I pinched it from the very readable Future Buzz blog.
Click on the image below to enlarge it.
.There's many more images and graphs like this at this link: 50 Clever And Creative Images The Web Shared In 2010.
Monday, December 27, 2010
Global Facebook connections, visualised
I hope all readers are having an excellent festive break. For those reading emails and blogs, here's another interesting chart that's worth a look.
I pinched it from the very readable Future Buzz blog.
Click on the image below to enlarge it.
.
There's many more images and graphs like this at this link: 50 Clever And Creative Images The Web Shared In 2010.
I pinched it from the very readable Future Buzz blog.
Click on the image below to enlarge it.
.There's many more images and graphs like this at this link: 50 Clever And Creative Images The Web Shared In 2010.
Friday, December 17, 2010
Sustainability, CSR and 70 years of books
Google Labs has found a way for any of us to search for words appearing in books from the 1920's to the year 2000. This New York Times piece offers some example of how you might use it, with the headline "In 500 Billion Words, New Window on Culture".
Here's the search tool, and a link to how it came about. Fascinating to play around with. Perhaps useful for presentations?
Some examples of keywords appearing in 70 odd years of books relevant to the CSR and sustainability world are below. Click on the images to enlarge them.
Sustainability
Ethical Business
Corporate Social Responsibility
Climate change
Here's the search tool, and a link to how it came about. Fascinating to play around with. Perhaps useful for presentations?
Some examples of keywords appearing in 70 odd years of books relevant to the CSR and sustainability world are below. Click on the images to enlarge them.
Sustainability
Ethical Business
Corporate Social Responsibility
Climate change
Christmas reading: Sustainable products and supply chain at Cargill
If someone asked you "what would you like for some Christmas reading?", your first response is unlikely to be: "well, thanks for thinking of me, you know, I'd really like a downloadable PDF on how a company is building a sustainable supply chain".
Yet, there is one available. And you never know, you might find it interesting.
It's about Cargill, one of the world's largest companies, and what they have achieved to date with the creation and production of new low calorie natural sweetener, Truvia.
Get the PDF 'corporate focus' special that we've recently published in just one click.
And consider how this kind of thing might be useful for your company, for both internal and external communications.
I'm on on a two week break as of today, so the blog will be a bit quiet for a week or two. Merry Christmas!
Toby
Yet, there is one available. And you never know, you might find it interesting.
It's about Cargill, one of the world's largest companies, and what they have achieved to date with the creation and production of new low calorie natural sweetener, Truvia.
Get the PDF 'corporate focus' special that we've recently published in just one click.
And consider how this kind of thing might be useful for your company, for both internal and external communications.
I'm on on a two week break as of today, so the blog will be a bit quiet for a week or two. Merry Christmas!
Toby
Tuesday, December 14, 2010
Can paid consultants be credible voices for corporate responsibility?
I think the answer to this has to be no.
But also very occasionally yes, within certain limitations.
I don't mean to suggest that consultants, engineering, inspection firms and the like, can't provide a valuable service.
But doing so is not without risk. Another example of how consultant views can be mis-represented is here.
Commercial vendors often do provide excellent value. They would not last long if they could not.
Yet some companies persist in believing that a technical audit of one area, or an overview by a small consulting or vendor outfit, or even a larger one, can provide stakeholder assurance that all is well on issue X or in community Y.
Here's an salient example of when that approach backfires.
To pay someone entirely profit-minded to 'verify' your progress, is not compelling on more complex issues than say, financial accounting or carbon emissions.
To do so is just not convincing to NGOs, to journalists, to your employees and other stakeholder groups.
So who can you work with in areas of increasing complexity and corporate responsibility to provide some assurance that your approach is genuine?
One option is non-profit consulting outfits. Like Verite on labour or BSR/BITC more generally. Another option is a group such as FSG.
A different approach is to work with academics, like Ethan Kapstein at Insead, or the University of Sussex.
Then there are groups like WWF who will offer comment and expertise, or UN-sanctioned groups such as UNEP, who undertake research sometimes paid for with corporate cash via governments such as Nigeria's.
But these are open to question too.
One can argue groups like BSR/BITC become too business-friendly and lack expertise in specific, complex areas, that WWF is too keen on business monies, that individual academics like private consulting cash, and that UNEP has become co-opted and is losing sight of its mission.
All of these can be seen as both legitimate groups to work with in your firm, but are also open to attack by your critics.
What then, is the solution?
Perhaps on narrow environmental issues, if international standards exist, and vendors are out there whose reputation is more important than one client, you can use commercial firms to verify, say, your carbon emissions, or a site's water footprint.
It's not perfect, but it's the best you can likely do, unless the issue, company, or site is controversial. If that's the case, you have a credibility problem no commercial audit can solve.
On broader issues more open to question, the answer is possibly to work with those whose core mission is clearly more important than the cash your project, or other such projects, represents.
So rather than an academic, a research team from one or more University departments.
Or rather than a single, business-friendly NGO or membership group dependent on corporate memberships and consulting cash, a coalition of NGOs, some of whom are independent, or at least multi-stakeholder oriented, such as ETI.
This is of course, very hard to set up and manage to a successful outcome when you start getting into coalition territory.
Even in a bi-lateral short-term partnership, Unilever will tell you how hard that is, based on their experience with Oxfam back in 2004.
But I wonder where else the solution lies, if not in research partnerships with credible academic institutions or groups of NGOs.
On difficult issues, or in the case of controversial companies, perhaps the best you can hope for is to be able to call on the views of those least open to the questioning of their credibility.
No-one said that getting out of a reputation mess, even one that's not your fault, is easy.
But also very occasionally yes, within certain limitations.
I don't mean to suggest that consultants, engineering, inspection firms and the like, can't provide a valuable service.
But doing so is not without risk. Another example of how consultant views can be mis-represented is here.
Commercial vendors often do provide excellent value. They would not last long if they could not.
Yet some companies persist in believing that a technical audit of one area, or an overview by a small consulting or vendor outfit, or even a larger one, can provide stakeholder assurance that all is well on issue X or in community Y.
Here's an salient example of when that approach backfires.
To pay someone entirely profit-minded to 'verify' your progress, is not compelling on more complex issues than say, financial accounting or carbon emissions.
To do so is just not convincing to NGOs, to journalists, to your employees and other stakeholder groups.
