Money where it matters
Why long-term community investment beats charity, hands down.
“If you’re a company with $1 billion in profit and give away $1 million, it doesn’t matter. What I’m more interested in is the impact - what gets done with that money.”
This was Steve Croth’s answer when asked what percentage of a company’s profits should go to corporate social responsibility (CSR).
Croth is General Manager of Better the World, an organization that develops CSR initiatives to engage stakeholders and one of several social enterprises to attend the 2011 In Good Company conference in Toronto.
Exploding into the mainstream as a business imperative in the early-2000s, CSR initiatives that translate into positive results on the ground and financially are still sought by many companies. The conference, put on by Orenda Connections, allowed practitioners from civil society and the private sector to share knowledge and experience on how to get the most – both socially and economically – from their community investment initiatives.
With stakeholders no longer satisfied with one-off charitable events, there seems to be a palpable shift among practitioners towards CSR projects that achieve economic and social returns while conveying genuineness. When initiatives match these criteria, the results are optimal for the company and the community. Such was the case with Edelman, a leading public relations firm, and The Little Give initiative, where Toronto staff helped two local non-profits (KUPE Arts Society and Sketch) over a 48-hour period in 2010.
Sketch provides creative services to 15 to 29 year olds who self-identify as living in poverty. The organization’s work has enabled participants to address personal issues and, in one case, even helped a local woman launch a hemp clothing business in Toronto’s Kensington Market.
“Most people do art in their ‘leisure time.’ If you’re street involved, that kind of leisure is hard to come by. Most of your time and energy is aimed towards food and finding a place to live,” according to Dale Roy, Sketch’s Marketing and Communications Associate.
Edelman helped Sketch by developing a new website and teaching its community how to use the site’s administrative functions to manage its business activities and communications.
Lisa Kimmel, General Manager at Edelman’s Toronto office, said that in an employee satisfaction survey after the campaign, 82 per cent of staff were interested in working for companies who support causes that are important to them.
