Executives and academics gathered at Boston College on June 26-27 to examine how to include UN principles in management systems and responsible business practices.

During the two-day retreat, leaders from 14 global businesses and leading academics examined ways businesses can align their operations and strategies with the UN Global Compact’s 10 principles designed to guide business in the areas of the environment, anti-corruption, human rights and labor. Read the rest of this entry »

by Bradley K. Googins, Ph.D., Executive Director, Boston College Center for Corporate Citizenship

Just when I begin to think that I am getting a solid handle on corporate citizenship I have some new experience and gain fresh perspective that humbly reminds me we are still looking at citizenship through a glass darkly.

Last week I spent four days in Kingston, Jamaica, working as a volunteer at a group of centers that serve as home for society’s castaways. One center houses a group of 40 severely retarded and disfigured children abandoned at birth. In another live a group of men dying of AIDS and in yet another, a group of older men covered with bed sores who will spend their final days without any family to comfort them. Tough to take, but real in a city where within a two-block area of these centers some 15 people were killed in gunfights during the past month.

In the midst of this gritty environment I reflected on the vast disconnect this has with my life in corporate citizenship. Much of what I – and most who toil in the corporate citizenship arena – do is search for new strategic approaches and new “sustainabilities.” This is a world of strategy and leverage, usually conducted in company headquarters typically located in a community considerably upstream in terms of education, safety, health and job readiness. Read the rest of this entry »