So who can you work with in areas of increasing complexity and corporate responsibility to provide some assurance that your approach is genuine?
One option is non-profit consulting outfits. Like Verite on labour or BSR/BITC more generally. Another option is a group such as FSG.
A different approach is to work with academics, like Ethan Kapstein at Insead, or the University of Sussex.
Then there are groups like WWF who will offer comment and expertise, or UN-sanctioned groups such as UNEP, who undertake research sometimes paid for with corporate cash via governments such as Nigeria's.
But these are open to question too.
One can argue groups like BSR/BITC become too business-friendly and lack expertise in specific, complex areas, that WWF is too keen on business monies, that individual academics like private consulting cash, and that UNEP has become co-opted and is losing sight of its mission.
All of these can be seen as both legitimate groups to work with in your firm, but are also open to attack by your critics.
What then, is the solution?
Perhaps on narrow environmental issues, if international standards exist, and vendors are out there whose reputation is more important than one client, you can use commercial firms to verify, say, your carbon emissions, or a site's water footprint.
It's not perfect, but it's the best you can likely do, unless the issue, company, or site is controversial. If that's the case, you have a credibility problem no commercial audit can solve.
On broader issues more open to question, the answer is possibly to work with those whose core mission is clearly more important than the cash your project, or other such projects, represents.
So rather than an academic, a research team from one or more University departments.
Or rather than a single, business-friendly NGO or membership group dependent on corporate memberships and consulting cash, a coalition of NGOs, some of whom are independent, or at least multi-stakeholder oriented, such as ETI.
This is of course, very hard to set up and manage to a successful outcome when you start getting into coalition territory.
Even in a bi-lateral short-term partnership, Unilever will tell you how hard that is, based on their experience with Oxfam back in 2004.
But I wonder where else the solution lies, if not in research partnerships with credible academic institutions or groups of NGOs.
On difficult issues, or in the case of controversial companies, perhaps the best you can hope for is to be able to call on the views of those least open to the questioning of their credibility.
No-one said that getting out of a reputation mess, even one that's not your fault, is easy.
Is Asia Pulp & Paper in your supply chain?
I asked this question recently of a friend who is head of CSR for a large UK company.
We were discussing companies that no-one credible should want to do business with, and APP came up top of our list.
Of course, there are others in the electronics, agriculture, commodities supply and textiles sectors, amongst others.
However, APP, and its parent, Sinar Mas, probably comes top as the only firm that appears to be losing big corporate customers faster than it can possibly gain them.
I won't go into all the detail on the company here, there are links below. But if they are in your supply chain, you would be well advised, morally and with your reputation in mind, to get well shot of them.
I don't say any of this lightly. There's probably only a handful of large companies world-wide who are genuinely beyond redemption as things stand right now. APP/Sinar mas are one of them.
My friend's company, fortunately, eventually reported back from various divisions that they did not do business with APP. But it caused a few weeks of concern for my friend while he checked with various arms of the business.
APP/Sinar Mas is a company that both Greenpeace and WWF, despite years of discussion, have completely failed to convince of the benefits of any real kind of sustainability.
Having reviewed the growing and damning evidence against them for almost a decade, it's obvious that this is true. There's a lot I know about them that I can't publish, unfortunately.
The last findings from WWF are here. Greenpeace's reports are here. APP has responded here. And George Monbiot has also weighed in recently, here.
See Mongabay's reporting here on APP's representation of auditors who are now trying to distance themselves from the company.
APP/Sinar Mas is a company currently beyond the pale for anyone sourcing paper or palm oil.
Click here for the Wikipedia entry that details large companies who will now not do business with Sinar Mas.
And click here for the Wikipedia page on APP which tells you some of the story.
Given the growing list of companies refusing to do business with APP and its parent Sinar Mas, it might wise if your own firm checked whether or not they supply your business with either paper or palm oil.
If you do, you should switch suppliers as fast as you can. APP/Sinar Mas is years from being in a state where anyone should do business with them.
We were discussing companies that no-one credible should want to do business with, and APP came up top of our list.
Of course, there are others in the electronics, agriculture, commodities supply and textiles sectors, amongst others.
However, APP, and its parent, Sinar Mas, probably comes top as the only firm that appears to be losing big corporate customers faster than it can possibly gain them.
I won't go into all the detail on the company here, there are links below. But if they are in your supply chain, you would be well advised, morally and with your reputation in mind, to get well shot of them.
I don't say any of this lightly. There's probably only a handful of large companies world-wide who are genuinely beyond redemption as things stand right now. APP/Sinar mas are one of them.
My friend's company, fortunately, eventually reported back from various divisions that they did not do business with APP. But it caused a few weeks of concern for my friend while he checked with various arms of the business.
APP/Sinar Mas is a company that both Greenpeace and WWF, despite years of discussion, have completely failed to convince of the benefits of any real kind of sustainability.
Having reviewed the growing and damning evidence against them for almost a decade, it's obvious that this is true. There's a lot I know about them that I can't publish, unfortunately.
The last findings from WWF are here. Greenpeace's reports are here. APP has responded here. And George Monbiot has also weighed in recently, here.
See Mongabay's reporting here on APP's representation of auditors who are now trying to distance themselves from the company.
APP/Sinar Mas is a company currently beyond the pale for anyone sourcing paper or palm oil.
Click here for the Wikipedia entry that details large companies who will now not do business with Sinar Mas.
And click here for the Wikipedia page on APP which tells you some of the story.
Given the growing list of companies refusing to do business with APP and its parent Sinar Mas, it might wise if your own firm checked whether or not they supply your business with either paper or palm oil.
If you do, you should switch suppliers as fast as you can. APP/Sinar Mas is years from being in a state where anyone should do business with them.
Monday, December 13, 2010
Microsoft, spurred into action, deserves praise
Microsoft recent announced it would
http://blogs.technet.com/b/microsoft_on_the_issues/archive/2010/12/06/microsoft-announces-immediate-availability-of-unilateral-software-license-for-eligible-organizations.aspx
http://blogs.technet.com/b/microsoft_on_the_issues/archive/2010/12/06/microsoft-announces-immediate-availability-of-unilateral-software-license-for-eligible-organizations.aspx
Sweden's Kristianstad is a bright spot post-Cancun
Despite the fact that climate diplomats declared Cancun got negotiations back on track, most businesses are pretty disappointed at the global political failure to offer them surety over climate change regulation and carbon pricing.
