Redesigning Organizational Sustainability Through Integrated Reporting

This book explores the role of accounting and reporting practices, such as corporate and integrated reports, as organizations attempt to represent sustainability. By relying upon the case of a large international oil and gas company and its recent development of integrated reporting, this book argues that the ambiguity of sustainability as a concept, and the impossibility to fully capture it through accounting and reporting practices, does not mean that any attempt to represent it inevitably leads to distortion or obfuscates ‘reality’. Rather, the way in which this concept is presented through accounting and reporting practices can have a constructive effect on the organization through the aspirations that these representations entail. The book demonstrates that accounting and reporting practices, such as integrated reporting, are not expected to offer complete representations of organizations’ sustainability. Rather, these practices offer a number of representations (e.g. graphs, diagrams, tables, grid) that affect the way in which organizations understand and report on sustainability, changing its meaning over time. Finally, this study demonstrates that undefined concepts, such as ‘sustainability’, and practices, such as ‘integrated reporting’, mutually construct each other. The attempt to represent sustainability within the organization and the debates that this process generates, make accounting and reporting practices unfold themselves, and evolve. The book will be of interest to scholars in the field of accounting, management and sustainability, as well as practitioners from a wide array of additional fields, such as planning and control, organizations’ strategy, business ethics, corporate social responsibility and corporate reporting.

This book critically examines the implementation and adoption of integrated reporting (IR) in organizations and corporations. A relatively new area of policy and practice, IR has rapidly gained considerable prominence since the formation of the International Integrated Reporting Committee in 2010. The book analyzes the outcomes and benefits as well as the shortfalls of integrated reporting. It offers an introduction to the foundations of IR and a comprehensive overview of its use through a number of detailed case studies. Lastly, it discusses the outlook for further developments in sustainability accounting and reporting.

This book focuses on Integrated Reporting as a contemporary social and managerial innovation where a number of initiatives, organizations and individuals began to converge in response to the need for a consistent, collaborative and internationally accepted approach to redesign corporate reporting. Integrated Reporting is a process that results in communication of the annual “integrated report” which describes value creation over time. An integrated report is a concise communication about how an organization’s strategy, governance, performance and prospects lead to the creation of value over the short, medium and long term. This book offers a fresh perspective with expert contributions focusing on both the theoretical underpinnings and the practical challenges for the future of corporate reporting.

Business sustainability has advanced from greenwashing and branding to being a business imperative. Stakeholders, including shareholders, demand, regulators require, and companies now need to report their sustainability performance. No longer is this a choice for businesses. A decade ago, fewer than 50 companies released sustainability reports, and now more 8,000 global public companies disclose sustainability performance information on some or all five economic, governance, social, ethical, and environmental (EGSEE) dimensions of sustainability performance, and this trend is expected to continue. Indeed, more than 6,000 European public companies would be required to disclose their environmental, social, governance and diversity information for their 2017 reporting year. However, the proper determination of sustainability performance, accurate and reliable reporting and independent assurance of sustainability information remain major challenges for organizations of all types and sizes. Through reading this book, you will: Identify sustainability strategies to create innovation in new products, services, energy-efficiency, environmental facilities and green initiatives. Understand the role and responsibilities of all participants in the corporate reporting process, including directors, officers, internal auditors, external auditors, legal counsel, and investors. See ways to improve public trust, investor confidence, business reputation, employee satisfaction, corporate culture, social responsibility and environmental performance. Learn all five economic, governance, social, ethical and environmental (EGSEE) dimensions of sustainability performance separately and their integrated and interactive effects on achieving the goal of creating sustainable value for all stakeholders, including shareholders. Learn how to adopt best practices in sustainability development and performance, and deliver effective integrated sustainability reporting and assurance.

