02. Choose the right metrics
Why does it matter?
Even though all business contexts are different, a set of key environmental metrics should help you drive positive impact. These metrics are generally greenhouse gas emissions (starting with carbon emissions), energy consumption, water consumption, resource use and depletion, water/air/soil pollution, impact on biodiversity, etc. Some are more obvious than others, and you won’t track them all on day one. But metrics will be key to making informed and effective decisions to reduce your impact on the environment. Plus, by focusing on continuous improvement, you’ll see where and when you’re making progress.
What can I do?
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Start by verifying if you can partner with your ESG or sustainability department, if your organization has one. It will help you understand what they already have in place, how to contribute to their strategy and avoid starting from scratch.
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In the beginning, keep it simple, reliable, and consistent. You, your product team, and the data team must trust the measurements to be credible and convincing when interacting with stakeholders and building momentum toward climate action
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Consider both absolute metrics (e.g. CO2e) and relative metrics (CO2e per page, visit, user, employee, revenue generated per campaign/impression, etc.). Using both allows you to correctly assess the net impact of your sustainability strategy.
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Factor different types of impact: greenhouse gas emissions (in g of CO2e or kg of CO2e), Energy consumption (in kWh), Water consumption (in cl or l), depletion of natural resources, etc.
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Measure data transfer parameters: for example: page weight (in KB), number of requests, and load time (in s). Keep in mind that it will not be the absolute way to measure, but it is a good starting point in your journey.
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Use the right tools for your context and your needs. See more in Track your digital footprint.
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Report these metrics against OKRs and KPIs. Work with your ESG compliance teams to include those metrics in your company reports.
What does success look like?
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🌍 Collective efforts to gauge and reduce ecological footprints
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💰 Building trust through transparent data collection and valuable insights
Things to consider
We recommend keeping things simple at the beginning. If you don’t measure yet, use a proxy (80% accuracy is better than not tracking anything). Observing trends consistently over time is more important than being 100% accurate, and will support you to identify the next steps and keep moving forward.
Then, prioritize your efforts based on the relevant local ESG regulations your organization must comply with: Scope 1, 2 and 3 greenhouse gas emissions, water use, impact on biodiversity, resource use, and pollution tracking are becoming standards, and so is assessing climate-related risks. If you don’t have a sustainability department, check with your Finance and accounting team to get these informations.
Measuring your digital footprint once will be a major milestone and should be celebrated. From there, you could set up a dashboard and monitor environmental impact on an ongoing basis to measure progress (or regress), and share your data-backed victories and environmental impact with stakeholders.