How much water does that strawberry cost?

How much water does a strawberry cost?

Do you care?  Should you care?  Maybe it is kind of important to think about how much water, or clean air, or healthy ecosystem, things cost. 

Water is valuable.  It is important to make conscious choices about how we spend it.

Before you read further – if you are reading this to get an answer to that question you should stop now.  You won’t get it.  If you want to (maybe) get pushed to thinking about it a bit differently, then you might enjoy the next 500 words…

But, you won’t get an answer…  You may find a new way of thinking about cost though.

What do you think when you hear How much water does a strawberry cost?  Does it sound weird?

Wait, think about it.  Water is one of the most important things on this planet.  It is finite.  Shouldn’t we want to know how much water it takes to produce something?

If you think this irrelevant go to California’s Central Valley, indeed all of California and watch the struggles for the declining amount of available water. Almonds, strawberries, people, lawns, fish (yes, fish) and many more interests all ‘need’ water.  Some will get much less than they ‘need’.

Suddenly, strawberries that cost less water will have a competitive advantage, and consumers may become interested in how much water a strawberry costs.

It isn’t just water.  Our planet has a finite amount of a lot of things that our lives depend on.  And a finite amount of ecosystems and other resources that make our planet able to support so many billions of us.

We’ve proven remarkably incapable of managing them prudently.  Far beyond the California water situation.  Check out what Berkeley based Global Footprint has to say. 

Do we fit on the planet?

Today humanity uses the equivalent of 1.5 planets to provide the resources we use and to absorb our waste. This means it now takes the Earth one year and six months to regenerate what we use in a year. http://www.footprintnetwork.org/en/index.php/GFN/page/world_footprint/

Not good management, especially if you think some of the other creatures on the planet deserve something too.

So, what does that all have to do with How much water does that strawberry cost?  If you can’t measure it, you can’t manage it.

If you don’t pay for it you won’t manage it?

So, maybe we should know how much water something costs? 

How much water does your designer jacket cost?  How much carbon?

Your iPhone?  Your Xbox?  Your favourite TV show?

What about education?  How much water does a degree cost?   The list goes on.

Even to How much water does that beer cost?   Beer can cost a lot of water.  But, some companies are taking big steps to manage it.  Some aren’t.  Would you like to know How much water your beer costs?

Some companies are measuring things like this.  I was pleasantly surprised this week, while reading the sustainability report of Eldorado Gold, a Canadian gold mining company that is not recognized as a sustainability leader.  Yet, they tracked water usage around gold production, and have made impressive steps at managing it.

I’m sure other companies are doing similar, with water and other important natural capital inputs.

Wait, what is natural capital?  There are a few definitions that people use.  I like to think of natural capital as those resources the planet provides for us and which people and industry are not really paying the full price to use (or abuse).

Things like water, like clean air, like ecosystems.  For the most part we use and abuse water and air and such at the cost of acquiring them.  As water gets more scares it costs more to acquire but is the price really a market price?  Are we paying the full ecosystem cost of taking that water from nature?

Same with abusing air.  Industry (and individuals, for those of us who occasionally want to point at others as the problem) are starting to pay some cost for managing how much we mess up the air and the atmosphere.  But, not nearly the true cost.

This is a long debate and we won’t try to resolve it here, even though it is important.

Back to how much water that strawberry costs…

Do you think we should know how much?  Or should we even care?

Do you think it important to know how much of our earth’s ecosystem resource are used by the different things in your life?

Do you trust industry and governments to manage these resources without measuring them in relation to outputs?

If you answered these questions like I do then you may want to ask How much water does that strawberry cost?   

And keep asking until it becomes not weird to ask because everyone knows that we should know how much of our planet’s ecosystem is used for the products and services that we buy.

How many planets do we have?

…remember… How much water does that strawberry cost?   

Who? Me? Responsible for CSR?

Shared Value requires Shared Responsibility:  Whose Responsibility is Corporate Social Responsibility?

Watching some of the discussion on corporate social responsibility it sometimes seems like governments, communities, NGOs and everyone else expects to sit back and have somebody (aka business) deliver CSR to them on a silver platter.

