How can you use third-party assurance providers to improve your sustainability report?

From my perspective in working in the investor relations field, third-party assurance offers stakeholders, including investors, consumers, employees, and communities, confidence in the accuracy and completeness of sustainability information provided by organisations. By subjecting their sustainability reports to external scrutiny, companies demonstrate their commitment to transparency and accountability, fostering trust and credibility in their sustainability efforts.

In my experience : Third-party assurance adds credibility to your sustainability report. External assurance providers bring independence and objectivity to the evaluation process, validating the accuracy and reliability of the reported information. Stakeholders, including investors, customers, and regulatory bodies, are more likely to trust a report that has undergone independent verification.

Trust is hard to find but easy to lose. You may be acting responsibly but without 3rd party verification, many stakeholders will not see it or believe it. Seek out the gold standard, high bar, accreditations (like Fair Tax Mark, in the realm of tax/finance and sustainability). They're the safest bet in the long run for building trust, because they'll only ever place you in good company among other exemplars of excellent responsible practice. They'll likely also bring a healthy challenge and help you to meaningfully improve your strategies and performance.

It's essential to understand what decisions your report readers need to take on the basis of your reported information. If users need to make decisions based on the factual accuracy of reported data, for example - commonly thought true of financial reporting - then assurance is needed to confirm the specific reliability of that data and the systems that generated it. In sustainability reporting, these decisions may be more nuanced. Is the company asking the right questions of its sustainability strategy or performance? How well or poorly has the company done in relation to its environmental and social risks and impacts? Can they be trusted to do the right thing for people and planet? These questions require a much different approach.

Remember that credentials alone won't guarantee a good assurance engagement. An assurance provider should be able to maintain their focus on the ESG outcomes to which their services contributes, and should be willing to challenge the client beyond box-ticking.

Depending on the methodology, standards and levels of assurance being sought, the evidence required to support the assertions in a sustainability report could be very demanding. Be prepared to be challenged, and engage in the give-and-take that is fundamental to the assurance process. Moreover, make sure you understand intimately the reporting standards, measurement protocols and sustainability frameworks you rely on for your report - not only for the sake of the assurance process, but to deliver authentic, transparent and professional reporting that supports accountability.