Community Index Magazine - Sustainability Index

A sustainable manifesto for The Slow Movement

A sustainable manifesto for The Slow Movement

Living too fast can turn life into a blur, but Carl Honoré is here to wake us up. Carl is a bestselling author, TED speaker, broadcaster and the global voice of the Slow Movement. He travels the world to deliver powerful keynotes that put time and tempo in a whole new light. By using stories and research from across the globe, Carl teaches us how to unleash “the inner tortoise”. His book, “In Praise of Slow”, chronicles the international trend towards putting on the brakes in everything we do – from work to relationships, travel, food or parenting.

Slowness is key to sustainability. It means being conscious, present, responsible, and putting quality before quantity. In order to thrive in a fast world, we have to slow down. Discover how by reading Carl’s insights in this exclusive interview for Community Index Magazine!

The interview was initially published in the bilingual yearbook Community Index Magazine no. 5. You can flip through it here: https://communityindex.ro/community-index-magazine-2023/

1.You’re the internationally acclaimed voice of the Slow Movement. It seems we need to slow down if we want to age well. What is it about slowness that turns it into a superpower?

When you get stuck in fast forward, when every moment of your life is a race against the clock, you pay a heavy price. You wear out your body and mind. You struggle to think, work, and enjoy the moment. Your creativity falls off a cliff. You make more mistakes and are less efficient. You make bad decisions. Your relationships suffer. Slowing down to the right speed makes you calmer, healthier, happier, more focused, more accurate, more efficient and productive, more creative, and more present. You start living your life instead of racing through it.

2.In a world of busyness, speed and living life on fast-forward, what are the biggest gains of slowing down? What is the connection to sustainable living? Do you find that individuals are ready and willing to get in tune with taking it slow or is it hard to cut through the noise and expand the slow movement?

When you live “slow”, you tread more lightly on the planet. You consume less and more wisely. You stop obsessing about your to-do lists. That is when you truly start contemplating the big picture and thinking long-term. I noticed that most people yearn to slow down, but many find it hard. Because of the powerful taboo against slowness, even just thinking about slowing down makes us feel afraid, guilty or ashamed. Speed is often an instrument of denial, a way of avoiding deeper problems or being alone with ourselves. Rather than facing up to what is going wrong in our lives, we find it easier to speed up, to lose ourselves in busyness, to focus on the trivial stuff. Living a fast life is, often, a way of running away from yourself!

3.You believe that “ageism is a self-fulfilling prophecy”. What made you decide to start championing and celebrating the advantages of growing old?

For me, it all started with discovering that I was the oldest player at a hockey tournament! It may sound trivial, I know, but it sure didn’t feel that way! Picture the scene: I was 48 at the time! I had just propelled my team into the semi-finals by scoring a dramatic goal. I was walking on air! Then came the news, straight from a tournament official.

He told me: “Mate, there are 240 players here, and you’re older than every one of them!” In the blink of an eye, I went from goal scorer to grandad. Even though I’d been playing well and having fun, the questions crowded in: “Do I look out of place here? Are people laughing at me? Should I take up a more age-appropriate pastime? Bingo, perhaps?”

My wobble got me thinking about how we are all in thrall to the cult of youth. To the idea that younger is always better and that ageing is a terrible and shameful thing. Once I opened my eyes and began doing some research, I realized that there is a much better story to tell about growing older – and I wanted to share that with the world!

4.How can we escape the cult of youth and become free to enjoy whatever phase of life we are in?

First, check your language. Stop using phrases like “senior moment”, “showing my age” or “the wrong side of 40” that reinforce the idea that ageing is all about decline. Second, be honest. Lying about your age gives the number a power it does not deserve. It locks you into the old ageist script. Being honest about how old you are and owning your age lets you define what your life will be at every stage. To embrace ageing as an adventure rather than an affliction, a process of opening, rather than closing doors. Third, find inspiring role models for ageing, on social media or beyond. Fourth, join multigenerational groups with people older than you. Befriending older people is a great way to build a more optimistic view of what the future holds for you.

5.What would be the top three steps anyone can take in order to set free “the inner tortoise” and cultivate a more meaningful and conscious lifestyle that’s in line with what they value most in life?

Do less. Buy less. Consume less. Drive less. Unplug more. Walk more. Listen more. Sleep more. Stop multitasking and do one thing at a time. Embed slow moments and rituals into your schedule. Embrace your inner tortoise!

Riane Eisler: A Caring Economy based on Partnerism

Riane Eisler is a walking story. A social systems scientist, cultural historian, and futurist, whose research, writing, and speaking and groundbreaking contributions have transformed the lives of many worldwide. Riane is the recipient of many honours, such as the Distinguished Peace Leadership Award earlier given to the Dalai Lama, and is included in the Great Peacemakers books as one of 20 leaders for world peace, along with Mahatma Gandhi, Mother Teresa, and Martin Luther King.

She is the author of many books, including “The Chalice and the Blade”, “The Real Wealth of Nations”, and “Nurturing Our Humanity”, which focus on her innovative whole-systems research that offers new perspectives and practical tools for constructing a less violent, more egalitarian, gender-balanced, and sustainable future. Riane is the President of the Center for Partnership Systems, which provides practical applications of her work, and editor-in-chief of the online Interdisciplinary Journal of Partnership Studies published at the University of Minnesota.

In this exclusive interview for Community Index Magazine, Riane discusses the key role women play in a nation’s quality of life and the economic value of caring for people and for nature.

1.Your work and books, including the internationally acclaimed “The Real Wealth of Nations”, have inspired and transformed the lives of many worldwide. You are championing the “Partnership System”, focused on building a more equitable, sustainable, and less violent world based on Partnership rather than Domination. Can you briefly describe what this concept means and why domination systems are “trauma factories”?

We are all familiar with domination in our own lives: top-down relations backed up by fear of pain, whether it’s physical, economic, or emotional pain. What we may not yet be familiar with is the family, social, and economic configuration of systems based on domination, or that this configuration heavily depends on what is internalized by us as normal, even divinely ordained, in our intimate family and gender relations.

Our conventional social categories such as right/left, religious/secular, Eastern/Western, capitalist/socialist (all of which we inherited from times when domination in families, economics, and all social institutions was generally accepted) do not let us see this configuration. Nor do they make it possible to see that there is an alternative to domination-oriented societies: the partnership configuration.

Only as we start connecting the dots, which requires including the majority of humanity – women and children – and the millennia of our prehistory, does all this become evident. Why? To begin with, neuroscience shows that what happens in children’s first five years impacts nothing less than how our brains develop, and with this how we think, feel, and act – including how we vote. This means that the nature of family relations, which are marginalized in conventional social studies and categories, are key elements of the interactive, mutually supporting configurations of either a partnership or domination-oriented system.

Our siloed, fragmented education makes it hard to see all this, so it is easier to understand it from a visual that shows these contrasting configurations.

All of which takes me to your second question: why domination systems are trauma factories? Through the lens of the partnership/domination social scale, we see that traumas start in domination-oriented families. These are families that are authoritarian and highly punitive, where male dominance is the ideal norm. Consider that Putin enacted a new law that lowered the penalty for family violence in Russia so that if you hurt or kill a child or other member of your family your penalty is lower than if you hurt or kill a stranger! Putin recognized the connection between families that use violence or the threat of violence as a means of control and a state that does the same. These are not coincidences, they are patterns!