WRONG!!

Corporate Social Responsibility is not something a company does to or for communities, governments or others. 

To be successful and sustainable it takes a shared and collective responsibility with all stakeholders.  How could it be any other way?

Yet, far too often we see major stakeholders, governments, communities, NGOs and others, placing all the responsibility on companies, almost as if they expected them to play the role of Government (or Santa Claus). 

Sometimes too, we see companies sitting back and trying to leave the responsibility to other stakeholders, including often other companies or industries.

Neither approach will work very well.

All partners are in the same boat.

If the boat floats all will benefit.  If it sinks everyone gets wet.

Those communities and organizations that are pro-active in organizing and planning CSR activities and sharing in the responsibility with companies, will find that they simply get more value at the end of the day.  And, they will gain more capacity as well, and more ownership over their destiny.

Those companies that take the lead AND have projects where ALL stakeholders take appropriate responsibility will find that more value is created for stakeholders and shareholders.

If CSR is about aligning interests so that more benefits can flow to more stakeholders (including shareholders) how does it make sense that all responsibility should be on the company or other partner to organize and do.

Surely Shared Responsibility is where everyone should be trying to get to.

Let’s assume that through a collaborative consultation process a mining company and local community identified that improvements in education and health were priorities.

• What is the role and responsibility of the community and local organizations?What is the role and responsibility of local government?
• What is the role and responsibility of the Sector Ministries (Education & Health)?
• What is the role and responsibility of the company?
• What is the role and responsibility of NGOs and other development actors with an interest in education and healthcare?

Think about what the roles and responsibilities should be.  Then think about how the project would normally play out.

This way works:  In successful examples the various stakeholders will all play a proactive part in the overall project, exhibiting leadership, collaboration and initiative as required. 

The project is truly made up of partners, working together and through their collaboration and collective responsibility helping to achieve results that none of them could achieve on their own.

This way, not so much:  In other cases one partner (often business, but not always) is looked at to lead and take the bulk of the responsibility.  Other stakeholders sit back and expect benefits to come to them.  

Regardless of which partner, or partners are left with the bulk of the responsibility, the project won’t succeed nearly as well as if there was a collective sharing of responsibility.

Do your CSR projects sometimes end up looking like this?

Ironically, in projects where the bulk of the responsibility is left to one or two partners, they are the ones that get blamed if things don’t work perfectly. 

Is it any wonder that some get frustrated and, if they keep going, end up frustrated and cynical.

So, Whose Responsibility is Corporate Social Responsibility?

Look at any CSR projects that you are involved in. Is there a collective responsibility?

If not, why not?

And, what will you do to change that and facilitate collective responsibility.

Blaming the partners who have been carrying the responsibility probably isn’t the most productive response.  Training and encouraging all partners to accept a fair share of responsibility is a far better way to go.

 

Sharing responsibility across partners and stakeholders can drive project success and make the work more fun

 

 CSR can be an effective mechanism for creating value for society and shareholders.  But, it doesn’t work well for anyone if responsibility and ‘ownership’ is not shared amongst all stakeholders.

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To read other CSR Articles and Thoughtpieces by Wayne Dunn click here>>>

Dirty, ugly mining has lessons for Hi Tech!

Dirty, ugly mining has lessons for Hi Tech!

And Hi Tech should pay attention or it could feel the pain that mining felt when it started getting slammed by a rising tidal wave of social performance expectations.

The mining industry has become relatively good at figuring out how to organize itself to create local benefits and value as a by-product of its core business operations. 

In general mining goes beyond simply meeting regulatory requirements on environment, labour, safety, etc. and is actually creating additional value for local communities through targeted development programs and efforts.

From working with local agricultural producers, to supporting alternative economic opportunities for women to general education and health programming and across a wide-range of other social value areas, the mining industry is reaching out to support people and families in the communities near its operations.

Of course, it is far from perfect and one doesn’t have to look far to find where it has come up short.  But, what is important here is that there are many places where it is succeeding and having meaningful impacts on people, families and communities.

What does this have to do with hi tech?  Lots.

