Reporting Standards /
Our work /
Shift’s work on human rights reporting has shaped today’s sustainability reporting standards.
In 2012, we partnered with Mazars to develop the UN Guiding Principles Reporting Framework – for the first time providing companies with a straightforward way to identify material ‘social’ information for inclusion in their public reports. Along with Mazars, we worked with the Institute for International Auditors to develop guidance and tools for auditors and assurance providers on how to engage with human rights information.
This initiative drove catalytic changes in leading companies’ human rights reporting. It defined the process for identifying material impacts that is embedded in sustainability reporting standards today.
We have remained centrally involved with the processes and institutions that define regional and international reporting standards, including:
- through the Technical Committee that advised the Global Reporting Initiative (GRI) on the alignment of its Universal Standards with the UN Guiding Principles.
- in the current Sustainability Reporting Board of EFRAG that advises the European Commission on the European Sustainability Reporting Standards (ESRS)
- on the Steering Committee of the Taskforce on Inequality and Social-related Financial Disclosures; and
- in the Sustainability Reference Group of the International Sustainability Standards Board.
We have helped hundreds of companies to report in meaningful and practical ways on their people-related impacts and risks. We have seen in practice the power of good reporting to drive a virtuous circle that improves both human rights outcomes and business performance.
Good human rights reporting can spark meaningful conversations. Through the reporting process, businesses are prompted to discuss and challenge their own assumptions, approaches, and to identify areas for improvement. In parallel, these conversations offer stakeholders valuable insights into a company’s human rights risks, its efforts to address them and the challenges that persist.”
Caroline Rees / President and Co-Founder of Shift
Our approach /
Bringing clarity. Advising business. Equipping users of information.
Bringing clarity and workability to social standards
Our work has helped build consensus that social reporting should focus on business impacts on the human rights of workers, communities, consumers, and end-users. We connect social, climate, and nature issues with financial risk, and have demonstrated how these concepts can be translated into meaningful qualitative and quantitative disclosures
Advising business functions that are key to good reporting
We help companies ground reporting in a clear understanding of their material social impacts and meet evolving standards with practical, authentic, and decision-useful disclosures. This enables companies to communicate how they address impacts on people and planet while demonstrating how effective management of these issues supports resilience and helps manage financial risk.
The assurance of social reporting matters too. It is not a simple extension of general audit skills but requires specific approaches and knowledge. So, we build the skills of internal auditors, who play a central role in good reporting.
Equipping users of sustainability information
Featured resources /
Putting the European Sustainability Reporting Standards into practice
Practical guidance for implementing the ESRS in ways that strengthen human rights reporting, sustainability practice, and risk management.
ESRS reporting for Financial Institutions
A brief on how financial institutions can apply ESRS requirements to identify and report human rights risks in their portfolios.
UNGPs Reporting Framework
Guidance for companies to report credibly and effectively on their human rights impacts in line with the UN Guiding Principles on Business and Human Rights.
UNGPs Assurance Guidance
A practical guide and indicators for audit and assurance professionals to assess the quality, completeness, and credibility of corporate human rights reporting.
Dissecting Disclosures
This series helps investors and others identify disclosures that signal effective management of social risks and impacts. and those that don’t.
“Signals of Seriousness” for Human Rights Due Diligence
A briefing for regulators and supervisory bodies about what to look for when evaluating compliance with mandatory due diligence requirements.
Strengthening the S in ESG
Guardrails and Guidelines for designing indicators and metrics within reporting requirements in order to better capture companies’ social performance.