Other institutions in domination-oriented systems also create trauma. For example, physical punishment of children in schools, such as caning, used to be the norm in the West and still is in much of our world, including some southern US states. This causes trauma, as does domination, top-down economics, which create artificial scarcities for most of the population – not to speak of the waste and destruction of resources through war and the failure to adequately support the “women’s work” of caring for children.

2.Gender equality is a key component of the partnership configuration. What alternatives are out there to injustice, cruelty and suffering?

In much of the West, in Canada, Europe, and the US, as well as in bits and pieces all over the world, there is a growing recognition of the importance of how the roles and relations of females and males (and everyone in between) are socially constructed. This recognition is basic to my research, which deviates from earlier methods that marginalize or leave out women and children. What my multidisciplinary, cross-cultural, trans-historical research shows is that how gender roles and relations are constructed is not, as we are still often told, “just a women’s issue” – in other words, a secondary matter. Actually, this is a key family, economic, and social organizing principle. So if we are to successfully build a future that is more just, sustainable, and humane, we must pay special attention to gender!

If we look around us, this is evident. In fact, those today trying to push us back to more rigid domination times pay special attention to gender, whether they are religious or secular, Eastern or Western, and so on. Consider religious societies like the Eastern Muslim Taliban or the Western Christian fundamentalists, where the subordination of women is clearly visible. Consider both fascist Hitler’s Germany and socialist Stalin’s USSR, where women and the “feminine” were culturally subordinated. Consider that these are all domination systems characterized by dehumanizing out-groups, whether “infidels” or Jews or people of colour.

The reality is that rigid male-superior, female-inferior gender stereotypes equate difference with dominating or being dominated, with being served or serving. This ranking of male and “masculine” over female and what is viewed as “feminine” is a template for in-group versus out-group thinking, and with it, as we see all around us, dehumanization and violence.

3.Based on your work findings, the Nordic nations seem to be more oriented towards a partnership system. How can a country like Romania bridge the gap between the willingness to implement the partnership framework and the reality on-site?

Yes, Nordic nations have more caring policies because they do not subscribe to the dominator norm of devaluing women and caring, which in domination systems is labelled feminine, whether in women or what are considered “effeminate” or “girlie” men. Romania has people who recognize that cultural systems and the values they normalize are human creations, and therefore can – and have been – changed.

Perhaps one way Romanians who want to move to a more just and sustainable world can start is by exposing that what we have been taught about our past is false.

”In reality, Balkan countries like Romania have a long prehistory of orienting more to the partnership rather than the domination side of the partnership-domination social scale.

This means spreading findings from archaeology, mythology, and even recent DNA studies, about our Western partnership prehistory. You can find much of that information in books such as “The Chalice and the Blade: Our History, Our Future”, now in 56 US printing and about 30 foreign editions. It is not yet published in Romania, though when it was recently republished in Spain, there were interviews and stories about it in all the major Spanish media.

4.How do you define the Caring Economy and what are the steps towards nurturing and caring for our planet and all the living systems on it?

As you noted, my book “The Real Wealth of Nations” details not only the problems with current economic operating systems, whether capitalist or socialist, but also proposes a caring economics of Partnerism.

Consider that both capitalism and socialism came out of early industrial times in the seventies and eighteen hundred – and we are today in the 21st century post-industrial knowledge-service age. So our current economic operating systems would be antiquated on that count alone. But the problem is deeper: both the “fathers” of capitalism and socialism perpetuated a gendered system of values: a system in which caring is coded “feminine” and hence out of bounds for the “real men” in charge. There is nothing in Smith’s or Marx’s writings about caring for nature, which both viewed as only there to be exploited. As for caring for people – for children, the sick, the elderly, for everyone – for both men and their economic theories, this work was to be done for free by a woman in a male-controlled household. Even in the mid eighteen hundreds, when Marx wrote, a wife could not sue for injuries negligently inflicted on her; only her husband could, for loss of her services! Not surprisingly both Marx and Smith called caring for people, starting at birth, and caring for nature, just “reproductive” rather than “productive” work – which is still taught in business and economics schools.

It is also reflected in currently used metrics like GNP and GDP, where, for example, trees on which we depend to breathe, are only included when they are dead: as logs. Not only that, the work of care in households has only recently been valued through government policies like paid parental leave, pioneered by Nordic nations, and it is still available only in a few US states, rather than nationally, This devaluation of care work continues worldwide, even though a recent Australian study showed that if the unpaid work of care in households, still primarily performed by women for free, were included, it would be 50 per cent of the reported Australian GDP!

”So the first step is recognizing this fundamental problem. We need new metrics that show the enormous economic value of caring for people, starting at birth, and caring for our natural environment. Women and children are the mass of the world’s poor and the poorest of the poor, so shifting to a caring economics of partnerism that adequately rewards care work is essential if we are to reduce poverty.

So the first step is recognizing this fundamental problem. We need new metrics that show the enormous economic value of caring for people, starting at birth, and caring for our natural environment. Women and children are the mass of the world’s poor and the poorest of the poor, so shifting to a caring economics of partnerism that adequately rewards care work is essential if we are to reduce poverty.

It all starts with changes in consciousness. Let’s remember that all our gains in shifting from domination to partnership, from abolishing child labour and women getting the vote to even the idea that there is such a thing as human rights and that these must also be applied to protect the majority of humanity (women and children), all these gains were due to a small, in their time unpopular, dedicated group of women and men who were persistent and did not give up. We can each make a difference!

The interview was initially published in the bilingual yearbook Community Index Magazine no. 5. You can flip through it here: https://communityindex.ro/community-index-magazine-2023/

Community Index Magazine Riane Eisler

Community Index Magazine 2023, anuar bilingv ajuns la a cincea ediție: Cea mai importantă publicație dedicată domeniului CSR din România

Community Index Magazine este singura publicație bilingvă Română-Engleză din România dedicată domeniului CSR, disponibilă atât în format flipview, cât și print. Anuarul cuprinde rezultatele ranking-ului Community Index 2023, interviuri naționale și internaționale în exclusivitate, studii de caz și articole din domeniul sustenabilității.
În premieră, cititorii se pot bucura în această ediție de articole și interviuri exclusive care pun în valoare perspectivele unor lideri recunoscuți din cadrul BCR, University of Wisconsin, Kaufland Romania, The Slow Movement sau Seeds of Wisdom.
Publicația promovează și încurajează adoptarea Obiectivelor de Dezvoltare Durabilă ale ONU pentru a veni în sprijinul României în eforturile de implementare a Agendei 2030.

Community Index Magazine: o sursă de know-how de calitate pentru orice profesionist care are un mindset sustenabil

Anuarul bilingv Community Index Magazine, ajuns la cea de-a cincea ediție, conține rezultatele ranking-ului Community Index 2023, interviuri în exclusivitate cu profesioniști internaționali de renume, articole și interviuri cu profesioniști locali din domeniile sustenabilitate și CSR, și numeroase studii de caz ale unor companii care pot fi considerate reper la nivel de proiecte pentru comunități.

Publicația este deosebit de utilă nu doar pentru profesioniștii din domeniu, ci și pentru companii, membrii comunităților, ONG-uri, universități, agenții de PR și autorități.