In general the hi tech industry has been paying increasing attention to its supply chain.  To materials sourcing and to the labour, environmental and human rights practices in its supply chain.

This isn’t easy with supply chains spread throughout developed and developing economies and across a range of national regulatory frameworks. 

In many countries the national regulations governing environment, labour standards, health, safety and human rights are below what the hi tech industry’s consumers would consider appropriate.

Many companies have acted to set their own standards in these areas to guide their employees, contractors, sub-contractors and others in their supply chain, essentially establishing a private regulatory framework.

Managing compliance throughout this diffuse network and across its linguistic, cultural and economic diversity is challenging to say the least.  Often the marketplace expectations that drive this private regulatory framework are totally foreign to the people and organizations being asked to apply them.

And now, in the midst of this challenge, more is coming!

Soon companies will be held accountable for a broader social performance expectation.  In addition to meeting global expectations on materials sourcing, health, safety, labour standards, environment and human rights companies will be expected to create social value in the communities in which their supply chain activities take place.

This is where mining has lessons that can be helpful.  Those companies that want to lead, rather than be driven to meet these emerging social value creation expectations should take a close look at what happened in the mining industry. 

The mining industry’s movement to support social value and development was often driven by painful pressures from NGOs, communities and the global public.

As society became more focused on social and environmental performance (starting roughly in the 1990s) the mining industry was an early and relatively easy target.  It had:

·         Large, highly visible and concentrated environmental footprint

·         Legacy of less than stellar environmental performance (some would say terrible)

·         Legacy of social disruption

And the industry wasn’t really prepared to handle the pressure for increased social performance. 

Some balked and resisted.  Many of those lost market cap and even valuable projects as that elusive ‘social license’ evaporated when they were unable to effectively deal with growing social demands on their projects and activities.

But some have thrived.  Some adapted well and have learned to integrate local value creation into their projects and activities.

Today leading mining companies are routinely involved in a wide-ranging suite of social, economic and environmental activities aimed at making life better in the communities in which they operate.

These activities go far beyond mining and encompass a range of health, education, economic/poverty alleviation, agriculture, environment, gender and other activities. 

The major themes of the mining industry’s social value added activities are nearly perfectly aligned with the global development community’s focus areas as defined by the Millennium Development Goals and the Sustainable Development Goals.

Hi tech companies have two choices in the face of the emerging expectations to create social value as a result of its supply chain activities.

They can sit back and wait for the pressures to develop further and respond later as pressures build.

Or, they can be proactive and get out ahead of the curve.

For those wanting to get out ahead of the curve the lessons learned in the mining industry can be valuable.

Internal CSR Communications Suck

Let's be honest:  Internal CSR Communications Suck

CSR Mumbley Gook communications need to stop. Until us CSR Professionals get better at internal communications and engagement we will stay in an irrelevant sandbox away from core business activities and decisions.

CEOs, because of the broad and diverse constituents they deal with, generally get the relevance of CSR.

Too often the Finance, Operations, Engineering, Production and other functions don’t get it. They may make the right noises (because it is expected of them) but at a fundamental level they don't get the core relevance of CSR to their role and their career.

Part of the reason they don’t get it is because the CSR Pros (myself included) can’t or won’t spend the time making focused internal business cases.

The “What’s in it for me?” case must be developed and communicated across the entire organization.

It is the CSR team's responsibility to help EVERY leader and their team understand the relevance of CSR for their role and work.

There is a strong What's in it for me? for Finance, Operations, Engineering, Production, R & D and other areas of the business. If they don't know it then it is up to the CSR team to develop and communicate it so they can hear it.

Until they do, CSR will remain an outsider to the inside of the business.

·         CSR is important for Shareholders AND for all functions and divisions inside a company.

·         It is CSR’s responsibility to help those functions and divisions to understand why.

·         If they don’t, then the CSR team has failed.

If CSR is on the outside looking in at company operations then the CSR team has to take the lead to change that.  By making it clearly understood how and why CSR is directly relevant to the organization's Departments and Units, Leaders and Workers.

Some thoughts on how to do this are in Engaging Internal Stakeholders in our CSR Knowledge Centre. But don't expect all the answers there. They aren't.

