FEI Podcast - Episodes Tagged with “Esg”

Turn the CSRD delay into a strategic business win. Learn what steps you need to take

Financial Executives International — Tue, 29 Apr 2025 07:00:00 -0400

In this episode, we’re diving into the fast-changing world of global ESG reporting and regulation. FERF’s Managing Director of research, Dillon Papenfuss, sits down with Kevin O’Connell, PwC Sustainability Assurance Services Leader, to break down the latest EU sustainability proposals—including the two-year delay to CSRD reporting—and what it all means for U.S. companies with overseas operations. From long-term strategic planning and technological transformation to data-driven insights and AI integration, this discussion provides finance leaders with practical steps to navigate the complexities of global ESG requirements and achieve business success.

Additional PwC resources:

Sustainability News Brief

The CFO’s sustainability playbook for driving growth

Don’t wait for the Omnibus proposals approval to start preparing for CSDDD

European Commission publishes ‘Omnibus’ proposals

⁠PwC's Sustainability reporting guide (Register for free access)

Special Guest: Kevin O'Connell.

Change is not a "nice to have" in ESG with ServiceNow's Mark Spinner

Financial Executives International — Mon, 18 Nov 2024 08:00:00 -0500

To learn more, download the "FEI Engage Career Pathway: ESG Controller" report at https://www.financialexecutives.org/Research/Publications/2024/FEI-Engage-Career-Pathway-ESG-Controller.aspx.

Special Guest: Mark Spinner.

Episode 155: Understanding the risk and building for the future with CBRE’s Scott Song and S&P’s Theshan Goble

Financial Executives International — Mon, 11 Nov 2024 07:00:00 -0500

Sustainability professionals Scott Song of CBRE and Theshan Goble of S&P Global join the FEI Weekly podcast to discuss the evolving ESG controller role, collaborative challenges within the enterprise and the journey toward value-driven sustainability reporting amid regulatory and political shifts.

Get the FEI Engage report on the ESG Controllership role.

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Special Guests: Scott Song and Theshan Goble.

A new EU disclosure rule that will have a global impact with Latham & Watkins’ Toon Dictus

Financial Executives International — Wed, 16 Oct 2024 07:00:00 -0400

Just as US-based multinationals are moving on from the US Securities and Exchange Commission’s decision around carbon disclosures with at least some measure of certainty, they will now need to turn to Europe and its Corporate Sustainability Due Diligence Directive.

The CSDDD is a proposed European Union (EU) regulation aimed at environmental and human rights issues. The directive obligates large EU companies, as well as non-EU companies operating in the EU, to identify, prevent, mitigate, and account for adverse environmental and human rights impacts throughout their supply chains.

In this episode of the podcast week speak with Toon Dictus and associate with the law firm Latham & Watkins in London about the directive and how it could impact U.S companies operating in the EU.

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Special Guest: Toon Dictus.

ESG Controllership and making something new with Mastercard's Tarynn Zenk

Financial Executives International — Mon, 23 Sep 2024 08:00:00 -0400

Financial Executives International was founded nearly a century ago as a community of like-minded professionals focused on developing the role of the financial controller. Today, the profession is going through another accelerated transformation with the development of the ESG controller role that requires new skills and metrics to match against stakeholder demands that are rapidly changing.

The Financial Education and Research Foundation, or FERF, is kicking off a series of conversations with ESG controllers and other thought leaders in the ESG finance space, focusing on how these leaders are adapting to the challenge.

These conversations, along with a survey and other interviews, will ultimately result in a new research study on ESG controllers by FERF.

In this first conversation I spoke with MasterCard's, ESG controller Tarynn Zenk. Tarynn leads the team responsible for reporting integrity over MasterCard's ESG disclosures and KPIs that measure progress towards the organization's ESG goals.

To learn more, download the "FEI Engage Career Pathway: ESG Controller" report at https://www.financialexecutives.org/Research/Publications/2024/FEI-Engage-Career-Pathway-ESG-Controller.aspx.

Special Guest: Tarynn Zenk.

