Adam Burns
Adam Burns:
Hello and welcome toMeetTheBoss TV. I’m Adam Burns and in this week’s program: how to be a goodcorporate citizen and win at business.
Corporate socialresponsibility has a noble heritage, but what of its future? These are awkwardtimes. Cash is tight, and unemployment is running high. Do companies have timeto make with the nice? I don’t think I’m spoiling the program ahead if I sayyes. Coming up are some very persuasive and very solid business arguments forsocial awareness from this week’s panel of experts.
They will also bediscussing how to measure the impact of your good work, the rise ofvolunteerism, and core ideas for solid strategies.
But first, here’s Karen Bergin in defense of corporate citizenship today.
Karen Bergin:
If you make thedecision to cut sustainability because it’s a line item you think you can’tafford I think that’s short term thinking in my personal opinion and theproblem is that once you stop activity it takes a number of years forreputations to change. It takes a numberof years for programs to kick in and make a difference. So it’s a short term solution because chancesare in two or three years when you have more budget you may want to reinstatethat line.
The second point isthat employees who are all of our greatest ambassadors expect organizations tohave strong sustainability and a corporate social responsibility or citizenshipcampaigns and certainly at Microsoft we’re seeing that both in terms fromemployees that we already have and those that we’re trying to recruit. People expect – particularly younger peopleare expecting us to be strong advocates, strong leaders and good corporatecitizens, part of which is having a strong sustainability campaign.
Adam Burns:
Good stuff. Now:metrics. Because I know it’s not a proper business practice unless you canmeasure it. The problem inherent with social programs is that they are largelyqualitative. You can measure activities,but the real interest is in impact and, ultimately, in outcomes. With that inmind, what would our panel say are their most valuable metrics?
Karen Bergin:
We have three successmetrics for corporate citizenship. Thefirst is reporting an impact, second is employee feedback and the third isexecutive score cards ...
Bo Miller:
We tend to be a largeemployer in a relatively small community in most of the communities around theworld where we operate. We also operatevery large chemical and plastic processing plants that have significant capitalinvolved, and literally billions of dollars invested. And we look to our communities for ouremployees, for our local suppliers, and even though we’re in a highly regulatedindustry, at the end of the day, our license to operate comes from our communities...
We also then have avery specific way we go about measuring our favorability, our acceptance inthat community, and then we set about developing a community success plan, thatwhile it does include philanthropy, it also includes our volunteerism, ourengagement of our senior leadership in that community, our local purchasingpractices, and all those other kinds of elements that really make up what thelocal citizens see of Dow in their community. We measure against the limitation of those success plans, and then,about on a three-year cycle, we’ll come back and then we’ll re-measure thecommunity acceptance scores...
Karen Bergin:
we run a poll, ananonymous poll around the world every year in all of our 109 subsidiaries andwe ask employees a whole host of different questions. One is which is, “How do you valueMicrosoft’s involvement to the local community?” Every year we think that number can’t get anyhigher and every year it does get higher. So it’s an important way for us to measure it.
Michael Dupee:
So volunteerism we trackat a gross hourly level but we dig into the detail on that in two ways. One would be how many hours does the averageemployee volunteer. So instead of eachperson looking at an aggregate number they can personalize it tothemselves. Then the percentage ofpeople participating.
So we want thatparticipation in that program to spread out across the company and not just bea select group of people ...
Karen Bergin:
The third area isexecutive score cards. So we have scorecards in place for any executive above the level of general manager. As part of the metrics on that score card isalignment to our citizenship activities ...
Adam Burns:
One of the mostinteresting things about corporate social responsibility today is howenlightened your staff are. They want to help, but perhaps they don’t know how.The potential for a win-win is both enormous and multi-layered. Here’s AllysonPeerman of AMD to explain how they have benefitted community and company...
Allyson Peerman:
... just in Januaryof this year, we rolled out a whole new initiative called Community Corps, andit’s a skills-based volunteerism initiative, meaning that each AMD employee inthe world is required to have a personal development plan to look at kind ofwhat some of the skill sets that they need and how they would go aboutachieving those. So, we worked veryclosely with the human resources department, and now all employees around theworld can say, “Gee, I need to have this particular skill.” Maybe it’s public speaking, maybe it’sbudgeting, maybe it’s working on a team, and we can help place them with anonprofit organization, where they will not only gain that skill but dosomething good in the process. And thenwhatever they learn there, they certainly bring right back into the company, soit’s a benefit for AMD, as well.
Adam Burns:
Not wanting to labourthe point, but there is a very clear benefit to volunteerism even beyond theskillsets that staff bring back. It’s incredible value, in every sense...
