Category — Corporate Social Responsibility

When travelling, ‘local’ breakfast television makes an educative ’screen saver’ for the morning routine. Pictures, and presentation style speak volumes, even if the language is incomprehensible: a black cloud ‘avec’ rain drop, means a soaking in any tongue.

So, on a recent trip to Ljubjana it was enlightening to watch Slovenian television showcase business leaders on its breakfast programme; it even appeared to give their salary, although I’m not entirely sure about that. The tenor of the pieces are obviously meant to inspire, giving career path, and an ‘ideal day’. Not quite ‘Hello Magazine’ style, but it could easily be given a gloss.

Apart from celebrity business people such as Richard Branson, Simon Woodroffe and Alan Sugar, when did I last see a ‘normal’ business hero outside the business pages of newspapers and journals in the UK? When did you?

Slovenia is a new country rising from the ashes of communist Yugoslavia; which itself was wrested out of the fatally tangled Habsburg Empire. Except for a short time under Napoleon, the Slovenes don’t seem to have had very much independence in the last 1000 years. Now, with around 2million people, the Euro, and EU development funding, they are seeking a purpose with competitive advantage and ‘feeling’.

Making business rather than ‘Pop Idol’ an aspiration for people seems a shrewd move. And there is evidence aplenty to show that distinctive business success based on a personal social responsibility is Slovenia’s zeitgeist. “Forward with nature” is their united mission covering everything from pre-fabricated motorway architecture, to ecological housing construction and a hospitality industry built around ‘wellness’ and ’slow-food’.

But I would say they still have one cultural disadvantage to overcome from their communist past - customer service. Real, honest, altruistic customer service woven into their shiny, new, green, designer businesses could well be a world beater for brand Slovenia.

This time last year the ‘plastic bag’ movement was getting into full swing. Now, the hype is passing. Going green hit a high last season; now economic pressures have taken over. A new report by Ernst and Young suggests that as food prices rise, higher priced organic food will be shunned; whilst higher fuel prices show that giving up ‘combustion engine’ transport is neither popular or viable. Meanwhile the evidence on climate change is looking less and less consensual.

But that does not mean that organizations can go back to business as usual. There is seldom hype without good cause; a butterfly has fluttered its wings and changes are in motion.

The problem with greenwash is that it has been a bullying, hypocritical, bandwagon. Live Aid wrist bands were worn more as a ‘personality’ fashion statement, than out of a real passion to help Africa sort out it’s structural issues. But underneath it all there is still a need to think about our environment - just look at the state of China. There is still a need to save resources - Freecycle is a popular movement. There is still a need for companies to help combat social issues - obesity is real, and food education badly needed.

So, in your research find out both the ethical concerns and the everyday problems of your customers, and build your proposition accordingly - but be informative and be honest. There are still good ’solid’ reasons for people to buy organic food from local producers, cut down on plastic bag use, and walk more - it will save them money, declutter their houses, and help them lead healthier, longer lives. There are also major market segments very interested in doing something real to help others, and companies like outdoor clothing company Patagonia, provide an excellent service in raising awareness of global social and environmental issues.

Personal social responsibility never was and never will be hype.

How to respond to the ‘man made’ climate change debate is difficult for business.  If you run a staff workshop on ‘brand or product development’ you will encounter swathes of ‘foot dragging’ cynicism: and that goes for customers too.  But if you don’t consider the issue, then other stakeholders and ‘interest groups’ may not look on that favourably. 

Now, in spite of the claim that all scientists agree that climate change is mostly man made, we have had yet more contradictory evidence in the last few months: a film in the US ‘An Inconvenient Truth or Convenient Fiction’ and a court case in the UK which has ruled that ‘The Inconvenient Truth’ has overlooked, well, some inconvenient truths of its own. 

Then comes ‘Cool It - A Sceptical Environmentalists Guide to Global Warming’, by Bjorn Lomborg, telling us that no climate model has predicted the Gulf Stream will turn off.  And ‘Scared to Death’ a book by Christopher Brooker and Richard North which tells us that:-

•  The 1998 hockey stick temperature graph is now a totally discredited scientific thesis. The hottest year of the 20^th century was 1934 not 1998.
•  Many scientists now say world temperatures have fluctuated for centuries, and tend to correlate with the radiation from the sun, not CO2 levels.
•  In 1998 the UN’s enquiry into climate change asked 1,500 experts to report. But in the final huge document the prefacing Summary for Policymakers did not include the caveats that the experts reports had put forward.

