Connecting the dots

This is the intersection of impacts and strategy, where we transform sustainability from a compliance (reporting) requirement into a strategic advantage. Our unique methodology combines the results of the Impacts assessments with the strategy assessments to provide a comprehensive view of your organization’s or your asset’s sustainability landscape. This dual approach ensures that

> as an Organization: you not only understand your current and forecasted impacts, related risks, and opportunities but can also choose a strategic ambition that fits your risk/opportunity profile. This becomes the prerequisite to ensure that your strategy, governance, and management approach is consistent and coherent, leading to improved resilience and competitive advantage.

> as an Investor: you not only understand your or your assets’ current and forecasted impacts, related risks, and opportunities, but you can also validate if the strategic ambitions of your assets fit their risk/opportunity profiles. This becomes the prerequisite to ensure that their strategies, governance, and management approaches are consistent and coherent, leading to improved resilience and competitive advantage of your assets.

The combined assessment of current/forecasted Impacts and Strategy is done in the Strategy Stress Test. It offers a robust evaluation utilizing the combined intelligence of our Impacts and Strategy Frameworks by using our extensive research on their inter-linkages. This assessment forms the foundation for identifying potential ambitions and understanding the scope of what it takes to achieve them—akin to preparing for a potentially challenging yet rewarding ‘hiking trip.’ To further support this journey, our guides and consulting arm help to facilitate management buy-in, define feasible ambitions, and determine the scope of sustainability efforts to ensure overall alignment with set goals.

Strategy Stress Test

Aligning Impacts and Strategic Ambitions

Our Strategy Stress Test is a powerful tool that bridges the gap between your organization’s sustainability impacts and strategic ambitions. We comprehensively view sustainability journeys by combining insights from our Impacts-Level Assessments, Impacts Forecasts, and Strategy Assessments.

How It Works:

  1. Impacts-Level Assessment: We measure your or your asset’s current sustainability impacts across various dimensions
  2. Impacts Level Forecast Assessment: We forecast your or your asset’s impacts until 2050, considering various scenarios and trends
  3. Strategy Assessment: We evaluate your or your asset’s top management practices and overall sustainability approach and help to understand the sustainability strategy your or your assets currently pursue
  4. Alignment Analysis: We compare your forecasted Impacts with the strategic ambition levels to identify any misalignment and opportunities

Outcomes and Benefits

Our Strategy Stress Test offers valuable insights and opportunities:

> Ambition Calibration: Leverage our Financial Effects Database to align strategic ambitions with your risk/opportunity profile derived from current and forecasted Impacts.

> Reality Check: Evaluate the consistency of your current strategy, governance, and management approach with plausible Strategic Ambitions. Identify both gaps and potential overshoots that may represent risks or unnecessary costs.

> Strategic Roadmap: Gain actionable insights to align effectively desired Impacts-Levels with your strategy.

> Risk Mitigation: Proactively identify misalignment to avoid potential reputational risks and capitalize on opportunities.

> Opportunity Identification: Discover areas of potential strategic advantage, opening new avenues for sustainability leadership and innovation.

Optional Next Steps

The Strategy Stress Test forms the basis for a fact-based scoping exercise of your sustainability journey. It paves the way for our consulting support, where we:

> Facilitate management buy-in and strategy alignment

> Define the highest feasible ambition for your organization to be assessed further

> Determine the scope of a more thorough assessment phase, including portfolio segmentation and value chain considerations

These additional services can help you dive deeper into your sustainability journey, but the choice is yours. Our Strategy Stress Test provides standalone value, and our team is ready to offer further support when and if you need it.

Packages

Common for all product scopes below

Own organization

* We use this information as a basis for the assessment. However, assessments can also be conducted on a plan, e.g., if you plan significant changes to your strategy, governance and management approach.

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Assessing other Organization’s Strategies:

Example use cases:

> Suppliers: Obtain a complete understanding of the supplier risks by identifying poor sustainability management practices considering their forecasted impacts and which ESG KPIs are material for the target setting you expect

> Peers: Obtain a deeper understanding of the resilience of their strategy, considering their forecasted impacts

> Clients: Obtain a deeper understanding of the resilience of their sustainability strategy, considering future challenges that they may not be aware of to understand where your products/services can help them to achieve their strategic goals and if your sales are at risk

> Assets or M&A targets: Use a complete understanding of your assets’ or M&A targets’ sustainability management practices, forecasted Impacts, risks, and opportunities to complement your fiduciary duty/Due Diligence

* We use this information as a basis for the assessment. However, assessments can also be conducted on a plan, e.g., if you plan significant changes to the strategy, governance and management approach of a target.

let’s talk

Guides

How to gain a strategic advantage out of the CSRD and avoid risks:

Obtain a list of typical steps that ensure CSRD compliance while ensuring that your money spent turns from compliance costs into an investment to boost your resilience and obtain a competitive advantage.

PI’s Overall Strategy Integration Approach: Guide & coaching

We guide organizations through the CSRD compliance journey, transforming what could be considered a regulatory burden into a strategic advantage. Our approach ensures that your investment in compliance becomes a catalyst for boosting resilience and gaining a competitive edge. The order of the steps can be aligned to your needs:

  1. Status quo assessment of available & missing data and information (both on Impacts & Strategy)
  2. Optional: Benchmarking
  3. Preliminary Ambition Level workshop
  4. Optional: Deep-dive Impacts-Level Assessment & Impacts-Level Forecast
  5. Optional: Deep-dive ESGF Risk & Opportunity Assessment (short-, mid-, and long-term)
  6. Double materiality assessment, utilizing PI’s Topic Taxonomy, Impacts-Level Framework, incl. science-based (impact materiality) and fact-based (financial materiality) thresholds and PI’s Financial Effect Database
  7. CSRD/ISSB/GRI* Gap Assessment
  8. Identification & Valuation of actions (quantifying contributions to impacts, financials, and risk along with financing needs)
  9. Strategy workshop: Informed decision on final Strategic Ambition & target setting, incl. potential changes in Governance, Processes
  10. Implementation support (Policies, Governance, Processes, Monitoring, Financing)
  11. Reporting

 

PI’s Topic Taxonomy Database

Benefit from PI’s research on over 800 “unique” sustainability topics, sub-topics, and sub-sub-topics as well as management disclosures (i.e., non-topics). We aligned them with the AR 16 of the CSRD to distill them to about 200 unique topics, sub-topics, and sub-sub-topics, their classification and categorization, and descriptions to be used for your double materiality assessments, risk, and opportunity evaluations.

PI’s Overall Strategy Integration Approach: consulting services

Our Strategy Integration Approach leverages decades of experience and PI’s extensive research to seamlessly incorporate sustainability into your business strategy. We work hands-on with organizations to implement key findings from Impacts and Strategy assessments, ensuring that sustainability drives value creation. Our expert team guides you in setting up a tailored sustainability management system that aligns with your unique business goals. We partner with you to achieve your desired results, offering practical support at every step. This collaborative approach ensures that sustainability initiatives are integral to your operations, unlocking new opportunities for innovation, efficiency, and long-term success.