As you implement the Workiva ESG solution, you may use a spreadsheet — called a Structured Metric File (SMF) — to set up an ESG Program to curate values to disclose in your ESG reporting. While you can manually create an ESG Program, the SMF enables Workiva to help automatically build your ESG Program and its metrics.
With the SMF, you'll specify:
- The topics to include in your report, organized in hierarchical sections
- The qualitative or quantitative values to collect for each topic
- Related ESG Explorer content, such as standards or disclosures from common frameworks
- Custom tags and dimensions to further categorize metrics or their values, respectively
Step 1. Determine topics to disclose
Before you start to complete the SMF, perform a materiality assessment to decide what you want to include in your ESG reporting. For example, consider topics:
- Previously included in your ESG reporting
- Recommended for all companies, based on Global Reporting Initiative (GRI) Universal Standards or United Nations Sustainable Development Goals (UNSDG)
- Recommended for your industry, based on Sustainability Accounting Standards Board (SASB) or a GRI Sector Standard
- Meaningful to your investors, customers, and other stakeholders
Tip: To help identify the metrics to collect for a topic, explore related guidance and standards in ESG Explorer.
After you determine the topics to disclose, identify the metrics to collect for each. You'll use these topics and related metrics to build your ESG Program from the SMF.
Step 2. Configure the SMF
From the Configuration section of the SMF, enter general information about the ESG Program:
- Enter a name and description to help identify the ESG Program.
- In Period start and Period end, enter the first and last dates of the ESG Program's initial reporting period, in a
YYYY-MM-DDformat. - In Default data provider, enter the name or email address of the workspace member to assign metric values' data collection by default.
Tip: This workspace member is only the default provider. You can assign each metric value to other providers as necessary.
Step 3. Set up custom dimensions
To collect multiple values for a single metric, set up custom dimensions for your ESG Program. For example, your company may collect multiple values for a metric based on different:
- Entity locations
- Market regions
- Business units
- Demographics, such as gender or race
From the Dimensions sheet, set up each custom dimension:
- In Dimension name, enter the unique name of the custom dimension, such as Location or Gender.
- In Dimension value ID and Dimension value, enter a unique identifier and display name for each dimension value.
Note: Each Dimension value ID must be unique. To ensure data integrity, you can't delete dimension values or edit their IDs after the ESG Program is created.
For example, for a Gender dimension:
| Dimension name | Dimension value ID | Dimension value |
|---|---|---|
| Gender | M | Male |
| Gender | F | Female |
| Gender | NB | Non-binary |
Step 4. Enter the topics and metrics
From the Metrics section of the SMF, set up the topics to disclose, grouped in sections and with metrics to track their values:
-
Topics indicate the specific ESG factors that the Program addresses, and can categorize other topics by general themes; for example, an Environmental topic may include topics such as Energy and Waste, while a Social topic may include topics like Diversity & inclusion (D&I) and Human rights. Topics can contain topics within other topics — such as a Greenhouse gas emissions topic within a Planet topic, that contains additional topics based on Scope 1, Scope 2, and Scope 3 emissions.
Note: An ESG Program can include hierarchies up to six topics deep.
- Metrics curate and track values for each topic. For example, a Scope 1 emissions topic may have separate metrics to collect values for Refrigerants, Mobile combustion, and Stationary combustion.
- In the Metric column, list the names of each metric to collect for the ESG Program's topics.
- For each metric, enter its related topic, and any hierarchy within additional topics.
Note: To successfully create the ESG Program, enter at least one topic — in Topic 1 — for each metric.
For example, to collect metric values for Scope 1 emissions:
| Topic 1 | Topic 2 | Topic 3 | Metric |
| Environmental | Greenhouse gas emissions | Scope 1 emissions | Stationary combustion |
| Environmental | Greenhouse gas emissions | Scope 1 emissions | Refrigerants |
| Environmental | Greenhouse gas emissions | Scope 1 emissions | Mobile combustion |
In the ESG Program generated from the SMF:
- The hierarchy of topics and metrics appear as the outline
- The metrics appear in the context of their respective topics
Step 5. Enter the metrics' details
From the Metrics section, enter details about each metric:
- In Metric description, enter an explanation or more context about the metric.