Many of the answers are in your experience and insights. Look there for the stories and the business case that can help your colleagues to understand the importance of CSR for all functions and departments in your organization.

Remember, if you are not creating value with CSR then you will have a tough time to communicate value.  But, when you do create value with CSR, be sure to communicate it.

Not communicate in a Socialwash sort of way, but it a way that can be heard and accepted.

CSR is about value.  Figure out the value for them and communicate it clearly to your internal stakeholders.

When we get the internal CSR communications right not only will our work be easier and our external CSR projects work better and have more societal impact.  Our company and our shareholders will capture more value too.

Get CSR value right AND get the internal and external communications right and get ready for an exciting ride.

Four Strategies for Local Content Success

Local content has emerged as one of the most pressing issues facing business in emerging markets. 

Rightfully so.

Planned and executed properly, local content is the most sustainable and the most cost-effective mechanism for delivering value into local communities and economies.

It has the best local value to investment ratio (ROI) and even when done poorly it can have significant positive impacts.

Effective local content strategies have two focus areas that are common across industries and geographies.  These are employment and procurement. 

Get them right and your project has the foundation for a strong and resilient social license.  Local employment and procurement can also be a key component of your project’s overall economic viability. 

Get them wrong and your project will struggle with social and community issues and, quite often, overall project viability.

Developing local employment and local procurement is one of the best leveraged CSR investments that a company can make.  Think about it.

The jobs have to be filled.  The goods and services have to be procured.  If they aren’t procured locally then very little of the money from them will circulate in the local economy. 

If they are procured locally then virtually all of the money circulates in the local economy and has a significant multiplier effect.

Even if local content creates additional costs the socio-economic impact derived from those extra costs represent a significant return on that investment because they are leveraged by the overall employment and procurement spending.   

And, often there aren’t extra costs or the additional costs are front-loaded and the benefits last over the life of the project.

If a project isn’t maximizing local employment and procurement then it will be bringing in more outsiders.  This costs extra and can increase community tension beyond the lost employment and contracts.  (Think of an influx of single young men coming to work at a project site and the impact on local families and communities).

Successful local content strategies can not only result in strong local relationships, they can also help with a project and company’s relationship with local and national governments and regulators as well as with developmental and advocacy NGOs.

But, success is not easy 

Common constraints that must be overcome to have success with local content include:

·         Projects are often based in remote locations with little or no experience with industrial employment or even salaried employment of any kind. 

·         Levels of literacy are low and household economies are often subsistence based.

·         There is little or no effective infrastructure to provide training and support to assist potential workers with the transition to industrial employment.

Local residents desperately want opportunities to participate in the project's economic activity through jobs or contracts.

·         Local businesses and prospective entrepreneurs lack the skills and experience to be effective providers of goods and services.  This includes both technical skills and business management skills.

·         There are no economic vehicles in the local economy that can enable effective participation in the larger contracts and opportunities. 

Locally owned businesses lack the financial, operational and management capacity to compete for larger contracts, even with extensive support and assistance from the project/company.

The bulk of the overall value of contracts for goods and services cannot be broken down to a size that can be digested by local businesses and entrepreneurs. 

This means that by default the local economy is effectively prohibited from participating in the lion’s share of opportunities other than as sub-contractors.

·         Programs to facilitate local content development are under-resourced and focus on short-term impacts rather than the structural issues that inhibit optimization of local content.

Below are four strategies that can help achieve local content success. 

They probably won’t all work all of the time.  And some may have no applicability to your particular project or venture. 

But, you may find some useful, or they may stimulate you to think of other strategies and approaches for optimizing local content.

1.       Think Cap Ex when budgeting

Developing and implementing successful local content programs isn’t cheap.  Getting to success often means overcoming significant gaps in skills and capacity, and sometimes requires development of organizational and institutional infrastructure.  This can be costly and time-consuming, yet can provide valuable long-term results.

Investments in local content development pay back over the life of the project.  Yet most budgets treat them as operating expenses, not capital expenses.  Why?

