India CSR Network
No Result
View All Result
  • Login
  • Register
SUBSCRIBE
  • Home
  • CSR
    • Art & Culture
    • CSR Leaders
    • Child Rights
    • Culture
    • Environment
    • Education
    • Gender Equality
    • Health
    • Skill Development
    • No Poverty
    • Safety
    • Covid-19
    • Safe Food For All
  • Sustainability
    • Sustainability Dialogues
    • Sustainability Knowledge Series
    • Plastics
    • Sustainable Development Goals
    • Circular Economy
    • BRSR
  • Corporate Governance
    • Diversity & Inclusion
  • Articles
  • Interviews
  • Events
  • BOOKS
  • More
    • Technology
    • Lifestyle
    • Case Studies
    • Knowledge
    • Social Sector Leaders
    • Social Entrepreneurship
    • Philanthropy
    • Sports
    • Gaming
  • Prime
  • Home
  • CSR
    • Art & Culture
    • CSR Leaders
    • Child Rights
    • Culture
    • Environment
    • Education
    • Gender Equality
    • Health
    • Skill Development
    • No Poverty
    • Safety
    • Covid-19
    • Safe Food For All
  • Sustainability
    • Sustainability Dialogues
    • Sustainability Knowledge Series
    • Plastics
    • Sustainable Development Goals
    • Circular Economy
    • BRSR
  • Corporate Governance
    • Diversity & Inclusion
  • Articles
  • Interviews
  • Events
  • BOOKS
  • More
    • Technology
    • Lifestyle
    • Case Studies
    • Knowledge
    • Social Sector Leaders
    • Social Entrepreneurship
    • Philanthropy
    • Sports
    • Gaming
  • Prime
  • Login
  • Register
No Result
View All Result
India CSR Network
No Result
View All Result
Home More

Corporate Leaders Come Together to Incorporate CSR Into Business

by India CSR Network
9 years ago
in More

CSR & Competitiveness

It has reported that debates on corporate sustainability get louder by the day. Enticing monikers for doing good are coined. Codes of conduct proliferate and there is much congratulatory backslapping among CEOs on receiving awards and recognition. What is sorely missing is substantive progress on the ground.

Now, a plain-speaking, crack team of 14 leaders have ambushed the debate. It’s ‘The B Team’ of global business, and they are beginning to push a ‘Plan B’ to alter the status quo”the relentless, single-minded pursuit of profits that is endangering the planet and its people. Significantly, on the team’s inaugural in June, it began with a confessional that stated: “The overwhelming conclusion that we have reached is that businesses have been a major contributor to the problems and we, as business leaders, have the responsibility of creating sustainable solutions.”

It’s acknowledged that Plan A ” the current way of doing business ” is “broken” and that it’s “no longer acceptable” to them. “Where we think we will be different,” insists Richard Branson, chairman of the Virgin Group, to Economic Times, “is that we will mostly focus on action.”

New Business Values

The mercurial Branson is co-founder of The B Team, along with Jochen Zeitz, who had, in a ground-breaking move, sought to include externalities into his company’s balance sheet as head of Puma, the sporting goods manufacturer. He released an environmental profit & loss (EP&L) account, calculating the 2010 environmental impact of his company’s operations and supply chain at 145 million (Rs 1,160 crore). Zeitz has been campaigning to reform the regulatory environment that continues with perverse incentives that harm the planet and usher positive incentives that help future bottom lines”maximisation of social, environmental and economic well-being, all together.

The current financial model and reporting frameworks are almost a century old. The B Team, in keeping with its mandate, therefore constitute doers, action-oriented leaders who are upturning existing business architecture and practices, usually against stiff opposition from the entrenched establishment, and suspicion or curiosity from peers. “Over the past 40 years, corporations are failing faster and faster; there is something going on,” explains Bill Drayton of Ashoka, a US-based mentoring organisation for social entrepreneurs that hails the Plan B initiative.

Businesses have been traditionally organised for efficiency, repetition and bigger scale. “This existing structure is failing,” says Drayton, “because it can’t deal with a situation of rapid change.” Businesses of the future will have to be organised differently.

The inaugural B Team leaders, selected over a course of years through a robust process, recognise the ongoing churn, the ever-changing circumstances, and are therefore pushing for business reforms in a particular direction. They have articulated three key challenges: the future of leadership; the future of incentives; and the future of bottom lines. “The three challenges also went through an elaborate vetting process,” reveals Derek Handley, CEO of The B Team.

This was primarily to ensure relevance and alignment to The B Team’s key criteria: transformative capacity, creation of new models and expectations, scalability, and appropriate for business to tackle.

