‘Compliance is no longer the standard. Companies want to do business with other companies whose values align with theirs.’ This is one of the main talking points in this week’s episode of The ESG Report, where Jagmeet ‘Jag’ Lamba and Daniel Perry join Tom Fox for a conversation about third-party risk management.
The Importance of Third-Party Automation
“Companies are not islands,” says Jag, “they exist mainly with the help of partners.” As the companies grow and expand, the third-party network does too. With the compliance burden, data security/privacy burden, and now, the ESG burden that accompany all of these third parties, it’s impossible to manage without automation.
Reputational Damage
Tom mentions the risk of reputational damage to one’s brand through their third parties. In Jag’s company, Certa, reputation plays a role in all of the contracts they make with their key stakeholders, therefore, any reputational issue is a breach of that contract. He advises holding your third parties to that same standard. It is no longer sufficient to be compliant, as today, employees and other companies want to do business with those whose values align with theirs. “Compliance is no longer the standard,” Jag tells listeners.
The Work of EcoVadis: Improving Sustainability
ESG stands for environmental, social, and governance. The ‘S’ can also stand for sustainability, but, “Sustainability actually covers all of the pillars of ESG,” Daniel claims.
In a company, experts are generally required to aid in making procurement decisions, but they are probably not also experts on sustainability and ESG. His company, EcoVadis, provides a simple scorecard that tells how well, or how poorly a company is doing on key areas of sustainability, such as environment, labor and human rights, ethics, and supply chain. With these scorecards, you can start making broad, tactical decisions. By having one way of understanding the ESG of all suppliers, companies are able to implement necessary changes.
The Partnership between Certa and EcoVadis
Both Daniel and Jag detail their goals for both their clients, as well as the world of ESG, from their respective company perspectives. “The only way to have a strong ESG profile is if you also measure the ESG profile of your third parties,” is a quote from Jag that sums up this partnership quite well.
RESOURCES
Tom Fox’s email
Jagmeet Lamba | LinkedIn | Twitter | Certa
Daniel Perry | LinkedIn | Twitter | EcoVadis
