The Spreadsheet Ceiling: How ESG Consultancies Scale Without Adding Headcount

Every new client should not mean another spreadsheet

Most sustainability consultancies run on the same model. A new client signs, someone copies last year’s best workbook, adapts the tabs, loads a fresh set of emission factors and starts emailing for data. It works. It is how most of the first CSRD and VSME projects were delivered.

The problem is what happens at client number fifteen. Each workbook has drifted from the template in its own way. Each client has its own thread of unanswered data requests. And the hours that go into keeping all of it running are hours the client is not really paying for. The model does not fail. It stops scaling, and the ceiling arrives sooner than most practices expect.

That ceiling matters more now than it did two years ago, because the market for ESG advisory work is changing shape.

The market is moving towards more, smaller engagements

The Omnibus I Directive narrowed the CSRD considerably. It now applies to EU companies with more than 1,000 employees and more than €450 million in net turnover. Fewer companies are in scope, assurance stays at the limited level, and most newly covered companies prepare their first report for financial year 2027.

At the same time, demand for sustainability data from smaller companies has not gone away. It has become standardised. The voluntary standard for SMEs – VS, formerly VSME – is now a delegated regulation, and from financial year 2027 the value chain cap limits what a CSRD company can require from suppliers with up to 1,000 employees to what that standard contains. For a large number of mid-sized companies, VS has just become the default answer to every customer questionnaire.

For a consultancy, that means more clients with smaller, more repeatable engagements: a VS report for a supplier this year, perhaps a fuller ESRS scope for a larger client next year. The fee per client goes down, so the fixed effort per client starts to decide whether the work is profitable at all.

Where the hours actually go

Ask a sustainability consultant what they are paid for, and the answer is materiality judgement, target-setting and strategy. Ask where their week goes, and the answer is usually different. Three costs account for most of the gap.

• One workbook per client. Custom calculators break as data volumes grow, and no two clients’ files look the same. Quality depends on who built the sheet, and reviewing someone else’s workbook takes almost as long as building one.
• Chasing data. Invoices, meter readings, HR figures and supplier answers arrive by email, in different formats, often late. Following up is unbillable, repetitive and impossible to delegate cleanly when it lives in personal inboxes.
• Audit exposure. Assurance applies to CSRD reports, and VS data is increasingly checked by the customers who request it. A copied cell or an outdated emission factor in a client’s workbook becomes the consultant’s problem, and a spreadsheet rarely records who changed what, or why.

None of these costs grows linearly. Ten clients do not create ten times the chasing of one client. They create ten different chasing processes, each with its own conventions and its own history.

What belongs on a platform, and what stays with the consultant

The answer is not to automate the consultant out of the engagement. Clients hire advisers for judgement, and software does not make a materiality call or defend a transition plan in front of a board. The answer is to separate the work that is the same for every client from the work that is not.

The repeatable part belongs in a shared system – this is the part Planmark is built to take over:

• Data intake from ERP exports, spreadsheets and invoices, mapped to the right reporting requirements
• Emission factor matching and Scope 1–3 calculations
• Structured data requests to the client’s teams, sites and suppliers, with reminders that do not depend on someone remembering to send them
• Version history and source documents on every figure
• A guided double materiality assessment, with scores, justifications and stakeholder input recorded in place
• Report output for VS and ESRS from the same data

The judgement stays with the consultant. The double materiality assessment is a good example: the process runs in Planmark, but the consultant guides it – facilitating stakeholder input, challenging the scores and standing behind the conclusions. The same goes for targets and transition plans, stakeholder engagement, and the client relationship itself. When the repeatable part is handled once, centrally, the consultant’s methodology becomes reusable too. A materiality framework or a sector template built for one client becomes the starting point for the next, rather than a file that has to be found and adapted.

This also changes how a client grows. A company that starts with VS does not need a new tool, a new workbook or a data migration when it later needs a double materiality assessment or a fuller ESRS scope. The data it has already collected carries forward.

Questions to ask before choosing a platform for your practice

Most ESG software is built for a single company reporting on itself. A consultancy has different requirements, and it is worth testing them before committing:

• Does the vendor compete with you? Some platforms sell consulting alongside the software. Clients you bring onto the platform should stay your clients.
• Who owns the client data? The answer should be the client, with your access tied to the engagement and every change logged.
• Can the client work in the platform too? The most efficient split is often for the client to enter its own Scope 1 and 2 data while you handle Scope 3 and the analysis.
• Are the roles right? Consultant, client owner, data contributor and auditor need different access, and an auditor should be able to follow a figure back to its source without asking you for a spreadsheet.
• Can you reuse your own methodology? Your frameworks and templates are part of what makes your practice distinctive. They should be saved once and reused, not rebuilt.
• Does it cover the whole path? VS, CSRD and ESRS, double materiality, EU Taxonomy and GHG Protocol carbon accounting on the same data, so a growing client never has to start again.

How Planmark works with consultancies

Planmark is an ESG platform built to be used by sustainability consultancies as well as the companies they advise. It has no in-house consulting arm, so the clients you bring stay yours, and each client owns its own data. What a practice gets is one audit-ready workspace for every client’s carbon accounting, VS and CSRD reporting, double materiality and EU Taxonomy work:

• One platform from VS to CSRD. Start a client on VS reporting and grow them into CSRD, double materiality and EU Taxonomy without migrating data or changing tools.
• AI does the data work. Import ERP exports, spreadsheets and invoices; AI maps them to the right requirements and flags gaps. You can also ask questions about your data in plain language with Data Explorer.
• Automated data requests. Send structured requests to your clients’ teams, sites and suppliers, and let Planmark’s automation chase what hasn’t come back.
• Clear roles and a full audit trail. Consultant, client owner, data contributor and auditor roles, with every datapoint keeping its source and change history.
• Reusable methodology. Save your own frameworks and sector templates once and reuse them for every new client.
• Double materiality assessment. A guided DMA across all ESRS topics: value chain scope, stakeholder consultation log, IRO scoring with justifications, and a finished materiality matrix and list of disclosure requirements, documented for limited assurance.
• EU Taxonomy. A step-by-step assessment from eligible activities and financial data to the turnover, CapEx and OpEx KPIs and a completed Article 8 disclosure table for the sustainability report.
• Carbon accounting to the GHG Protocol. Scope 1, 2 and 3 emissions calculated from activity data, with emission factors matched automatically.

A partner dashboard showing every client’s reporting status, open data requests and deadlines in one view is coming soon.

Getting started takes about two weeks. A partner call maps your client base and service model, we set up your workspace and walk your team through it, and your first client starts from their existing spreadsheets with our team supporting the project. From there, you add clients and reuse your templates as the practice grows. Planmark is already used for reporting by companies across the Nordics, with support in Finnish, Swedish and English.

If you run an advisory practice, read more about the partner model, roles and onboarding on our Planmark for consultants page.