India’s Global Capability Centres (GCCs) are evolving from operational support hubs into strategic engines of enterprise value. In this thought-provoking ET GCC article, Suja Chandy explores how AI, data, and domain expertise can help GCCs move ESG beyond compliance, enabling organizations to measure real-world outcomes, strengthen accountability, and demonstrate the long-term value of sustainability investments across regulated industries.
Read the full article here: https://gcc.economictimes.indiatimes.com/news/opinion/unlocking-the-impact-multiplier-how-indias-gccs-drive-esg-value-creation/132658950
A few months ago, someone asked me, How do you know your ESG investments are actually creating a change?
It is a simple question, but an important one. And increasingly, it is the kind of question that India’s global capability centres (GCCs) are uniquely positioned to answer. For years, GCCs were recognised for delivering scale, efficiency and execution for global enterprises. That story has changed. Today, leading GCCs are becoming enterprise hubs for AI, data, engineering, risk and product innovation, contributing not just to operations but to strategy.
ESG impact measurement is one of the most significant opportunities in that shift. Across boardrooms, annual reports and investor discussions, sustainability has become a strategic priority for organisations operating in regulated industries, from banking and insurance to healthcare, energy and telecommunications. Yet many still grapple with one fundamental challenge: understanding whether their investments are creating meaningful, lasting outcomes.
As ESG evolves, the conversation is shifting from commitments to accountability, from activities to outcomes, and from reporting impact to proving it.
For regulated industries, this shift is especially significant because their influence extends far beyond their own operations. Banking offers perhaps the clearest example. Every lending decision influences economic growth. Every investment decision shapes industries. Every financial product has the potential to expand financial inclusion and build resilience. Banks do not simply participate in the economy but help shape it. The same principle applies across regulated sectors. Healthcare organisations influence patient outcomes. Utilities accelerate the energy transition. Telecommunications companies enable digital inclusion. Their decisions create ripple effects that extend well beyond business performance.
This is why sustainability has become a strategic business priority. Regulators, investors and customers increasingly recognise that climate, social and governance risks are business risks.
However, while most organisations can articulate their sustainability commitments and meet reporting requirements, far fewer can clearly demonstrate the long-term outcomes their efforts are creating.
Consider two organisations investing in community development. One reports the number of beneficiaries reached. The other understands whether educational outcomes improved, employability increased or financial resilience strengthened. Both invested resources. Only one truly measured impact.
That distinction matters because the future of ESG will be defined less by intention and more by evidence.
One of the biggest challenges in sustainability has always been fragmented data. Organizations struggle to connect investments with outcomes across multiple systems, stakeholders and time horizons. The issue is not simply whether data exists. It is whether data can be trusted, connected and interpreted in a way that supports better decisions.
AI can help bridge those gaps, but not on its own. The stronger opportunity lies in combining AI with governed data, domain expertise, clear measurement frameworks and human oversight. That combination is what turns fragmented data into meaningful insight and insight into accountability. This is where GCCs have a decisive role to play.
India’s advantage lies not only in its engineering talent but also in its ability to combine domain expertise, digital capability and innovation at scale. GCCs are already helping global organisations solve complex challenges spanning responsible AI, sustainability, governance and business transformation. The next frontier is applying that capability to impact measurement itself.
A GCC supporting a global bank, for example, can help connect lending data, customer outcomes, community programmes, climate-risk indicators and governance controls to create a clearer view of whether ESG investments are producing durable value. In healthcare, the same principle could apply to patient access and outcomes. In utilities, it could support the measurement of transition risk and energy resilience. In telecommunications, it could help assess digital inclusion beyond connectivity metrics.
At organisations like ours, I see the conversation gradually shifting from managing ESG initiatives to understanding outcomes. Whether the focus is responsible AI, employee development, technology innovation or community investment, success is increasingly measured by the value created and not the activities completed.
That is an important shift because what can be measured can be improved. And what can be improved can be scaled.
As leaders, we should move beyond viewing ESG as a reporting exercise. Instead, we should see it as a value creation discipline, one that connects strategy, investment and measurable outcomes with the same rigour we apply to financial performance. The organisations that will lead tomorrow will not simply be those with ambitious sustainability commitments. They will be the ones that can demonstrate, with evidence, how they create resilience, reduce risk and expand opportunity.
As AI, data and human expertise come together, India’s GCCs have an opportunity to become the architects of that capability, helping global enterprises understand not just what they invested, but what they changed.
That, to me, is the true impact multiplier.