// Compliance & Standards

Sustainability Governance & Controls

Give sustainability commitments the oversight, ownership and controls that make them enforceable.

Board and management structures, delegated authority, policy and control design that put accountability behind published sustainability positions.

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// Context

Why this matters

Sustainability disclosure asks organisations to describe how the board oversees these matters and how management is accountable. Answering that honestly is difficult where oversight consists of an annual presentation.

The gap becomes material when commitments are published. A target with no owner, no budget and no reporting line is a statement rather than an obligation, and the difference is visible to anyone examining the governance disclosure closely.

Governance work is unglamorous and disproportionately effective: it determines whether anything else in the programme actually happens.

// The engagement

How CER helps

Board and committee oversight structure review
Terms of reference for sustainability oversight
Management accountability and delegated authority mapping
Policy framework development and review
Control design over sustainability data, claims and commitments
Approval process for public sustainability statements
Reporting lines and escalation routes
Board reporting pack design and cadence
Remuneration linkage assessment, where applicable
Internal audit scope recommendations for sustainability

// Deliverables

What you receive

Governance structure assessment
Committee terms of reference
Accountability and delegated authority matrix
Policy framework
Control matrix over sustainability data and public claims
Board reporting template and calendar
Recommendations for internal audit coverage

// Fit

Who this is for

Boards accountable for climate and sustainability disclosure
Company secretaries and governance functions
Organisations with published commitments and no assigned owners
Groups aligning sustainability governance across subsidiaries

// Why CER

Practitioners, not report writers

CER works from Singapore with organisations across Asia, which matters for this service because requirements arriving from European regulators, regional supervisors and local listing rules do not align neatly.

Engagements run through to implementation: the data collection process, the documentation, the controls and the internal handover, so that the second cycle is cheaper than the first and can be run without us.

Where an organisation would be better served by building the capability internally, CER Academy delivers the same technical material as training.

Meet the people behind the work

// Our people

Expertise on this service

Raymond Cheung

Advisor & Lead Trainer

Over twenty years in actuarial science and risk management, working across ESG, sustainability and ESG investment.

Actuarial science · Risk management · ESG and sustainability

View Raymond Cheung’s profile

// Questions

Frequently asked

Do we need a dedicated sustainability committee?

Not necessarily. Oversight can sit with an existing committee -- audit and risk is a common home -- provided the terms of reference are explicit and the committee has the information it needs. A dedicated committee that meets twice a year is not better than an existing one that reviews properly.

What controls apply to sustainability claims?

At minimum, a defined approval route for external statements, evidence supporting each claim, and a record of who approved it. Public claims made without substantiation carry regulatory and reputational exposure.

Should ESG be linked to remuneration?

It can be, but only where the underlying metrics are reliable and controllable. Linking pay to a metric the organisation cannot measure well creates a governance problem rather than solving one.

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