Corporate Sustainability: Integrating Performance and Reporting

Chapter 3

Business Sustainability and Accountability Initiatives, Reporting, and Assurance

ExecutiveSummary

Business sustainability addresses five dimensions of corporate performance reporting, as discussed in the previous chapters. These dimensions are economic, governance, social, ethical, and environmental (EGSEE). Conventional financial statements provide historical information on economic performance, reflecting an entity's financial condition and results of operations in assessing future business performance. Nonetheless, investors and other corporate stakeholders demand forward-looking financial and nonfinancial information on key performance indicators (KPIs) concerning the entity's governance, economic, ethical, social, and environmental activities. This chapter presents emerging initiatives and best practices of sustainability reporting in all five EGSEE sustainability performance categories and also offers suggestions relevant to providing assurance reports on all five EGSEE dimensions of sustainability performance.

Multiple Bottom-Line Dimensions of Business Sustainability

Chapter 1 introduced a framework for business sustainability performance and accountability and a reporting model with a multiple bottom-line (MBL) focus. Although the primary focus of corporate reporting continues to be financial, the inclusion of social, ethical, and environmental performance is gaining momentum. In fact, there is a growing understanding that sustainable efforts positively ...