I get some version of this call every few months. The sustainability lead who was running point on ASRS has left. Or the advisor who was engaged a year ago is still billing hours, but nobody internally could explain the reporting approach if you asked them tomorrow. Either way, the person on the phone is a CFO or a company secretary who’s realised they’re exposed and isn’t sure how exposed.
Both situations feel the same from the inside. You’re behind, you don’t fully trust what’s been done so far, and the deadline hasn’t moved. But they’re not the same problem and treating them the same way wastes money.
Two Different Problems
The first is a resourcing problem. You had someone capable, they built real progress, and then they left. The data collection, the scenario work, the governance documentation, some or all of it exists. What’s missing is a person to keep driving it. This is fixable fast, because you’re not starting from zero. You need someone who can pick up an existing body of work and keep it moving without re-litigating decisions that were already made properly.
The second is a fit problem. The advisor has been engaged for a year, the invoices are being paid, and the deliverables look fine on the surface. But ask a simple question: could someone on your team explain the methodology behind your Scope 1 and 2 numbers without calling the advisor first? Probably not.
Most businesses I talk to are living in some mix of both. The trick is figuring out which one is doing more damage before you sign anything else.
Two Questions Before Taking Action
Whether it’s a new advisor or the same one, don’t renew or re-engage until you’ve got honest answers to these:
- Has capability actually transferred in-house? Not “have we received reports,” but could your team run next year’s data collection process using what’s been documented this year? If the answer depends on the advisor still being in the room, nothing has transferred. You’ve just paid for access.
- Is there an executable plan? A plan tells you who owns each piece, what data feeds it, and what happens when that person is on leave or leaves entirely. If your ASRS process only works because one person holds it all in their head, you don’t have a plan. You have a single point of failure with a nice cover page.
If either answer is no, it tells you exactly where the gap is, which is more than most businesses have when they’re in this position.
Start With What’s Already There
Before bringing anyone new in, get a proper read on what exists. Most organisations in this spot have more usable material than they think: emissions data, a partial risk register, some governance documentation, maybe a materiality assessment that’s still broadly right. The job isn’t to start again. It’s to work out what’s solid, what’s half-built, and what was never real to begin with.
We’ve written before about how a proper gap analysis should look, and what good governance documentation actually needs to contain. If you’re not sure where you stand, that’s the place to check first, not the place to hire someone and hope they figure it out for you.
What Good Support Looks Like From Here
However you got stuck, the fix isn’t a bigger retainer with someone who does the work for you indefinitely. It’s support that’s structured to hand the process back to your team, on a clear timeline, with your people actually able to run it without you.
If you’re not sure which category you’re in:
Take the Climate Readiness Assessment – See where your ASRS process actually stands, and where the gaps are, in your own time, at no cost.
Book a Free Discovery Call – We’ll look at what’s been done, what’s missing, and what an executable plan looks like from here. No jargon, no obligation.
