The Sustainability Illusion: Big Promises, Tiny Teams, and Fashion’s Scope 3 Crisis

The Sustainability Illusion: Big Promises, Tiny Teams, and Fashion’s Scope 3 Crisis

When we began work on The True State of Sustainability 2025, we expected frustration, tight budgets and cautious optimism. What surprised us was how fragile the whole system has become.

After interviews with more than 450 sustainability leaders, one statistic stopped us in our tracks: most teams remain microscopic. Around two-thirds reported having three or fewer full-time employees, and many operate with just one person.

That single person is often expected to deliver a company’s entire Net Zero transition: collecting and validating data from hundreds of suppliers, navigating evolving regulations, training colleagues and sustaining organisational momentum. For a challenge of that scale, this level of resourcing is untenable.

Imagine a retailer in the 1990s announcing a move from physical to digital and assigning one person to make it happen. It sounds absurd — yet the same under-resourcing persists across sustainability teams today.

Another stark finding: only 11% of leaders believe they will meet their targets. While depressing, that figure also signals realism. Many sustainability professionals clearly see the scale of the problem and understand that more pledges or prettier dashboards won’t deliver the emissions reductions needed.

For years, organisations have too often confused activity with progress. An industry has grown around measurement and disclosure — glossy reports, dashboards and compliance filings — but not necessarily around actual emissions reduction.

Fashion’s Scope 3 problem is a perfect example: up to 95% of a brand’s emissions typically sit outside its direct control, spread across suppliers, mills, logistics partners and raw-material sources. Yet the default response has been to expand reporting regimes. We’ve normalised an audit culture where success is judged by how much data you collect, rather than how much carbon you cut.

At the core is misallocation. Many sustainability functions are structured like small compliance teams — designed to tick boxes rather than to drive measurable change. Budgets are under pressure (62% said theirs fell last year), while remits balloon (72% reported expansion). Teams cover more ground with fewer hands and are still expected to "be more strategic."

Surprisingly, only 19% of teams use AI regularly despite widespread pain around reporting. Concerns about AI’s environmental footprint are legitimate, but rejecting useful tools outright can trap teams in manual, inefficient processes that waste human time. AI will not replace the human skills of influence, negotiation and storytelling — but used carefully it can automate reporting, clean messy supplier data and flag compliance risks, freeing people for strategy and supplier engagement.

We are not in the boom years for sustainability. With economic and political headwinds likely to persist for several years, most teams should not expect significant headcount increases: 67% expect no additional staff, and 91% are being pushed into areas beyond their expertise.

A practical, emerging model

Given these constraints, teams must do more with less and work differently. A leaner, more flexible model is emerging — one that suits the seasonal and project-based nature of sustainability work. Key elements include:

• A small, empowered core team that reports directly to the C-suite rather than being buried in middle management.
• Fractional expertise on demand for specialist tasks such as life-cycle assessments, Scope 3 modelling or biodiversity, avoiding unsustainable full-time hires.
• Disciplined use of AI to automate repetitive tasks, tidy datasets and highlight risks, freeing human capacity for high-value engagement and strategy.

We are already seeing this approach deliver results at large retailers and brands: small teams producing outsized outcomes by combining an empowered internal core, trusted external specialists and targeted automation.

At Leafr, that shift is measurable: over the past 12 months the platform recorded a 300% increase in project volume as companies hire specialists who can measure, design and reduce emissions effectively. Underneath the compliance grind, a steadier rhythm is forming — one built on competence, collaboration and execution.

The conversation remains focused on ambition, but the work is finally catching up. Less stage-ready rhetoric, more supplier calls and spreadsheet-driven delivery: that practical change is reason for cautious optimism.

Gus Bartholomew is co-founder of Leafr, the world’s largest marketplace for independent sustainability consultants. He argues the future of sustainability is agile: lean internal teams driving strategy, supported by world-class specialists on demand.