It’s already become a cliché to comment on how 2020 has brought unexpected change, shifting expectations and a general sense of disorientation. COVID-19—the unprecedented crisis, our new normal—has overtaken almost all other business initiatives. For almost a year now, companies have been working to recalibrate their sustainability strategies and seek to understand how to communicate their responses to COVID-19 alongside other sustainability goals and targets.
We believe that 2020 is actually the beginning for companies to start doing a lot of things differently, and that includes sustainability reporting. The past year has laid bare the economic inequality that is the very foundation of many societies around the world, but especially in the U.S. Companies cannot avoid this knowledge or shirk their roles in addressing it, especially in light of uncertain leadership from national governments.
Here’s how our Purpose team is thinking about reporting through the lens of 2020 and the year ahead—and setting up for a rapidly changing “new normal.”
