Whether corporate social impact is contained in a department at your company, with an affiliated corporate foundation, or infused into the values and operations, there is always an opportunity to step back and do a bit of spring-cleaning. Where to start? Here are a few areas that can always use some TLC:
- Diversity, inclusion and equity are hot topics across sectors and near and dear to our work and personal philanthropy. Clean up and refocus energy to build gender and racial diversity on your executive team and board. Find additional resources you need to put words into actions in this article.
- Provide your executives and hiring managers with unconscious bias training before there’s an issue that demands it. This resource guide provides a variety of information on where to start and what strategies might be effective.
- Lead and manage by your values not simply your business goals. Give thought to how you might use your corporation’s non-financial capital to create social justice. We share thoughts on when and how to do this here.
- Provide professional and personal development opportunities to your employees. Bring in someone to explain the importance of retirement accounts. Hold Lunch and Learns monthly with speakers on financial literacy topics. People are often ashamed to admit they lack understanding or don’t know what they don’t know to ask. Here are 15 ideas on how to launch Lunch and Learns.
- Increase your business’ efficiencies and decrease costs by incorporating or growing a recycling program. Take a look here for a list of free local resources to make your business greener today.
- Build your talent pipeline with an emphasis on making the path equitable for traditionally marginalized yet just as qualified candidates. Whether its women, employees from lower income geographic areas, or people of color, begin to put plans into practice that help both your company’s pipeline and the individual employees. Read more for a case study on how employees are increasingly expecting this and how employers can simultaneously benefit.
- Do a supply chain check to be sure all of your suppliers meet your ethical and moral standards. Want to learn more about the impact this can have? Take a look at this case study on Wal-Mart’s seafood supply chain.
- Invite constructive participation. Build committees for employee engagement. Offer matching gifts or employee volunteerism days. Want more details on what other companies are doing for matching gift programs? Read more here.
- Create or evaluate key performance indicators for your CSR program. Read more about what makes a good KPI for a CSR program here.
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