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The Responsible Corporate CSR is not only about benefiting the company one owns but also benefiting the employees and the community, one is a part of. Any sector has mainly three leagues – government, public and private. Private sector comprises of the entrepreneurs or the business companies or ‘the corporate’. Corporate houses are usually the privately owned companies that are registered as commercial trading units, that work for monetary profits or self benefiting motives. However, it is of relevance for society to note and appreciate the initiatives that the corporate world takes as part of Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR), for welfare of the society as whole. Almost all the big Indian business houses are involved in CSR activities. CSR is not only about benefiting the company one owns but also benefiting the employees and the community, one is a part of. This is justified by what Samuel J. Palmisano IBM Chairman, President and Chief Executive Officer, IBM says, “IBMers have always believed that when people think about how the world should work, they are inevitably driven to challenge the status quo, and to change it. And the resulting benefits flow not just to them and their organizations, but to their communities and global society” India, a developing nation, is today seen as a growing power in terms of business opportunities it provides to the world. Growing business or commercial activities along with social, ethical and environmental responsibility helps in long term sustainability, competence of high order and success of the company, as well as the society. This also indicates that that corporate houses, at large, are a composite part of society and have a role in sustaining a balanced ecosystem, favouring social equity and advantage. In fact, CSR programmes are meant to hasten the process of societal development. According to Shantanu Prakash, MD & CEO, Educomp Solutions Ltd, “Today, business ethics and professional expertise are teaming up to contribute
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to social welfare adding to the effort of government & PPP initiatives. This coadjuvant mechanism is providing for a faster roll-out of development and therefore prosperity around the globe, which would otherwise take much longer.” And he is right. Indian has a culture of rich traditions that emphasises on co-operativeness amongst members of family, society, community, regions, states and finally nation. Entrepreneurs of India work on the same principles. They work towards growth of their own organisation, fulfilling aspirations of the stakeholders and actively participating with community for economic growth and development. Says Sushmita Chakravarti, Associate Director, CSC India: “CSR is a business imperative for CSC. It is not just about charity work, or just philanthropy, or just the environment. It encompasses all areas of our business–
our clients, employees, communities, environment, and governance. We believe that sustainability is good business. We used to report on financial assets. Now we need to report on our triple bottom line–our financial assets, our services which roll relationships, and our people.” Voluntary Guidelines for Running CSR CSR initiatives were introduced in India by the mid 1990s and the first voluntary code of corporate governance was a part of the former, an initiative known as the ‘Desirable Corporate Governance: A Code’, by India’s biggest business association – the Confederation of Indian Industry (CII). Ministry of Corporate Affairs then led to a National Foundation for Corporate Governance (NFCG) in a joint understanding with CII, the Institute of
Company Secretaries of India (ICSI) and the Institute of Chartered Accountants of India (ICAI). The aim of this foundation is to support good corporate governance practices and raise its standards, leading to stability and growth of corporate governance in India. According to recently reported attempts, Corporate Affairs Minister Salman Khurshid mentioned that Indian government is looking at how to make maximum companies adopt corporate social responsibility. It was reported that there are voluntary guidelines on CSR and corporate governance on government’s website available for discussion. Additionally, as a rule, companies who have been earning over INR 100 crore maybe asked to contribute upto two percent of the profit to the company. An eLearning module on Corporate Governance is also under construction, which is to be floated by the Ministry of Corporate Affairs. All the activities under CSR units are taken up as voluntary actions over and above companies’ obligations to the law and society. Also, companies are provided with guidance for CSR initiative through ‘Voluntary Guidelines’ for CSR. These guidelines suggest that a CSR policy should be developed by each commercial house which should be in line with the business principles. It should involve participation of its employees, be approved by the authorities and involve stakeholder participation. Ethical conduct and processes along with accountability and transparency are encouraged to be inherent with the CSR activity. Companies ensure judicious use of
resources–avoiding pollution, encouraging recycling, using resources optimally, supporting cleaner and productive ways of processing the daily chores–through their CSR programmes. CSR supports productive activities (both for social and economic growth of the communities). They work for the welfare of the society, especially for the so-called disadvantaged group, in areas such as education, livelihood, healthcare, and so on. It should not be just considered as a charitable activity but an effort for welfare of the whole community. For instance, in CSC, Sushmita Chakravarti says, “In India, CSC manages our CR activities though a committee called Binergy. Binergy is a thirty-plus member team of CSC employees (one member per five hundred employees), who are democratically elected each year in a formal electoral process. Employees interested in being part of Binergy, create a manifesto, present their vision on CR to the CSC employees in India and are elected to lead the CR efforts. While Binergy leads and manages the CR efforts, volunteers – also CSC employees – on an ongoing projectto-project basis, work towards meeting the CR objectives. The overall Binergy team is headed by an executive with each location having a senior-level mentor.” For implementation of the CSR activities the corporate houses identify the area of work,