Publicația in format flip view este disponibilă gratuit la următorul link: Community Index Magazine 2023

Ce tip de conținut regăsesc cititorii în anuarul Community Index Magazine?

1.Interviuri în exclusivitate cu experți recunoscuți la nivel global din domeniul sustenabilității:

Riane Eisler, The Real Wealth of Nations
Wakanyi Hoffman, Seeds of Wisdom
Jessica Leclair, University of Wisconsin–Madison School of Nursing
Carl Honoré, The Slow Movement

2. Articole și interviuri cu pofesioniști recunoscuți la nivel național:

Ilinka Kajgana, BCR
Katharina Scheidereiter, Kaufland România
Gabriel Ivan, CHEP
Adina Teleucă, TOBORO

3. Studii de caz naționale și internaționale:

„Ziua Bună – Ziua Voluntarilor Mici pe Via Transilvanica!”, Coca-Cola HBC România & Asociația Tășuleasa Social
Tricou de uriaș, Kaufland România & Asociația 11even
Phasing out plastic, Apple
Școala de Bani a BCR, FabLab & Asociația Edupedu
Programul de Sustenabilitate Personală (PSP), Auchan România
Grădina Noastră, Carrefour Romania
Salvatorii de vieți, Groupama & Fundația pentru SMURD
Kokoro Sports Project
Jobs for veterans, Starbucks
Microsoft’s New BING

Ce este Community Index?

Community Index este primul și singurul index al programelor şi proiectelor derulate de companiile din România pentru a investi în comunităţi, lansat în 2019. Ranking-ul este cea mai mare bază de date a proiectelor de CSR din România și reprezintă un instrument de analiză util companiilor, autorităților și comunităților atunci când iau decizii de investiție.

Este parte componentă a ranking-ului Romania CST Index (anterior Romania CSR Index), cea mai importantă analiză a nivelului de performanţă şi transparenţă din perspectiva sustenabilităţii corporative, din țara noastră, lansat în 2016.

Există o mare varietate de inițiative și proiecte pe piață, iar o privire de ansamblu, bine structurată, oferă informații relevante ajută factorii decizionali să creioneze o strategie bine adaptată la contextul local și național.

Pentru a stabili proiectele care au fost incluse în Community Index 2023, au fost analizate peste 800 de inițiative, proiecte sau programe care au avut loc în România în perioada ianuarie 2022 – decembrie 2022. Scorecard-ul pe baza căruia a fost făcută evaluarea a avut, în total, 6 categorii și 46 de indicatori aliniaţi la cele mai importante standarde sau referinţe internaţionale din domeniul investiţiilor în comunităţi.

Ce noi descoperiri a scos la suprafață analiza din 2023?

Piaţa de investiţii şi donaţii în sprijinul comunităţilor a crescut în ultimii ani şi se ridică la peste 80 milioane euro anual, în principal pentru proiecte de educaţie pentru elevi (9.4%, o usoară creștere de 1% față de 2022), sănătate (6%, în scadere față de anul trecut) sau medii defavorizate (23%, în creștere cu 5% față de 2022). Un alt domeniu de interes pentru companii este Artă/Cultură, 10% dintre proiecte fiind dezvoltate în această direcţie, în creștere față de 9.2% în 2022. Totuşi, 4% dintre proiectele derulate de companiile din România sunt destinate combaterii schimbărilor climatice, în scadere cu 1% versus 2022, iar 1.5% dintre proiecte sunt în direcţia oraşe sustenabile, în scădere față de 4.4% în 2022.

Printre principalele trenduri evidenţiate în urma analizei, menţionăm o creştere a nivelului de transparenţă privind rezultatele şi impactul proiectelor sau programelor de CSR. De asemenea, companiile încep să alinieze mai bine strategia de Sustenabilitate / CSR la specificul industriei şi la strategia de business. În ceea ce priveşte angajaţii, aceştia sunt tot mai dornici de a ajuta comunităţile şi apreciază companiile care le oferă oportunitatea de a se implica voluntar în proiecte. Un alt trend observat este faptul că există un interes crescut privind obiectivele pe termen lung: companiile pun mai mult accent pe a genera impact pe mai mulţi ani şi a evita crearea unei dependenţe a comunităţii – se concentrează pe dezvoltarea unor abilităţi sau a unei infrastructuri care să ramană în comunitate chiar şi după ce o companie îşi redirecționează investiția către alte proiecte.

Printre proiectele care au obținut Gold Recognition, menționăm proiectul educațional Lifelab dezvoltat de BCR, FabLab & Asociația Edupedu, la categoria Educație financiară – prin participarea în acest program, elevii învață noțiuni de educație financiară și exersează planificarea și munca în echipă. La categoria Implicarea angajaților, Programul de Sustenabilitate Personală (PSP) Auchan a fost construit sub formă unui demers de mobilizare a angajaților de a se implica activ în proiecte de susținere a comunităților locale. La categoria Reduce, Reuse, Recycle – Banca Transilvania și Ateliere Fără Frontiere au dezvoltat proiectul Remesh și luptă pentru inserția socială și profesională a persoanelor vulnerabile și marginalizate. Împreună în Slujba Binelui, proiect dezvoltat de Secom Healthcare Group prin care au fost susținute mai multe inițiative din domeniul sănătății, a primit de asemenea Gold Recognition la categoria Sănătate.

Anul 2023 vine cu o nouă distincție Community Index: pentru fiecare categorie în parte propunem distincția The One to Watch – o recunoaștere specială pentru a evidenția originalitatea și inovația proiectelor care stabilesc un trend important pentru următorii ani, în domeniul lor. Printre proiectele menționate la această categorie au fost YOXO Forest – Prima pădure digitală devenită realitate, 100 de idei de business pentru România – PENNY România sau Încrederea în sine se învață în școală – Oxygen.

Unde sunt publicate rezultatele analizei?

Rezultatele din 2023 pot fi regăsite atât în anuarul în format flipview și print Community Index Magazine, cât și online: https://communityindex.ro/rezultate-community-index-2023/

Care sunt obiectivele ranking-ului Community Index?

Misiunea Community Index este de a evidenția proiectele de CSR cu o performanţă ridicată care pun mai mult accent pe aspecte precum dialogul cu stakeholderii, sustenabilitatea proiectelor şi măsurarea impactului pe termen mediu şi lung. În plus, indexul are scopul de a evidenția acele proiecte care pot fi considerate Best Practices la categoria lor și care pot fi folosite drept exemplu în stabilirea strategiei unui proiect nou.

Anuarul Community Index Magazine este contribuția agenției The Azores Sustainability & CSR Services la dezvoltarea domeniului investițiilor în comunități din România.

Pe lângă know-how și conținut autentic, această publicație contribuie în mod concret la popularizarea conceptului de responsabilitate socială în mediul de business: o parte dintre anuarele tiparite va fi oferită, în mod gratuit, companiilor care au peste 500 de angajați (>750 de companii). În plus, varianta flipview va fi disponibilă gratuit o lună de zile, pentru a populariza domeniul și a contribui la dezvoltarea acestuia.

