Company reports based on the Guiding Principles Reporting Framework are not currently analyzed or graded by an official body, although the project team has begun comparing companies’ current human rights reporting to the Reporting Framework’s questions. This comparison will be available on this website.

The Reporting Framework is a product of the Human Rights Reporting and Assurance Frameworks Initiative (RAFI). The RAFI project team is now taking forward the second part of this initiative, to develop guidance on the assurance of human rights information. Practitioner consultations were held in June 2015, of which summary reports are publicly available. In light of these discussions, a first draft of guidance for assurance providers will be prepared for multi-stakeholder consultation in autumn 2015. This guidance should help both companies’ internal auditors as well as their external assurance providers assess the effectiveness of companies’ human rights-related policies and processes, and enable assurance providers to present more meaningful public opinions on companies’ human rights reporting than is often the case today.

Other ranking or benchmarking initiatives may choose to compare companies’ reports on the basis of the Reporting Framework. Since the Reporting Framework is the only reporting framework aligned with the global standard on business and human rights, comparisons of companies’ reports on human rights issues will be most meaningful if based on the questions in the Reporting Framework.