Global consultancy GlobeScan has released a report on sustainable value creation, exploring the gap existing between companies’ stated commitments and operational realities. The report was authored by Robert Eccles, Professor of Management Practice at University of Oxford’s Saïd Business School, and Alison Taylor, Clinical Associate Professor at NYU Stern School of Business. The pair had released a research paper last year, in which they highlighted that companies leading the charge on sustainability had a more commercial and integrated approach throughout their business, factoring it into their overarching strategy. The new report considered the full spectrum of practices in corporations, revealing a large gap between a limited number of leaders and the laggards that make up the majority of the market, according to Taylor and Eccles. “We see a world where companies say they focus on sustainability as a tool for value creation, but lack the capital allocation and operational focus to back this up,” the report read. “Many reasons are given for what gets in the way, but there is limited commitment to tackling them.” The report identified four common shortcomings, starting with a capital gap, with only half of firms claiming to be highly focused on sustainability securing the capital needed to address opportunities, risks and impacts. Another gap was implementation, whereby sustainability was widely seen as creating value through reputation, as opposed to operations. Only 37% of respondents said they believed sustainability was “very integrated” into the core of their business, thus revealing an integration gap. Finally, poor data quality on sustainability performance has been hindering value creation – evidencing a data gap.
