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Many companies striving to be good corporate citizens today face an internal tug of war between giving attention to community initiatives that address social problems and the growing demand to make environmental issues paramount.
New Standards of Excellence and Diagnostic Tool
By Allison Lee, Senior Research Associate, Boston College Center
Like the regulars at a local diner, companies now must be willing to try something different in changing times. Community involvement is still on the menu at the corporate citizenship café but the trans-fat is gone and the recipe is a little different.
This evolution has been a major focus of the Community Involvement Leadership Roundtable. Conceived as collaboration between the Boston College Center for Corporate Citizenship and current and future leaders in corporate community involvement, the Roundtable is an ongoing forum that convenes two to three times a year to identify and understand critical social issues; review changing public policy and public expectations; develop new and more effective community involvement strategies and; create and promote the adoption of new standards of excellence in community involvement.
At the Boston College Center’s 2009 Conference, Roundtable members Barbara Simic (ConocoPhillips Canada); Joyce Witte (EnCana Oil & Gas (USA) Inc); and Kate McAlister (Itron Inc) presented the “New Standards of Excellence in Corporate Community Involvement” to a packed room of conference participants.
They, along with other Roundtable members and Center faculty, have been working for the last year on the development of definitions and indicators for a new Standards of Excellence in Corporate Community Involvement. The original Standards of Excellence were developed more than 10 years ago as a diagnostic tool by the Center to help companies assess their performance.
While the initial standards served community involvement practitioners well they needed to evolve with the field. Roundtable member Pat Garris of State Farm Insurance elaborated: “CI is changing. Most companies know that it is not about balloons and T-shirts. But what they don’t know is what is excellence in the field and how that might compare not only to their past, but what they should aspire to be. The new standards acknowledge that CI is part of the business strategy, but goes on to answer the question, ‘How much of a business partner is CI and who are the collaborative partners as it moves forward and sets goals.’ The previous standards were great as we saw the field move from its infancy, but as the field matures so must the standards.”
The new Standards of Excellence:
Standard I: Leadership
My company is committed to the mutual success of business and the community and demonstrates leadership around this issue both internally and externally.
Standard II: Strategy
My company takes a strategic approach to community involvement to add demonstrable value to the business and to society.
Standard III: Relationship Building
My company builds and maintains trusting and productive stakeholder relationships in the community to advance both business and community goals.
Standard IV: Infrastructure
My company provides the resources and support needed to ensure the successful execution of its community involvement strategy.
Standard V: Measurement and Evaluation
My company measures and evaluates the results and effectiveness of its community involvement programs to improve performance.
Standard VI: Communication
My company effectively and transparently communicates about its community involvement mission, strategy and performance.
Along with the Standards of Excellence themselves comes a Diagnostic Tool that tests a company’s performance against the six standards that can be used to plan improvements going forward. Designed for use by Boston College Center members of all sizes, the Diagnostic Tool is comprised of detailed indicators that measure a company’s performance against each standard.
The Diagnostic Tool can be applied on all levels, from a corporation-wide perspective to business units to individual sites. It can be used to identify absolute strengths and weaknesses and to measure a company against others. It also can be used as an internal benchmarking tool to identify pockets of excellence within an organization as well as areas for improvement. The Standards of Excellence Diagnostic Tool is for Boston College Center members only and can be accessed on the Center web site at http://www.BCCorporateCitizenship.org/standards.
Roundtable member Joyce Witte has witnessed the changes in community involvement since she started in the field 10 years ago and appreciates the importance of the Roundtable updating the Standards of Excellence. “Back then, giving away money was considered a nice gesture and a write off for the company. Now it includes strategy and leadership, relationship building and communication. Boston College has kept pace with this evolving field from the beginning by defining what excellence means. The newly revised Standards of Excellence will again set the high bar for companies to evaluate the effectiveness of their programs for the next 10 years.”
