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The 100 Best Corporate Citizens
The 100 Best Corporate Citizens
Jacquelyn Smith, 03.07.11, 08:10 PM ESTThese businesses are setting the bar for corporate social responsibility, according to a new ranking.
Johnson Controls is the best corporate citizen in the U.S., according to CR magazine's annual ranking. That means it beat out everyone in the Russell 1000 large-cap index. It did so thanks to its high rankings in categories like philanthropy and environmental impact.
The 126-year-old diversified technology and industrial firm has been committed to sustainability since day one, when its founder, Warren S. Johnson, invented the first electric room thermostat. "We are gratified to receive this recognition, because it speaks to our culture and the way we conduct ourselves both internally and externally, throughout the world," says Paul Mason, a Johnson Controls ( JCI - news - people ) spokesman.
In Pictures: Tips for Making the Most of Your CSR Program
Johnson Controls ranked 22nd among the 100 Best Corporate Citizens a year ago, when Hewlett-Packard ( HPQ - news - people ) held the top spot. Mason credits the company's environmental impact, climate change, governance, human rights and philanthropic efforts for the change.
"Our attention to the environment and climate change has been core to Johnson Controls throughout our history," he says. The company is also dedicated to giving back through philanthropy, he adds, and its human rights focus is "guided by our ethics policy, which is consistent with international human rights standards."
The 100 Best Corporate Citizens list, now in its 12th year, ranks companies based on publicly available information in seven categories: environmental impact, climate change, human rights, philanthropy, employee relations, financial performance and governance. The list's creators assign a 19.5% weighting to environmental impact and employee relations, because they think they are what consumers, shareholders and employees care most about.
Technology and electric utility businesses dominated the list in 2010, when it had 25 of them. This year there's a slightly more diverse group of companies. "There are 23 sectors this year over 21 last," says Dirk Olin, the editor and publisher of CR Magazine. The reason: More companies in different industries are realizing the competitive advantage that full disclosure offers, Olin says.
"Transparency is a core aspect of our culture, both with our employees and external audiences," Mason says. "We strive to have open, honest dialogue with all of our stakeholders, including employees, customers, suppliers, communities and shareholders."
The list suggests that companies have ramped up their do-gooding ways, or are at least doing a better job of promoting them. "The aggregate performance of the 100 Best Corporate Citizen improved by slightly more than 5% this year over last, which is particularly remarkable when you consider that we are still operating in a recovering market," Olin says.
Seventeen companies that made the 2010 list disappeared from it this year, includingNortheast Utilities ( NU - news - people ), CVS Caremark, and Raytheon ( RTN -news - people ). Avon, Gap ( GPS - news - people ), Nike ( NKE - news - people ) and State Street are among the twelve that made the list for a fifth consecutive year--but only three, Intel ( INTC - news - people ) (No. 13), Starbucks ( SBUX - news - people ) (No. 39) and Cisco ( CSCO - news - people ) (No. 37), have made it all 12 years.
Not all the companies are model corporate citizens. 3M ( MMM - news - people ), Dell (DELL - news - people ), Johnson & Johnson ( JNJ - news - people ), JPMorgan Chase ( JPM - news - people ) & Co., and Occidental Petroleum ( OXY - news -people ) made the cut but were slapped with a "yellow card," denoting that an official legal action is ongoing. Occidental Petroleum, for example, is involved in a major human rights and environmental contamination lawsuit regarding the pollution of indigenous land and the Amazon River. Yellow-carded companies remain on the list without impact on their ranking until the investigation is resolved.
Pfizer ( PFE - news - people ), Allergan ( AGN - news - people ), and Exxon Mobil (XOM - news - people ) aren't as lucky. Those three companies were issued a "red card" and were removed from this year's list. This is year two of a three-year red card for Pfizer. The drug maker pleaded guilty in 2009 to a felony violation for illegal marketing of its pain reliever Bextra and was fined $2.3 billion.
Good corporate citizenship has always been excellent for public relations, but Olin says recruiting efforts may benefit, too. Mason, for his part, adds,"Johnson Controls is a performance-driven company always looking to improve and this recognition not only validates our culture and priorities, it will further our resolve to continue to conduct our business in a responsible manner."