This book helps make sense of the emerging and established social innovations that have disrupted and are disrupting the world of finance. Written in an engaging style, this book offers a systematic study of social innovation in the financial services. It introduces the fundamental concepts of financial social innovations (FINSIs), places them in the context of the broader literature, and provides a new framework for understanding and organising these innovations. The book applies the framework to seven existing FINSIs to illustrate their important components and explore their benefits as well as the more negative or harmful aspects to society. These seven FINSIs are microfinance, peer-to-peer (P2P) lending, crowdfunding, mobile banking, impact investing, digital cryptocurrencies, and social impact bonds. The easy-to-follow framework will help to ground the reader’s understanding of FINSIs as the existing ones evolve and new ones are developed. This book is ideal for courses on social innovation, social entrepreneurship, and financial innovation in departments of business, economics, social sciences, and political science.

Sustainability Accounting and Integrated Reporting deals with organizations’ assessment, articulation and disclosure of their social and environmental impact on various groups in society. There is increasingly an understanding that financial information does not sufficiently discharge organizational accountability to members of society who are demanding an account of the social and environmental impacts of companies’ and other organizations’ activities. As a result, organizations report ever more social and environmental information, and there are simultaneous movements towards providing the information in an integrated fashion, showing how social and environmental activities influence each other, members of society and the financial aims of the organization. The book Sustainability Accounting and Integrated Reporting provides a broad and comprehensive review of the field, focusing on the interconnection between different elements of these topics, often dealt with in isolation. The book examines the accounting involved in the collection and analysis of data, control processes over the data, how information is reported to external parties, and the assurance of the information being reported. The book thereby provides an overview useful to practitioners (including sustainability managers, consultants, members of the accounting profession, and other assurance providers), academics, and students.

An in-depth, enlightening look at the integrated reporting movement The Integrated Reporting Movement explores the meaning of the concept, explains the forces that provide momentum to the associated movement, and examines the motives of the actors involved. The book posits integrated reporting as a key mechanism by which companies can ensure their own long-term sustainability by contributing to a sustainable society. Although integrated reporting has seen substantial development due to the support of companies, investors, and the initiatives of a number of NGOs, widespread regulatory intervention has yet to materialize. Outside of South Africa, adoption remains voluntary, accomplished via social movement abetted, to varying degrees, by market forces. In considering integrated reporting’s current state of play, the authors provide guidance to ensure wider adoption of the practice and success of the movement, starting with how companies can improve their own reporting processes. But the support of investors, regulators, and NGOs is also important. All will benefit, as will society as a whole. Readers will learn how integrated reporting has evolved over the years, where frameworks and standards are today, and the practices that help ensure effective implementation—including, but not limited to an extensive discussion of information technology’s role in reporting and the importance of corporate reporting websites. The authors introduce the concepts of an annual board of directors’ “Statement of Significant Audiences and Materiality” and a “Sustainable Value Matrix” tool that translates the statement into management decisions. The book argues that the appropriate combination of market and regulatory forces to speed adoption will vary by country, concluding with four specific recommendations about what must be done to accelerate high quality adoption of integrated reporting around the world.

Winner of the 2010 PROSE Award for Best Business, Finance, & Management Book! "One Report" refers to an emerging trend in business taking place throughout the world where companies are going beyond separate reports for financial and nonfinancial (e.g., corporate social responsibility or sustainability) results and integrating both into a single integrated report. At the same time, they are also leveraging the Internet to provide more detailed results to all of their stakeholders and for improving their level of dialogue and engagement with them. Providing best practice examples from companies around the world, One Report shows how integrated reporting adds tremendous value to the company and all of its stakeholders, including shareholders, and also ultimately contributes to a sustainable society. Focuses on the emerging trend of integrated reporting as a top priority for companies, investors, regulators, auditors and civil society Provides compelling case studies from some of the world's leading companies doing integrated reporting Addresses how companies can move toward One Report and how it can become a keystone of a sustainable strategy for both the company and society Explains what others-such as analysts, shareholders, other stakeholders, auditors, regulators, legislators, and civil society-need to do to enable the rapid and broad adoption of One Report Filled with case studies and the most current trends on integrated reporting, this book is an invaluable guidebook on the future of reporting and how this future can lead to a sustainable society.