For a short guided walkthrough of the Double Materiality Assessment feature in Position Green  check out this product course.

TABLE OF CONTENTS

• Introduction
  • Way of Working
    • Login and Enter
  • Start mapping the results
  • Use a ready-made template
  • Organizational Units
• Impact Materiality
  • Assessment of impact
  • File upload
  • Materiality
• Financial Materiality
  • Assessment of risk and opportunities 
  • File upload
  • Materiality
  • Additional comments, attachments and collaborations
  • Custom Matter
  • Saving and Completing
  • The DMA results

Introduction

The Double Materiality Assessment is a regulatory framework containing a set number of Sustainability Matters. These Matters can be ways in which your organization impacts its environment (Impact Materiality), or they can be ways in which your organization’s finances are impacted (Financial Materiality). For ease, it can be helpful to think of Impact Materiality in terms of inside-out influence and Financial Materiality as outside-in.

Then, there is Double Materiality when a Sustainability Matter influences in both directions. In other words, a Sustainability Matter with both Impact Materiality and Financial Materiality for your organization has Double Materiality for you.   

Finally, there will likely be Sustainability Matters which are completely Non-Material to your organization or the world it inhabits. 

The Assessment itself lay in determining whether each Sustainability Matter has Impact Materiality, Financial Materiality, Double Materiality, or is Non-Material to your organization.

Way of Working

Now, let’s go over how you’ll complete your Double Materiality Assessment in the Position Green Platform. 

Login and Enter

Start by logging in at https://controlling.positiongreen.com/ 

Login using your company email and click Continue.

In the side menu, click Double Materiality Assesssment beneath ESRS:

The first step is finding out whether your organization has completed a Double Materiality Assessment (DMA) before. Your answer here is important because it cannot be undone, so make sure you have your ducks in a row before going further. 

If you have completed a DMA outside of Position Green before, simply dig up the results from your previous Assessment and click “Start mapping the results”. You’ll then go straight to a results page where you can enter your existing results. 

If you have not completed a DMA before, just click “Use a ready-made template”, and proceed to your very first Double Materiality Assessment.

Start mapping the results

Please select "Impact", "Financial" or "Not material" for each matter. You also have the option of adding one or several custom matters by clicking Custom Matter in the upper right corner of the page.

Use a ready-made template

After filling out some financial organizational information you can get started on filling out the DMA by selecting a sustainability matter to the left, such as "Pollution".

For each sustainability matter, you will be asked to register the actual and potential, negative and positive impacts your company has on the environment and people, as well as the risks and opportunities the sustainability matter may pose for you. See how to conduct your impact and financial materiality below. For each sustainability matter, you are able to register multiple impacts, risks and opportunities. 

Organizational Units

DMAs are usually conducted on the top level for the whole organization, if this is the case then no organizational unit needs to be picked from the dropdown list for each impact, risk/opportunity. If there is a specific impact, risk/opportunity that only applies to a specific part of the organization, e.g. a factory close to a water stream with a risk of water pollution, then that specific org. unit should be added in the first section on the top left side of the menu (if not part of the org. structure already) and chosen from the dropdown list for that specific impact, risk/opportunity.

Under the section Organizational Units, you can review all the org units that already exist in your setup and organizational tree previously. 

If you want to conduct your assessment on a specific org unit or business segment that is not found in the list, then you can simply press on + Org. Unit to add a new one. Keep in mind that these will appear in your organizational tree and can be used for data reporting at a later stage. 

Impact Materiality

Now we will cover a bit more on how to begin registering your impact(s) related to the sustainability matter.

• Organizational unit
  • If the impact refers to a specific organizational unit (such as a subsidiary, factory, geography, etc.) please specify which. If the impact refers to the whole organization, leave this section blank.
    
• Name of sub-sub topic
  • You have the option of categorizing your impact into a sub-sub-topic.
    
• Impact Title
  • Input what you would like to call this impact. This should be kept short and refer to the impact description below!
    
