The Total Economic Impact™ Of Nasdaq Metrio

Automated Data Collection And Measurement

Evidence and data. Forrester research states: “Many organizations begin their sustainability journey by setting a baseline and gathering data manually in Excel files. However, you must address sustainability management with as much rigor as financial accounting due to the complexity of data and data sources as well as regulations.”⁴

Interviewees described data collection as the first step in their organization’s process of preparing an annual sustainability report and third-party disclosures. This step involved interacting with various stakeholders across the organization who owned sets of data, often via email and manual spreadsheets. With Nasdaq Metrio, the organizations unified and automated their data collection processes by using the platform’s prebuilt templates and reference library features. The ability to set role-based permissions within the platform also led to less confusion about data input responsibilities.

• The director of sustainability and shared services at a utility company said: “The great thing about the tool is that we have 54 users who have the ultimate ownership of the data in the system. It’s not me playing the telephone game. I feel like the accuracy and the quality of the data is much higher because we get data from the right source and the backup documentation is uploaded.”
• The manager, environmental health and safety at a manufacturing organization said: “Part of our exercise was to develop a greenhouse gas management plan which outlines where the data is and who owns the data. That is the future state now with Metrio and [the Environmental Protection Agency’s] scope 3 [emissions]. It was just a scramble prior to Metrio because those people weren’t identified.”
• The sustainability reporting lead at a chemical manufacturing organization said: “We engage with environmental, compliance, and cyber teams who have the information to give for the report. They engage with us through material templates. [In the prior environment,] they spent a work week between gathering the information from their systems and sending it to us. With [Nasdaq] Metrio, this is two or three days at most.”
• The corporate director, energy efficiency at a manufacturing organization said: “The data is the same [as our old process]. But the difference is that we have a reliable source for most of the data input in [Nasdaq Metrio]. The time saving is that we are not questioning the data when we need to do an extraction. It’s not a spreadsheet that people lose track of. It’s more robust.”

Modeling and assumptions. For the financial analysis as applied to the composite organization, Forrester assumes:

• Data collection and measurement processes involve 75 data collectors.
• In the prior environment, data collectors spent 40 hours annually inputting data manually. With Nasdaq Metrio, data collectors gain 60% efficiency on this task.
• The composite recaptures 50% of this work for productive activities.
• The average fully burdened annual salary for a data collector is $80,000. The fully burdened hourly rate for these professionals is $38.

Risks. The cost of this benefit may vary among organizations depending on:

• How employees performed each of these activities in the prior environment and the extent.
• Employees’ salaries.

Results. To account for these risks, Forrester adjusted this benefit downward by 5%, yielding a three-year, risk-adjusted total PV (discounted at 10%) of $81,000.

Automated Calculation And Analysis

Evidence and data. During the initial configuration, interviewees explained that their organizations populated the Nasdaq Metrio platform with custom formulas, which automated the calculation and analysis process for GHG and water measurements. Previously, their sustainability teams used spreadsheets to manually calculate this data each year.

• The manager, environmental health and safety at a manufacturing organization said, “Prior to [Nasdaq] Metrio, the carbon was essentially calculated by hand on spreadsheets annually. … It really helped to map our scope 3, what the data needs were, and what the necessary inputs were to calculate the emissions.”
• The corporate director, energy efficiency at a manufacturing organization explained: “We have developed energy GHG and water dashboards. They were originally on spreadsheets. Now we have a platform where each of our sites can enter data monthly and the calculations are built into [Nasdaq] Metrio.”

Modeling and assumptions. For the financial analysis as applied to the composite organization, Forrester assumes:

• Data calculations involve six team members.
• In the prior environment, the sustainability team members spent 80 hours each year calculating data manually. With Nasdaq Metrio, the sustainability team gains 90% efficiency on this task.
• The composite recaptures 75% of the work for productive activities.
• The average fully burdened annual salary for a sustainability team member is $115,000. The fully burdened hourly rate for these professionals is $55.

Risks. The cost of this benefit may vary among organizations depending on:

• How employees performed each of these activities in the prior environment and the extent.
• Employees’ salaries.

Results. To account for these risks, Forrester adjusted this benefit downward by 5%, yielding a three-year, risk-adjusted total PV (discounted at 10%) of $42,000.