Earth Day 24 and the future of ESG and carbon reporting with Persefoni’s Mike Wallace

Financial Executives International — Mon, 22 Apr 2024 07:00:00 -0400

As an annual celebration of environmental protection, Earth Day means a lot of things to a lot of people. But in the world of finance and accounting, it’s an opportunity to take stock on the progress the industry has made in building sustainability metrics over the past year as well as the implementation and policy challenges facing companies in the next twelve months.

In this episode of the podcast we speak with Mike Wallace, Chief Decarbonization Officer at Persefoni about the opportunities and risks the ESG movement faces and how financial executives should navigate those issues until Earth Day 2025.

Episode links:
Persefoni
FERF, Persefoni Navigating the Evolving Landscape of Climate Reporting

Special Guest: Mike Wallace.

What’s the future of the ESG finance and accounting career with Acre’s Catherine Harris

Financial Executives International — Wed, 27 Mar 2024 14:00:00 -0400

With the announcement of the US Securities and Exchange Commission's final rule on carbon disclosure, financial executives and markets have finally gotten something the continuity craves: certainty.

But with a lot of the post rule discourse built around the SEC’s limiting of ESG disclosure, especially around Scope 3, there is some anticipation that the ESG talent bubble in finance and accounting will begin to burst.

In this episode of the podcast we speak with Catherine Harris, director of US sustainable business at executive recruiter Acre Resources, about the prospects for ESG finance and accounting specialists post the SEC rule and how the line between sustainability and traditional financial reporting may be merging.

Special Guest: Catherine Harris.

ESG and the bigger natural capital accounting movement with Carnegie Mellon’s Nicholas Muller

Financial Executives International — Mon, 18 Mar 2024 13:00:00 -0400

With the recent decision by the US Securities and Exchange Commission around carbon disclosure, it’s important to look at the larger narrative of applying traditional financial valuation methods to natural systems.

That’s where natural capital accounting comes in. At its heart, natural capital accounting is a series of practices – including carbon disclosure– where environmental resources are measured against economic activity. It’s not anything new, per se, but natural capital accounting is becoming part of the larger dialogue about government and private market policy.

In this episode of the podcast we speak with Professor Nicholas Z. Muller, Lester and Judith Lave Professor of Economics, Engineering, and Public Policy at Carnegie Mellon University.

Dr. Muller’s work focuses on the interaction of environment and economic policy including the use of natural capital accounting.

Special Guest: Nicholas Z. Muller.

What California’s new sustainability disclosure laws mean for coming SEC rules with Persefoni’s Kristina Wyatt

Financial Executives International — Fri, 17 Nov 2023 10:00:00 -0500

Over the past year the accounting profession has been waiting for the Securities and Exchange Commission to reveal new disclosure rules around sustainability reporting. The rules will have a major impact on how public companies construct and communicate their finance reports.
But a funny thing happened on the way to the new SEC rules: California - the largest US state economy and one of the largest world economies – passed their own sustainability disclosure legislation that throws an even greater amount of complexity around the ESG reporting debate.
In this episode of the podcast we speak Kristina Wyatt Deputy General Counsel and Chief Sustainability Officer for carbon and climate reporting platform Persefoni, about the new rules and how they could enhance or conflict with future SEC proposals.

Special Guest: Kristina Wyatt.

Sustainability means new skills for a new generation of professionals with Jeff Hales

Financial Executives International — Wed, 13 Sep 2023 07:45:00 -0400

FEI Engage – Financial Executives Internatinonal’s platform for the community of students and early career people in accounting finance – held three discussions during the summer for subscribers that were focused on the skills needed for newly minted professionals.

Today’s podcast is a recording of the first seminar held by FEI Engage’s Olivia Berkman with Jeffrey Hales – Executive Director of the Global Sustainability Leadership Institute at University of Texas at Austin – regarding how finance and accounting skills need to adapt to a world that demands new financial reporting skills.

Special Guest: Jeffrey Hales, PhD.

Are You Ready For The SEC's Climate Disclosure Rule?

