ESG Procurement: Chatting Green with eco-goddess and all round inspiration Emily Ashton-Jelley

In our final ESG instalment I talked with the brilliant Emily Ashton-Jelley; a seasoned expert who’s insights and experiences as a UK sustainability and environmental delivery manager are invaluable for those seeking to infuse ESG into their procurement strategies. 

Six questions delving into Emily’s wealth of knowledge and uncovering strategies and wisdom that she’s accumulated throughout her career. Delve into the multifaceted world of ESG in procurement through Emily’s eyes, discovering how this dynamic approach can transform businesses and drive positive change. She’s inspiring, informative and even a little bit spooky….

Why do you think that ESG has become increasingly more important for businesses and in particular procurement teams?

Simply put, ESG offers a more resilient and sustainable way of doing business from an environmental, social and economic perspective. ESG isn’t just a way of identifying, measuring and reporting on an area for your investors or clients.  ESG provides an opportunity for businesses and organisations to revisit their practices on a regular basis and identify areas of improvements under the ESG umbrella. This not only provides benefits to the environment and communities the businesses operate in but can also support their sustainable economic growth.

Procurement has a key role to play  at the start of any project in order to ensure the success of embedding ESG processes. This means procurement is uniquely placed to have a significant positive impact on the environmental and social outcomes of a business and its supply chain. Influencing your supply chain is an important part of how you improve your standards and support smaller businesses make improvements to their practices. Which means what you do can have an knock on effect to the supply chain.  

What are your top 3 tips for procurement to think further than ticking boxes?

At a high-level the top three things for consideration would be stakeholder engagement, communication and buy-in. 

Procurement teams need to think wider than their team, they need to engage will all parts of their business or organisation to fully understand what the environmental, social and  governance needs, goals and aspirations are. If the business has an ESG or similar team, engaging with them from the very start is a must, they will be able to guide and support you. Procurement teams need to understand the strategic direction the business or organisation is going in - what does it want to achieve? You need to think about the risk and opportunities of these goals and aspirations and develop  clear aims and objectives  - possibly with a set of KPIs.  There is no point a procurement team coming up with a nice to have list if this is completely at odds with the values and direction of the business.

Clearly communicate to stakeholders how you as a procurement team are going to help realise the businesses ESG goals, adding value to the business. You are the professionals when it comes to procurement - it’s part of your job to make aspirations a reality by effectively embedding ESG processes within procurement systems. The only way to achieve this is to effectively communicate how you are going to make this happen. 

Procurement teams can’t do it alone, to truly embed ESG you need buy-in from all levels of the organisation. How are you going to realise this? This circles back to clear communication and tailored messaging so everyone within the organisation is on board with the benefits of embedding ESG into procurement and wider business practices. Sustainable Procurement Policies and Plans in my opinion are key to this buy-in so that everyone is starting from the same page. 

I hope you don’t mind but I’m going to sneak in a fourth top tip as this is the one that ultimately means ESG isn’t just a tick box exercise! Different tenders and contracts will have different needs - one size certainly doesn’t fit all - but you also want to make the process simple to follow, easy to understand and not onerous.  Think about developing a tool which possess key questions helping stakeholders consider specific ESG elements in terms of what they are looking to procure. Each project or tender can then be run through this tool to determine a BAU approach. This can then be discussed to understand where improvements before re-running the tool on this basis - trust me it can be an eye opener and really helps to support continuous thinking and measurement. 

What tools can be used to help teams to report the great work they’re doing with their suppliers and agencies?

There are a plethora of industry standards - all have their merits and specialist areas, here are some examples:

• GRESB 
• Science-Based Targets initiative (SBTi)
• CDP (Carbon Disclosure Project)
• Sustainable Accounting Standards Board (SASB)
• Global Reporting Initiative (GRI)
• Taskforce on Climate-related Financial Disclosures (TCFD)
• Taskforce on Nature-related Financial Disclosures (TNFD)
• United Nations Sustainable Development Goals (UN SDGs)
• United Nations Global Compact (UN GC)

What do you wish more procurement teams knew about ESG?

Sustainable Procurement can actually save money! It’s not just about doing the right thing for the planet and communities, it can have a significant financial benefit  and resource efficiencies. Sustainable Procurement also offers an opportunity for growth, with the rising awareness of ESG in the wider community, especially as strong ESG policies and practices are a selling point for a business. 

What do you think procurement teams could do to form better relationships with ESG practises?

This goes back to my thinking in question 3 - it’s all about effective engagement! People who work in this area don’t want to make other people’s lives difficult, actually most want to  do the opposite and the majority of us are here to help. 

Like Procurement professionals we are strategic problem-solvers who thrive on cross-organisational working  to achieve co-benefits and value for money. Only today was I engaged in a workshop with health and wellbeing colleagues on  the collaborative benefits and thinking in environmental sustainability such as green space and warm homes having positive outcomes for health and well-being. This seemingly simple example highlights not only the great outcomes working together has but the financial benefits of preventative healthcare and relieving resource pressure within the health care system. 

Given that the majority of ESG achievements are self-reported, what’s the craziest story that you’ve heard…?

I’ve worked in both the private and public sectors for 18 years (it’s scary when you tot those years up) and a project I heard about that really sticks with me as a bit ‘out there’ but also very innovative is a Leisure Centre in the Midlands. They use waste heat from a local crematorium to heat it swimming pool! 

Maybe not one for the faint hearted!! 

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-hereford-worcester-23104502#