Most companies’ sustainability reports still fail to capture what matters to the people who actually experience the impacts. Assurance can help us put them and their wellbeing high up on the agenda – and push us to keep improving.
PART 3: Figuring out what to include in a sustainability report means accepting higher thresholds for uncertainty. That’s confusing for the user and more difficult for the auditor, writes our columnist – but there is a way to make it work.
Company directors’ reliance on international accounting standards means sustainability issues are currently reported separately, if at all. But there are steps they can take to better meet their legal responsibilities, says our columnist.
The financial accounting system we use today is hurtling towards irrelevance, undermined by the very inequality to which it has contributed. It's time to change how profit is calculated – before it's too late.
Our financial accounting systems were designed by white men, for white men – with disastrous implications for people and planet. Could a gender lens help us reshape an accounting system built on empathy and that works for the majority?
Are public sector accounts ‘materially misstated’? Our columnist gets anxious as he submerges himself in the alphabet soup of global public sector accounting standards – and proposes a simple addition to bring social value back to the surface.
Intangible assets have become a major consideration for investors, making up 90% of all enterprise value on the S&P 500. Yet our accounting system has failed to adapt, with real implications for sustainability. Our columnist suggests a simple fix.
In his latest Nicholls & Dimes column, Jeremy Nicholls applies Monty Python’s analysis of the Roman Empire to current challenges of reporting performance on ESG and corporate impact – and concludes that charities already have the answer.