The book also states, that consumers will not tolerate the drop in living standards that the EU’s 2050 emission targets demand.  In the end it will be the corporate world that needs to react on behalf of customers: and the Carbon Trust is already advertising for innovators to help business develop new ‘low carbon’ technologies. 

Maybe the best way for business is to depoliticise the whole issue and take the middle ground: split climate change away from CO2 emission, both are happening it’s the correlation that the issue .  Saving resources including energy is laudeable; after all it cuts down customer’s energy bills.  Innovating methods of CO2 control will save customers the extra tax they will be charged at least.  Looking after the natural environment enhances well being. 

In addition make sure your staff have access to ‘An Inconvenient Truth’, ‘Convenient Fiction’ and ‘Scared to Death’ as balanced inputs to workshop thinking and corporate debate.

I generally don’t read the papers on holiday so it was a shock to learn recently of the sudden death of Anita Roddick in the middle of September. Anita Roddick seems to have always been there as an inspirational  backdrop to the sustainability movement - so I felt an immediate sense of loss. But I quickly  reflected that the contribution to positive change she, and The Body Shop, has made over the last 30 years has a momentum that will roll on for the foreseeable future. We take the concept of fair trade for granted now, but its strong presence in the high street and consumer habits started with the pioneering purchasing and product development approaches that Anita was developing way back in the 1970’ and 80’s.

When I look at the burgeoning of CSR interest and practice that is exploding around us now it is remarkable to think that the Body Shop was motivated by a revolution in kindness and facilitating employee volunteering more than 15 years ago.  Of course that was just a part of it.

As Anita has said in interviews, she used her business to revolutionise  business. She demonstrated most famously that things could be done differently in the corporate world, yet still profitably. And if knowledge is power, she personally went to some lengths to acquire it, living with indigenous farming peoples around the globe to understand the forces at work in their markets. Then using that knowledge to shape the pioneering purchasing programme that underpinned the success of the Body Shop brand.

By helping  supplier communities develop sustainable production models for ingredients she made Body Shop products unique and delicious -  thereby introducing millions of consumers to the benefits of fair trade. Anita was a pioneer in mutual marketing.

But she didn’t stop there.  Anita’s company also set out to engage its customers and staff in its ‘kindness’ mission through creativity and meticulously planned communications. She was a forerunner of co-creation.  Millions of consumers have participated effortlessly in fair trade since all that cocoa butter first hit the shelves. But how many customers would have pictured themselves joining campaigns to release human rights activist prisoners across the world? Probably surprising themselves more than anyone, that is just what they did. As thousands of customers per store signed petitions and sent messages to lobby governments the prison doors swung open. Meanwhile, bathtime beauties felt ever better about their consumer choices. Astonishing.

Of course, there were mistakes and maybe some over-claims occasionally. In interviews Roddick seems to have been more than willing to put her hand up to these and assess why they had happened. I guess you have to be brave on all fronts if you are going to be a pioneer, including facing up to your very public slip-ups.

Finally, there was the L’Oreal business. Well, Anita Roddick certainly sold a very successful business for an awful lot of money. Whether she ‘sold out’ is another matter. She reckoned not: in interviews she likened the Body Shop becoming part of the L’Oreal beauty empire to a Trojan horse that would bring change from within. I hope so.

In the meantime the sale made £millions available to the foundations she established to further her causes. I’m sad that after all that hard work and enterprise she won’t be around to enjoy the fun of giving the profits away. But I’m convinced that the ingenuity and sheer gutsiness that she brought to business will impact on many of us for a good while to come.

Anita Roddick’s example of stepping out of line to achieve positive change and encouraging others to effortlessly engage in the process is even more relevant  in a world awash with CSR activities. There is a lot of CSR noise but those who can skilfully identify how to make a real difference in the context of  ground- breaking, mutual business will be equally as successful in their own  way.