plan projects that they want to indulge in, set objectives to be in a particular time frame, stipulate a time limit for completion of the project, decide upon mechanisms for monitoring the initiative and rectify according to feedback collected. Evaluation and timely feedback would help rectify any challenges involved in
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Employees interested in being part of Binergy, create a manifesto, present their vision on CR to the CSC employees in India and are elected to lead the CR efforts. -Sushmita Chakravarti, Associate Director, CSC in India
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execution of the CSR initiative. The company sets aside a fixed monetary amount for the initiative. Companies should encourage and partner with other companies and NGOs for execution of the projects. There should be dissemination of the details of the initiatives for public to know and understand at large. Why CSR? CSR is synonymously known by many names including Corporate Responsibility, Sustainable Responsible Business (SRB) and Corporate Social Performance. It is a
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IBM Reinventing rogramme “The IBM Reinventing Education (RE) program globally, is driven with the motivation to improve and enhance the quality of schooling in partnership with the local governments in various countries. Launched in 1994, this program is now available in 25 cities throughout the United States as well as in Australia, Italy, Ireland, Japan, Singapore, the United Kingdom, Vietnam, Mexico, Brazil, China and India. The RE program in India was initiated in 2006 with the primary focus on the continuous and ongoing professional development of teachers, integrating ICT and classroom transformation. The Reinventing Education programme in India is specially designed to align with the National goals for education reform in India as enshrined in the National Curriculum Framework 2005. NCF 2005 stresses on the primacy of children’s experiences, their active involvement in the process of learning and application to the child’s environment. RE program is being implemented in partnership with the Andhra Pradesh Residential Educational Institute Society (APREIS) and Corporation of Chennai (CoC). One of the findings indicate that both in AP and in Chennai, the students are able to articulate what they have done. They are now able to talk rather fearlessly in front of the teachers and are able to explain ideas that they have worked through in the RE programme. In APREIS schools where the children have limited interaction with the outside world, the program is also improving the social skills of the students. It has helped in improving the children’s communication skills and confidence levels by enabling them to interact with each other as well as the teachers.”
Mamtha Sharma, Manager CC&CA, IBM India
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form of self-regulation mechanism that is meshed in the business model a company follows. In this manner corporate houses ensure that they monitor and support the legal standards, ethical necessities of country and international regulations, while carrying out their business. Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) is indicative of the values and beliefs around which a company revolves. It involves not only working in line with the investors and the customers but also communities, regulators, special interest groups and society as a whole. It directs companies’ accountability to its stakeholders. Social responsibility implies ownership and accountability for actions. D Crowther defines social accounting in this sense as “an approach to reporting a firm’s activities which stresses the need for the identification of socially relevant behavior, the determination of those to whom the company is accountable for its social performance and the development of appropriate measures and reporting techniques.” A CSR is based on concept of managing and executing operations in order to maximise social, economic and environmental benefits while minimising the losses in any of the described areas It is a process whereby ownership is taken by the company for impact of its functioning on its employees, stakeholders, clients, community and environment. It is a process through which public interest and opinion is incorporated into corporate decision making process. Practice, Profit and Return of Investment (ROI) with CSR CSR practices are often debatable. Some believe that CSR is a viable way of allowing commercial society to benefit themselves through multiple channels, in form of immediate, short term and long term benefits. While some opine that CSR is a disturbance or interference with the economic role of business and is often a mask or a superficial cover. However, the practice of CSR mostly forms backbone of the societal profits. They are instrumental in providing for many social reforms, especially in areas where money is a constraint, even for government, such as education of disadvantaged group; capacity building; creating infrastructure, employment opportunities and providing for livelihood. There are many Indian companies that cater to education, health, skill
development, empowerment of weaker sections, environment and rural development as a part of CSR. These include Microsoft, Infosys, Wipro, Tata Consultancy Services, Birla, ITC Welcome Group, Bharti Enterprises, NIIT, CSC, CMC, APTECH, Indian Oil Corporation etc. The criterion on which a company chooses an area of work as
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ROI is all about the overall improvement and development in society feeds the chain of investment in the company and vice-versa. -Shantanu Prakash, MD & CEO , Educomp Solutions Ltd