That failure to date was perhaps somewhat inevitable. But the politicans are right: Some progress is better than none.
And the results may throw up some surprises, as Paul Hohnen notes in this free-to-all column for Ethical Corp recently. More of our recent coverage, on refrigerant gases, is here.
Amidst this relative gloom around progressive global climate issues, this New York Times story offers a ray of hope.
It's about Kristianstad in Sweden, and their work towards less reliance on fossil fuels. The community of some 80,000 is using "potato peels, manure, used cooking oil, stale cookies and pig intestines", amongst other sources, to generate grid-based energy.
Of course, those progressive Swedes have a big head start, seeing as they began to get their energy act together twenty years before most of the rest of us woke up and said "Oops, energy crisis, damn".
But I'd urge you to take a look at the article, even if you live in the the UK or US, where energy policy is a mockery of a shambles.
It certainly cheered me up at bit. Just look at what we can do if we get organised and plan ahead. Hold the front page... :)
For more on sustainable business in Sweden, section one of our recent briefing, published in the Dec/Jan edition of Ethical Corporation, is here.
Greener power, yes, its possible, we just need a plan, some incentives, and some backbone.
That failure to date was perhaps somewhat inevitable. But the politicans are right: Some progress is better than none.
And the results may throw up some surprises, as Paul Hohnen notes in this free-to-all column for Ethical Corp recently. More of our recent coverage, on refrigerant gases, is here.
Amidst this relative gloom around progressive global climate issues, this New York Times story offers a ray of hope.
It's about Kristianstad in Sweden, and their work towards less reliance on fossil fuels. The community of some 80,000 is using "potato peels, manure, used cooking oil, stale cookies and pig intestines", amongst other sources, to generate grid-based energy.
Of course, those progressive Swedes have a big head start, seeing as they began to get their energy act together twenty years before most of the rest of us woke up and said "Oops, energy crisis, damn".
But I'd urge you to take a look at the article, even if you live in the the UK or US, where energy policy is a mockery of a shambles.
It certainly cheered me up at bit. Just look at what we can do if we get organised and plan ahead. Hold the front page... :)
For more on sustainable business in Sweden, section one of our recent briefing, published in the Dec/Jan edition of Ethical Corporation, is here.
Greener power, yes, its possible, we just need a plan, some incentives, and some backbone.
Friday, December 10, 2010
Communications advice from other industries
As many of us know, the sustainability/corporate responsibility world can sometimes operate in something approaching a bubble.
Mallen Baker blogs on how to breach that barrier in this recent post.
To help my own thinking, and because half my job is publishing in other markets than the CR world, (mostly renewables, but not exclusively) I try to read blogs and articles in other areas regularly, as I am sure you all do too.
Here's a couple of blog posts from outside the CR world that those of you interested in communications might find useful:
You will be misunderstood. In this post Seth Godin talks about the importance of simplicity and repetition in communications. A real gem of a post.
Lessons From an Unconference. In this post, Dan Blank, a new media/publishing blogger, writes and shows, how an "unconference" can work. His tips could be very useful for companies, I believe, by helping them re-rethink how internal meetings and conferences can be structured.
Mallen Baker blogs on how to breach that barrier in this recent post.
To help my own thinking, and because half my job is publishing in other markets than the CR world, (mostly renewables, but not exclusively) I try to read blogs and articles in other areas regularly, as I am sure you all do too.
Here's a couple of blog posts from outside the CR world that those of you interested in communications might find useful:
You will be misunderstood. In this post Seth Godin talks about the importance of simplicity and repetition in communications. A real gem of a post.
Lessons From an Unconference. In this post, Dan Blank, a new media/publishing blogger, writes and shows, how an "unconference" can work. His tips could be very useful for companies, I believe, by helping them re-rethink how internal meetings and conferences can be structured.
Thursday, December 09, 2010
Corporate responsibility crises: What companies get wrong - and then right
For about a year Ethical Corporation has been publishing a series of corporate responsibility case studies, looking at some of the biggest events in the field, and how they came to pass.
We've put them all in one PDF briefing now, of some 35 pages. It's fascinating reading.
More about what's in the briefing is here.
Companies covered include: Shell, ExxonMobil, Monsanto, Trafigura, Union Carbide/Dow, McDonalds and Toyota. Industries include diamonds and the pharmaceutical industry.
I'll happily give blog readers a 50% discount on the £395 price. A snip even at full price to get the unvarnished truth about what happened to these companies - and what's been learned.
Here's the cover and contents page:
We've put them all in one PDF briefing now, of some 35 pages. It's fascinating reading.
More about what's in the briefing is here.
Companies covered include: Shell, ExxonMobil, Monsanto, Trafigura, Union Carbide/Dow, McDonalds and Toyota. Industries include diamonds and the pharmaceutical industry.
I'll happily give blog readers a 50% discount on the £395 price. A snip even at full price to get the unvarnished truth about what happened to these companies - and what's been learned.
Here's the cover and contents page:
New webpage for our best practice corporate reports
We've re-jigged the page on our website about our reports that are available.
Here's what some of the best selling reports are called:
- How to measure socio-economic impact
- Unlocking the profit in water savings
- How to embed corporate responsibility across different parts of your company
- Best practices for designing effective ethics programmes
We produce them all with exclusive interviews with leading companies, and they are designed to be as practical as possible. There's enough CSR theory floating about without us adding to it.
The full list, and free downloads from them are at: http://www.ethicalcorp.com/reports
Any blog reader that might like to buy one, let me know and I'll give you a 25% discount.
Here's what some of the best selling reports are called:
- How to measure socio-economic impact
- Unlocking the profit in water savings
- How to embed corporate responsibility across different parts of your company
- Best practices for designing effective ethics programmes
We produce them all with exclusive interviews with leading companies, and they are designed to be as practical as possible. There's enough CSR theory floating about without us adding to it.
The full list, and free downloads from them are at: http://www.ethicalcorp.com/reports
Any blog reader that might like to buy one, let me know and I'll give you a 25% discount.
WikiLeaks attacks herald future battles
It seems clear to me we are only at the beginning of a long global guerilla war against censorship and corruption.
The leaked WikiLeaks cables confirmed what we all knew: That the Russian and Chinese governments are fully prepared to use dirty tricks on the internet to further their political agendas. We may find that our own government do the same on occasion.
