IBM Consultants Providing CSR Roadmap

Survey enables clients to benchmark against peers’ programs

By Dennis Schaal

IBM is approaching clients with a benchmarking survey that enables them to gauge how their Corporate Responsibility efforts measure up against more than 250 companies worldwide.

IBM’s Corporate Social Responsibility Benchmarking Utility enables companies to see where their firms surpass or fall short of their peers in areas including labor relations, compliance, corporate ethics and other arenas in CR.

“Operating a business ethically and environmentally is not a requirement today, but also an opportunity—companies that demonstrate they adhere to the highest societal expectations of conduct have a significant advantage in attracting consumers, investors and talent,” said George Pohle, IBM Vice President and Global Leader for business strategy and consulting.

The introduction of the benchmarking survey is part of IBM’s push to advance its CSR Strategy Assessment and Roadmap program, with IBM consultants offering to assist clients in things like carbon footprint analysis and management; environmental procurement, CSR policy development; supplier monitoring; stakeholder engagement; developing “green” data centers; linking philanthropy to corporate strategy; and improving diversity and labor practices.

The benchmarking tool helps companies identify gaps in their CSR strategies, and IBM believes its consultants can help clients develop more effective programs to correct any shortcomings.

The initial survey, released in February, revealed numerous strategy gaps.

For example, more than 75 percent of the 250 C-level executives polled in the “Attaining Sustainable Growth Through Corporate Social Responsibility” survey, responded that “they don’t understand their customers’ concerns about CSR and only 17 percent are even asking them,” IBM stated.

“This indicates that many companies need to analyze and improve their CSR practices to ensure they line up with what customers and other key stakeholders expect,” IBM said.