Pentru tipărirea publicației a fost folosită hârtie certificată FSC®, din surse sustenabile. Anuarul oferă atât informații valoroase cât și o experiență autentică în sine, din punct de vedere vizual. Coperta publicației este creată de Ovidiu Solcan (collage artist), fiind un colaj sustenabil din reviste reciclate, reprezentând Capodopera ”Sărutul”, realizată de sculptorul Constantin Brâncuși în anul 1907.

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Despre The Azores Sustainability & CSR Services

Agenţie de consultanță, înființată în 2013, cu scopul de a sprijini companiile din România privind integrarea sustenabilității corporative în strategia de business, The Azores Sustainability & CSR Services are o abordare axată pe rezultate pe termen lung, utilizarea tehnologiei IT pentru un nivel ridicat de acuratețe a indicatorilor de sustenabilitate și analize/research care să sprijine decidenții din companii în definirea strategiei de sustenabilitate corporativă.

Cel mai important și complex proiect al agenției este Romania CST Index, în trecut denumit Romania CSR Index, ranking lansat în 2016 şi care este singurul din România care evaluează indicatorii de sustenabilitate ai companiilor: informaţii despre managementul sustenabilității, impactul economic, de mediu şi social. Indexul este lansat în fiecare an în cadrul conferinţei Best Practices in Corporate Sustainability. În 2019, agenția a lansat Community Index, cel mai cuprinzător ranking al proiectelor corporate de investiții în comunități și un centralizator al celor mai bune campanii de CSR derulate în fiecare an de companiile din România. Rezultatele ranking-ului, împreună cu studii de caz şi interviuri ale unor experţi naţionali şi internaţionali sunt prezentate în fiecare an în Community Index Magazine, singurul anuar bilingv dedicat investițiilor în comunități derulate de companiile din România.

Best Practices in Corporate Sustainability Community Index Community Index Magazine Romania CST Index SDGs Sustenabilitate

Digitalisation is a Clear Enabler for The Green Transformation of Our Society

Digitalisation is a Clear Enabler for The Green Transformation of Our Society

Ilinka Kajgana is an innovative and engaging risk leader whose 17 years of international work experience in large and complex banking organizations has delivered outstanding results. Her deep technical expertise across modelling and data, complex products and refined risk sensitivities is complemented by her consistent ability to partner with the business environment to drive risk-controlled growth.

In her current role as Chief Risk Officer for BCR, she has transformed the bank’s status and performance, obtaining a “low risk” rating following an ECB Supervisory Review and Evaluation Process. She also spearheaded innovation through the launch of a fully-fledged ESG transformation programme, central to business strategy.

The interview was initially published in the bilingual yearbook Community Index Magazine no. 5. You can flip through it here: https://communityindex.ro/community-index-magazine-2023/

What impact has sustainability had on your strategic planning in the last year?

Sustainability is one of the main pillars of our company strategy, not only in the last year but also in the years to come. It marks everything we do: from the way we evaluate risk to the way we train our people, from the way we look at the development opportunities ahead to the way we operate in our offices.

On a very concrete level, 100% of the cards issued by BCR from January 2023 onwards, for private individual and corporate customers, are made of environmentally friendly materials, both recycled plastic and biodegradable material. BCR started issuing environmentally friendly cards as early as 2021, and so far about 50% of the portfolio is issued on sustainable material. Also, the green mortgage loan ’Casa Mea, NaturA’ accounted for about 44% of the total standard mortgage volumes disbursed by BCR in H1 2023. The loan is granted for buildings with an A energy certificate or for the greenhouses certified by the Romanian Green Building Council.

We continued the roundtables series on the ESG transformation of the Romanian companies, organized by BCR in partnership with ECOTECA Association, with the involvement of institutional representatives, entrepreneurs and ESG experts. In March, together with the Academy of Economic Studies in Bucharest, we developed the topic of “Establishing and measuring ESG indicators”, and in June, together with EFdeN, we discussed about „Energy efficiency in buildings: best practices and challenges.

2. What ESG actions does BCR take today to help future generations meet their needs?

All our programs that are dedicated to future generations have one common denominator: education.

We have an integrated approach towards green education and digital education since we believe that digital transformation is a clear enabler for the green transformation of our society. Therefore, 66,000 Romanians participated in a Money School class, with a 50% increase in active users on Money School Platform.

We also have a partnership with NextLab Tech, the most important digital competition from South-Eastern Europe, where more than 60.000 children developed their skills for the future. Also, we have an integrated approach towards financial education and green education.

This is the underlying philosophy of our programmes: on one hand, the integration of digital and green education, on the other hand, the integration of financial and green education. Besides, we try to give young people a better understanding of what a job means today. Apart from our ongoing programmes of internships and career workshops, BCR has a strategic partnership with Joblandia, the innovative solution in education that matches highschool students and companies for a practical experience during “Saptamana Altfel” (The Alternative Education Week). In 2023, more than 3000 teenagers were enrolled in this programme, powered by BCR.

3. The fight against climate change has become pivotal for any responsible company. How does it affect your company and how do you fight to reduce its negative impact?

In the medium term, climate change will have a more significant impact on some economic segments such as agriculture, energy, construction, and possibly tourism. Our role is to support our clients from these segments into adapting their strategies for the future, to find alternatives and to invest in sustainability.

On the bright side, the recent pandemic produced an acceleration of the transition towards sustainability: hybrid work has significantly reduced the carbon footprint of the companies and has created a deeper sense of awareness towards the impact of global challenges. However, change has to be created person by person. In BCR, we have a ongoing training module about ESG that is mandatory for all our colleagues.

We have observed that no matter which generation colleagues are -Gen Z, Millenials, Gen X- they are very eager to enrol into saving resources while embracing a more environmentally-friendly routine. There is a long journey in front of us but at least there are more people who are seeing the importance of this road and who are trying to create a sensible map.

4. Banks can have a huge influence when choosing their ESG criteria for giving loans. What are BCR’s steps in this direction?

We try to position ourselves as a committed companion of our clients in their journey towards sustainability and ESG transformation. We believe that ESG is not only about compliance and ticking some boxes with the Environment, Social and Governance labels. It is about changing profoundly the way of doing business as a company.

Therefore, our role is to actively support our clients in their process of getting access to green finance. We are all in a process of learning, therefore being transparent and open is of critical importance for transitioning towards an ESG society.

We try to explain to our clients that sustainability is the most important investment: it means care for future generations and for the planet we leave to our children. On a more pragmatic note, getting access to green finance creates real business opportunities while staying relevant in the international value chain.

5. In May 2023 you had your first green Eurobond bank transaction. What were your aims with this issuance?

BCR’s green bond issue was a first on the Romanian financial-banking market, being the largest corporate bond issuance in Romania.

The bond issue proved successful from the outset, as the order book registered a significant volume of EUR 1.9 billion, well above the minimum issue size of EUR 500 million. This increased the issued amount to EUR 700 million. The final volume reflects our commitment to the market in terms of future issuance plans and our aim of building a relationship of trust with our investors.

It is also a signal of trust in the potential of the green economy of our region. A signal of trust for a greener future.