• Impact description
  • Describe your organization’s impact on the environment and people related to this sustainability matter. Remember that your whole value chain should be kept in mind! Don’t forget to describe how your organization’s activities and/or business relationships and value chain contribute to this impact. 
  • This description should focus on your impact, not activities or mitigating efforts in place to mitigate or manage your impact.
    
• Information source
  • Describe how you have learned about this impact. This can be through an internal or external expert, report, study or internal documentation, for example. Have you learned about it from multiple sources? Include all of them!
    
•  Affected stakeholder
  • Choose which stakeholder group(s) are most affected by this impact. More than one stakeholder group can be chosen. The options include:
    
    • End users or customers
      
    • Natural environment
      
    • Own workforce
      
    • Workers in the value chain
      
    • Affected communities
      
• Value chain direction
  • Choose where in your value chain this impact occurs. The options include upstream value chain, own operations and downstream value chain. Choose all that apply.
    • Keep in mind that certain impacts will occur in multiple steps of the value chain, but may not be as severe in all steps. Consider if they should be split into several impacts.
      
• Value chain position
  • Multiple positions for each value chain step can be chosen.
    
    • The value chain positions for each value chain direction can be customized for your company with the help of Position Green.
      
• Actual or potential impact
  • Choose if the impact is actual or potential.
    
    • An actual impact is an impact that the organization currently has, either through its own operations or its value chain, for example, waste from packaging.
      
    • A potential impact is an impact that the organization may have, either through its own operations or its value chain.
      
• Positive or negative impact
  • Choose if the impact is negative or positive.
    
  • If the impact is negative, you will have the option to describe how your company mitigates this impact as well as upload relevant documentation under Company mitigation.
    
•  Human rights relevance
  
  • Select if the impact is related to human rights. 
    
    • This will impact the scoring of the impact, as for human rights-related impacts severity is prioritized over likelihood.
      
• Future materiality
  
  • You are able to choose the level of materiality you suspect the impact will have in the future.
    
    • This can be helpful as the double materiality assessment should be reviewed every year.
      
• Time horizon
  
  • Choose the expected time horizon of the impact. More than one-time horizon can be selected.
    
    • Short-term: Within the reporting period
      
    • Medium-term: The reporting period - five years
      
    • Long-term: Greater than five years
      
• Direct or indirect impact
  
  • Select if the impact is related to your company's own operations (direct) or related to its business relationships (indirect).
    

Assessment of impact

• Assessed by
  
  • Write in who has assessed the impact.
    
• Assessment sourcing
  
  • Describe what sources of information were used in your assessment of the severity of impact (scale, scope and remediability) as well as likelihood. 
    
• Impact Scale
  
  • For negative impact:
    
    • Choose how grave the impact is.
      
  • For positive impact:
    
    • Choose how much the impact contributes to sustainable development.
      
• Impact Scope
  
  • Choose how widespread the impact is. Choose based on the most relevant affected stakeholder group.
    
• Remediability
  
  • For negative impacts only, you will be asked to choose how easy or difficult it is to reverse the effect of the impact.
    
• Likelihood
  
  • Choose the likelihood of the impact occurring.
    • For actual impacts, the only option will be 100%.

File upload

Upload any documentation your organization has related to the impact assessed or the assessment itself. 

Materiality

Based on your assessment of the impact, it will be deemed as material or not.

Add additional impacts related to the sustainability matter. Keep in mind that there will more often than not be multiple impacts for each sustainability matter.

