What an ESG consultant actually does
ESG stands for environmental, social and governance. Stripped of the jargon, an ESG consultant answers three questions on your behalf: what is this business actually doing to the world around it, can you prove it, and what should you fix first.
Most of the work is unglamorous. Pulling twelve months of electricity bills. Sitting with the HR register. Walking the shop floor to see whether the policy on paper matches what happens at seven in the morning. The report at the end is the easy part, and it is only worth anything if the work underneath it was done properly.
We do that underlying work ourselves. We are not a firm that hands you a template and a deadline.
Book a consultationWhere you are now, and where we would start
Most conversations begin in one of these six places. You do not need to know which service you need before you call.
| What is happening | Where we would start |
|---|---|
| A customer has sent us an ESG questionnaire and we cannot answer half of it | A rapid gap check against their specific template, then a full assessment so the next one is easy. |
| SEBI now requires us to file a BRSR | ESG assessment first, then BRSR reporting. Filing without the data underneath it is how companies get caught out. |
| A buyer in Europe is asking for our carbon footprint | Carbon assessment and GHG inventory across Scope 1, 2 and 3, to a methodology that will survive scrutiny. |
| We have hundreds of suppliers and no idea what their practices are | Supplier and vendor ESG assessment, run at scale, so your Scope 3 and your risk picture come from evidence. |
| We have committed to something publicly and now have to deliver it | Sustainability Office as a Service. A named sustainability lead, working inside your business, without a full-time hire. |
| Nobody has asked us anything yet | This is the cheapest and calmest time to build the system. Everything after this happens under a deadline. |
Six services, one system
They are sold separately because budgets work that way, but they are built to feed each other. The assessment produces the data the report needs. The data system means next year costs a fraction of this year.
How an engagement actually runs
Whichever service you start with, the shape is the same.
- Discovery call — we work out what is being asked of you and by whom, and tell you honestly whether it is achievable in the time you have
- Scoping — which entities, which sites, which period, which framework, and what evidence already exists
- Fieldwork — site visits, interviews, bills, registers and observation. This is the part most firms skip
- Analysis and rating — findings scored against the SIM framework, with the gaps ranked by what will hurt you soonest
- Deliverable — the report, inventory, dashboard or rating you engaged us for, plus the evidence pack behind it
- Handover or ongoing support — either your team takes it from here with a working system, or we stay on and run it
How to choose an ESG consulting firm
Six questions worth asking whoever you shortlist, including us.
- Ask who does the fieldwork. If the answer is that you fill in a data request template, you are buying a document, not an assessment.
- Ask what happens when your numbers look bad. A firm that has never delivered uncomfortable findings is not assessing anything.
- Ask whether they can assure their own report. Nobody credible can. Assurance has to be independent of the people who wrote it.
- Ask what you are left with afterwards. A PDF is not a system. You want the data structure, the owners and the cadence.
- Ask about their experience in your sector. A hospital, a footwear plant and an IT company have almost nothing in common at the metric level.
- Ask what happens next year. If the second report costs the same as the first, nothing was built.
The frameworks we work to
Which one applies to you depends on who is asking and why. Part of the first conversation is working that out, so you are not reporting against three standards when one would do.
| Framework | Who it applies to | What it is for |
|---|---|---|
| BRSR and BRSR Core | Listed Indian companies, and increasingly their suppliers | The SEBI requirement. Non-negotiable if it applies to you, with a smaller Core set subject to assurance. |
| GRI Standards 2021 | Any company, especially those with global buyers | The most widely recognised international reporting language. |
| IFRS S1 and S2 (ISSB) | Companies with international investors | Investor-focused disclosure on sustainability and climate-related risk. |
| GHG Protocol | Anyone publishing a carbon number | The accounting rules for Scope 1, 2 and 3 emissions. |
| SIM — Sustainability Index Metric | Our own assessment framework | A 19 sub-pillar rating that turns an assessment into a score you can track and improve. |
| Buyer or customer format | Suppliers filling in a specific brand template | Getting through vendor onboarding. Narrow, but usually the most urgent thing on your desk. |
Where we work
We work with companies across India, from offices in Bangalore and Kerala. Fieldwork means we travel, so the office address matters less than whether we can get to your sites and back often enough to actually see how they run.
Most of our work to date has been in Kerala, Karnataka and Tamil Nadu, across healthcare, manufacturing, technology, hospitality and events.
Book a consultationWork we have done
Named generically until we have written permission to use the names.
Healthcare
Multi-facility hospital group, Kerala
A full cycle across several facilities: as-is assessment, materiality assessment, ESG strategic framework and sustainability report.
Healthcare
Ayurvedic teaching hospital, Coimbatore
A GRI-referenced ESG report taken through independent limited assurance.
Manufacturing
Footwear manufacturer, Kozhikode
An inaugural GRI-aligned sustainability report, built from a standing start.
Frequently asked questions
What does an ESG consultant do, in practice?
Collects and verifies data about how your business operates, measures it against a recognised framework, tells you where the gaps are, and produces whatever document the person asking for it needs. Some of it is technical, most of it is legwork.
We are not a listed company. Do we need any of this?
Nothing is compulsory unless SEBI applies to you or a customer has made it a condition. But insurers, lenders, corporate clients, accreditation bodies and export buyers are all asking now. Voluntary work done calmly costs far less than mandatory work done in a panic.
What does ESG consulting cost?
It depends on how many sites and entities are in scope, which framework applies, how much usable data already exists and whether assurance is involved. We will tell you the range on the first call once we know those four things, and we will tell you if the budget you have in mind is not realistic for the deadline you have.
How long does a first engagement take?
For a company starting from nothing, plan for three to four months to a published report. An assessment on its own is quicker. If the data work is already done, a report takes six to eight weeks.
Do you do the work, or do you advise us while we do it?
We do it. You review, correct and approve, because the disclosures are yours and nothing gets published without your sign-off. If you would rather build the capability in-house, the Sustainability Office engagement is designed for exactly that.
Can you assure the report as well?
No, and neither can anyone else who wrote it. Assurance has to come from a party independent of the people who prepared the disclosures. What we do is build the evidence trail as we go, so your assurance provider is not starting from scratch.
Which framework should we report against?
Whichever one the person asking for it recognises. If SEBI applies to you, BRSR is not optional. If your pressure is coming from European buyers, GRI or their own template is usually the answer. Reporting against three standards when one would do is a common and expensive mistake.
Not sure which of these you need?
That is the normal starting point. Tell us who is asking you for what, and we will tell you on the first call what it will take and whether your deadline is realistic.
Book a discovery call