Taking The Lead

The B Team leaders have been already walking the talk for some time now, or as Zetiz likes to say: ‘If we don’t live our codes, they are just words.” Take Paul Polman of Unilever. He is changing the very DNA of his business with the Unilever Sustainable Living Plan (USLP), taking the message even to his over 2 billion consumers. When he started in 2010, he took the risk of offending Wall Street by suspending earnings guidance and quarterly results. “The world’s incentive drivers are too short-term,” Polman told in an earlier interaction.

“One of the main reasons we believe The B Team needs to exist,” says Branson, “is because there is just not enough of the type of action and leadership that Paul and Unilever are taking.”

Ratan Tata in India and Mo Ibrahim across Africa have doggedly focused on governance and the need to address the issue of corruption. Ibrahim, at the kick-off event, insisted “there is no place to hide” and that the sun of transparency is shining all over us. “When everyone knows you don’t pay bribes, no one bothers you,” he told the gathering, on his experiences of running a telecom behemoth.

(Economic Times, 15 August 2013)

CSRBooks.com CSRBooks.com CSRBooks.com
ShareTweetPin

India CSR Network

India CSR is the largest tech-led platform for information on CSR and sustainability in India offering diverse content across multisectoral issues. It covers Sustainable Development, Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR), Sustainability, and related issues in India. Founded in 2009, the organisation aspires to become a globally admired media that offers valuable information to its readers through responsible reporting. To enjoy the premium content, we invite you to subscribe it.

Related Posts

Union Budget 2022: Tax Rebates in Budget for Realty Vital for Salaried Class
More

Union Budget 2022: Tax Rebates in Budget for Realty Vital for Salaried Class

January 19, 2022
India’s Veteran journalist Vinod Dua passes away
More

India’s Veteran journalist Vinod Dua passes away

December 5, 2021
Meet a NGO Leader who digs up dirt to set right system
More

Meet a NGO Leader who digs up dirt to set right system

August 10, 2021
More

Republic or Democratic?

January 22, 2021
Brand Identity of India CSR Network
CSR

Nomination invited for India CSR Professional of the Year Awards

August 4, 2021
More

Value of Books in Life

August 4, 2021
More

Google generates its 83% of revenues from the display of ads

August 4, 2021
More

Reliance Foundation Hospital rewarding medical staff with extra pay

August 4, 2021
CSR

Covid-19: ITC’s Paperboards and Specialty Paper Business lend its support to the needy in Telangana

August 4, 2021

Discussion about this post

Popular Stories

  • Lupin Terminates 300 Staff

    Lupin Terminates 300 Staff

    0 shares
    Share 0 Tweet 0
  • What is liberalization?

    0 shares
    Share 0 Tweet 0
  • 7 Reasons Why Smartphone Can Make Your Life Easier

    0 shares
    Share 0 Tweet 0
  • QNET CSR Arm Supports Electrification Project to light up the lives of 470 villagers in Meghalaya

    0 shares
    Share 0 Tweet 0
  • MCA amends Schedule III of Companies Act on disclosure norms in financial statements and Details of Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR)

    0 shares
    Share 0 Tweet 0
India CSR Network

  • Home
  • About Us
  • Team
  • Partnership
  • Contact
  • Terms of Use
  • Subscribe

No Result
View All Result
  • Home
  • CSR
    • Art & Culture
    • CSR Leaders
    • Child Rights
    • Culture
    • Environment
    • Education
    • Gender Equality
    • Health
    • Skill Development
    • No Poverty
    • Safety
    • Covid-19
    • Safe Food For All
  • Sustainability
    • Sustainability Dialogues
    • Sustainability Knowledge Series
    • Plastics
    • Sustainable Development Goals
    • Circular Economy
    • BRSR
  • Corporate Governance
    • Diversity & Inclusion
  • Articles
  • Interviews
  • Events
  • BOOKS
  • More
    • Technology
    • Lifestyle
    • Case Studies
    • Knowledge
    • Social Sector Leaders
    • Social Entrepreneurship
    • Philanthropy
    • Sports
    • Gaming
  • Prime
  • Login
  • Sign Up
  • Cart

Welcome Back!

Sign In with Facebook
Sign In with Google
Sign In with Linked In
OR

Login to your account below

Forgotten Password? Sign Up

Create New Account!

Sign Up with Facebook
Sign Up with Google
Sign Up with Linked In
OR

Fill the forms below to register

All fields are required. Log In

Retrieve your password

Please enter your username or email address to reset your password.

Log In