6. How about your social impact, where do you stand and what are your latest achievements?

Let us review some clear benchmarks because I believe that, in sustainability, it is important to walk the talk. In 2022, the social impact of the BCR Group (the banking services for NGO-s and social enterprises) generated the following impact: 290.000 beneficiaries from vulnerable categories, 1800 jobs supported or created (including jobs for vulnerable persons), 2.5 million Euros for developing associations and social enterprises, 127 NGO-s included in training or acceleration programmes, 900 NGO-s enrolled in The Good Exchange (Bursa Binelui), the only donor platform without commission. Besides, at InnovX-BCR, we accelerated 32 start-ups so that the local tech business got access to 19,7 million euros.

I should add that more than 21000 local entrepreneurs had free access to entrepreneurial education on the platform Școala de Business (School of Business).

Not in the least, we have 5000 employees – they are the engines that will really move Romania towards sustainability.

Ilinka Kajgana’s Biography

Since joining the Erste Bank Group in 2006, Ilinka has taken on and executed strategic projects for the business, including Operational risk, Capital Adequacy, AMA and other priorities for both the group and its international network of savings banks (Sparkassen). As a member or chair of the supervisory board, or board of directors for a number of entities over the past five years, she has helped guide the strategic direction of the group and put in place frameworks, policies, processes and controls to optimize clarity and efficiency, as well as mitigate risk.

She adopts new technology and uses agile methodologies to transform businesses, aligning them to the evolving needs of our clients and an increasingly complex international regulatory environment. Her scientific background, Master’s and PhD, have all honed her problem-solving and analytical skills. Building trusted relationships with key stakeholders in large and complex organizations has been a key facet of her success, and is complemented by an ability to engage with the regulator, clients, partners and suppliers.

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COMMUNITY INDEX 2023, ediția a V-a, anunţă rezultatele anuale privind domeniul CSR în România

COMMUNITY INDEX 2023, ediția a V-a, anunţă rezultatele anuale privind domeniul CSR în România.

Singurul ranking din România dedicat proiectelor de investiţii în comunităţi analizează anual peste 800 de proiecte, programe şi iniţiative de CSR, structurate pe 19 categorii.

Key Facts:

Companiile din Romania alocă anual un total de aprox. 80 milioane euro pentru dezvoltarea comunităţilor, conform analizei Community Index.
Peste 22% dintre proiectele de CSR dezvoltate sunt dedicate educaţiei, fie că vorbim de educaţie pentru elevi, antreprenori, educaţie digitală sau financiară.
23% dintre proiectele analizate sunt dedicate mediilor defavorizate, în timp ce doar 6% sunt dedicate sănătății.
Peste 5% dintre proiecte sunt dezvoltate de companii pentru combaterea schimbărilor climatice şi dezvoltarea sustenabilităţii oraşelor.

Bucureşti, 18 octombrie 2023: The Azores Sustainability & CSR Services, lider pe piaţă în Romania privind analizele de sustenabilitate şi CSR, lansează a cincea ediţie a Community Index, cel mai complex ranking al proiectelor de investiţii în comunităţile din România, structurat pe 19 categorii.

Indexul îşi propune să fie un instrument util pentru profesioniştii din domeniu pentru a-i ajuta să ia decizii mai bine informate privind viitoarele investiţii în comunităţi. De asemenea, scorecard-ul Community Index, care are 46 de indicatori, poate servi drept un checklist pentru a analiza gradul de complexitate şi de performanţă al unui proiect.

“Prin acest index ne dorim să oferim mai multă vizibilitate pentru proiectele și programele care se dezvoltă în România pentru comunități și să le structuram în funcție de cele mai importante direcții. Ne dorim ca rezultatele obținute să fie un instrument de benchmarking util pentru companiile care caută noi idei de investiții. Sperăm, de asemenea, ca felul în care am structurat informația să ajute la o înțelegere mai profundă a contextului local și național.” – declară Alina Liciu, Managing Partner The Azores Sustainability & CSR Services.

Printre proiectele care au obținut Gold Recognition, menționăm proiectul educațional Lifelab dezvoltat de BCR, FabLab & Asociația Edupedu, la categoria Educație financiară – prin participarea în acest program, elevii învață noțiuni de educație financiară și exersează planificarea și munca în echipă. La categoria Implicarea angajaților, Programul de Sustenabilitate Personală (PSP) Auchan a fost construit sub formă unui demers de mobilizare a angajaților de a se implica activ în proiecte de susținere a comunităților locale. La categoria Reduce, Reuse, Recycle – Banca Transilvania și Ateliere Fără Frontiere au dezvoltat proiectul Remesh și luptă pentru inserția socială și profesională a persoanelor vulnerabile și marginalizate. Împreună în Slujba Binelui, proiect dezvoltat de Secom Healthcare Group prin care au fost susținute mai multe inițiative din domeniul sănătății, a primit de asemenea Gold Recognition la categoria Sănătate.

Anul 2023 vine cu o nouă distincție Community Index: pentru fiecare categorie în parte propunem distincția The One to Watch – o recunoaștere specială pentru a evidenția originalitatea și inovația proiectelor care stabilesc un trend important pentru următorii ani în domeniul lor. Printre proiectele menționate la această categorie au fost YOXO Forest – Prima pădure digitală devenită realitate, 100 de idei de business pentru România – PENNY România sau Încrederea în sine se învață în școală – Oxygen.

Community Index analizează anual peste 800 de proiecte din România, derulate în perioada ianuarie – decembrie. Rankingul este o parte componentă a Romania CST Index (Corporate Sustainability & Transparency Index), care evaluează informaţiile publicate de companii în rapoartele de sustenabilitate. Principalele obiective ale Community Index sunt de a structura toate aceste proiecte într-o baza de date şi a analiza modul în care acestea se aliniază la cele 17 Obiective de Dezvoltare Durabilă (ODD).

Puteţi regăsi mai multe detalii accesând următoarul link: https://communityindex.ro/community-index-2023/

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The Azores lansează Community Index Magazine, anuar bilingv ajuns la a patra ediție, cea mai importantă publicație dedicată domeniului CSR din România

Agenția The Azores Sustainability & CSR Services lansează a patra ediție a anuarului Community Index Magazine, singura publicație bilingvă în format flipview și print din România. Anuarul cuprinde rezultatele ranking-ului Community Index 2022, interviuri naționale și internaționale în exclusivitate, studii de caz și articole din domeniul sustenabilității.
În premieră, cititorii se pot bucura în această ediție de articole și interviuri exclusive care pun în valoare perspectivele unor lideri recunoscuți din cadrul University of Cambridge Institute for Sustainability Leadership, Sustainability Embassy in Romania, UN Global Compact Network UK, Sustainable Development Solutions Network.
Publicația promovează și încurajează adoptarea Obiectivelor de Dezvoltare Durabilă ale ONU pentru a veni în sprijinul României în eforturile de implementare a Agendei 2030.

Community Index Magazine: o sursă de know-how de calitate pentru orice profesionist care are un mindset sustenabil

Anuarul bilingv Community Index Magazine, ajuns la cea de-a patra ediție, conține nu mai puțin de 180 de pagini de analize, interviuri în exclusivitate cu experți internaționali de renume, articole și interviuri cu profesioniști locali, CEOs și experți din domeniul sustenabilității și CSR-ului, cât și numeroase studii de caz ale unor companii care pot fi considerate reper la nivel de proiecte pentru comunități.