Now we also see how quickly UK and Swedish officials wilt in the face of American wrath about these leaks.
The war against government censorship, secret deals, corruption, cyber attacks and the targeting of citizens that leak, will be fought by activists like WikiLeaks, and individuals such as Alexei Navalny.
Proxy armies of web hackers will mobilise to support them. This is what many of them have been waiting for, for years.
No doubt some of the leakers will go too far, as WikiLeaks most certainly did. (They should have filtered their leaks properly, and probably begun by leaking business-related material, which would have built more public support earlier)
But that will not stop the mirror sites that host copies of everything once it is out there, and others who want to do the same.
Leaking is the new cool thing to do for hackers, activists and others who might not have thought about it before.
The attempts at censorship by targeting Julian Assange does nothing except cause outrage, totally justified, or otherwise.
And shows how pathetically pliant the British and Swedish legal systems are in the face of political pressure.
Let's not pretend anything else is going on here.
Who needs evidence when you have Hilary Clinton working the phones?
As a result the legions of real Lisbeth Salander's will come out on the web in force.
Twitter, Facebook, Visa, PayPal and Mastercard and others are going to face a difficult time. Some will deserve the attention of campaigners more than others. The New York Times offers an analysis of the complexities surrounding their decisions.
Joining the Global Network Initiative will probably now seem like a good idea to many of these companies as a result.
It's the only credible multi-stakeholder group out there on global internet freedom.
So far only Yahoo!, Google and Microsoft are members from the corporate world.
Here's a podcast with one of the architects, Rebecca MacKinnon.
The leaked WikiLeaks cables confirmed what we all knew: That the Russian and Chinese governments are fully prepared to use dirty tricks on the internet to further their political agendas. We may find that our own government do the same on occasion.
Now we also see how quickly UK and Swedish officials wilt in the face of American wrath about these leaks.
The war against government censorship, secret deals, corruption, cyber attacks and the targeting of citizens that leak, will be fought by activists like WikiLeaks, and individuals such as Alexei Navalny.
Proxy armies of web hackers will mobilise to support them. This is what many of them have been waiting for, for years.
No doubt some of the leakers will go too far, as WikiLeaks most certainly did. (They should have filtered their leaks properly, and probably begun by leaking business-related material, which would have built more public support earlier)
But that will not stop the mirror sites that host copies of everything once it is out there, and others who want to do the same.
Leaking is the new cool thing to do for hackers, activists and others who might not have thought about it before.
The attempts at censorship by targeting Julian Assange does nothing except cause outrage, totally justified, or otherwise.
And shows how pathetically pliant the British and Swedish legal systems are in the face of political pressure.
Let's not pretend anything else is going on here.
Who needs evidence when you have Hilary Clinton working the phones?
As a result the legions of real Lisbeth Salander's will come out on the web in force.
Twitter, Facebook, Visa, PayPal and Mastercard and others are going to face a difficult time. Some will deserve the attention of campaigners more than others. The New York Times offers an analysis of the complexities surrounding their decisions.
Joining the Global Network Initiative will probably now seem like a good idea to many of these companies as a result.
It's the only credible multi-stakeholder group out there on global internet freedom.
So far only Yahoo!, Google and Microsoft are members from the corporate world.
Here's a podcast with one of the architects, Rebecca MacKinnon.
Wednesday, December 08, 2010
WikiLeaks, Mastercard and Visa
The Guardian reports today that:
"…while MasterCard and Visa have cut WikiLeaks off you can still use those cards to donate to overtly racist organisations such as the Knights Party, which is supported by the Ku Klux Klan.
The Ku Klux Klan website directs users to a site called Christian Concepts. It takes Visa and MasterCard donations for users willing to state that they are "white and not of racially mixed descent. I am not married to a non-white. I do not date non-whites nor do I have non-white dependents. I believe in the ideals of western Christian civilisation and profess my belief in Jesus Christ as the son of God."
More live WikiLeaks coverage here.
"…while MasterCard and Visa have cut WikiLeaks off you can still use those cards to donate to overtly racist organisations such as the Knights Party, which is supported by the Ku Klux Klan.
The Ku Klux Klan website directs users to a site called Christian Concepts. It takes Visa and MasterCard donations for users willing to state that they are "white and not of racially mixed descent. I am not married to a non-white. I do not date non-whites nor do I have non-white dependents. I believe in the ideals of western Christian civilisation and profess my belief in Jesus Christ as the son of God."
More live WikiLeaks coverage here.
Monday, December 06, 2010
Responsible tax, when is something legal, unethical?
If you are in the UK and reading the papers, you can't miss the current round of tax protests.
The group, UK Uncut, has become something of a social media phenomenon in recent days.
Protests have hit Arcadia group companies, Boots, Vodafone and others.
Other, more established NGOs and activists are taking a pop at UK listed firms such as SAB Miller on tax avoidance. SAB responds here.
The BBC's File on Four programme recently painted a pretty damning picture of UK corporate tax avoidance at this link.
The UK Government has to be seen to be taking some action.
But the File on Four documentary shows just how far ahead of the regulatory/enforcement curve many firms are. A transcript of it is here.
Back in about 2003 I remember publishing articles on this topic. We hosted some conference debates about the same issue: When is something that is legal, unethical?
There is of course, no easy answer here.
If only so much money was not at stake.
Some firms don't mind being disliked if being so is very profitable.
There may be a parallel here with labour standards.
What many people refer to as "sweatshops" are often not illegal, or breaking the law.
But workers being paid a national minimum wage that has not risen in decades to keep in line with basic inflation is regarded as increasingly unethical (whilst technically being legal in countries such as Bangladesh).
That's one reason why the better brands are instituting 'living wage' programmes in parts of the supply chain. Over time, these will spread, I predict, to many 'Tier one' supplier factories. Second tier suppliers are a more complex challenge.
When it comes to responsible tax, however, the stakes are really much higher.
CFO's and accountants hold much sway in modern business. Shareholders, some of whom have been starved of dividends in the downturn, are demanding their return. Think BP.
Companies that are saving millions of pounds in tax are not just going to turn around and start paying the UK Government just because a few protesters shut some shops for an hour.
Last time this debate rose up, continued rising economic growth meant it fell away to a low rumble until recently.
This time it's different. It's here to stay on the activist agenda, along with demands for a Tobin tax.
But I am less than sanguine that it will make much difference to how companies treat tax within the confines of national law and international tax regimes.
