Sustainability Action Readiness Assessment (SARA)

Everybody counts

The Sustainability Action Readiness Assessment (SARA) is a survey-based assessment tool built by Kite Insights. It is designed to assess employees’ knowledge, engagement, and ability to act on sustainability in the context of their work, using Kite’s Head, Heart, and Hands Framework.

We built the SARA using years of experience in developing assessment tools and bespoke surveys, combined with our knowledge of the sustainability challenges businesses face, and communicating about them. To validate our approach, we consulted sustainability, transformation and behaviour change experts, and the World Benchmarking Alliance.

The SARA helps companies to:

Set a baseline of employee readiness,
Benchmark your workforce against peers,
Identify specific pain-points and opportunities,
Inform the development of learning and engagement journeys,
Measure the impact employee engagement.

Why measure employee engagement in sustainability

True sustainability means business transformation; it needs everyone on board Achieving net-zero, protecting biodiversity, promoting human dignity and prosperity, and the myriad other challenges
facing business constitute a fundamental transformation for most companies. Such foundational change stands the
greatest change of success when all employees understand the “what”, “why” and “how” of it. Setting a baseline of where
employees are today from which to establish targets and a plan of action provides the foundation for success.

Employee engagement can be an indicator (and predictor) of ESG performance In a study conducted in January 2023, 80% of C-suite leaders reported that “employee activism” was a significant driver of corporate action on sustainability. Measurement of employee engagement - which captures capacity rather than commitment - offers a compelling indicator of a businesses’ ability to implement ESG today and in future. Indeed, investors, boards, and other stakeholders increasingly recognise that many ESG indicators use transparency as a proxy for performance. Another study of climate literacy in 2023 found that climate knowledge was a stronger predictor of individual’s level of action than other factors, and an academic meta-analysis found investment in sustainability training corresponded to stronger ESG performance.

Managing what you measure Empowering employees to play their part in sustainability is increasingly reflected in standards and regulations that define what businesses should seek to manage (and measure) in their sustainability activities. Sustainability training features in Article 12 of the Paris Agreement, Article 6 of the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change and in the IFRS S2 Climate-related Disclosure standards, which call on businesses to “determine whether appropriate skills and competencies are available or will be developed to oversee strategies designed to respond to climate-related risks and opportunities.” These inclusions illustrate the critical role that workforces will play in driving progress

Data can help drive better choices on what to prioritise Business leaders increasingly recognise the need to inform and upskill their workforces to be supporters of their sustainability strategies. In a 2023 survey of CSOs supported by Kite, 64% of leaders were investing in training, with a further 30% planning to in 2024. In the recent PwC survey of 4,700 CEOs, two third planned to or had already started to upskill or reskill their workforce, Yet, with such a wide range of challenges to address, the unique context of each company to consider, and different roles for different parts of the business, identifying what topics and skills to focus on among so many is a critical challenge. Measuring existing knowledge and capacity can identify pain-points and opportunities that make training more efficient and effective in supporting sustainability strategies.

Join leading companies measuring what counts

The SARA is a unique and leading measurement tool, designed to help shape company’s transformation and engagement efforts. Already, Kite has delivered it with tens of clients, including some that repeat it annually as part of their sustainability change programmes. Kite holds an increasingly powerful database of over 50,000 responses, enabling refined benchmarking. With a growing number of companies using the SARA, it will soon become a leading indicator of company’s investment in sustainability transformation that informs standards and reporting frameworks, as well as individual business action.

Sustainability Action Readiness Assessment (SARA)

Everybody counts

The SARA helps companies to:

Why measure employee engagement in sustainability

Join leading companies measuring what counts

Learn more about the SARA