In my experience it is mostly because nobody has challenged finance and accounting on how they are treated.  But, it does make a difference.  And it should be treated as a capital expense.  The payback is over time, generally over life of project.

Local content investment contributes value over the life of the project. Yet, it is seldom budgeted as a capital expense.  This results in chronic under-funding.

When local content development is treated as an operating expense it is generally under-resourced and focused too much on short-term rather than life of project impacts.

There is a strong case to be made for including local content development budgets early on in a project’s overall capital budget.  This can provide the resources and the time-frame to make it work effectively and will pay off handsomely over the life of the project.

2.       Development Corporations

The scale of most procurement opportunities is simply beyond the financial, operational and organizational capacity of local businesses and economic institutions.

Local businesses are simply unable to scale so as to take advantage of the opportunities the project presents.  And, if they were given them they would not have the capacity to manage them effectively.

This was a challenge faced by many Indigenous communities in Canada. 

Development of major industries and projects on their traditional lands meant that there were large contracting and business development opportunities available to them.  But, their local businesses and economic structures did not have the scale to take advantage of them.  The opportunities and benefits went to outside providers.

A development corporation model evolved over time and proved to be very successful at enabling local capacity to bid on major contracts and activities. 

In the development corporation model geographic or tribal based populations come together and form for profit development corporations that are collectively owned.  They are able to operate at a scale whereby they can engage professional management and be better able to meet the needs of modern industry.

In many cases development corporations would recognize that the scale of the contracting opportunity was so large that they needed to bring in additional operational and financial expertise.  This was often accomplished via joint-venturing with firms that could bring the missing pieces to the opportunity and supplement the strategic local content advantage that development corporations had.

Kitsaki Development Corporation – Local Content Success Story

An early example of using a development corporation approach is the Kitsaki Development Corporation, a business development vehicle created by the Lac La Ronge Indian Band in northern Saskatchewan, Canada.

Kitsaki Development Corporation is an successful example of a development corporation being used to overcome gaps and issues that inhibit local content success

The regulatory structure that was put in place to enable the development of the Uranium industry in northern Saskatchewan sought to facilitate local content development.  One of the ways it did this was to put in place a requirement that local content providers be given a specific bid preference.

Kitsaki used this preference, along with a well-executed joint-venture strategy to secure an initial contract.  It has used that strategy across a range of focused opportunities and created a venture with annual turnover in the ½ billion dollar range (see details on their website here.

The Lac La Ronge Indian Band used a Development Corporation (Kitsaki) and a strategic partnership approach to create NRT Trucking and capture a major transportation contract from a local mine.  Using the same tactics they have grown Kitsaki into a substantial economic force, generating many hundreds of jobs and contract opportunities for band members and significant revenues and profit

In the mid-1980s the bulk transportation contract was coming up for Key Lake Mine.  Kitsaki recognized the opportunity and also recognized that while it had a local content advantage, it did not have operational experience in the bulk transport business.

Kitsaki, which had astute professional management, sought out a partner that could bring the missing pieces to the venture.  It partnered with Trimac Transportation, the largest bulk transport firm in North America. 

The Jt Venture that was created, Northern Resource Trucking, which was 51% owned by Kitsaki, went on to become the largest bulk transport business in Northern Saskatchewan and today provides services to industry and communities across the region.

Kitsaki used a similar approach to take advantage of other strategic opportunities in the local and regional economy.  See more here.

This development corporation and joint venture model has proven very successful for many Indigenous communities and tribal organizations across Canada and the United States.

A key to the sustainable success of development corporations is a strategic approach that leverages local content advantages and meets the needs of industry and other markets, often through partnerships and joint ventures.

An equally important key is effective governance and political management that give the development corporation operational space and keeps it free from political interference and manipulation.

3.       Pre-employment training

Advertise for entry level workers at a remote project and you are overwhelmed with applications.  And, the process of sifting through them is inefficient, often bringing in poorly suited applicants and leaving better suited ones off the list.

Some applicants find that the structure of industrial employment and its impact on family and life simply doesn’t fit for them.  In other cases, immersion in a structured institutional setting can bring out traits that were not evident during the screening and hiring process

Too often the end result is high turnover of employees and frustration on the part of employees, managers and the company. 