Tax avoidance may be as distasteful to the general public as textile supply chains, but my prediction is the campaigners will be a lot less successful in encouraging large companies to change practices.
Tax is a red-line issue that most head of corporate responsibility will likely stay well away from. Unless their company has nothing to hide of course.
Something legal becomes unethical when malleable society sentiment decides that it is so. The question is, how long does that sentiment last? Tax, as something of an intangible compared to the clothes we wear, is a more difficult issue to sustain a public campaign on.
But if your firm has a 'good' record on the topic, 2011 would not be a bad time to shout about it.
The group, UK Uncut, has become something of a social media phenomenon in recent days.
Protests have hit Arcadia group companies, Boots, Vodafone and others.
Other, more established NGOs and activists are taking a pop at UK listed firms such as SAB Miller on tax avoidance. SAB responds here.
The BBC's File on Four programme recently painted a pretty damning picture of UK corporate tax avoidance at this link.
The UK Government has to be seen to be taking some action.
But the File on Four documentary shows just how far ahead of the regulatory/enforcement curve many firms are. A transcript of it is here.
Back in about 2003 I remember publishing articles on this topic. We hosted some conference debates about the same issue: When is something that is legal, unethical?
There is of course, no easy answer here.
If only so much money was not at stake.
Some firms don't mind being disliked if being so is very profitable.
There may be a parallel here with labour standards.
What many people refer to as "sweatshops" are often not illegal, or breaking the law.
But workers being paid a national minimum wage that has not risen in decades to keep in line with basic inflation is regarded as increasingly unethical (whilst technically being legal in countries such as Bangladesh).
That's one reason why the better brands are instituting 'living wage' programmes in parts of the supply chain. Over time, these will spread, I predict, to many 'Tier one' supplier factories. Second tier suppliers are a more complex challenge.
When it comes to responsible tax, however, the stakes are really much higher.
CFO's and accountants hold much sway in modern business. Shareholders, some of whom have been starved of dividends in the downturn, are demanding their return. Think BP.
Companies that are saving millions of pounds in tax are not just going to turn around and start paying the UK Government just because a few protesters shut some shops for an hour.
Last time this debate rose up, continued rising economic growth meant it fell away to a low rumble until recently.
This time it's different. It's here to stay on the activist agenda, along with demands for a Tobin tax.
But I am less than sanguine that it will make much difference to how companies treat tax within the confines of national law and international tax regimes.
Tax avoidance may be as distasteful to the general public as textile supply chains, but my prediction is the campaigners will be a lot less successful in encouraging large companies to change practices.
Tax is a red-line issue that most head of corporate responsibility will likely stay well away from. Unless their company has nothing to hide of course.
Something legal becomes unethical when malleable society sentiment decides that it is so. The question is, how long does that sentiment last? Tax, as something of an intangible compared to the clothes we wear, is a more difficult issue to sustain a public campaign on.
But if your firm has a 'good' record on the topic, 2011 would not be a bad time to shout about it.
Ethics, growth and the smaller company conundrum
Jeremy Leggett, founder of Solarcentury does not mince his words.
In his FT review of a new book, "Eminent Corporations" by Andrew Simms and David Boyle, he encapsulates the challenge that most people in the sustainable business world would agree is paramount:
"...what chance do I think a social entrepreneur such as myself has of building a corporation that sticks to its original purpose? The answer, I have to admit, fills me with dread."
The history of corporate responsibility is, in the minds of some, littered with the moral corpses of small firms who became so successful the temptation of real cash just became too much.
The Body Shop, Ben & Jerry's, Stonyfield Farm, Innocent, Honest Tea, and many more, all sold up, more or less, when big money hit the table.
They are not the companies they once were. That much, at least, is definitively true.
Whether you believe they sold out for cash or seized the chance to 'mainstream' their corporate values depends on your point of view.
The founders sometimes did not have much of a choice (Innocent, given ownership structures) or credibly justified the shift so they could scale up the positive impacts of their business (Stonyfield, and also Innocent)
But retaining that small company innovative ethos, and closeness to customers, suppliers and stakeholders simply becomes exponentially more difficult as a much bigger firm, at best.
The core mission inevitably suffers dilution, pressures grow.
The firm and its executives and shareholders become increasingly detached from other stakeholders.
At worst, it becomes impossible to maintain the core mission, and the brand simply remains as a shell of its former self.
Is the answer to forego the desire for growth?
Not for it's own sake, I would suggest.
That is, simply arguing against growth is not something even environmentalists such as Jonathon Porritt do much of any more.
That won't, and never did, wash.
It's about the kind of growth.
The type of business expansion you seek defines the character of your business.
Look at it another way for a moment.
My two favourite stand-up comedians (well, they are a bit more than that really) are Daniel Kitson and Stewart Lee.
In Lee's recent book, he revealed how he and Kitson had agreed on what constituted sustainable audience growth.
The goal? To make a decent living whilst not losing their 'edge'. Make too much money in the creative industries (and others) and that quickly happens, it is a well documented fact.
Their solution is to evolve their material carefully, to keep the right kind of customers coming back and grow the audience sustainably.
Not to aim at stadium gigs for three years and then burn out.
Part of their plan is a stated aim to drive away those they don't want as customers, by taking elements of their acts to the extreme. To keep those that get it, and push away those that do not.
Another tactic is never to play venues which are 'too big', so as to keep the audience numbers to a manageable level, where interaction is still possible.
They want to make a living, and grow the audience.
But not so much as to lose sight of what they are trying to achieve.
That's the key balance to strike for sustainably-minded smaller business.
And it ought to be possible, given that most companies are simply not able to grow that fast anyway.
There's not many companies that grow more than 5-10-20% per year. And when they do, it's not for a sustained period.
So adopting a sustainable growth paradigm can work, as long as you have clear sight of your eco-system, your place within it, and what your values will support.
At least, that's the conclusion I have come to with Ethical Corporation after ten years of attempted growth beyond a couple of million pounds turnover a year.
I am not unambitious, but I've learned to accept the above. We have a place in the ecosystem.
But equally I can't lie and tell you I think we can quadruple the size of the business in the next three years. We tried, even in the good times it doesn't work that way.
That's not to suggest smaller companies cannot become large and successful. Some can. All large companies started small.
But you have work out whether the trade-offs are worth it, and whether the eco-system will allow it. Sometimes it just won't, and that's a good thing, not a failure.
