Find the best ESG Software

Today’s businesses face a wide range of environmental, social, and governmental (ESG) initiatives for which compliance is mandatory. Noncompliance can lead to fines levied by regulatory agencies and adversely affect a company’s reputation. Furthermore, with a regulatory environment that is constantly in flux, taking a proactive approach to keeping up with new ESG initiatives can be daunting without the right information.

ESG software provides businesses with the tools to monitor existing ESG initiatives, collect data regarding a company’s progress towards compliance, and proactively outline efforts towards new ESG goals.

This guide will help you understand the different factors that must be considered when choosing an ESG software solution.

Here’s what we'll cover:

• What is ESG software?
• Common features of ESG software
• What type of buyer are you?
• Benefits and potential issues
• Market trends to understand

What is ESG software?

ESG software helps companies stay up to date with environmental, social, and governance (ESG) initiatives by automating data collection of key performance indicators (KPIs) across multiple sources of information, monitoring progress or deficiencies in reaching ESG goals, and providing an automated framework to disclose the status of a company’s successful ESG initiative implementations.

Common features of ESG software

While features vary from product to product, ESG software typically offers some or all of the following functionality:

Framework management	Manage global or internal ESG standards that are designed to measure and limit the impact of business processes or procedures.
Multi-channel data collection	Collect information from multiple sources, such as internal company data, regulatory entities, and social media.
Compliance management	Identify non-adherence to policies in a service, product, process, or supplier behavior and monitor progress towards improvement.
Disclosure management	Create, manage, and publish disclosure statements or reports to the public and regulatory agencies.
Performance metrics	Track indicators that detail how well an organization, a division, or a particular project are performing within required parameters.
Reporting and analytics	Compile key data into customizable dashboards. View and track pertinent metrics.
Risk management	Identify areas of risk and implement processes to mitigate future ESG hazards.
Sustainability management	Manage the impact of a company’s processes on the environment and comply with government regulations.

What type of buyer are you?

As you research your options for ESG software, consider the type of buyer you are. This will help you better understand your company's needs and the required software features:

• Companies with strong regulatory requirements: As businesses have become increasingly interconnected in a global marketplace, the variety of environmental and governmental regulations with which an organization must comply has continued to expand. By utilizing ESG software, companies can track their progress toward ESG-related initiatives by monitoring key performance indicators. In doing so, an organization can make necessary changes to business practices to avoid unnecessary fines due to non-compliance.
• Organizations that rely on public reputation: Adherence to ESG initiatives is a primary factor in how consumers view the reputation of a company. Customers want to know the products and services they are paying for have been sustainably provided and without negative impacts to the environment or society. Additionally, as the labor market diversifies, maintaining compliance with ESG initiatives also attracts employees and talent that share the same level of global conscience.

Benefits and potential issues

By employing ESG software, companies can experience the following benefits:

• Publicize existing strengths: By providing up-to-date information on a company's progress related to ESG initiatives, ESG software allows your company to publicize its successes in bringing sustainability and moral responsibility to the market. In addition to attracting potential customers to your brand, this also provides a gauge for investors to assess investment viability.
• Limit liability: ESG software monitors where your company stands in relation to vital KPIs. In doing so, companies can proactively identify potential ESG risks and change business processes to mitigate potential financial losses or damage to public reputation.

As with any change in business workflow, be mindful of the following potential issues when considering an ESG software:

• Confidence of reported data (due to multiple sources): Even though ESG software has the ability to track data from multiple sources, such as internal company data, regulatory entities, and social media, the adage of “garbage in, garbage out” still applies. Therefore, it’s vital to make sure that the data being tracked by your ESG software is reliable and up to date.
• Provide a pathway for isolated data: In many cases, data vital to ESG research may not be easily amenable to automated collection. Much of this data may reside in spreadsheets or PDFs that are not easily collected by ESG software’s automated tracking. In order to leverage all necessary ESG data, be sure that you have provided a means to import this data from isolated sources.

Market trends to understand

When researching the ESG software market, there are some market trends that you may want to consider.

• Monitoring political action involvement: As sustainability and adherence to ESG initiatives becomes an increasingly key component in a business’s success, the impetus for a company to influence environmental policies through political action threatens the viability of ESG data. As a result, the need to track both businesses and consumers moves towards the ideal of increased transparency. An organization's contributions to political action groups will most likely become a key data point in the future for ESG software.
• Incorporation of social listening tools: One of the best ways to gauge public sentiment of a company’s adherence to ESG initiatives is by simply listening to what people are saying on social media platforms. Social listening tools will increasingly be employed to scan social media platforms for mentions of a company’s reputation which can then be factored into ESG software scoring.