies make ambitious commitments to sustainability. There is much business as usual but these targets matter because what gets measured gets done and &#8212; hopefully &#8212; reported against. This shift in where the agenda is set holds real potential to influence products and services &#8212; and eventually to shape business models of the future.<\/p>\n<p>Reporting will be important but will need, explicitly, to make clearer links between sustainability issues and core business strategy &#8212; something that all stakeholders (including the mainstream investment community) seem to agree upon.<!--more--><\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p>So who are the readers of these reports?<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>About 60% of readers are in business, and the rest are mainly consultants and government employees;<\/li>\n<li>Prospective customers or suppliers were more than one-quarter of respondents; and<\/li>\n<li>60% of readers used sustainability reports to help themselves benchmark the reporter\u2019s overall performance.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>And what do they think about these reports?<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>Survey results tended to support the viewpoint that sustainability reports are good for developing new business;<\/li>\n<li>Having reports tends to project a good image to both potential and current investors;<\/li>\n<li>Companies need to\u00a0demonstrate a willingness to talk about the bad news, as well as trumpeting the good news in order to promote confidence in the reports.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>Finally, according to the survey, readers would like to see reports:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>Provide stronger connections between a company\u2019s overall business strategy, and their sustainability strategy;<\/li>\n<li>Some sort of measure as to the impact that sustainability initiatives have had on the company;<\/li>\n<li>A demonstration of whether and how companies use risk management as part of their sustainability strategy; and<\/li>\n<li>A more formalized manner of incorporating stakeholder feedback, since that tends to demonstrate a commitment to sustainability.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>Image Credit: A Pile of Annual Reports by <a title=\"Photographer\" href=\"http:\/\/www.flickr.com\/photos\/hourann\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">azza-bazoo<\/a> via Flickr&#8217;s Creative Commons<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>An open question to our readers: do you read annual sustainability reports? Well, it turns out that the Global Reporting Initiative (GRI)\u00a0were curious as well. So, they went ahead and hired a few consulting companies (SustainAbility and KPMG) to go ahead and survey sustainability report readers. While some of the responses were not all that [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":819,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_uag_custom_page_level_css":"","site-sidebar-layout":"default","site-content-layout":"","ast-site-content-layout":"","site-content-style":"default","site-sidebar-style":"default","ast-global-header-display":"","ast-banner-title-visibility":"","ast-main-header-display":"","ast-hfb-above-header-display":"","ast-hfb-below-header-display":"","ast-hfb-mobile-header-display":"","site-post-title":"","ast-breadcrumbs-content":"","ast-featured-img":"","footer-sml-layout":"","theme-transparent-header-meta":"","adv-header-id-meta":"","stick-header-meta":"","header-above-stick-meta":"","header-main-stick-meta":"","header-below-stick-meta":"","astra-migrate-meta-layouts":"default","ast-page-background-enabled":"default","ast-page-background-meta":{"desktop":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-4)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center 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!important}}\n\";s:2:\"js\";s:0:\"\";s:18:\"current_block_list\";a:2:{i:0;s:14:\"core\/paragraph\";i:1;s:10:\"core\/image\";}s:8:\"uag_flag\";b:0;s:11:\"uag_version\";s:10:\"1713657651\";s:6:\"gfonts\";a:0:{}s:10:\"gfonts_url\";s:0:\"\";s:12:\"gfonts_files\";a:0:{}s:14:\"uag_faq_layout\";b:0;}"],"rank_math_news_sitemap_robots":["index"],"rank_math_robots":["a:1:{i:0;s:5:\"index\";}"],"_uag_css_file_name":["uag-css-818.css"]},"uagb_featured_image_src":{"full":["https:\/\/inspiredeconomist.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2008\/10\/1748342315_6a6b5fa102.jpg",500,396,false],"thumbnail":["https:\/\/inspiredeconomist.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2008\/10\/1748342315_6a6b5fa102-150x150.jpg",150,150,true],"medium":["https:\/\/inspiredeconomist.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2008\/10\/1748342315_6a6b5fa102-300x237.jpg",300,237,true],"medium_large":["https:\/\/inspiredeconomist.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2008\/10\/1748342315_6a6b5fa102.jpg",500,396,false],"large":["https:\/\/inspiredeconomist.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2008\/10\/1748342315_6a6b5fa102.jpg",500,396,false],"1536x1536":["https:\/\/inspiredeconomist.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2008\/10\/1748342315_6a6b5fa102.jpg",500,396,false],"2048x2048":["https:\/\/inspiredeconomist.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2008\/10\/1748342315_6a6b5fa102.jpg",500,396,false],"adace-sponsor":["https:\/\/inspiredeconomist.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2008\/10\/1748342315_6a6b5fa102.jpg",61,48,false],"adace-sponsor-2x":["https:\/\/inspiredeconomist.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2008\/10\/1748342315_6a6b5fa102.jpg",121,96,false]},"uagb_author_info":{"display_name":"Amiel Blajchman","author_link":"https:\/\/inspiredeconomist.com\/author\/amielb\/"},"uagb_comment_info":2,"uagb_excerpt":"An open question to our readers: do you read annual sustainability reports? Well, it turns out that the Global Reporting Initiative (GRI)\u00a0were curious as well. So, they went ahead and hired a few consulting companies (SustainAbility and KPMG) to go ahead and survey sustainability report readers. While some of the responses were not all that&hellip;","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/inspiredeconomist.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/818"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/inspiredeconomist.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/inspiredeconomist.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/inspiredeconomist.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/inspiredeconomist.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=818"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/inspiredeconomist.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/818\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/inspiredeconomist.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/819"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/inspiredeconomist.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=818"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/inspiredeconomist.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=818"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/inspiredeconomist.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=818"},{"taxonomy":"adace-sponsor","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/inspiredeconomist.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/adace-sponsor?post=818"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}