It doesn't mean you can't start another company in a different sized eco-system, for example.
Where this argument falls down, of course, is with large existing companies. What to do there?
Leggett writes that "Simms and Boyle focus on employee ownership. They see a renaissance for mutuals and other people-powered businesses. They laud the Co-operative Group and retailers John Lewis and Waitrose: all successful in a time of recession."
I'd suggest that it's slowly becoming obvious that for large firms, ESG (environmental, social and governance) limitations will become so important that the limits to growth in a given period, (palm oil sourcing, for example), will simply become overwhelmingly obvious.
Whether that will happen quickly enough, of course, remains to be seen.
Unilever will be the test of this theory. I admire their ambition.
The below, also available here, may be of interest if you have read this far:
In his FT review of a new book, "Eminent Corporations" by Andrew Simms and David Boyle, he encapsulates the challenge that most people in the sustainable business world would agree is paramount:
"...what chance do I think a social entrepreneur such as myself has of building a corporation that sticks to its original purpose? The answer, I have to admit, fills me with dread."
The history of corporate responsibility is, in the minds of some, littered with the moral corpses of small firms who became so successful the temptation of real cash just became too much.
The Body Shop, Ben & Jerry's, Stonyfield Farm, Innocent, Honest Tea, and many more, all sold up, more or less, when big money hit the table.
They are not the companies they once were. That much, at least, is definitively true.
Whether you believe they sold out for cash or seized the chance to 'mainstream' their corporate values depends on your point of view.
The founders sometimes did not have much of a choice (Innocent, given ownership structures) or credibly justified the shift so they could scale up the positive impacts of their business (Stonyfield, and also Innocent)
But retaining that small company innovative ethos, and closeness to customers, suppliers and stakeholders simply becomes exponentially more difficult as a much bigger firm, at best.
The core mission inevitably suffers dilution, pressures grow.
The firm and its executives and shareholders become increasingly detached from other stakeholders.
At worst, it becomes impossible to maintain the core mission, and the brand simply remains as a shell of its former self.
Is the answer to forego the desire for growth?
Not for it's own sake, I would suggest.
That is, simply arguing against growth is not something even environmentalists such as Jonathon Porritt do much of any more.
That won't, and never did, wash.
It's about the kind of growth.
The type of business expansion you seek defines the character of your business.
Look at it another way for a moment.
My two favourite stand-up comedians (well, they are a bit more than that really) are Daniel Kitson and Stewart Lee.
In Lee's recent book, he revealed how he and Kitson had agreed on what constituted sustainable audience growth.
The goal? To make a decent living whilst not losing their 'edge'. Make too much money in the creative industries (and others) and that quickly happens, it is a well documented fact.
Their solution is to evolve their material carefully, to keep the right kind of customers coming back and grow the audience sustainably.
Not to aim at stadium gigs for three years and then burn out.
Part of their plan is a stated aim to drive away those they don't want as customers, by taking elements of their acts to the extreme. To keep those that get it, and push away those that do not.
Another tactic is never to play venues which are 'too big', so as to keep the audience numbers to a manageable level, where interaction is still possible.
They want to make a living, and grow the audience.
But not so much as to lose sight of what they are trying to achieve.
That's the key balance to strike for sustainably-minded smaller business.
And it ought to be possible, given that most companies are simply not able to grow that fast anyway.
There's not many companies that grow more than 5-10-20% per year. And when they do, it's not for a sustained period.
So adopting a sustainable growth paradigm can work, as long as you have clear sight of your eco-system, your place within it, and what your values will support.
At least, that's the conclusion I have come to with Ethical Corporation after ten years of attempted growth beyond a couple of million pounds turnover a year.
I am not unambitious, but I've learned to accept the above. We have a place in the ecosystem.
But equally I can't lie and tell you I think we can quadruple the size of the business in the next three years. We tried, even in the good times it doesn't work that way.
That's not to suggest smaller companies cannot become large and successful. Some can. All large companies started small.
But you have work out whether the trade-offs are worth it, and whether the eco-system will allow it. Sometimes it just won't, and that's a good thing, not a failure.
It doesn't mean you can't start another company in a different sized eco-system, for example.
Where this argument falls down, of course, is with large existing companies. What to do there?
Leggett writes that "Simms and Boyle focus on employee ownership. They see a renaissance for mutuals and other people-powered businesses. They laud the Co-operative Group and retailers John Lewis and Waitrose: all successful in a time of recession."
I'd suggest that it's slowly becoming obvious that for large firms, ESG (environmental, social and governance) limitations will become so important that the limits to growth in a given period, (palm oil sourcing, for example), will simply become overwhelmingly obvious.
Whether that will happen quickly enough, of course, remains to be seen.
Unilever will be the test of this theory. I admire their ambition.
The below, also available here, may be of interest if you have read this far:
Bribery risks on the BBC, but does it mean much?
The BBC's flagship news programme Today has a piece this morning on the UK Bribery Act and ramifications for British business.
UK folks can listen to it here.
I think non-UK readers may be able to get the piece on the BBC's iTunes page here.
At Ethical Corporation we see conflicting trends in anti-corruption.
On the one hand there's lots of warning about what the UK Bribery Act and beefed-up US legislation will mean for large companies working in bribe-prone areas of the world (i.e. pretty much anywhere).
On the other you don't see many executives attending events on the topic compared with two or three years ago.
Perhaps that has more to do with conference budgets than the overall trend.
But I can't help thinking that UK firms won't take the Bribery Act seriously until some big scalps pay a price for bribery, if our Serious Fraud Office can finally deliver on its mandate. That was the case, largely, in the US.
I'm off to the Control Risks "Riskmap 2011" conference on Wednesday.
I'll report back on anything interesting that comes out of it.
UK folks can listen to it here.
I think non-UK readers may be able to get the piece on the BBC's iTunes page here.
At Ethical Corporation we see conflicting trends in anti-corruption.
On the one hand there's lots of warning about what the UK Bribery Act and beefed-up US legislation will mean for large companies working in bribe-prone areas of the world (i.e. pretty much anywhere).
On the other you don't see many executives attending events on the topic compared with two or three years ago.
Perhaps that has more to do with conference budgets than the overall trend.
But I can't help thinking that UK firms won't take the Bribery Act seriously until some big scalps pay a price for bribery, if our Serious Fraud Office can finally deliver on its mandate. That was the case, largely, in the US.
