Chief financial officers are indicating a substantial increase in focus on ESG programs, according to an annual survey by global business consulting firm Protiviti.
The Global Finance Trends Survey reveals that the pressure to implement and report on organisation-wide ESG programs has intensified for finance leaders, as 60% said they are ranking ESG metrics as one of their top priorities.
The survey found that 57% of publicly held and 40% of privately held companies report that measuring and reporting ESG risks and issues has become part of their finance team's role in the last year.
CFOs are currently gearing up for a global wave of ESG-related regulatory requirements, including the already-enacted Corporate Sustainability Reporting Directive (CSRD) in the European Union (EU) and expected climate impact reporting requirements for US public reporting companies from the US Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC).
As these new requirements come to be, finance departments continue to prepare, with 52% of privately held organisations and 62% of publicly held companies consider themselves ready for new required ESG disclosures.