Accelerated Data Disclosures And Reporting

Evidence and data. Once interviewees’ organizations completed the data collection and calculation process, sustainability teams could create their annual report and disclose against all mandatory and voluntary third-party frameworks. With Nasdaq Metrio, interviewees explained that their organizations could autopopulate data across multiple disclosures, accelerate data table creation and the design process, and more easily update the reports in real time. Organizations configured users’ visual settings within the platform to allow them to focus on the disclosure with the upcoming deadline. One interviewee also explained how Sustainable Lens’s gap-analysis feature allowed their organization to more effectively understand the data to disclose.

• The director of sustainability and shared services at a utility company said: “[Nasdaq Metrio] does have linkages in the background. If I open CDP, I could see that CDP aligns with SASB. If you answer one question, like scope 1 emissions, and you fill it in once, it fills across all disclosures.”
• The same interviewee commented: “[With Sustainable Lens,] it’s great to have the instant gap analysis. We had a very low governance score in CDP and other third-party raters. I couldn’t understand why. The day I bought the Sustainable Lens, this was the first thing I checked. It turns out we never actually said that our board had oversight of our targets and goals. I’m thinking we’re going to have a huge jump in some of that scoring by really pinpointing what investors or some of these other rating agencies are really looking at as important. Usually, we have all the data, but we don’t know what to disclose.”
• The sustainability reporting lead at a chemical manufacturing organization said: “Our focus is on the annual sustainability report. We would spend half of the year on that. We have an early publication date compared to most companies, starting May, June, even July, publishing their annual reports. So we do it early in the year due to investor requests. … Now with Metrio, everyone knows the template perfectly and what they need to provide. We have cut that to three months, basically. Half the time.”
• The same interviewee said: “It’s the ability to update it in real time. That’s a super plus for us because there are always mistakes. We’re able to correct them as soon as we catch them. For example, if we receive a new request for a specific data point or a sentence that we should include, we just quickly edit that page and that’s it.”

Modeling and assumptions. For the financial analysis as applied to the composite organization, Forrester assumes:

• The annual report and disclosures preparation involves two sustainability team members.
• In the prior environment, the sustainability team members dedicated 1,040 hours annually to creating the annual sustainability report. With Nasdaq Metrio, the sustainability team gains 50% efficiency on this task.
• The composite prepares four disclosures annually.
• In the prior environment, the sustainability team members dedicated 520 hours to disclosure preparation. With Nasdaq Metrio, the sustainability team gains 30% efficiency on this task.
• The composite recaptures 75% of the work for productive activities.
• The average fully burdened annual salary for a sustainability team member is $115,000. The fully burdened hourly rate for these professionals is $55.

Risks. The cost of this benefit may vary among organizations depending on:

• The number and type of disclosures and reports prepared annually.
• The number and type of employees involved in preparation activities.
• The extent to which each of these activities was performed in the prior environment.
• Employees’ salaries.

Results. To account for these risks, Forrester adjusted this benefit downward by 5%, yielding a three-year, risk-adjusted total PV (discounted at 10%) of $223,000.

Enhanced Audit And Assurance Reviews

Evidence and data. Beyond the data collectors and sustainability team, interviewees explained that their organizations’ audit teams also gained workflow efficiencies by accessing Nasdaq Metrio. Auditors gained direct access to a unified view of the data and could perform simultaneous reviews rather than waiting for colleagues to finish their work. The robust audit-tracking log and reference library with backup documentation also streamlined their workflows.

• The director of sustainability and shared services at a utility company estimated that the internal assurance process for their organization prior to Nasdaq Metrio was two weeks, which it shortened to a few days. They said: “Our number one reason we got [Nasdaq Metrio] was for audit and assurance. It offers a very robust tracking of the audit log where you can see exactly who entered what, what was changed, tracking changes on it, year-over-year reporting, some autocalculations that are done there, and then all the tools to approve and review. Being able to load up all the backup documentation and have it stored in the reference library year over year is great.”

Modeling and assumptions. For the financial analysis as applied to the composite organization, Forrester assumes:

• The annual report and disclosures assurance involves three audit team members.
• In the prior environment, each audit team member dedicated 160 hours annually to audit work. With Nasdaq Metrio, the audit team gains 70% efficiency on this task.
• The average fully burdened annual salary for an auditor is $80,000. The fully burdened hourly rate for these professionals is $38.
• The composite recaptures 75% of this work for productive activities.

