Corporate

Responsibility and

the Big Society - Why

Bother?

Dr Karen Blakeley

Corporate Responsibility, Big Society

– Why Bother?

• Research on PwC’s Responsible Leadership Programme

• Current Research Findings

• Big Society – Why Bother?

Research findings regarding the

business benefits of CSR

• Schreck (2011) ‘The empirical

research on a possible link between

corporate social and financial

performance spans more than 30

years. As narrative and quantitative

reviews have repeatedly

demonstrated, the findings of those

studies are ambiguous.’

The Social Performance and Financial

Performance Link?

Employee

Relations

Society &

community

Involvement

Corporate

Governance

Product and

customer

Responsibility

Environmental

management

Share price

Price/Earnings

Ratio

ROA

ROE

Earnings per

share

Dimensions of CSP Measures of CFP

An Alternative Perspective?

Employee

Relations

Society &

community

Involvement

Corporate

Governance

Product and

customer

Responsibility

Environment mgt

Quality of

client

Relationships

Inspirational

Leadership

Increased

commitment

Employee

satisfaction

Motivation

Engagement

Reputation

Lower risk

Lower cost of capital

Dimensions of CSP Mediating Effects Measures of CFP

e.g. Hansen et al. (2011)

The PwC Responsible Leadership

Programme

• Very senior Partners in the organisation

• A week’s preparation

• Four weeks spent on front line with carefully selected NFP organisation

• A week reflecting and preparing to re-enter the workplace

Seeing Leadership Role Models

“There were the people that worked for [the charity] that were the most amazingly giving people that worked for not very much money. They were very bright intelligent, capable, you know, they wanted to give back to the sector, they wanted to help the people, they really genuinely wanted to help the people that they worked for. We all say we like to do our job because we like to help the people but they were just so committed to it.”

“ [I was] moved…I was incredibly moved by the people I met …in terms of the people who worked for the charity, I felt quite humbled by them”

Heightening Social Awareness

“it started to raise lots of questions about why and how people could end up in that situation and why and how the system couldn‟t help them and again why and how they could survive in terms of money because actually the whole money thing the government tap was being switched off and it was gonnna mean that these great people weren‟t going to be able to do what they wanted to do”

“there was kind of like a realization I mean you see and you watch TV and you have friends that are involved in charities but to be that close to it first hand ..I‟m very fortunate through the luck and the upbringing that I‟ve had and the work that you do, but there‟s these people, its almost like there but for the grace of God go I”

Learning Openness and Transparency

“genuine people…I mean really genuine people. There were no sides to them. I felt like they were very, very open. Almost they were transparently open about who and what they were. In a way that a lot of the people that I meet would be like if I had I had a breakdown in the past you wouldn‟t know about it and I‟d probably never tell you but these people talk about their breakdowns and their sleeping on the street and their drug problems and their alcohol problems and the charity people would talk about you know struggling to make ends meet…they were just very, very open and very, very real… whereas a lot of people try to be something they‟re not or will gloss over the cracks…its like an onion and you peel the layers open but these people you were right at the heart of the onion and you were seeing everything”

Finding meaning and purpose

• Felt hugely motivated actually…..If I‟m going to do this job I‟m sure as hell going to do it well to really make a success of it. So really, really strong commitment coming back to PwC really strong commitment to what I was doing…if I‟m going to do it here, I might as well do a blimmin good job otherwise why don‟t I just go out and do something completely different where you are going to have that impact

• There are things that I want to do differently; there are things that I want to make a difference with in my life

• But I don‟t want to be as committed to doing things that I don‟t believe in or that I don‟t think that are going to make a difference where there‟s a whole host of things out there where I think I can make a difference and where I really can make an impact.

Becoming a stronger person and

leader

• I think it‟s made me stronger as a person. I feel more…I know who I am, I‟ve always known who I am but I believe in who I am and why I am who I am, so that gives you an inner core strength…its not strong as in a „rod of iron‟ its actually an inner strength that actually has a softness around it which is the people bit again.

Summing Up the Learning

• “what really matters in life is people - so the people that are close to you, the people you interact with, the people you can have an influence on, and the people that you can choose to impact on…..People are the same all over the world…. its about trust and its about doing the right things well, for me that‟s really, really important.”

Summing Up the Learning

• And the other thing that factors in on this is about where you spend your time and how you spend your time. So it‟s the impact you can have and giving of your time where it matters most. So people and time are like this balance now and giving people time, so letting people in, letting people get closer to me, to the heart of the onion…and also me helping and wanting to help others more

Big Society – Why Bother?

Doing

Inside

PwC Outside

PwC

Being

Wider

Community -

volunteering

Calmer

Clearer

priorities

Open

Vulnerable

Confident

Family and friendships

Purpose and meaning

Client

relationships

Taking

leadership

If you’re interested in finding out

more….

• Please sign up for information on our

next series of talks at the Centre for

Responsible Management. To include

stories from:

• PizzaExpress, PwC, Abel and Cole,

and others

• Sign the forms or contact me:

karen.blakeley@winchester.ac.uk

References

• Schreck, P. (2011) Reviewing the Business Case for Corporate Social Responsibility: New Evidence and Analysis, Journal of Business Ethics, Vol. 103, pp.167-188

• Hansen, S.D., Dunford, B.B., Boss, A.D., Boss, R. W. and Angermeier, I. (2011) Journal of Business Ethics, Vol. 102,pp. 29-45