Publicația poate fi deosebit de utilă nu doar pentru profesioniștii din domeniu, ci și pentru membrii comunităților, ONG-uri, universități, agenții de PR și autorități.

Publicația va fi disponibilă gratuit timp de 30 de zile la următorul link: https://communityindex.ro/flip-book-2022/

Ce tip de conținut regăsesc cititorii în anuarul Community Index Magazine?

În premieră, ediția din 2022 a Community Index Magazine conține articole și interviuri în exclusivitate cu experți recunoscuți la nivel global din domeniul sustenabilității corporative, precum:

Wayne Visser, University of Cambridge Institute for Sustainability Leadership
Michael Wernstedt (Inner Development Goals)
Heidi Solba (Let’s Do It World)
Jessica Lobo (UN Global Compact Network UK)
Torkild Justesen (CEC European Managers)

Anuarul conține, de asemenea, articole și interviuri cu personalități recunoscute la nivel național, cu experiență vastă în sustenabilitate și CSR, precum:

Marco Hößl, CEO Kaufland România și Republica Moldova
Alice Nichita, Director Corporate Affairs & Sustainability Coca-Cola HBC România
Alina Greavu (Aluziva) Content creator & Social activist
Cristina Hanganu, Director de Comunicare și CSR, Lidl România
Angela Galeța, Director Fundaţia Vodafone România

Ce este Community Index?

Există o mare varietate de inițiative și proiecte pe piață, iar o privire de ansamblu structurată poate oferi informații extrem de relevante care să ajute factorii decizionali să creioneze o strategie bine adaptată la contextul local și național.

Pentru a stabili proiectele care au fost incluse în Community Index 2022, au fost analizate peste 870 de inițiative, proiecte sau programe care au avut loc în România în perioada ianuarie 2021 – decembrie 2021. Scorecard-ul pe baza căruia a fost făcută evaluarea a avut, în total, 6 categorii și 46 de indicatori aliniaţi la cele mai importante standarde sau referinţe internaţionale din domeniul investiţiilor în comunităţi.

Ce noi descoperiri a scos la suprafață analiza din 2022?

Piața de investiții și donații în sprijinul comunităților a crescut în ultimii ani și se ridică la peste 80 milioane euro anual, în principal pentru proiecte de educație pentru elevi (8.4%), sănătate (11.5%) sau medii defavorizate (18.1%). Un alt domeniu de interes pentru companii este Artă/Cultură, 9.2% dintre proiecte fiind dezvoltate în această direcție. Totuși, sub 5% dintre proiectele derulate de companiile din România sunt destinate combaterii schimbărilor climatice, iar 4.4% dintre proiecte sunt dezvoltate în direcția orașe sustenabile.

Printre principalele trenduri evidențiate în urma analizei menționăm o ușoară creștere a nivelului de transparență privind rezultatele și impactul proiectelor de CSR. De asemenea, companiile tind să alinieze mai bine strategia de CSR la specificul industriei și la strategia de business. În ceea ce privește angajații, aceștia sunt tot mai dornici de a ajuta comunitățile și apreciază companiile care le oferă această oportunitate. Un alt trend observat este că există un interes crescut privind obiectivele pe termen lung: companiile pun mai mult accent pe a genera impact pe mai mulți ani și a evita crearea unei dependențe a comunității – se concentrează pe dezvoltarea unor abilități care să rămână în comunitate chiar și după ce o companie își retrage sprijinul.

Unde sunt publicate rezultatele analizei?

Rezultatele din 2022 pot fi regăsite atât în anuarul în format flipview și print Community Index Magazine, cât și online: https://communityindex.ro/comunicarea-rezultatelor-2022/

Care sunt obiectivele ranking-ului Community Index?

Anuarul este contribuția agenției The Azores Sustainability & CSR Services la dezvoltarea domeniului sustenabilității corporative din România. Pe lângă know-how și conținut autentic, acesta contribuie în mod concret la popularizarea conceptului de sustenabilitate în mediul de business: o parte dintre anuarele print va fi oferită, în mod gratuit, companiilor care au peste 500 de angajați (>750 de companii). În plus, varianta flipview va fi disponibilă gratuit o lună de zile, pentru a populariza domeniul și a contribui la dezvoltarea acestuia.

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Despre The Azores Sustainability & CSR Services

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Cantina socială Kaufland, un model de parteneriat privat cu societatea civilă

În februarie 2021, Kaufland România și Asociația Șansa Ta au lansat prima Cantină socială dedicată sprijinirii persoanelor defavorizate, prin intermediul căreia oferă mese comunitare persoanelor fără adăpost și familiilor cu venituri mici. Proiectul este o premieră în România, un model de parteneriat privat cu societatea civilă, ce vine în sprijinul persoanelor defavorizate și contribuie la diminuarea risipei alimentare.

Studiul de caz a fost publicat iniţial în anuarul bilingv Community Index Magazine nr. 3 2021, ediţie tiparită. Acesta poate fi comandat de aici: h ttps://communityindex.ro/community-index-magazine-2021/

Cantina socială se află în București și oferă mese comunitare în fiecare zi, de luni până vineri. În 6 luni de funcționare, au fost pregătite aproximativ 100.000 de meniuri ce au fost distribuite de reprezentanții Asociației Șansa Ta către persoane fără adăpost, familii cu venituri mici și ONG-uri partenere, care au oferit mai departe porțiile către beneficiarii lor. În primele luni ale anului 2021, cantina a funcționat în regim take-away (luat la pachet), în linie cu restricțiile impuse de autorități. Ulterior, cantina a fost deschisă și pentru a servi masa în interior, având o capacitate de 70 de locuri.

Pentru că risipa alimentară este o problemă globală cu consecințe complexe, Kaufland România își propune ca acest proiect să utilizeze inteligent toate resursele de care dispune. Astfel, compania asigură toate produsele necesare pentru prepararea meselor comunitare, iar parte din alimente provin din stocurile aflate în vânzare accelerată. Meniul este stabilit zilnic și adaptat pentru folosirea optimă a tuturor alimentelor disponibile.

Spațiul cantinei dispune de toate dotările necesare și respectă cele mai înalte condiții igienico-sanitare, fiind compus din bucătărie, unde se depozitează și se pregătește mâncarea, zonă administrativă și cameră tehnică, vestiare pentru femei și bărbați, dar și o zonă de servit cu mese și scaune pentru aproximativ 70 de persoane.

Bucătăria este utilată cu echipamente de gătit moderne: cuptoare, plite, mașini pentru gătit (curățat, tocat, paste etc), frigidere, vitrine, camere pentru depozitare. Printre facilitățile disponibile se numără și sistemele de siguranță, instalații sanitare și de ventilație noi, vestiare cu dușuri, spălătorie pentru echipamentul de lucru, toalete pentru beneficiari, lift pentru persoanele cu dizabilități, dar și o parcare cu 20 de locuri și o zonă de recepție a mărfii.

„Credem că o companie are rolul de a fi partener al comunității și că implicarea face diferența, de aceea ne-am dorit să realizăm acest proiect ce vine în sprijinul persoanelor vulnerabile. Facem constant eforturi pentru diminuarea risipei alimentare, iar prin această acțiune, ne-am propus să folosim inteligent toate resursele de care dispunem și să aducem zâmbetul pe buze celor care au nevoie de ajutor”, a declarat Katharina Scheidereiter, CSR Manager, Kaufland România.