A well-structured pre-employment training program can address these issues.  It can dramatically reduce turnover and provide the broader community with enhanced life-skills and livelihood potential.

It works by establishing a short-term program (typically 6-12 weeks) where a pool of prospective employees are brought into a program that prepares them for industrial employment and helps them to determine if industrial employment is for them.

The program typically consists of a range of components that are directly and indirectly related to the anticipated employment.  

They include elements related to the lifestyle transition that often accompanies a move from a subsistence lifestyle to salaried industrial employment.  Some of the programming, such as household financial literacy and household economic transition involve spouses and sometimes children.

At the end of the pre-employment training the trainees have a much better sense of what all is involved in industrial employment and whether that is a fit for them and their families.

Pre-employment training helps companies to know prospective employees better and to make smarter hiring decisions.  It also helps prospective employees to understand whether industrial employment is a fit for them.  Even those that don’t move into industrial employment leave the program with valuable life and livelihood skills.

Pre-employment training gives employers the opportunity to know prospective employees over a much longer time-frame and across broader range of situations. 

At the conclusion of the program those deemed the most suitable for industrial employment go into a pre-screened pool that the company can select from when it next needs to hire new workers.  This pool can also be made available to contractors and others, helping to improve secondary and tertiary level local content success.

The end result is that those who are hired and brought on board are much more likely to stay and succeed.  A big cost saving for the company, big value for the local economy and a big frustration avoider for all!

Even those that are not brought into the pre-screened pool benefit. They have learned new skills and are better positioned to secure other employment or develop alternative livelihoods.

In many cases pre-employment training can be undertaken by more than one project.

4.       Invest in education and training institutions

The skills, attitude and expertise gap between where local workers are at and where they need to be can be huge.

Especially when the local content strategy is focused beyond simply bringing in entry level workers and instead has a target of seeing local employees at all levels and across all functions in the organization.

There is a need for effective education and training programs to systematically bridge gaps and help both employees and employers.

While it may seem simpler to either do the training in-house or bring in outside experts to do the training, this can be a short-sighted approach with longer term costs.

Most times there are local polytechnics and other local training institutions.  And often they don’t have the capacity to develop and deliver the type of training needed and at the quality level required. 

 

Investing in creating the local capacity to develop and deliver effective skills training can pay dividends over the life of a project. Partnerships between local skills training institutions and their more developed international counterparts can help ensure a steady supply of local workers with the required skills AND develop the capacity for the local institution to provide a range of other pragmatic skills and livelihood related programming.

Local training institutions are local content too.

Rather than simply pass by the local institutions in favour of bringing in a qualified institution or instructor, or even doing it in-house, companies should carefully consider investing in developing local training capacity.

This would include facilitating partnerships between local training institutions and international partners who can help them to both develop and deliver effective programming to meet current requirements, and develop the institutional capacity to do so in the future.

 

Facilitating partnerships between local training and educational institutions and highly experienced international counterparts can help create short term solutions AND put in place longer-term local skills training capacity

While this may be slightly slower and more expensive in the short term, the improved local capacity will pay many dividends, including lower costs later on and an improved local capacity to train people for a range of livelihoods and skills (thus reducing dependency on the dominant industrial employer in a region).

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These four strategies are no guarantee of success.  Local content is not an easy puzzle to solve.  But, following those strategies that can apply effectively to your project can help improve your chances of success, and can make a huge difference for local families and communities and, ultimately, your shareholders.

Some of my recent tweets on CSR and Sustainability

A few people have asked me to put my recent tweets into a document so here they are.

Follow me here https://twitter.com/ZINGmore if you want to get future tweets in real time.

Win/lose = Lose/lose. Sustainable business wins by helping others to win too. Broad value propositions = long-term sustainable value. Read more at http://bit.ly/CSRknowledge

11 Sustainable U.S. Wineries. Feel good about feeling good. Everyone wants more reasons to buy & enjoy good wine. Great article by Mary Mazzoni of Triple Pundit http://bit.ly/1xGhAGK

Increasing costs. Increasing complexity. Uncertain value generation.

