The On-Line Forum on Corporate Responsibility ran for three weeks in October-November, 2001, following Professor David Birch's seminar on Corporate Citizenship and Sustainability. Questions pursued and conclusions are as follows:
1) What role should government take in relation to corporate citizenship?
This question produced most discussion in the forum. The problem of internal tension within the regulator's role, which involves compliance audit, enforcement action as appropriate, and advisory/educational activities. It's therefore difficult, said James Treloar, to maintain a level of independence that satisfies sectors of the community.
The model that's now evolved for environmental
regulation looks workable, with
certification paid for by the organisation itself, and independent certification
bodies working to standards accredited and audited by bodies like the Joint
Accreditation System, so results are both independent and consistent.
For the regulator, this structure provides a sense of comfort in the compliance verification role yet it is at arms length from Government itself.
There are standards being developed for corporate citizenship. AccountAbility, a UK-based organisation set up in 1996 to promote best practice in social and ethical accounting has a set of standards for reporting, and while not a standard, the Australian Business Excellence Framework of the Australian Quality Council includes an item on environmental and community contribution.
2) What measures of corporate citizenship would enable investors to assess company performance?
While there's growing interest in ethical investment, there's not much rigor in the analysis of company performance. John Bell saw a danger that initial interest will wane unless there are credible measures of performance in relation to corporate citizenship.
This question was raised in the first round of agenda setting, but not pursued by participants.
3) How do companies translate the aspiration to corporate citizenship into policy, and then into operational activity?
Peter Elliott suggested that a major avenue has been public environmental or sustainability reports, generated by departments or sites, not necessarily in response to corporate policy but simply because the specialists in those departments see this as a better way to handle the reporting task. These developments haven't necessarily been labelled as "corporate citizenship." Hence there's a need to work with senior management to write overarching policy on sustainability, and to locate that inside the broader agenda of corporate citizenship.
Another avenue has been the extensive scenario planning and business environment reviews that some large companies engage in when thinking about their positioning. What is giving sustainability agenda "bite" here is modelling that anticipates financial impacts. The Balanced Scorecard approach puts an economic value on soft issues, and is providing a platform for debate about environmental cost accounting and new economic measures such as EVM.
What we could do with are good case studies of the different pathways companies have taken.
Summary by Ross Colliver
Facilitator, The Training and Development Group