Why ESG Isn't Just Going To Go Away
- Media Manager
- Jul 28, 2023
- 1 min read
Forbes
Written By: Robert Sheen - Forbes Councils Member
Published: July 28th, 2023
The debate over ESG (environmental, social and governance issues) has simmered for years due to the growing pressure on business leaders and the investment community to address it in meaningful ways.
This pressure is being applied not just by regulators but by stakeholders of virtually every type—investors, customers, business partners, employees and job seekers. All of them want greater transparency into the operations and business practices of the companies they invest in, buy from, partner with and work for. A 2022 KPMG survey of more than 1,300 global CEOs, for example, found that 69% now face higher levels of stakeholder pressure to improve their companies’ ESG reporting transparency.
ESG Is Here, And It’s Here To Stay
There’s plenty of healthy debate still to take place. We need to come to an agreement on many things—which types of ESG initiatives are financially material; which data should we be disclosing and to whom; which metrics should be utilized in lawmaking, rating and reporting efforts; and so much more. But we can’t do any of this if we can’t depoliticize ESG and accept the fact that we must responsibly manage the ways we impact society and our planet.
These are big concepts and big challenges. To make progress on them, we need to take small, focused steps on specific ESG issues that are strongly tied to our organization’s purpose, mission and culture. This means each organization’s ESG choices will be unique, with a few notable exceptions.
