Small and medium-sized enterprises, for 8 out of 10 sustainability is an absolute priority

Listen to the audio version of the article

Paola of order sustainability. For 8 out of 10 small and medium-sized enterprises it is a top priority. Not only that, companies look positively to the future despite inflation, the energy crisis and what is happening in the international geopolitical scenario. This is what emerges from a survey carried out by the Observatory of Deloitte Private, on a sample of 300 small and medium-sized Italian companies. The companies interviewed, as the promoters underline, find themselves having to implement strategies aimed at monitoring a multiplicity of risks of different nature. “To deal with the impact of these external phenomena and continue to grow – it is underlined -, companies declare that in the short term it will be important to focus on certain actions, such as increasing sustainability initiatives and expanding the business ecosystem”.

Starting from the current scenario, Ernesto Lanzillo, Deloitte Private Leader remarks that «it is essential for Italian companies to adopt an approach that generates financial and organizational solidity and is able to meet stakeholder expectations even in difficult conditions. In an increasingly global and interdependent market, resorting to more sustainable business models and opening up to collaboration logics can represent the path to take in order to face the multiplicity of challenges underway. For SMEs, it is essential to oversee ESG standards and collaborate within virtuous ecosystems».

The survey: the G of Governance snubbed

The evidence from the survey confirms that sustainability has become an absolute priority for companies: around 8 out of 10 place it as a priority on their agenda (80%) or declare themselves convinced that sustainability allows for the preservation of corporate value (79%). enhancing the ability to adapt to environmental, social and economic changes.

Two-thirds of the companies interviewed attach great importance to all three areas (ESG) in which sustainability is declined (environmental, social and governance), however, giving greater priority to the S component (38%) and to the E component (33%), compared to the G component (22%).

These three dimensions are in fact the key areas on which companies are called to discuss with their suppliers, customers and more generally with the entire set of stakeholders of the ecosystem in which they operate, including banks and financial institutions. «To fully exploit the ecosystem logic also at the ESG strategy level, however, companies – argues Lanzillo – must adopt a less opportunistic and episodic and more systematic and structural approach, where relationships with other stakeholders assume greater continuity and a more strategic”.