- In Metric value type, enter the type of data to collect for the metric — Text, Number, Currency, Date, or Percent.
- In Units, select the unit of measurement for any Number, Currency, or Percent value.
Tip: To use a unit that doesn't appear as an option, add it to column A of the Units sheet. In the ESG Program, any units you add to the Units sheet will appear only on their respective values, and won't be available for other metrics.
- To assign a value's data collection to a workspace member other than the Default data provider, enter them in in Data provider.
Note: Only one workspace member can be assigned as a value's data provider.
- In Data approver, assign workspace members to approve the value collected:
- To assign only one member, enter their full name or email address.
- To assign one of multiple members to approve the value by a shared due date, enter their full names or email addresses as a comma-separated list, such as
homer@org.com,marge@org.com,bart@org.com,lisa@org.com. - To assign multiple members to approve the value through a series of approval steps with their own due dates, enter their full names or email addresses, with each step separated by a pipe (
|). If one of multiple members can approve the value as part of an approval step, separate their names or email addresses with a comma (,). For example:homer@org.com,marge@org.com | bart@org.com | lisa@org.com
- Enter any instructions to help the data provider and approvers complete their tasks.
- In Provider date and Approver date, enter the due dates for the value's collection and approval in a
YYYY-MM-DDformat. If the value has multiple approval steps, separate each step's due date with a pipe (|), or enter a single date to apply to all steps.Note: If a value has multiple approval steps, enter the same number of pipe (
|| delimiters in Data approver and Approver date. To not set a due date for an approval step, leave a blank between its corresponding delimiters — such as2024-15-01 | | 2024-15-03, to not set a date for the middle step. - To align a metric with a standard or disclosure in ESG Explorer, enter its title in the column for its framework — GRI, SASB, UNSDG, Task Force for Climate-related Financial Disclosures (TCFD), CDP (formerly Carbon Disclosure Project), European Sustainability Reporting Standards (ESRS), or Corporate Sustainability Assessment (CSA).
Note: While ESG Explorer provides deprecated and pending versions of standard and disclosures, you can align a metric with only its current version from the SMF. To align with a deprecated or pending version, edit the metric's Related ESG content from the ESG Program.
Tip: When you align a metric with a standard or disclosure, you can refer to its content from the metric and its related data collection or approval task in Workiva Tasks.
Tip: To align a metric with a framework or questionnaire not included in ESG Explorer, create a program tag based on its content.
- From the Program tag columns, add custom metadata about a metric, such as a company goal or additional ESG framework it aligns with. To create a tag, enter its name following Program tag: in the header, then enter the appropriate value in the metric's row.
Tip: If a metric has multiple values for a tag, enter them as a comma-separated list.
- In Require supporting attachments and Require notes, select whether to require assignees to include supporting attachments or notes with a metric's values.
- To assign a specific unique identifier to a metric, enter its numerical ID — up to 20 digits — in Metric code.
Tip: When the ESG Program creates a metric, it prefixes its code with an
M. If no code is specified in the SMF, the ESG Program automatically creates one. - To collect multiple values for a metric:
- For values based on a custom dimension, select the applicable criteria — such as location or demographic — in the Dimension column.
Tip: You set up custom dimensions from the Dimensions sheet.
- For quarterly or monthly values, select the applicable interval in the Frequency column.
- For values based on a custom dimension, select the applicable criteria — such as location or demographic — in the Dimension column.
- In the Connected metric location column, select whether to collect the value through a connected spreadsheet or document in the workspace.
Tip: To streamline data collection for the provider and approver, select No in Connected metric location to collect the value through Workiva Tasks instead of a source file.
In the ESG Program generated from the SMF, you can manage these details and track data collection from the metric.
Step 6. Create the ESG Program
After you set up the Metrics section, contact your Workiva Customer Success Manager (CSM) to create an ESG Program based on your SMF.
From the ESG Program, you can:
- Attach reference files to metrics for additional context or guidance.
- Send tasks to workspace members assigned to collect and approve metric values.
- Track the data collection status of the metrics' values.
- Adjust ESG reporting needs as your topic materiality evolves.