Back to basics (1): The value of transparency

Sometimes overwhelmed by so many different views, details, different priorities and cultural takes on sustainable development, I find it useful to really go back to the "heart of the matter", summarizing what we really need to achieve for a better future.

I'll start with an exercise that most of us go through at a certain moment of their career in GRI, trying to explain to others in not more than 60 seconds why GRI and sustainability reporting are so important. Here's my take on it:

"In today's globalized world transparency is absolutely fundamental to create trust, which is the basic ingredient to create partnerships (we already know that we will only be able to create sustainable change in partnerships!); only through partnerships continuous improvement will be possible, which finally is a necessary essential to create sustainable change. Accepting this logic simply means that without the right level and depth of transparency sustainable change will not be achieved.

Since we know that trust in most organizations is at an all-time low all over the world (open any newspaper on any day and just count how many articles you will find on this or somehow related topics), we need to work towards higher levels of transparency to recreate the necessary trust.

This is where using the GRI Framework can help. GRI facilitates the necessary dialog of all stakeholder groups from all over the world to define the aspects any organization should take into account while assessing how to close their own transparency gap. The problems we need to solve are global, so the format that structures the expected level of transparency to create sustainable change needs to be global as well. There is no other format than the GRI Framework that serves this purpose. So, why hesitate using it?"

We all need to decide if we can agree to this simple logic. Otherwise the other simple logic of W. Edwards Deming applies: "It is not necessary to change. Survival is not mandatory!"