How to approach CSR in a sustainable manner | Caroline Dale Ditlev-Simonsen | TEDxOsloSalon

the interest in corporate social responsibility or CSR sustainability has increased tremendously this graph shows the number of times the term corporate social responsibility is mentioned in media since 1989 and we see the same trend of interest among corporations this graph illustrates the number of reports on sustainability and CSI issued by corporations 30 years ago it was tree huggers that were talking about sustainability and CSR where's today ninety-three percent of CEOs claim that sustainability is a key to success and they're right research shows that if you have a good CSR program you will increase employee commitment

customer satisfaction reduce risk and even get better access to finance so no wonder companies spend a lot of money on being good companies showing responsibility actually the world's 500 largest companies spend more than 15 billion dollars annually on CSR so how come then that we read again and again about companies which are behaving irresponsible we all remember this tragedy around La Plaza the building that fell down more than thousand employees died and these people were working under very poor condition making clothing for people like us for great big international companies another example of irresponsibility which

is more recent is the Volkswagen case Volkswagen was known to be one of the most responsible companies top-rated on different screens and still it turned out that they had tampered with their emission technology and that of course led to a major drop in their brand value but it's also read to a drop in their share prices companies want to behave good they want to be the right company tourists ability and yet they fail why is that so the reason is that they don't have a good CSR program up and going companies that are struggling ask

me all the time we want to be behave in the right way we want to be good companies what do we do where do we start how do we get going and through studying companies and consulting companies and CSR in for many many years many years I have developed this five-step model or manual for how to get the CSR program that works up and going this is the model simple map test launch implement and report will start on the map but before you get started the program has to be anchored in the top management top

management is not going to do the job but they have to endorse the activities on the CSR so the first thing then is to put together a group of the company across the company five to ten people from different departments and they together are going to find out discuss what this company's main social impact the main footprints of the company a good checklist for that is the Sustainable Development Goals the SDGs which goals is relevant for individual companies depends upon which secretary they're in so let's say companies and the industry of producing clothing in developing

countries well probably decent work goal eight is most relevant if the company is in oil industry I would say goal 13 climate issues is relevant and if the company is in fish farming well it will be the 14th goal when the most relevant goals are identified a concrete plan with concrete targets and how to reach the targets must be set up when that is ready we move on to the second step that is a test take the draft plan presented to key stakeholders ask for their input accordingly whose the stakeholders customers suppliers other employees non-governmental

organization environmental organizations these are the ones to feedback come with feedback and then revise the plan according to that then we're ready for the third step that's the launch the launch is about making the rest of the company aware of the plan and let them buy into it make them put it into the day-to-day work how do you do that put it on the company website newsletter monitors be creative the fourth step is the implementation have you had to follow up the plan are we reaching the targets are we not why there will be unexpected

happenings these are great learning points the fifth step is about reporting the reporting is like accounting coming forward with what worked what didn't work and why and be open and honest and transparent not only focused on what went well but also the problems the challenges one might think that companies with big CSR report are doing a lot of things are being good companies but actually not true it's the opposite way around companies with the big reports writing a lot those are the ones who have been criticized and have to explain that they have changed and

convinced the reader the CSR reports are good source of finding out to which extent the CSR work is actually integrated into the company one company I studied had two reports one annual report which was big glossy didn't say anything about CSR and then the CSR report that was some recycled paper all about CSR obviously this company hadn't integrated the CSR work the CSR report was probably out sorts when it came to production another example is a company that I studied over time one year I looked at it it had the greatest CSR a plan what

to do targets concrete everything but the next year there was nothing about these are there at all I couldn't find anything so I called the company I said well happen where's your sister plan and this guy on the other line was after a while he finally answered you know this is our head of series I left the company okay so everything was in this person so then we see another example of a company where the CSR is not integrated in the company okay we've been through the five steps are we finished I will complete the

work is complete no definitely not this is an ongoing process with new challenges and new opportunities so the circle has to continue I'm gonna conclude a wrap-up research shows that if a company has a well designed well implemented C's our plan it's good for the company is good for society both in the short term and even more in the long term given that we are living in on a planet with limited resources a company that want to stay in business have to have a well planned well established C's our plan up and going in order

to be prepared for the future [Applause]