With the launch of the government’s new Corporate Social Responsibility website to promote good corporate citizenship bringing issues of social responsibility into the spotlight once more, ethical outsourcing specialist Remploy Offiscope is urging the UK business community to start taking CSR seriously.
Dave Knight, General Manager at Remploy Offiscope explains:
“There’s certainly been a shift in attitude towards responsible business practice during the past 12 months, however for many businesses, CSR is still a buzz word and not something which is seriously considered.
“What these businesses fail to realise is that this shift in attitude is also taking place amongst consumers – their customers. Those who want to keep a healthy customer base need to start thinking about how they can become socially responsible.”
To help tackle CSR, Remploy Offiscope has identified five key areas for businesses to review as a starting point:
Environment – Are you working to ensure any potential damage to the environment caused by your business practices is minimised? This could include everything from recycling office paper work to production processes.
Community – How do you interact with the local community? Are you involved in any educational or charitable schemes for example?
Employees – How do you treat your employees both in the UK and overseas? What are your policies regarding equal opportunities and diversity?
Corporate Vision – What are your core values and ethical principles and how are these communicated both internally and externally?
Existing relationships – What are your relationships with customers, suppliers, distributors and manufacturers like? Do you treat all parties with respect and are you on good payment terms? “By examining these five key areas, businesses have a good foundation on which they can build a cohesive action plan. These pointers can also be used to assess potential partners to ensure CSR policies are being extended to suppliers.
“With a wealth of resources including the new government website available, the UK business community is left with no excuse for not planning for CSR and those who don’t will certainly face the consequences from both their peers and the consumer,” Dave Knight concludes.