Measuring Good Business

This is a book about what a good company means. It sketches some of the challenges faced by companies and investors in assigning numbers to environmental, social and governance (ESG) issues.

It suggests that many of the ratings and rankings, scores and labels, lack accuracy, meaning and legitimacy. This is because the framework that successfully captures environmental physics (like greenhouse gas emissions) is ill-suited to the complex, contextual and dynamic world of sustainable business.

Topics like diversity, inclusion, biodiversity and human rights are complex phenomena. They require different methods to fully capture their essence. A better way of knowing is based on humility about what we don’t know as well as more inclusive, bottom-up data.

Involving people in the numbers is vital to better reflect a reality that is subjective, dispersed, often ambiguous and sometimes contradictory. Whether seeking to profit from sustainable investments or better understand companies as employees, consumers and citizens, good measurement is the cornerstone of good business.