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part of CSR depends on companies’ personal discretion. Shantanu Prakash adds, “Being in the education sector, Educomp is in the unique position, wherein our core offerings fall in the social domain. Therefore CSR flows naturally in our case. Our products and services have the potential to impact society and social development at large.” For instance, Project Shiksha worth INR 100 crore was launched by Microsoft for providing computer education in the country. For this purpose it aimed at training 80,000 school teachers who would further impart computer literacy to children. The effort is seen more as an investment and not restricted to words such as charity, as Microsoft also mentioned its keenness of investing INR 1900 crores in India over a period of three years. In field of education similarly,
“…Educomp undertook to provide Computer training to the inmates of Hazaribagh Jail. This activity was started in collaboration with the Jail authorities with an aim to make the inmates computer literate… A full fledge computer lab was set up in the premises with facility of 10 computer & its accessories… The content was specially designed to address the needs of freshers in terms of computer education…The enthusiasm among the inmates about computer education was extremely rewarding for our team. This endeavor has allowed a large number of them to learn about usage of computers in day-to-day life which will give them a sound technological base when they return to mainstream society,” shared Shantanu Prakash. In line with a study that was undertaken in June 2009 by an industry body, CSR initiatives of around 300 companies were analysed and it was found that the CSR work is spread across 20 states and UT. Maharashtra was leading the game, with Gujarat and Delhi following the lead. According to Sushmita Chakravarti, the ROI is received in form of making a better society: “The way our CR functions, it provides our employees - across our seven locations and across the hierarchy - a platform to give back to society. A big part of CSC’s employee base in India is under thirty years of age. With this energetic team of employees, our CR ideology is not merely to give back to society by means of charity, but also by means of giving our time and effort in making a better society. This works for our advantage as we have more engaged employees.”
Challenges and Opportunities with CSR Companies executing CSR activities also deal with challenges that include1. Laws and Regulations – Different form of government rules, marked by different regions and political will. 2. Lack of requisite infrastructure and technology. 3. Financial constraints due to lack of cost effective resrouces. 4. Social and cultural barriers. Opportunities that CSR activities present are usually presented in form of community development approach. For instance, Shell Foundation’s work in South Africa, in Flower Valley, where an Early Learning Centre was created to educate and induce skills in children and adults of the community. CSR initiatives are also involved in providing for monetary donations and aid to the local community and oragnisations. CSR activities promote what is knon as ‘Creating Shared Value’, thereby making corporate success and social welfare as independent processes. For instance, in companies like CSC, the CSR activities have been reportedly chosen under the broad categories of community development, education, healthcare, environment and supporting people affected by natural calamities. The main criterion for chosing a project is based on the location. As put by Sushmita Chakravarti, “The projects should be in close vicinity to our people, since they run these projects.” For any business to sustain it needs a skilled and educated workforce, resources and effective laws, while for any society to thrive well economically
and socially they need to be supportive of business houses, especially in order to create income. Sushmita Chakravarti, shares briefly about one of the successful projects by CSC “One of CSC’s successful projects has been the adoption of backward villages (Sagarpaisa, Nayagaon, Lalpura, Chenchupally). This ongoing program has helped improve the quality of life in these villages by providing financial aid, and more importantly volunteers to help develop the villages. One of the initiatives include constructing and maintaining primary schools in these villages, training an educated physically challenged member of the village to teach, compensating the teacher, providing for books, stationery and uniforms for the students, organizing summer camps for extra curricular activities and regularly visiting the village school to mentor the children, tracking school education activities, and even tracking the career ofThe state the children passing out of the schools.” graduate One of the implications of the above Howeve has been achievement of “100% literacy for the children of Nayagaon and10% of g Sagarpaisa villages.” employe
Disseminating the Knowledge Most of the companies share the meaningful measures they take with population at large through what are known as the ‘Triple Bottom Line’ reports, that vary in the style of presentation. These reports provide details of the activities devised and implemented and their impact over three dimensions of ‘people, planet and profit’. On this criterion the social, ecological and economic implications of the activities company has undertaken, with respect to human capital/ resources, natural resources and cost of capital utilised. Sushmita Chakravarti says, “People, planet and profit is the other way that it is referred to in CR. This is how we do business in the 21st century. This is what the Gen Yers care about. This is what our customers Malti care about. A growing number of Shekh investors perceive sustainability as a catalyst for enlightened and disciplined management.” Director (Academic Despite some of the best efforts from For Electro Institute companies that have been working Email:for 380mcs@gm welfare community at large, CSR in India is still at very early stage and has to be explored and understood by many. There is a need to change its concept from a charity proposition to a ‘must’. \\
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