„Ne bucurăm nespus să primim sprijinul Kaufland România și să pornim împreună această inițiativă frumoasă, ce va ajuta atât de mult persoanele fără adăpost și familiile cu venituri mici”, Gabriel Ciobotaru, președinte Asociație Șansa Ta.

Exemple de meniuri:

Supă cremă de ciuperci

Piure de cartofi cu cotlet de porc marinat în iaurt pe grătar și salată verde

Plăcintă cu brânză dulce cu stafide și gutui

Ciorbă de legume

Ratatouille cu cârnați de casă

Griș cu lapte, stafide, scorțișoară și banane

Ciorbă rădăuțeană de pui

Plăcintă cu carne, sos de iaurt și salată verde

Orez cu lapte și scorțișoară și dulceață de măr cu ghimbir

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Green jobs for a bright future

CSR Europe is the leading European business network for Corporate Sustainability and Responsibility. Through its network of around 39 corporate members and 41 National CSR organizations, it gathers over 10,000 companies and acts as a platform for those businesses looking to enhance sustainable growth and positively contribute to society.

We interviewed Marco Matrisciano, Sustainability Manager for CSR Europe, in order to see how is he focusing on supporting companies across different industries in integrating ESG elements in strategy and investment decision. Marco is a sustainability professional and a foresight trainer with experience in business collaboration and design thinking. During the years, he successfully developed multi-stakeholder framework within business and academia linked to system change and sustainable development.

The interview was initially published in November 2021, in the bilingual yearbook Community Index Magazine no. 3, printed edition. It can be ordered here: https://communityindex.ro/community-index-magazine-2021/

1. Your goal at CSR Europe is mainstreaming sustainability. How do you scale up the impact of individual efforts made by companies, industry federations and EU leaders?

Mainstreaming sustainability starts with the projection of trends into different scenarios around diverse alternative futures where companies and sectors can have a better impact on society. EU leaders have the responsibility to enhance the convergence of the society towards a most plausible and sustainable scenario. I believe that supporting companies in their journey in integrating sustainability does not just mean working to minimize their impact on the planet as a business, but growing their ambition to play a leadership role in society by inspiring and implementing solutions to societal and environmental challenges.

To engage these stakeholders in practical, impact-oriented projects, I am responsible for corporate engagement in the CSR Europe’s Pact for Sustainable Industry, building partnerships with representatives from 40 different industry sectors and more than 200 European business associations. Securing the engagement of companies and associations begins with the assessment of their level of maturity and readiness of the sustainability strategy. The objective is to identify common pathways and priorities to explore inter or cross-sectorial collaboration.

2. If we particularly talk about sustainable practices in sports, would mainstreaming them increase the awareness of the broader public towards these issues?

Despite the growing awareness of the population, still a lot needs to be done to reach those who have zero or low knowledge of the principles of sustainability. Professional athletes and sporting organizations must lead by example, given the role they have in our society. We become fans of their gesture as children, and it cannot be ignored how important these role models are in influencing future generations. Last year, we have seen sports pitches becoming a global stage to deliver messages against racism and address social justice issues. Keeping the focus that much on the social component has grown also in ESG investing. Also, sport brands can finally benefit from more awareness in the society and support athletes ready to step up in order to move the conversation forward.

3. You are a target-oriented project manager, working in the sustainability field. While setting sustainability performance targets can be difficult, what are the best ways to be successful?

For measuring the impact on the environment, we can benefit from the work done by leading organization supporting companies and industry sector to design their strategy to achieve science-based targets. Meaning preventing climate change by limiting global warming to well-below 2°C.

For tackling social issues, the United Nation Sustainable Development Goals are providing targets and indicators to leave no one behind. We have all the tools to design potential pathways towards a more sustainable economy. Building sustainable scenarios is a good approach to start. It gives the opportunity to people and organizations to explore alternative futures by integrating concrete targets in their strategy. Especially, when exploring these scenarios help to identify with which group of stakeholders a company must engage in order to achieve its targets.

4. How can companies encourage their employees and business partners to show more genuine commitment to CSR?

By showing positive impact. If a company is committed, it should always seek innovative strategy and tactics to foster impactful change. But translating those strategies into actions require the collaboration of employees and business partners.

Engaging employees helps companies to create shared commitments. While regarding other stakeholders, implementing sustainable business models requires building partnership only with those partners who can contribute to strategy.

5. In what ways does sustainability mean new growth and job opportunities in Europe?

The debate around the impact on job creation of a transition towards a low carbon society started in Europe already across the years 2000’ with the transformation of the European energy sector. Since the Kyoto Protocol of 1997, there has been an increasing quantification of the employment effects of these policies. The launch of the European Green Deal with its ambitious targets and roadmap for Europe towards 2050 has been particularly supported by the potential number of jobs creation. Not just for the direct impact on a country or region, but for the spillover effect amplified by an increasingly globalized world.

The estimation around the industrial transformation of the next 20-25 years turns around the capacity of the Union to develop new technology and upskill or reskill the workforce. The economic transformation towards low carbon society that we are experiencing at a faster pace has an impact not only on the creation of jobs, but also on the development of a globally competitive industry based on technology shift and not labor costs. But as described also in a study of the European Commission on the “Paths towards a sustainable industry in 2035”, the development of “Green Industries” can create a large number of green jobs but also job loss and shift in those sectors, particularly carbon intensive.

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The Community of Place becomes The Community of Purpose

The pandemic has given us an opportunity we would never have allowed ourselves to radically shake up the way that we see ourselves. Fundamental to this is the way that we identify ourselves in relation to each other. It has allowed us to look at our sense of community in a new way. For a long time, our communities have been defined by geography. Is now the time to revisit this definition and see whether we need be so constrained?

As we leave the current pandemic crisis, we can look back at what Jonathan Stubbs calls “the trial we never would have given ourselves” and a glimpse into the future of work. One of those is the change in our idea of community, and how we define those groups to which we identify. Ever since Martin Buber stated that “the place is community”, the concept of community (in terms of Gemeinschaft and Gesellschaft) has been strongly tied to geography.

The concept of Community of Place likely dates back to the creation of the nation state, where a sense of identity was forged based on a shared geographical location. Before, community was defined by Relationship, the people with whom you aligned yourself, your identity tied to family or allegiance. Now, identity was aligned with geography. For before a Roman citizen could be an inhabitant of any country in the Empire, a speaker of any of various languages, with one of many cultural identities. Now, to be English meant to identify home as England, to be Romanian meant Romania. This quickly translated into other aspects of life too. Work became somewhere that activity took place – a factory, an office – with others who went to the same place. School became a venue for education. Our definition of our community, and by extension, our identity, became tied to the place we were born, the place that we live, the place that we work.

However, over time, this definition has been challenged. Community of Relationship never truly went away, although much weakened, but other models have risen. Increasing globalisation and pervasive communication have broken down the solidarity of Place. Instead, during the 1980s, we began to realise that Communities of Time were as important, and the rise of shared spaces continues to challenge the Communities of Place. What the pandemic has done is accelerate this change. No longer do people throng to the office. Instead, we meet at the same time online, what Ryan Anderson calls distributed working. The transition has been difficult for many, not least because many organisations and teams have attempted to recreate the sense of Community of Place virtually at the same time as trying to hold onto a Community of Time. We have also realised that Communities of Time are in themselves insufficient. We need something more.

