Which Sustainability Metrics Should I Be Measuring? 

Like a childhood basketball team whose coaches forego scorekeeping, and whose players have no idea what the end goal is, so too are employees and businesses lost when trying to evaluate their own success without a scorecard.

How, and even more importantly, why would you want to play the game without keeping score?  Interestingly enough, some very important corporations with strong boards, large shareholders, who are recognized as titans of their brands, do the very same thing when it comes to Sustainability and even ESG. They have good intentions, but can’t back it up with actual numbers, percentages, and mathematical conclusions–not surprising since it is a relatively new field not taught in business school. Why are we not keeping score?

What Are Sustainability Data Points?

It seems the answer is that there are too many data points, not the proper oversight, multiple locations that have different reporting methods, and shockingly many are still in the manual spreadsheet mode. 

When we work with clients we look at each process, each data point, each input from: 

• waste diversion 
• air and water quality
• greenhouse gas emissions
• both upstream and downstream packaging effects
• office building energy usage 
• other environmental factors

You can immediately recognize the difficulties in gathering and analyzing this data, especially in multiple locations. It’s not easy. In fact, it takes quite a bit of expertise.

We use a specific type of software designed to report on all this in real time to all levels of an organization, from the CEO down to the janitorial staff. We recommend ECO Visor to our clients and work with them to develop processes and reporting that gives data for all the points listed above and more. 

Why do all the work if you don’t keep score? How do you know if you are winning without looking at the scoreboard? Okapi Environmental Services is helping coin the vernacular around sustainability and define the units of measurement needed to quantify success. When answering the call to substantiate your sustainability efforts, you need a partner with the knowledge and discernment to keep score and put your organization on the leaderboard. With stripes similar to the referee, we’ll be there to blow the whistles and keep you on task, but we need an invitation: or officiating begins with a conversation.

Sustainability is only sustainable if it positively affects the triple bottom line. The People, the Profits, and the Planet.