Risks. The cost of this benefit may vary among organizations depending on:

• The number and type of employees involved in audit activities.
• The extent to which employees performed each of these activities in the prior environment.
• Employees’ salaries.

Results. To account for these risks, Forrester adjusted this benefit downward by 5%, yielding a three-year, risk-adjusted total PV (discounted at 10%) of $23,000.

Improved Stakeholder Communication

Evidence and data. Forrester research states: “Strong data management and dashboard capabilities help organizations avoid making public statements that put them under the scrutiny of watchdog and government regulations on greenwashing.”⁵

Interviewees explained multiple ways in which their organizations communicated their collected and measured sustainability data: internally to management, externally to investors, and during executive-level meetings. With access to real-time data, simple and easy-to-interpret dashboards, and improved comprehensiveness of annual reports, sustainability teams saved time during document preparation and when answering investor requests.

• As it relates to investor communications, the sustainability reporting lead at the chemical manufacturing organization said: “We are always requested to provide further details and breakdowns per our businesses’ performance on decarbonization plans. Now we just go through [Nasdaq] Metrio and find detailed plans per business. Before, it would require a super huge email with investors. What they really want is transparency, and you know an email does not provide transparency.”
• The same interviewee explained many other communication use cases for the sustainability data: “[We pull data] for the executive teams on very specific inputs, and we have a whole month on ethics training and sustainability as part of that training. We also use the data for onboarding new hires. We are able to [pull from Nasdaq Metrio] rather than having to produce any sort of other resources.”
• The corporate director, energy efficiency at a manufacturing organization said: “Nasdaq Metrio provides the company with a view of the monthly performance to make projections as objectives and track against these objectives. It gives us the tools to have a reliable picture that we can follow from the executives all the way to the supervisors and at each site. We share performance data results from Nasdaq Metrio with three divisions, totaling roughly 100 people.”
• The same interviewee said: “Our energy efficiency engineer reports on 12 sites. Every month, this [equates to] a day and a half of validating data and sharing reports. Without [Nadsaq Metrio,] the energy efficiency engineer would spend a week doing this.”

Modeling and assumptions. For the financial analysis as applied to the composite organization, Forrester assumes:

• The following communication activities involve two sustainability team members: internal monthly performance updates, answering investor communications, and preparing sustainability reports for executive and investor meetings.
• In the prior environment, the sustainability team members dedicated 480 hours annually to internal monthly updates. With Nasdaq Metrio, the sustainability team gains 80% efficiency on this task.
• In the prior environment, the sustainability team members dedicated 270 hours annually to answering investor communications. With Nasdaq Metrio, the sustainability team gains 90% efficiency on this task.
• In the prior environment, the composite dedicated 40 hours to preparing sustainability reports for executive and investor meetings. With Nasdaq Metrio, the sustainability team gains 75% efficiency on this task.
• The average fully burdened annual salary for a sustainability team member is $115,000. The fully burdened hourly rate for these professionals is $55.
• The composite recaptures 75% of this work for productive activities.

Risks. The cost of this benefit may vary among organizations depending on:

• The number and type of employees involved in stakeholder communication activities.
• The extent to which employees performed each of these activities in the prior environment.
• Employees’ salaries.

Results. To account for these risks, Forrester adjusted this benefit downward by 5%, yielding a three-year, risk-adjusted total PV (discounted at 10%) of $128,000.

Unquantified Benefits

Interviewees mentioned the following additional benefits that their organizations experienced but were not able to quantify:

• Improved relationships with cross-functional teams and investors. Interviewees noted that Nasdaq Metrio’s ease of use and templated process reduced friction between their organizations’ sustainability teams and data collectors during the data collection phase. The unified platform also allowed colleagues to easily fill in for others during absences or turnover periods. Additionally, investors could access the data they needed more easily with the improved functionality of the annual sustainability reports. Interviewees commented:
  • The sustainability reporting lead at a chemical manufacturing organization said: “We have smoothed relationships with external stakeholders. We have stopped receiving so many requests throughout the year. Showing investors an interactive page versus a static PDF makes the conversation go farther.” On internal stakeholder relationships, the same interviewee said: “We have mainstreamed our interactions; this has kept those relationships really smooth. Nobody is angry anymore. I would say every single corporate function within our organization engages with us through Metrio.”
  • The director of sustainability and shared services at a utility company said: “Overall user satisfaction for people outside of the sustainability team was huge. As soon as we switched to the [Nasdaq Metrio SDM] tool, and then when we upgraded to the FDM tool, everyone commented, ‘Oh, I love it, it’s so great.’”
  • The corporate director, energy efficiency at a manufacturing organization said: “Since [Nasdaq Metrio] is standardized, one of the big advantages is that when we have turnover or when people are changing position, [the work] is done the same way as before because [everything is] on a platform. There is a person responsible in each of the sites. If they are not there, there’s a backup; if they leave, then there’s a system in place. It’s not a person duty, but a system instead.”
• Guided the creation of new, internal best practices. Nasdaq Metrio’s benchmarking data creates new opportunities for organizations to structure and enhance their sustainability management programs. The director of sustainability and shared services at a utility company shared the following example: “I made all these different peer groups [within Nasdaq Metrio] that I can benchmark myself against. This is unique because some questions are only utility-related and some are industry-agnostic. We only used to do utility benchmarking in the past. We would never think about comparing ourselves to another industry.”
• Improved data visibility drives production cost savings. Forrester research states: “Companies that are maturing through an environmental sustainability strategy, especially at operational excellence, realize cost savings — by improving efficiency and reducing consumption of resources.”⁶
  
  Real-time, measured production data via Nasdaq Metrio provided leaders with new insight to make business operations decisions. The corporate director, energy efficiency at a manufacturing organization said: “[Nasdaq Metrio] pages provide pictures of the performance every month. We know that doing this prevents us from having long appearances of performance that are not in line with objectives. This performance data is powerful enough that our team can take action, and we can save on our cost of production.”
• Met cybersecurity requirements. The platform meets IT cybersecurity requirements, which is particularly important since it collects and stores organization-specific, investor-grade data. The director of sustainability and shared services at a utility company said: “There is a single sign-on capability and multifactor authentication available. It’s very secure since only the users in the company can get in and use it.”
• Decreased reliance on external consulting resources. Interviewees noted that Nasdaq Metrio allowed their organizations’ sustainability teams to simplify the report creation process and rely less on external consultants for design and publishing resources. The director of sustainability and shared services at a utility company said: “Before we’d have to hire an outside service to put reports in [designed] PDFs. We’ve reduced this reliance [with Nasdaq Metrio].”
• Improved data quality and accuracy. By unifying all ESG data into a centralized system and storing backup documentation with the source of all data, interviewees noted that their sustainability team members gained improved trust in the quality of data populated into annual reports.

Flexibility

The value of flexibility is unique to each customer. There are multiple scenarios in which a customer might implement Nasdaq Metrio and later realize additional uses and business opportunities, including:

• Exploring new features and expanding access across more users. Interviewees shared anticipation for upcoming platform features including automatic user tagging. They also explained how more users could gain value from the platform as their organizations considered new data to track and measure. The corporate director, energy efficiency at a manufacturing organization said, “We have more and more requests for real-time reports [on GHG and water use].”

• Being better prepared for future regulatory changes. Nasdaq Metrio’s data mapping feature and stored database of industry-specific benchmarking data allows organizations to react and respond quicker to future disclosures. The director of sustainability and shared services at a utility company said: “We’re better prepared for potential regulatory changes that may come our way because we can research them and see what other companies are doing related to X, Y, and Z. I can use their guided prompt, which tells you step by step how to get ready and what overlap there is with what we currently report.”

• Finalizing API connections and investing in Sustainable Lens to drive further workflow efficiencies. Some of the interviewees’ organizations were in the process of implementing API connections to create additional time savings for their sustainability teams. The sustainability reporting lead at a chemical manufacturer estimated it would eliminate all the time in the first step of data collection. Additionally, interviewees expressed excitement for AI automation with Sustainable Lens for additional benchmarking and report readiness insights.

Flexibility would also be quantified when evaluated as part of a specific project (described in more detail in Appendix A).