Footprint and handprint: measuring both sides of a company’s impact

A company's impact is not only about the harm it creates or reduces. It is also about the positive change its products and services can enable. That is the distinction between footprint and handprint: footprint looks at negative impacts across a company's operations and value chain, while handprint captures the positive contribution of its business model (see Exhibit 1).

Historically, sustainability assessments focused on a company’s negative environmental impacts, like emissions, pollution and resource depletion – ie, its “footprint”. The handprint concept arose to provide balance by recognising when its activities – including products and services – proactively benefit climate, nature and people. Handprint is often associated with solutions that support environmental and social goals, including the UN Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) as shown in Exhibit 3.

Footprint and handprint are two sides of the same coin – determining the overall impact of a business on the world. Both are central to impact materiality assessments which underpin a growing number of regulatory frameworks.ⁱ

As we see transition solutions gain momentum as attractive long-term investments, handprint-oriented activities are increasingly aligned with structural growth themes like clean energy, sustainable agriculture, efficiency solutions and digital inclusion. Actively supporting the transition away from high emitters is central to sustainable, thematic and impact investing. Industry frameworks like the ICMA - Sustainable Finance Principles & guidance have helped strengthen the credibility and transparency of such approaches and facilitated use-of-proceed debt issuance via green bonds, social bonds and sustainability bonds.

Yet, a strong handprint alone is not sufficient. We need to recognise whether the achievement of positive impact overlooks significant negative impacts to assess appropriateness for inclusion in certain style funds.

We have built company profiles into our Sustainability Insights Engine (SusIE), as shown in Exhibit 3, which display a comprehensive range of metrics on separate footprint and handprint tabs, for example:

• Footprint metrics – controversy flags, individual factor scores from our PSSⁱⁱ (Proprietary Sustainability Scores), carbon and net-zero alignment KPIs, and a DNSH (Do No Significant Harm) assessment outcome.
• Handprint metrics – alignment with key taxonomies, sustainable investment classificationiii(according to our Proprietary Sustainable Investment Share), and SDG alignment shares with detailed positive contributions.

We believe that combining footprint and handprint into a single “net impact” assessment can obscure underlying opportunities and may not align with investor expectations. Investors need to be able to assess the magnitude of both the positive and negative impacts.

Footprint analysis and metrics have been the backbone of ESG approaches for a decade, with investors seeking to identify companies that are actively minimising or mitigating harm. Those reducing their footprints are often better positioned to manage risks, build resilience, and deliver long-term sustainable returns.

As the necessity and urgency to transition to a more resilient global economic model increases, we anticipate that more investors will push investee companies for clarification and measurement of their positive and negative impacts. The ability to reduce or mitigate footprint, while expanding handprint, is increasingly being aligned to value creation and protection, and we believe this is a hallmark of future-ready companies.

ⁱ For example Principal Adverse Impacts disclosure (for footprint and green taxonomies for handprint), and the EU Corporate Sustainability Reporting Directive (which integrates both)
ⁱⁱ Allianz Global Investors, ESG ratings - are they still relevant? 2026
ⁱⁱⁱ In accordance with our proprietary sustainable investment share – a KPI which assesses the share of company revenue that is tilted towards sustainable activities.