Financial Executives International — Wed, 22 Mar 2023 07:00:00 -0400

At the onset of the new year, the WSJ reported the SEC is “considering a softening of planned rules” while also highlighting the proposed 1% threshold, otherwise known as a bright-line test.

On this episode of the Financial Executives Podcast, we sit down with Maura Hodge, KPMG’s ESG Audit Leader, to get a better understanding of what the 1% disclosure threshold could mean for companies and their auditors as they prepare for the SEC’s final climate disclosure rule.

Download the Financial Education & Research Foundation Report on "How Corporate Finance is Preparing for Climate Disclosure & Best Practices" here

Special Guest: Maura Hodge.

Proxy Season is ESG Season

Financial Executives International — Wed, 01 Jun 2022 15:00:00 -0400

Shareholders have filed more ESG resolutions in 2022 than in all previous years, according to Morngingstar..

In this podcast we speak with Andrew Behar, CEO of the non-profit As You Sow, a shareholder advocacy non-profit that focuses on corporate social responsibility. We discuss the current proxy season and how accounting, auditing and financial disclosure practices fit into their approach to engaging with public companies.

Special Guest: Andrew Behar.

Episode 60: Sustainability Disclosure "Must Be Done" With Existing Rules

Financial Executives International — Thu, 14 Oct 2021 08:00:00 -0400

Financial executives in the US are waiting for a new set of rules focused on sustainability reporting that’s expected to come from the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission before the end of the year. That could mean a great deal of resources and time for the preparer community to adapt to any new standards.

But sustainability reporting doesn’t necessarily need to be laden with new rules and a lot can be accomplished within the existing frameworks. That’s the argument of David Pitt Watson, one of the leaders of the Climate Accounting Project: an informal group of finance and investment executives attempting to advance the ESG accounting and reporting dialogue out of the UK.

In this episode of the podcast we speak with Mr. Pitt Watson about his hopes for ESG reporting in the US, the usefulness of existing rules and the challenges of accounting and reporting carbon emissions.

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Special Guest: David Pitt-Watson.

Episode 44: Big Data and Sustainability Reporting

Financial Executives International — Thu, 29 Apr 2021 17:00:00 -0400

One of the big challenges for companies, as well as investors, when it comes to ESG is wrangling the data points that are important to every stakeholder and a relevant to the issue of sustainability.

In this episode of the podcast we speak with Rebeca Minguela, Founder and CEO of Clarity AI. Clarity AI uses big data and machine learning to tracks a broad universe of companies to measure sustainability metrics. In January BlackRock purchased a minority stake in the company and plans to integrate Clarity AI into its investment analytics platform.

We discuss the importance of disclosures, the challenges to standardized ESG data and why there is no turning back when it comes to sustainability reporting.

Thanks to the episode's sponsor, Deloitte.

Special Guest: Rebeca Minguela.

Episode 41: What Is Extinction Accounting?

Financial Executives International — Tue, 26 Jan 2021 12:00:00 -0500

Sustainability reporting is something that both financial statement preparers and investors have been discussing for years, and it’s expected to become even more of a hot button issue in the US as a new administration focused on climate change takes charge of capital markets oversight.

It’s fair to say that in Europe, the debate regarding ESG reporting practices is more evolved. There is already a movement to adopt a practice known as “extinction accounting” where companies report on the impact they have in biodiversity.

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Special Guest: Jill Atkins.

Episode 28: Measuring The True Value of ESG Reporting: Crowe Quarterly Insight

Financial Executives International — Fri, 08 Nov 2019 05:00:00 -0500

There is a push for more holistic measures of value than what sits on a company's bottom line. These efforts -- combined with increased concerns stemming from corporate scandals, climate change and social justice movements -- have increased the demand for environmental, social, and governance (ESG) reporting. FEI Daily sat down with two professionals focused on ESG reporting, Jeffrey Hales, chair of the Sustainability Accounting Standards Board (SASB) and professor of accounting at the University of Texas at Austin, and Gregg Anderson, managing director at Crowe and a member of the American Institute of Certified Public Accountants' Sustainability Task Force.

Special Guests: Gregg Anderson and Jeffrey Hales, PhD.