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COMMENTSיום שבת, 6 באוגוסט 2011
Timberland Announces Bolder CSR Goals That Underscore Its Brand Values
rAug. 1, 2011, 9:41 a.m. EDT
Timberland
Announces Bolder CSR Goals That
Company Launches Dynamic, New CSR Communications Portal to Provide Real-Time Content and Discussion Around Social and Environmental Efforts
STRATHAM, NH, Aug 01, 2011 (MARKETWIRE via COMTEX) -- The Timberland CompanyTBL +0.05% , a leading outdoor footwear and apparel company known for its best practices in transparency and accountability, today announced the company's CSR goals and forward-looking targets, which are positioned to align more strategically with its overall brand values. The updated goals and targets have been published on Timberland's newly-launched CSR communications portal, which provides a dynamic, integrated experience that informs, inspires and engages consumers around the brand's CSR efforts.
Timberland's Bold CSR Goals Timberland's refined CSR goals focus on larger issues associated with each pillar -- Climate, Product, Factories and Service. For example, the company's aspiration around its products has evolved from designing recyclable product (one area of the product lifecycle) to creating a strategy to ultimately target the entire life cycle through cradle-to-cradle innovations.
Similarly, the company's approach for compliance with its Code of Conduct has evolved from a check-list approach in factories to putting workers at the heart of the assessment process and driving changes that ensure human rights and improve lives.
"We want to be proof positive in terms of the change we seek to influence through our business. Our updated goals now reflect this approach -- and engaging employees and communities in this work is a critical part of our objectives," said Mark Newton, Vice President of CSR for Timberland. "Our climate goal, in particular, is framed in a way that is ambitious, meaningful to consumers, and closely linked to our goal of becoming the number one outdoor brand."
Timberland's new bold goal for each of its four CSR pillars are as follows: CLIMATE: Protect the Outdoors PRODUCT: Innovate Cradle-to-Cradle FACTORIES: Improve Workers' Lives SERVICE: Engage Communities
The new goals are not just aspirational -- quantifiable performance metrics have been established for each pillar. For instance, to support Timberland's bold product goal, the brand will work to increase the percentage of renewable, organic and/or recycled materials used in its products to more than 50 percent by 2015.
"I loved drilling down into the data in the website," said Dara O'Rourke Co-Founder of GoodGuide, whose mission is to help consumers make purchasing decisions that reflect their preferences and values. "As a researcher, and a consumer, Timberland's site let me understand much better the company's actual environmental and social footprint, see what they are doing specifically to improve their performance (and where I think their actions may not meet the challenge), and then track them over time. I look forward to the company publishing product-level environmental scores in the near future. I think this kind of product-level transparency could be a real game-changer in the apparel and footwear industry."
New CSR Communications Platform In addition to its new CSR goals and performance targets, Timberland has released its annual 2009-2010 performance data on the portal. The portal replaces printed CSR-related communications and will be updated quarterly, allowing visitors to view data against the company's quantifiable CSR targets associated with each pillar.
But there's more than metrics -- in an effort to reach a broader consumer audience, the portal places data in the context of stories about how Timberland and its partners are enacting change to positively influence a variety of social and environmental issues. The site also allows readers to probe deeper and explore the progress Timberland is making against its groundbreaking initiatives, such as its Green Index(R) rating system, its commitment to plant 5 million trees in the next 5 years, and learn what opportunities and challenges lie ahead.
"This new tool offers us an opportunity to educate and inspire consumers to take part in our Earthkeepers philosophy, which encourages consumers to be good stewards of the earth and their communities," said Jeff Swartz, President & CEO of Timberland. "Timberland is, and will continue to be, a values-based company. We see this new initiative as a way to integrate our CSR goals with the overall brand and engage a broader group of stakeholders in our commerce and justice mission."
On the new portal, people can also follow Timberland's CSR efforts in real-time and join the ongoing discussion through Timberland's Bootmakers Blog, stakeholder engagement call podcasts, Voices of Challenge dialogue, Twitter and the brand's YouTube channel.
About Timberland Timberland TBL +0.05% is a global leader in the design, engineering and marketing of premium-quality footwear, apparel and accessories for consumers who value the outdoors and their time in it. Timberland markets products under the Timberland(R), Timberland PRO(R), Mountain Athletics(R), SmartWool(R), Timberland Boot Company(R) and howies(R) brands, all of which offer quality workmanship and detailing and are built to withstand the elements of nature. The company's products can be found in leading department and specialty stores as well as Timberland(R) retail stores throughout North America, Europe, Asia, Latin America, South America, South Africa and the Middle East. Timberland's dedication to making quality products is matched by the company's commitment to "doing well and doing good" -- forging powerful partnerships among employees, consumers and service partners to transform the communities in which they live and work. To learn more about Timberland, please visit www.timberland.com .
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