I'm off to the Control Risks "Riskmap 2011" conference on Wednesday.
I'll report back on anything interesting that comes out of it.
WikiLeaks, business pages and corporate transparency
I can't help agreeing with Ben Schiller that if WikiLeaks wants to have a serious impact beyond politics, business is where it ought to focus.
Ben is right that most business journalism is far more reportage than analysis.
Where impact is considered, it's never social or environmental when you read the financial pages.
Business journalists write about stock prices and financials, with the odd foray into corporate governance.
That leaves consumer and environment journalists, and increasingly some investigative types, where they remain, to cover ESG (enviro, social, governance) issues.
If large companies want to convince the markets that ESG is material to strategy, then perhaps they ought to start by helping educate business editors and their staff.
Tailor some communication specifically to business media perhaps.
WikiLeaks, if the organisation survives its 'arrest warrents' and technology travails, is sure to make a big splash when it releases what it has on big banks and others, shortly.
We'd better get used to radical transparency. Naturally the media are rubbing their hands in anticipation of what Assange et. al. have on business. We'll find out soon enough.
Still, if you work for a large company, this might have one benefit : You may spend a lot less time writing emails than in the past. That can't be so bad.
Ben is right that most business journalism is far more reportage than analysis.
Where impact is considered, it's never social or environmental when you read the financial pages.
Business journalists write about stock prices and financials, with the odd foray into corporate governance.
That leaves consumer and environment journalists, and increasingly some investigative types, where they remain, to cover ESG (enviro, social, governance) issues.
If large companies want to convince the markets that ESG is material to strategy, then perhaps they ought to start by helping educate business editors and their staff.
Tailor some communication specifically to business media perhaps.
WikiLeaks, if the organisation survives its 'arrest warrents' and technology travails, is sure to make a big splash when it releases what it has on big banks and others, shortly.
We'd better get used to radical transparency. Naturally the media are rubbing their hands in anticipation of what Assange et. al. have on business. We'll find out soon enough.
Still, if you work for a large company, this might have one benefit : You may spend a lot less time writing emails than in the past. That can't be so bad.
Friday, December 03, 2010
Cancun climate negotiations, what's wrong with REDD?
Given the negotiations over in Mexico about climate change right now, here's a link to an interesting blog post, entitled: "The Top 10: What’s wrong with REDD?".
REDD is, according to Wikipedia: "...a set of steps designed to use market/financial incentives in order to reduce the emissions of greenhouse gases from deforestation and forest degradation."
Here's the first five objections to the current plans, from the Climate Justice Research Project at Dartmouth College:
1. Calculation of offsets is highly sensitive to choice of baseline methods and data availability, raising the potential for fraudulent “hot air” resulting from corruption
2. There is a severe lack of environmental safeguards in place to protect affected communities or to avoid biodiversity loss beyond project boundaries
3. REDD forest definitions can encourage plantation forestry, leading to mono-cropping and food insecurity
4.There is a severe lack of genuine community participation in project planning, implementation, monitoring, and evaluation
5. A lack of consultation with people affected by REDD projects means individuals affected often do not receive benefits and are further impoverished
The other five are here.
I'm not really sure what I think about REDD so far. Like a lot of these big picture ideas, I suppose it's all about how REDD is monitored and is accountable and transparent, to use the same old cliches.
From what I gather about the Clean Development Mechanism, it's always struggled a bit with those notions in places.
(Google has just released a new environmental mapping/data tool that is worth a look)
REDD is, according to Wikipedia: "...a set of steps designed to use market/financial incentives in order to reduce the emissions of greenhouse gases from deforestation and forest degradation."
Here's the first five objections to the current plans, from the Climate Justice Research Project at Dartmouth College:
1. Calculation of offsets is highly sensitive to choice of baseline methods and data availability, raising the potential for fraudulent “hot air” resulting from corruption
2. There is a severe lack of environmental safeguards in place to protect affected communities or to avoid biodiversity loss beyond project boundaries
3. REDD forest definitions can encourage plantation forestry, leading to mono-cropping and food insecurity
4.There is a severe lack of genuine community participation in project planning, implementation, monitoring, and evaluation
5. A lack of consultation with people affected by REDD projects means individuals affected often do not receive benefits and are further impoverished
The other five are here.
I'm not really sure what I think about REDD so far. Like a lot of these big picture ideas, I suppose it's all about how REDD is monitored and is accountable and transparent, to use the same old cliches.
From what I gather about the Clean Development Mechanism, it's always struggled a bit with those notions in places.
(Google has just released a new environmental mapping/data tool that is worth a look)
Thursday, December 02, 2010
Companies, wake up in 2011...
OK guys, the recession has been officially over for a while now.
It's still not that pretty out there, as we know.
But big corporates, by and large, are sitting on piles of cash.
And large companies are not exactly the most trusted institutions in town.
CR budgets should be improved next year. Communications/External affairs are waking up to the importance of environmental, social and governance issues.
CEOs say increasingly how much they want to embed CR into their businesses. Many claim they already have.
So really there's no excuse for the continued lack of innovation in CR that we've seen in 2009/10.
Why do I say this? Well, it's not just me, many of my contacts, customers and other commentators have noticed the lack of ambition, ideas and creativity out there too.
Our conferences have been, let's be honest, quite dull this year.
It's been "slowly slowly catchy monkey" for far too long on CR innovations.
Tell me I'm wrong. But our review of the year shows that there's a lack of big creative ideas out there.
There are some significant moments in the PDF below. Such as Unilever's big announcement, BP's travails, ISO 26,000, and the California slave labour disclosure law. But Unilever, M&S and a few others aside, its not been a great year for corporate sustainability innovation.
in key emerging markets, big companies missed a chance to really innovate in areas such as supply chain ethics. Our China briefing also below, analyses this in some detail.
It feels to me like large companies are doing more reacting to pressures around climate change, sustainable supply chains, biodiversity and communication, than really helping set the agenda.
That's a real shame. It's also a missed opportunity
So in 2011, let's hope big companies can raise their corporate responsibility game and get out in front of the issues a bit more, as PR folks like to say.
After a hiatus populated with a new notable exceptions, it's about time.
Our attempts to help set the agenda for 2011 are here, and here.
It's still not that pretty out there, as we know.
But big corporates, by and large, are sitting on piles of cash.