Financial Materiality

• Organizational unit
  • If the risk/opportunity refers to a specific organizational unit (such as a subsidiary, factory, geography, etc.) please specify which. If the risk/opportunity refers to the whole organization, leave this section blank.
• Name of impact
  • Input what you would like to call this risk/opportunity. This should be kept short and refer to the risk/opportunity description below!
• Impact description
  • Describe your organization’s risk/opportunity related to the sustainability matter. Remember that your whole value chain should be kept in mind! Don’t forget to describe what the key drivers are of this risk/opportunity and what the consequences are. 
• Information source
  • Describe how you have learned about this risk/opportunity. This can be through an internal or external expert, report, study or internal documentation, for example. Have you learned about it from multiple sources? Include all of them!
• Risk or opportunity
  • Choose if it is a risk or an opportunity.
• Value chain direction
  • Choose where in your value chain this risk/opportunity occurs. The options include upstream value chain, own operations and downstream value chain. Choose all that apply.
    • Keep in mind that certain risks/opportunities will occur in multiple steps of the value chain, but may not be as large in all steps. Consider if they should be split into several risks/opportunities.
• Time horizon
  • Choose the expected time horizon of the risk/opportunity. More than one time horizon can be selected.
    • Short-term: Within the reporting period
    • Medium-term: The reporting period - five years
  • Long-term: Greater than five years
• Future materiality
  • You are able to choose the level of materiality you suspect the risk/opportunity will have in the future. 
    • This can be helpful as the double materiality assessment should be reviewed every year.
• Ownership
  • Choose who has control of the risk/opportunity depending on if it is direct or indirect. If it is indirect, choose the most relevant step in the value chain.

Assessment of risk and opportunities 

• Assessed by
  
  • Write in who has assessed the risk/opportunity.
    
• Assessment Rationale
  
  • Describe what sources of information were used in your assessment of the size and likelihood of the financial effect.
    
• Size of the Financial Effect
  
  • Choose the expected magnitude of the financial effect of the risk/opportunity.
    
  • This depends on the Net Asset Value described above.
    
• Likelihood of the Financial Effect
  
  • Choose the likelihood of the risk or opportunity occurring.
    
• Mitigations/procedures/policies already in place
  
  • If your organization is currently taking any steps to offset your risk or take on your opportunity, describe it here.
    
• Mitigations/procedures/policies proposed
  
  • If your organization has any proposed steps to offset your risk or take on your opportunity, describe it here. Include if it is preventative or reactive actions.

File upload

Upload any documentation your organization has related to the impact assessed or the assessment itself. 

Materiality

Based on your assessment of the risk/opportunity, it will be deemed as material or not.

Add additional risks/opportunities related to the sustainability matter. Keep in mind that there will more often than not be multiple risks/opportunities for each sustainability matter.

Additional comments, attachments and collaborations

For each sustainability matter, you will have the option to add comments and attachments as well as invite other people within your organization to collaborate on the materiality assessment of that topic. If you feel unsure about a particular sustainability matter, its related impacts, risks and opportunities, or the assessment of these, we recommend inviting someone to collaborate!

There is also an activity log that describes everything that has been done relating to that sustainability matter’s materiality assessment.

Custom Matter

If you want to assess on matters other than the ones provided as default you simply click on Create New Matter to add your own.

Saving and Completing

All information and data is saved continuously while the DMA is being filled out as indicated by the Saved icon in the upper right corner.

Once you have completed the materiality assessment of a certain matter, don’t forget to confirm this completion.

Realized that you have missed an impact, risk or opportunity or would like to adjust something? Just press Revert.

When all the Sustainability Matters in the list have been completed, your Double Materiality Assessment will be finished!

The DMA results

Have you completed your double materiality assessment or are curious about the results so far? Click on See DMA results under Sustainability Matters.

Here, you will find an overview of the Sustainability Matters. If you have completed the materiality assessment of that matter, you will be able to see if it is material from an impact or financial perspective, or both. Remember that it is enough for the matter to be material out of one perspective for it to be material for you to report on!

You will also see the ESRS Topical Standard that it relates to, its ESG category, and which Disclosure Requirements are material for you to report on based on the results of the assessment. 

Also, you will see if the Disclosures are added to your Setup or not. Keep in mind that you have to have completed your double materiality assessment to add any Disclosures. Once they have been added your Position Green Team will continue the Onboarding process to prepare you for the disclosure reporting. 

Lastly, on the ESRS Hub page, you can get a good overview of your Double Materiality Assessment progress by looking at the bar chart to the left: