Social Responsibility: The New Critical Metric

When running a business and building a brand, it’s easy to get so focused on profits and growth that you miss other key metrics that you never knew were important. One such metric that too many people overlook nowadays is that of social responsibility.

 

Have you ever wondered how you’d do if you garnered a social responsibility score for your business? Have you ever even thought about how your business impacts the wider community and society around us? It’s something that increasingly matters to both shareholders and consumers, and speaks loudly about the quality of different brands around the world.

What is Social Responsibility?

The idea of social responsibility refers to both individuals and companies acting not just in their own interest, but also taking into account their employees, local community, and the wider society and environment as a whole.

For a business, it includes things like operating ethically, treating its workforce well and ensuring that suppliers that it cooperates with adhere to those same standards. It also refers to making their operation more sustainable in the long term, and the company making a meaningful pledge to operate in ways that reflect a strong commitment to that responsibility.

Why Does Social Responsibility Matter for Business?

Consumers Care About It

For those who think of social responsibility as a sort of “fad,” they should think again. Consumers increasingly care a great deal about it, and it has a lot of impact on their daily brand choices. Therefore, social responsibility has tremendous bearing on the reputation and bottom-line success of a business in the modern age.

It Improves Employee Morale

When businesses act responsibly to their workforce, it’s a huge boon to overall worker morale. Many modern employees complain about not feeling valued or heard in their current positions, but if their employer is more socially responsible, then one of the positive effects is being more empathetic to staff needs.

Everyone in the Chain Benefits

Believe it or not, the benefits of social responsibility go far beyond just helping your staff feel a bit better and making your brand look good. In practical terms, real and genuine social responsibility leads to better business outcomes, as well as positive input being put back into the community. It’s a win-win for all concerned.

Ways to Improve Your Social Responsibility Metric Fast

Strengthen Community Connections

The first thing to be done is to improve outreach within your own local community. The old saying “charity begins at home” is a bit cliche, perhaps, but the principle behind it holds true. You have to start where you are. Try things like attending or sponsoring community events either with cash or with prizes for a raffle, for instance. You could also prioritise local residents for internships and work experience.

Be More Transparent

Establishing transparency in your business is not about publishing all your mistakes and closet-dwelling skeletons in the media, but it is about trying to be open and honest at all times with all stakeholders. The idea of transparency is to admit when mistakes are being made, actively seeking solutions to make the business better, and ensuring that everyone involved in the business is on the same page.

Become More Responsive to Staff Issues

Finally, if and when your employees have suggestions on how things can be improved, it’s important to acknowledge these and try to implement the ones that make sense while openly and fairly explaining why it can’t be implemented if not. Learn about issues your staff are having and see if there’s an opportunity to help.

For instance, if one employee is often late, find out why that is. If it’s because they’re temporarily having to hurry every morning to drop their kids off at school while they seek new childcare solutions, then perhaps you can help by pushing back their start time by 30 minutes. Such gestures say a lot about a company’s social responsibility.