The solution, I suggest, is not to go back to relying on Time or Place for our sense of Community. Rather, it is to look beyond these constraints to what the purpose of the community is. Over the last few decades, we have seen to rise of business with a purpose. A way to look at organisations as more than the sum of parts, with objectives that go beyond the pragmatic, Community of Purpose provides a powerful alternative to Place, and, with increasing globalisation, forms an antidote to the greater risk that we would lose community altogether.

Business now has an opportunity to look at their communities and redefine them, and there are external factors that mean that Communities of Purpose are likely to come to dominate. Fundamental to this is the inexorable rise of responsible business. Whether it be the response of businesses like AstraZeneca and Diageo whose alignment with social value was critical to the quashing of the pandemic, or the environmental and social values evident in the AGMs of companies held in 2021 like Unilever, where 99.6% of shareholders backed a radical climate transition plan, it is clear that Purpose beyond Profit is now firmly at the driving seat of many businesses. As the awareness that this also has very positive financial, HR and other business benefits grows, it is likely that this will spread even wider.

However, the rate of change is also likely to increase as there are a lot of positive feedbacks that push the growth of a broader Community of Purpose. Some of this will be driven by technology. For example, the greater availability of VR and MR (virtual and mixed reality) is likely to remove even more geographical constraints in more sectors, including enabling greater collaboration in design, more immersive education and training and more inclusive access to roles. Some of it will come from employees, who, as Edelman reports, are requiring increasingly high levels of social responsibility from their companies. Some will also come from the rise of a Community of Purpose amongst customers, who respond to what Smith and Alcorn called cause marketing, who exhibit high levels of brand loyalty and are often very vocal on social media. This often overlaps with the growing Community of Purpose amongst investors, as ESG requirements become the minimum standard and the rise of more active investors looking to hold companies increasingly accountable.

One effect of this is that responsible business leadership will become even more important. Responsible business is fundamentally about the creation of purpose that transcends short term financial gains, and sustainable business leadership is essentially aligning corporate values with purpose. Right now, there is a clear competitive opportunity for companies to embed themselves as Communities of Purpose to their customers, employees and wider society. Those who succeed, I suggest will be the leading businesses of tomorrow.

Simon Graham is Head of Innovation of De Courcy Alexander, the London-based sustainable innovation consultancy. Recipient of over 20 awards for his business change programmes built around zero carbon, zero waste and zero human trafficking, he has seen how companies can be transformed by focusing on their purpose. He is now involved in transformational programmes which combine cutting edge technologies, new business models and focus on community cohesion, working with public and private sector partners in areas like blockchain and IoT.

Simon also advises businesses and government bodies on how to simultaneously achieve net zero and improve customer satisfaction. Widely quoted, from The Economist to New Scientist, his latest contribution, published by Palgrave Macmillan, was titled “Sustainability, Management Education, and Professions: A Practitioner Perspective”, looking at how universities can nurture a new generation of sustainable leaders.

Community Index Magazine Community of Purpose De Courcy Alexander Simon Graham

Must-Have CRS skills for a bright future

From being a good influencer to efficient networking, the modern-day CRS professional needs a wide range of skills to be able to deliver a long-term vision and impactful change.

We discussed this topic with Anita Longley, a board level sustainability professional with over 25 years’ experience in the private and public sectors. She is currently Chair of the Institute of Corporate Responsibility and Sustainability (ICRS), a go-to platform for anyone who wants to fine tune their CRS knowledge, learn from other members and stay up to date with the latest sustainable thinking.

A passionate advocate for collaboration and transparency, she has delivered impactful sustainability strategies and community partnerships, and is a trustee of the ScottishPower Foundation.

1. You have delivered impactful sustainability programmes over time. What are the main elements of a successful programme?

A successful sustainability programme should be central to the purpose and strategy of an organization and it must be authentic. It should focus on what’s significant to the business and encompass environmental, social and governance (ESG) issues.

In order to create long lasting change, companies need to understand their purpose and the impact of their activities – they have to strive towards ‘net positive’. It’s no longer enough just to use a risk-based approach, because opportunities will be missed. Corporate Responsibility is about helping companies positively engage in the process of shaping our shared future.

Leading companies set bold targets and report their progress regularly. The strategy is led by the Board, informed by effective stakeholder engagement and delivered through collaborative action. The increasing focus on ESG from the financial sector is helping to drive this change and support business resilience, as we have seen during the global pandemic.

Investors are now aiming to double their sustainable investments over the next five years.

2. The modern-day CRS professionals intend to create visible change in the company, but to do so they must gain the support of multiple decision-makers in order to make it happen. What approach would you recommend in this regard?

The first step is to set a vision that reflects the purpose of the organization and secure ‘buy in’ to that vision. Ultimately, businesses can only make progress in their ESG strategies if they convince the financial markets that they are worth the investment. This means that ESG must be a core part of board discussions.

Building capacity and understanding of the sustainability within the company will ensure effective decision making. This can be supported by integrating ESG into existing business processes, such as risk management or financial approval mechanisms.

We’ve seen a sea change in attitudes towards sustainability and the role of business. Employees can be the best advocates for change, and their interest and enthusiasm should be embraced. Employee volunteering, for example, provides opportunities to develop understanding and ensure practical support. Engaging senior managers with stakeholders, such as vulnerable customers, really helps them understand the challenges that those customers face, and how they can best be supported.

In order to influence, we need to understand what motivates people, how the business operates and when and how decisions are made. It will be different for everyone and each organization, and there’s a balance to be had between challenging and supporting. Professionals must be clear about the business benefits and offer solutions, not problems.

3. Which do you consider to be the must-have skills for a CRS professional? Which ones can be taught in time?

Now, we have an extraordinary opportunity to embed sustainability in business, and professionals have a key role to play. The Institute of Corporate Responsibility and Sustainability has developed a comprehensive framework of core competencies and guiding principles for corporate responsibility professionals. We use this framework to appoint our fellows and support individual personal development.

These include knowledge-based skills – ranging, for example, from environment to ethics and a range of ‘soft skills’, such as influencing. Professionals must develop and deliver impactful and measurable strategy, engage stakeholders effectively, work collaboratively and have strong communication skills. Corporate responsibility practitioners are in a position of trust and need to act with integrity to uphold that trust.

The sustainability profession is evolving very quickly and specialists need to understand a wide range of issues, so networking is extremely important. CRS professionals are good at sharing the best and the constantly evolving practices, we found this was particularly important during the early phase of the pandemic. Mentoring also provides an opportunity to test and develop new skills.

4. What courses, certifications or learning platforms would you recommend to any CSR aficionado?

My ‘go to’ learning platform is, of course, the Institute of Corporate Responsibility and Sustainability (www.icrs.info), which was established to support CRS professionals to be brilliant at what they do. We provide networking, practitioner led webinars, resources, mentoring and a competency framework. I would also recommend the Cambridge Institute for Sustainability Leadership, which offers a range of courses.

Anita Longley Community Index Community Index Magazine CRS ESG Institute of Corporate Responsibility and Sustainability (ICRS) ScottishPower Foundation Sustainability