Is this what your CSR looks like? http://bit.ly/1C5TES1

National Hockey League in top 20 of EPA’s Green list. Global first for a sports league! http://bit.ly/1C1Kqns  

Read 2014 NHL Sustainability Report http://bit.ly/1zgieuT  to see more of the league and the team’s sustainability efforts. And, the NHL and its teams and players do even more.

The players, teams and league make a major social impact with their support for communities, youth and causes. And, they do it very quietly and without calling for attention. This analysis argues that they could create more value for themselves if they weren’t so quiet about it. http://bit.ly/1BOqCDZ

CVS continues tobacco free support. Great alignment of social value and corporate core. http://bit.ly/1xtieaq  @EileenBooneCSR @CVSHealth It is great to see companies step up to the plate on creating social value and do it in a smart way.

The CVS contribution of $5 million to Campaign for Tobacco-Free Kids is great alignment with their corporate core. It is great to see fewer corporate CSR contributions that look like they were selected on a whim by the CEO’s new mistress! Smart companies align CSR outreach and investments with their corporate core.

Done something amazing in sustainability/CSR last year?

Tell the World!  Enter 2degrees Champions Awards. Let the world know about it and give you feedback. http://bit.ly/1LQOSgH

Market driven waste management. Financial & environmental performance.

Great article by Alexis Petru @triplepundit http://bit.ly/1yJVbtu

CSR Beyond Beads n Trinkets. Think before you spend.

See more #CSRKnowledgeCentre http://bit.ly/CSRknowledge

CSR: Create, don’t just donate.

CSR should create value for shareholders AND society

See more #CSRKnowledgeCentre http://bit.ly/CSRknowledge

Patagonia-Aligning CSR with brand, market & impact Authenticity pays!

Great short read http://bit.ly/1zy22bX  by @marcstoiber

Recycled water into beer!

Sustainability that is easy to support http://bit.ly/18Ffhz0  @LeonKaye @triplepundit

Perfect for the Super Bowl

Progress not perfection.

This and other efforts are adding up to big differences in supply chain sustainability http://bit.ly/1EXvrOM  

Stopping Hazardous Chemicals from Entering the Supply Chain By Padma Nagappan — February 01, 2015 The $11 billion parent company of brands such as North Face, Timberland, Nautica, Lee and Wrangler has debuted a chemical management initiative that could be a game changer for the industry, as it scales the program across its vast supply chain and invites the industry to take advantage of it.

Super Bowl and sustainability.

Quick insights and history at http://bit.ly/1CM6iqI  Courtesy @GreenBiz

Mars Rocks on Supply Chain Sustainability

Mars continues to push on sustainable supply chain (beef, pulp, paper, soy) http://bit.ly/1Lsvsi0  @marsglobal @EUAfricaMonitor

It was great to see them winners at the EU-AFRICA Chamber of Commerce CSR Awards Gala in Brussels in November.  See video https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0P6MfGhLRKI

And congrats to EU-AFRICA Chamber of Commerce creating the event to showcase the work of Mars, Newmont, DHL and the other winners

ICMM opens commenting period on updated Indigenous Peoples and Mining Good Practice Guide @ICMM_com http://bit.ly/1yMtmj7

Did you know the NHL is a global leader in sustainability?

Full carbon offset for one http://bit.ly/1CGUvty  more @NHLGreen GREAT leadership

Is CSR about distributing, creating or sharing value or all three?

Discussion & thoughts here. http://bit.ly/CSR_Value

Role of mining in national and emerging economies.

Interesting @ICMM report https://lnkd.in/eZFNvyv

CSR SWOT: discover risk, value and more

See new LinkedIn Post if interested https://lnkd.in/bX7V4na

Well done is better than well said!

CSR Communications must be free of Socialwash or Greenwash. 11 Mistakes to avoid http://bit.ly/1qQMM9t

Food for thought – 13 Sustainability trends for 2015

http://bit.ly/1GvgN5T  by Richard Mazzola Quick read

Viewpoints for Business in 2015 - Progress and Purpose.

Interesting Webinar discussion from @GlobeScan http://bit.ly/1CKGitY