Creating better corporate responsibility

Companies are still failing to integrate corporate responsibility into their business strategies, a senior chief executive has said.

Despite discussions about corporate responsibility among company board members, there still seems to be a lack of action beyond the boardroom, according to Stephen Howard, Chief Executive of Business in the Community (pictured).

“I believe the underlying reason for this is that although corporate responsibility is discussed at the boardroom it is still disconnected from discussions about business strategy and business operational issues,” he said in a press release on the Business in the Community website.

Nine out of ten UK businesses have substantive discussions about corporate responsibility at board level, according to a voluntary index of corporate responsibility published today by Business in the Community.

The economic downturn, says Howard, can offer business the opportunity to take a fresh look at how they can better combine profits with employee and environmental protection.

“There is a great opportunity for business to emerge from the recession with a more balanced position between being wealth creators and having a responsibility to steward our social, environmental and economic wellbeing,” he said.

The findings did however show some improvements, as seven UK companies achieved the index’s new “Platinum Plus” level, an indication of those companies whose “significant efforts to manage their business impacts [have] surpassed the benchmarking criteria in other levels, and whose outlook in this area showed real long-term commitment.”

The “Platinum Plus” level was achieved by BT, EDF Energy, National Grid, Northumbrian Water, Scottish and Southern Energy, The Co-operative Financial Services and United Utilities.

There is however a limit to the effectiveness of voluntary measures to implement corporate responsibility in the private sector, according to a WHO report on the social determinants of health.

“To date...corporate social responsibility is little more than cosmetic. One of its principle shortcomings is that, being voluntary, it lacks enforcement...voluntary initiatives will inevitable be limited in their impact,” the report says.

“Corporate accountability may be a more meaningful approach,” the report adds.

You can find the full corporate responsibility index of the Business in the Community website here.

The WHO report on the social determinants of health can be found at the website of the WHO Commission on the Social Determinants of Health.