Allyson Peerman:
... a lot of what wecontribute is in the human capital, if you will, and not just what wecontribute in dollars and cents.
Adam Burns:
One of our keynoteinterviewees this week is Stan Litow, vice president of corporate citizenshipand corporate affairs for IBM. On taking the role, he is quoted as saying:“When I got to IBM, the sense was that in the corporate philanthropy area, inparticular, they lacked focus. While the company was spending a lot of money,it didn’t have a strategic element attached to it.” How important is thatstrategic element to out panel of experts, and how does it work within theirorganizations?
Henry Dornell:
Well, I think thatelement is critical because it really serves to help make decisions, and theright decisions and consistent decisions.
Our focus is onunder-served needs in our communities, very similar to our general corporatefocus, which is on unmet needs for various therapeutic interests in each of thethree areas that I described. Scienceeducation: There’s a strategy there. We’re a science-based organization, in fact avery, very sophisticated science-based organization, and it’s important to usthat we secure the workforce of the future.
So, engaging withschools and whatnot to help further and actually improve the quality ofeducation in science has mutual benefit. Community involvement: It is ourright to operate that we give back to the community in a very, very tangibleway, and that comes all the way from our senior most executives in the company. That’s the philosophy.
Ralph Reid:
We did studies, andpeople would say, “Sprint is a great company. They do a lot.” But when you askthe question, “What do you do?” “Oh, I don'tknow, but they do a lot.”
And so we took thatsame point at IBM. We had to look atit’s good to be known for being good, but at the same time, you need to bestrategic. You want to be known forsomething, and I know if we had questioned enough people, somebody – you mayhave found two people in a row that said, “Oh, it’s education,” orwhatever.
But the reality, ourCEO on the executive lead team was a new CEO, and he said, “Ralph, they’retelling me that we’re great. We’re agreat company, but no one can tell us what we’re great at.” So we had to embark on the process that IBMis on and said, “Okay, let’s focus where we can have the greatest impact.”
There were thingsthat we had been doing for years, and we know that the recipient of thosedollars felt good about it, but from an impact standpoint, we were not reallymoving the needle. So we had to look atour focus areas. We had to look at ourstrategy in those focus areas and then develop programs there ...
Michael Dupee:
... you’re not justtrying to make a bunch of money and give a bunch back. You’re trying to put this – contextualize it,set it inside a business model that generates success ...
Adam Burns:
So there you have it.CSR is good for business because it’s good for your staff, and, as HåkanBjörklund, CEO of Nycomed said in his interview here on MeetTheBoss, there’s noculture in the walls. But the benefits run deep into retention, attraction andskill building. Good citizenship programs tick all those boxes, andvolunteerism puts them within reach for all organizations. It is possible tomeasure the impact on the community, and by using employee feedback andexecutive score cards, but you have to get the foundation stone, your strategy,right.
I’ll leave you withone last section. If we accept that the tone of any organisation starts at thetop, then the people that lead corporate social responsibility must be a mix ofSaint Theresa and Warren Buffet. So what do our experts believe are their corevalues?
Allyson Peerman:
Well, I think it’sfairly simple for me. I laugh, I’mchuckling because I have two daughters, and I’ve told them over and over againthat it’s all about the relationships, and for me that’s, at the end of the daywhat matters in life.
None of us can do iton our own, and so, for that reason, it’s easy to look at it and say that’swhat I hold up as most important. Ithink that’s what gives us the most joy in life.
Bo Miller:
I don’t think I haveit all figured out, but the one word or one value I would use is integrity,because I think integrity speaks to so many other things. It speaks to honesty, reliability,dependability, commitment, and so I think if I had to choose a word that Iwould hope to model over the course of my career it would be integrity.
Michael Dupee:
The advice I givemyself often and that I try to share with people is a simple one. It’s just pay attention. Things are changing so fast. We always need to be learners but you need tobe paying attention and not too consumed by or obsessed with your ownparticular point of view. Don’t be tooobsessed by that and miss the learning that goes on and the chance to maybetrim your sales a little bit and move in a new, more productive direction.
Karen Bergin:
To listen withcuriosity and to always seek to set the other person up to succeed. If you do those two things that you can’t gofar wrong in life. That would be myadvice.
Adam Burns:
Thank you very muchfor watching. To find out more about one of the very best CSR programs around –namely IBM’s much lauded Corporate Citizens Corps – be sure to watch theaforementioned interview with Stan Litow. And we’re always interested in youropinion. You can add to the comment board below me now on MeetTheBoss TV.