CorporateResponsibility.Net

Mandatory corporate social responsibility (CSR) reporting will become a reality for large firms operating in Denmark from next year, after the Danish government last month passed legislation requiring 1,100 of the country’s largest listed firms to include updates on CSR performance in their annual reports.

The new law was passed by an overwhelming majority of the Danish parliament, and while it will not oblige firms to to undertake CSR programmes they will have to disclose that they are failing to invest in CSR activities.

The new law is the latest move in a growing trend which has seen both France and UK pass similar legislation that has required firms to report on their social and environmental performance in some way since 2007. Read more

Source: Business Green

The number of large multinational companies reporting corporate responsibility (CR) data has risen dramatically over the last three years, with vast majority doing so because of ethical reasons, according to new research from KPMG.

Nearly three-quarters of the top 100 U.S. companies by revenue reported sustainability data this year, twice as many as three years ago, KPMG has found. Eighty percent of the world’s 250 biggest multinational companies divulge CR information, compared to 64 percent in 2005. Read more

Source: GreenBiz

How do you start ‘doing CSR’ at a university? Is there a need to have a clearly articulated CSR agenda and if so, how does it differ from the private sector?
Most corporations state that CSR is about having “a licence to operate”, it is about their “brand”, “reputation” and pushed forward by “stakeholder pressure”. While this may be true in the corporate sector, in the context of higher education this is not (yet!) the case.
On the contrary, one could argue that a university has positive CSR credentials by definition; an institution providing education, conducting valuable research,  promoting widening participation and life-long learning  can hardly be seen as a ‘bad guy’ who crudely aims to make profit whilst neglecting its stakeholders. Mitigating our negative environmental impact is far easier than that of for example an oil company. Moreover, most people don’t even perceive universities as corporations.
So why is it necessary to pursue and further develop a CSR programme? To start with, a university is a corporation in the sense that it does need to have a positive bottom line. It needs to be able to sell its product (education) to customers (students) and be competitive in the marketplace (other universities), attractive as a workplace to retain high quality staff (both support and academic) and, it has a significant role through its buying power (procurement). Academic excellence increasingly unites policy-makers, businesses and other organisations. At the end of the day, we either gain or lose in the global competition over high calibre students.
The way I see it, CSR has two main purposes in the university context. First, it enables the institution to develop a structured and economically viable approach on issues around social and environmental responsibility. Universities are intriguingly complex institutions with multiple organisational cultures within them. This means that there are often fairly autonomous pockets, such as schools (in our university there are seven schools), departments, committees, working groups…etcetera. It is, therefore, very important that there is an overarching institutional framework and a clear sense of direction of how to develop our role in the society as one entity.
Second, it is a commonly acknowledged issue that universities are good at drafting policies and committing themselves to them but when it comes to actions, it can suddenly get quiet.  Through CSR we can initiate a transformation process within the institution. CSR is actually a tool that allows us to reflect on our identity as an institution and what we aspire to be. In a constructive way, it makes us revisit our core purpose and our values and ensures that we walk our talk.
So what does developing CSR actually mean?
CSR is about taking actions. Building up a CSR programme is about implementation.  CSR is also about engaging people in the work/study place. In our university there are around 24 000 students and more than 2000 staff. I firmly believe that they want to identify with the organisation they work or study with and, they want to be proud of it. If an institution places any value on that, a holistic, action focused CSR programme is needed.
Anne Raudaskoski
The writer works with the University of Westminster as a CSR Research & Development Officer and is a member of The Sustainability Writers Network (TSWN).

The public demand for stories about the caring, sharing side of investment bankers is unlikely to be huge right now, writes Adam Jones in the Financial Times.

“But bankers aren’t necessarily the only turn-off in ‘caring capitalism’ ventures these days. I’ve been wondering for a while whether tougher economic conditions will lead to a broader backlash against the CSR industry on the grounds of cost.” Read more

Source: Financial Times

Communications professionals from around the world want to raise the profile of their organisations’ corporate social responsibility (CSR) efforts by beefing up communications and backing stand-alone CSR departments, MarketingCharts reports.

In a poll by Ragan Communications and PollStream, some 70% of the 439 respondents indicated that their companies practice and communicate CSR. 43% would like to increase their CSR programmes, for various reasons: some 40% say it would improve employee engagement, 50% say it would enhance PR and corporate image, 7% hope to grow sales and 4% want to attract new employees. Read more

Source: Marketing Charts

RWE npower, one of largest utility companies in the UK, published its latest Corporate Responsibility Report not so long ago:

2007 RWE npower Corporate Responsibility Report

by Robert Barnard-Weston, 2008

So, once again, we’re in an economic downturn. After almost twenty years in Corporate  Responsibility (CR), I’ve seen several of these already and they always seem to trigger the same response among corporate leaders. Those who are not doing anything decisive in CR tend to defer any plans they may have had while they wait for the economic climate to improve. Those who are already doing something have a habit of curtailing their CR activities or cancelling them altogether.

