Why Doing Good is Good for Business

Doing good business is not only good for society, it can help build reputation, lower costs, attract talented people and delight customers.

Good Business Matters were very proud to play their part at the Small Business Festival, presenting their workshop in Federation Square to a passionate group of business leaders interested in growing their businesses in a responsible and sustainable way.

The 90-minute event was split onto 4 distinct parts with both co-Founders, Cliff and Simon, leading the discussion.

Insights on both “Why” doing good is good for business as well as the “How” to do it were shared. The participants themselves were then invited to get involved with a couple of engaging group exercises that would see them practice using the Good Business Canvas™, our Social Responsibility strategy setting tool.

Part 1: Why we’re here – Connecting 4 seemingly disparate ideas

The presentation began in an apparently abstract manner with the audience being asked to consider the connection between a Pinterest board, a piece of innovations research, an employee engagement survey and a sustainability graph.

The connection was shown to be the current upward trend in social responsibility thinking and business models, some examples of which were detailed in case studies later in the workshop.

This simplistic diagram, with its somewhat antagonistic title, made the point that the way people and organisations choose to think about their place in the world would go on to determine just how truly sustainable they would be.

if we continue to do ‘business as usual’ we’ll end up with both a society and ecology that suffers at the expense of purely profit motivated business.

Examples of a number of companies making  headway on their social responsibility journeys were presented, beginning with some large  international organisations and then a few others, a little closer to home.

We began with Kering, the former PPR group and then touched on the robust and all encompassing Sustainable Living Plan implemented by Unilever and the well entrenched corporate responsibility activity at Vodafone.

We also touched upon some activity closer to home, of both multi-national and local companies, most notably the second sustainability report published by Simplot and the ‘Essentials for life’ activity undertaken by Kimberly-Clark, as well as Steggles and the culture of safety being invested in by Coates Hire.

Drawing the discussion back to smaller-sized businesses, Koffie Kan and Pinifer were provided as examples of companies doing some excellent work in Europe and a new up and coming bank here in Australia was given it’s moment in the spotlight.

 Part 2 – So how do you get started?

During the second session, Simon dug into how exactly to go about establishing a relevant social responsibility strategy and introduced the Good Business Canvas™ strategy setting tool. Case studies for All Good Organics, Crafted Digital Marketing and Kering were detailed and then applied to the canvas, to demonstrate just how the tool should be used. This was the precursor to Part 3 of the workshop where participants were asked to split into teams and practice using the tool with a case study of their own.

Part 3 – Group exercise

The group exercises focused on four imagined examples of small and medium sized companies who required a social responsibility strategy and associated leveraging ideas. The key requirement in each case was to focus on setting an agenda relevant to the company’s ability to execute it and detail any ‘amplification’ or leveraging ideas. The remit was to use the tool to help direct participant thinking as opposed to feeling they had to cover every area that the business is involved in… i.e. do what you can, when you can… simple.

Part 4 – Profiling Session

When signing up, the managing Director of Snooza Pet products, Victoria Hope, opted to have the company profiled during our workshop, so the final 20 minutes of the session were set aside for this purpose. We provided some brief details about Snooza and their current efforts in this space, then invited the whole group, in their teams, to collaborate and address ideas and areas that Snooza could focus on.

92% of attendees said they learned information they intend to apply

The Upshot – In brief

Participants walked away with 1) a clear understanding of why doing good is good for business 2) some clear direction on how to get started and 3) a set of tools they can use to immediately make improvements to their businesses’ social and financial performance.

Resources:

Business in the Community

Network for Business Sustainability

Ethical Performance

Triple Pundit

CSR Wire

B Corporation

Images courtesy of:

http://www.posterpage.ch/winners/socd_12/socd_12.htm