Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) is not new – that being the case why do so many businesses struggle to find structured ways to engage with it?
Giving Tuesday is the latest positive social responsibility campaign. It reflects on those less fortunate after the excess of the U.S. Thanksgiving weekend retail extravaganza.
Social responsibility lies at the heart of the ethos of Opencity Inc. Merely running a successful for-profit consulting business was just not enough. This is what we mean by with conscience. This is how CSR is defined in Wikipedia.
The purpose of this post is to highlight the challenges we see for both business and charities in knowing where to start. Here are 6 tips for each:
For businesses:
- Elevate a corporate social responsibility initiative to your annual business planning
- Define an accountable project lead with your organization to make it happen
- Choose a specific charity or cause for one year to focus and test your efforts
- Brainstorm with the charity creative ways to mutually collaborate
- Engage all your employees in contributing to the partnership and cause
- Communicate the relationship through your business blog and amplify through social (off-site) channels with a pre-defined hashtag
For charities / non-profit organisations:
- Make a strategic board decision to focus on partnerships with corporations
- Clearly articulate the commercial value to the businesses
- Draft a sponsorship opportunities booklet and test it
- Organise a specific event and develop a package around it
- Find some celebrity supporters which will attract media, companies and public
- Build a blog if you don’t already have one, amplified through social (off-site) channels with a pre-defined hashtag
In last week’s charity spotlight I highlighted the sponsorship provided by Lloydspharmacy to Diabetes UK in support of Walk in the Park. Previously we highlighted business supporting Sleeping Children Around the World and Waitrose UK promoting Soup for Syria. I am touched every week learning about how businesses have found imaginative, innovative and positive ways to contribute to the global community in which we live. Some chose to support charitable causes close to their locations, while others are providing aid to countries and children in parts of the World in which they otherwise have no tangible links. This week’s Charity Spotlight will look at Blue Sea Philanthropy as they prepare to launch the 2016 Coldest Night of the Year campaign. Remember to support Giving Tuesday in any way you can.
Opencity Inc. think giving a spotlight to charities is important and one way we can be socially responsible.
COMPLETE THE CONTACT FORM TO CONTINUE THIS DISCUSSION
We are absolutely passionate about the mutual benefits in awareness alone that collaborations between for profit businesses and non-profit charities. Let us show you how.
I am currently reading Leveraging Corporate Responsibility – The Stakeholder Route to Maximizing Business and Social Value by CB Bhattacharya, Sankar Sen & Daniel Korschun (Cambridge University Press).