What this clearly demonstrates is that CR is seen by most as a luxury, a ‘nice to have’ element of their corporate tactics. It is a cost that cannot be justified when the economic going gets tough, since it doesn’t yield a worthwhile return on investment (ROI).

There are two very important issues here that corporate leaders ignore at their peril:

1. Under company law in most industrialised countries, a prime requirement of senior executives is that they provide maximum returns for their investors. Therefore, those who have been operating CR programmes while knowing ROI was shaky or non-existent have been breaking the law.

2. CR programmes, appropriately designed, implemented and managed, can be extremely powerful and reliable profit and shareholder value boosters. Astonishingly, very few business leaders seem to realise this.

So, the conclusions from these facts, particularly in an economic downturn, are clear: if your CR programme is not commercially successful, end it now or make changes so that it becomes commercially successful. If you don’t have a CR programme, now is a very good time to launch one if it can add profits and shareholder value.

There are three essential, inter-related disciplines required to make CR improve your financial numbers:

a. appropriate CR strategy

b. integrated communication

c. dedicated measurement systems

An Appropriate CR Strategy is one that is aligned completely with the overarching  corporate strategy. It does not require (indeed, it should avoid) trite vision statements and homilies from the Chairman at the front of the Annual Report. It requires a clear understanding of precisely what the organisation exists to achieve and careful articulation for all stakeholders of what CR can contribute to that achievement.

Integrated CR Communication differs from most communication programmes that we have seen in that it combines several core characteristics:

· It brings to bear both interpersonal and artefact-based communications

· It makes full use of both internal and external communications

· It is dialogue-based, not monologue-based

· It is iterative – building over time to achieve metamorphic performances

All four of these criteria must be met for integrated CR communications systems to deliver their benefits. When they do, the results can be staggering in their potency.

A Dedicated CR Measurement System provides a means of bringing together tangible and intangible benefits, quantitative and qualitative analysis, into a cohesive, easily understood picture which shows clearly the financial benefits that a CR programme has activated.

For the system to deliver optimal results, all three of the above disciplines need to be deployed simultaneously in a ‘tuned whole’. CR strategy alone tends to be seen as empty promises, lacking substance; CR communications without strategy and measurement is meaningless; and the best measurement systems are of no use if there’s nothing to measure.

The ‘tuned whole’ that results from appropriate design and delivery of an integrated CR strategy, communication and measurement system can be likened to a highly trained athlete. The athlete needs to be laser-focused on the goal in mind: no amount of fitness wins the gold medal if you veer away from the racetrack. All the body’s organs need to be in the best of health – if any one of them fails, the whole system goes down – and dialogue between the heart, the lungs and the other organs needs to fast, accurate and complete. Finally, we need to know when we’ve achieved our goals – for every event, there’s a finishing line at a carefully measured distance from the starting blocks.

Pass that finishing line first and you win gold for everyone concerned.

The author, Robert Weston lives with in Bath, England. He has been a CSR consultant, writer, speaker and facilitator for fifteen years. He holds degrees in Philosophy and in Responsibility and Business Practice; he has also co-launched the UK farmers’ markets movement, Bath’s first eco-hotel and five children. His clients include a wide range of high-profile corporations, along with numerous NGOs, government departments, national governments and supragovernmental organisations.
You can e-mail him at: robert@organismics.org or call him on +44 7074 661166
You can write to him at the following address:
Bloomfield House,
146, Bloomfield Road,
Bath. BA2 2AS, UK

Anticipating the release by the Royal Bank of Scotland of its 2007 Corporate Responsibility Report, a coalition of NGOs are criticising the bank for funding fossil fuel developments in various parts of the world.

RBS’ report isn’t published until Friday (11 June), but Friends of the Earth Scotland, People & Planet, Platform, BankTrack and Scottish Education and Action for Development have already taken the bank to task for ploughing an estimated $6bn (£3bn) into oil companies and “heavily contested fossil fuel projects”.

The NGOs expect the report to focus on the bank’s $2-4bn loans to renewables projects, but says its investments in fossil fuel projects negate any claims the bank makes about its environmental stance. Read more

Source: Business Green

Vodafone plc published its 2007/08 Vodafone Corporate Responsibility Report recently:

2007/08 Vodafone Corporate Responsibility Report

Source: ReportAlert.info