And large companies are not exactly the most trusted institutions in town.
CR budgets should be improved next year. Communications/External affairs are waking up to the importance of environmental, social and governance issues.
CEOs say increasingly how much they want to embed CR into their businesses. Many claim they already have.
So really there's no excuse for the continued lack of innovation in CR that we've seen in 2009/10.
Why do I say this? Well, it's not just me, many of my contacts, customers and other commentators have noticed the lack of ambition, ideas and creativity out there too.
Our conferences have been, let's be honest, quite dull this year.
It's been "slowly slowly catchy monkey" for far too long on CR innovations.
Tell me I'm wrong. But our review of the year shows that there's a lack of big creative ideas out there.
There are some significant moments in the PDF below. Such as Unilever's big announcement, BP's travails, ISO 26,000, and the California slave labour disclosure law. But Unilever, M&S and a few others aside, its not been a great year for corporate sustainability innovation.
in key emerging markets, big companies missed a chance to really innovate in areas such as supply chain ethics. Our China briefing also below, analyses this in some detail.
It feels to me like large companies are doing more reacting to pressures around climate change, sustainable supply chains, biodiversity and communication, than really helping set the agenda.
That's a real shame. It's also a missed opportunity
So in 2011, let's hope big companies can raise their corporate responsibility game and get out in front of the issues a bit more, as PR folks like to say.
After a hiatus populated with a new notable exceptions, it's about time.
Our attempts to help set the agenda for 2011 are here, and here.
What makes a good corporate responsibility blog?
"In the land of the blind, the one eyed man is king".
I often think of that line when I see some of lists of "best CSR blogs" out there in the social media universe.
Often, just because a blog exists on responsible business it seems to be held in high esteem by some folks. I don't quite fathom that.
Many of them really seem to lack opinion and analysis.
In the anodyne risk averse world of LinkedIn and corporate Facebook pages, most people seem to scared about their future career or clients, to be too forthright.
Yet we know it is bold campaigners who drive a lot of the progress in the field.
I do find that curious.
My advice: Have an online opinion, you'll be more interesting if you do. (As long as you are not an extremist that is, there's enough nutters on the web as it is)
What makes a good blog? I think its a combination of personality, authenticity, topicality, honesty and a bit of humility. (note: my blog is not very good)
In short: Corporate blogs are too bland, Consultant blogs often lack bite. NGO blogs are often too rabid, journalist blogs are often too lightweight, and academic blogs often too unreadable.
Good ones are hard to find. The BBC correspondent blogs are among the best I would argue.
Anyhow, here's a list of some blogs I think are worth reading now and again:
CR/Environment blogs:
Mallen Baker, writer, commentator and regular Ethical Corp columnist
Andy Crane and Dirk Matten's blog. Excellent academics
Fortune and Greenbiz writer Marc Gunther
NY Times Green
Rajesh Chhabara, Asia editor for Ethical Corporation
UK Green lefty blog collective
Joel Makower, Greenbiz.com's founder
Chris MacDonald, Canadian academic and consultant
Greenpeace's various blogs
(Is it just me, or are there no labour standards, social issues in CR blogs out there? I can't really find any that are updated regularly and not about really specific issues, like fair trade. Odd isn't it?)
Other blogs, not about CR, but v interesting:
Paul French, China writer. Not a CR blog but fascinating on China
Ben Schiller's wide ranging blog
Project Syndicate. Not really a blog, more a collection of thinker Op Eds
AdvanceAid's blog (Disaster relief NGO creating jobs in Africa and Asia)
Digital marketing blog
Seth Godin's blog
Some of the more interesting corporate blogs:
http://blog.timberland.com
Patagonia's excellent blog (CSR Director Cara Chacon blogs at http://carachacon.wordpress.com)
Kevin Moss, BT America's blog
Some of the more standard corporate CR blogs:
Intel's CSR blog
Sun's CSR blog
Mcdonald's Bob Langert
If you want to add your own favourites in the comments box below, that would be just dandy.
I often think of that line when I see some of lists of "best CSR blogs" out there in the social media universe.
Often, just because a blog exists on responsible business it seems to be held in high esteem by some folks. I don't quite fathom that.
Many of them really seem to lack opinion and analysis.
In the anodyne risk averse world of LinkedIn and corporate Facebook pages, most people seem to scared about their future career or clients, to be too forthright.
Yet we know it is bold campaigners who drive a lot of the progress in the field.
I do find that curious.
My advice: Have an online opinion, you'll be more interesting if you do. (As long as you are not an extremist that is, there's enough nutters on the web as it is)
What makes a good blog? I think its a combination of personality, authenticity, topicality, honesty and a bit of humility. (note: my blog is not very good)
In short: Corporate blogs are too bland, Consultant blogs often lack bite. NGO blogs are often too rabid, journalist blogs are often too lightweight, and academic blogs often too unreadable.
Good ones are hard to find. The BBC correspondent blogs are among the best I would argue.
Anyhow, here's a list of some blogs I think are worth reading now and again:
CR/Environment blogs:
Mallen Baker, writer, commentator and regular Ethical Corp columnist
Andy Crane and Dirk Matten's blog. Excellent academics
Fortune and Greenbiz writer Marc Gunther
NY Times Green
Rajesh Chhabara, Asia editor for Ethical Corporation
UK Green lefty blog collective
Joel Makower, Greenbiz.com's founder
Chris MacDonald, Canadian academic and consultant
Greenpeace's various blogs
(Is it just me, or are there no labour standards, social issues in CR blogs out there? I can't really find any that are updated regularly and not about really specific issues, like fair trade. Odd isn't it?)
Other blogs, not about CR, but v interesting:
Paul French, China writer. Not a CR blog but fascinating on China
Ben Schiller's wide ranging blog
Project Syndicate. Not really a blog, more a collection of thinker Op Eds
AdvanceAid's blog (Disaster relief NGO creating jobs in Africa and Asia)
Digital marketing blog
Seth Godin's blog
Some of the more interesting corporate blogs:
http://blog.timberland.com
Patagonia's excellent blog (CSR Director Cara Chacon blogs at http://carachacon.wordpress.com)
Kevin Moss, BT America's blog
Some of the more standard corporate CR blogs:
Intel's CSR blog
Sun's CSR blog
Mcdonald's Bob Langert
If you want to add your own favourites in the comments box below, that would be just dandy.
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