IA05

Dr. Macagno is my academic advisor and a sustainability professor at Chatham University. Prior to teaching here, he served as the Head of Sustainability for engineering firm May Gurney Ltd. In Norwich, UK. Here, his major accomplishments included saving the equivalent of 2.5 million dollars by reducing CO2 by 18 percent and site waste by 21 percent. He worked extensively in the software industry before transitioning to the field of sustainability.

During his lecture, Dr. Macagno defined corporate social responsibility A responsibility among firms to meet the needs of their stakeholders and a responsibility among stakeholders to hold firms to account for their actions. There are several “arguments” for CSR: ethical, moral, rational, & economic. People who argue for more environmentally focused CSR say that one should either view environment as a stakeholder or take care to observe how it affects stakeholders. No matter what action is taken, there is a “sweet spot” and “danger zone”. We compared the mandatory reaction to cost of business vs voluntary action for competitive advantage, as well as the potential risk of not acting vs potential benefit from acting. Ideally, CSR functions as a “filter” to identify a company’s mission (what) and vision (why) within strategy (specifics) and tactics (how) to approach business.

              In her book, Exploring Business, Karen Collins defines CSR as “the approach that an organization takes in balancing its responsibilities toward different stakeholders when making legal, economic, ethical, and social decisions” (Collins, 2017). Overall, it is how a company is socially responsible to stakeholders (anyone who, like owners, employees, customers, and the communities in which it does business, has a “stake” or interest in it).

Additionally, she pointed out the signs of an ethical organization which include the following:

• Treating employees, customers, investors, and the public fairly
• Making fairness a top priority
• Holding every member personally accountable for his or her action
• Communicating core values and principles to all members
• Demanding and rewarding integrity from all members in all situations

Some argue that CSR should reach beyond its current definition and make sure to encompass risk management because the wellbeing of employees and customers depends on the ability of a company to keep their data safe, and the images of companies such as amazon and Facebook are influential of many people. Just as some places prioritize environmental protection and encourage their customers to care as well, so should businesses look out for the data of their stakeholders. Adrienne Day writes for The Stanford Review that “CSR correlates to better access to funding due to changes in social expectations for companies; investors care more about the effects that their money is having” (Day, 2014). She says that “some companies truly excel at ESG practices, and some merely pay lip service to improving their performance in this area. The big task for investors over the next decade, Serafeim suggests, will be to find ways to distinguish between those two groups” (Day, 2014). It is essential for investors who care about the effects of the money to learn to distinguish between these. Greenwashing has become all too common in business, as CSR is seen soley as a marketing tool and not as a defining principle of a company’s actions, poiting directly back to Dr. Macagno’s comparison of CSR vs Strategic CSR – true, strategic CSR is about value creation.

References:

Research – Thomas Macagno. (n.d.). Retrieved from http://blogs.chatham.edu/macagno/tm/

Faculty Spotlight: Tom Macagno. (2016, June 21). Retrieved December 12, 2018, from https://blogs.chatham.edu/businessblogs/2014/12/10/faculty-spotlight-tom-macagno-2/

Karen Collins. (2017). Exploring Business. Boston, MA: FlatWorld

Day, A. (2018). The Upside of CSR (SSIR). Retrieved December 10, 2018, from https://ssir.org/articles/entry/the_upside_of_csr

Dr. Macagno’s LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/tmacagno/

IA04

This past September I attended the AASHE conference downtown with some of my fellow sustainability students. While there, we had the privilege of listening to several different speakers, addressing issues from climate change to fossil-fuel divestment to inclusive language in management. These each observed different aspects of the sustainability triangle - the pillars of environment, society, and economy.

The conference website states the following:
“The Association for the Advancement of Sustainability in Higher Education’s (AASHE’s) annual conference is the largest stage in North America to exchange effective models, policies, research, collaborations and transformative actions that advance sustainability in higher education and surrounding communities. We invite you to join us and share your knowledge, achievements and ideas” (AASHE, 2018).

For the most part, the speakers’ topics addressed climate issues, which can be connected to corporate social responsibility. According to Karen Collins, in her book “Exploring Business”, “CSR refers to the approach that an organization takes in balancing its responsibilities toward different stakeholders when making legal, economic, ethical, and social decisions” (Collins, 2017). Environmental and social issues involve many branches of management. Topics of divestment from fossil fuels is an issue with company investments, and inclusive language in management focuses on employee welfare and social wellbeing. However, overall, corporate social responsibility relates best because it entails the positive, sustainable things that a company does.
           These lectures relate to the ideas expressed in Andrew J. Hoffman’s article for the Stanford Review, The Next Phase of Business Sustainability. In his article, Hoffman states that business is going to be the greatest driving force in the push to create a more sustainable society, especially as we near the cliff of climate change (Hoffman, 2018). Rather than wait for the market to further demand more and more environmentally & socially beneficial products, actions and services, companies should strive to provide them at a competitive level (Hoffman, 2018). This would ideally cause paradigm shift in the market, further increasing demand for sustainable products. Hoffman sees business as the ultimate influence for this cause globally because of its nearly universal market influence; He says, “The market is the most powerful institution on earth, and business is the most powerful entity within it. Business transcends national boundaries, and it possesses resources that exceed those of many nation-states” (Hoffman, 2018).

This article directly connects to the topics at the AASHE conference through the idea that climate change is an urgent issue which can be prevented through methods that will actually stimulate the market and economy. I listened to students who were actively seeking to get the University of Pittsburgh to divest from fossil fuel resources, something Chatham University has already done. They are a perfect example of the influence that a single determined group of people can have on an institution in the same way a small group of businesses can change a whole market.
              Right now, a group’s newsletter I signed up for at the conference is making headlines. The Sunrise Movement recently sat in soon-to-be House Majority Speaker, Nancy Pelosi’s, office to push for democratic support for The Green New Deal. New Congresswoman, Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, spent her first day on Capitol Hill supporting these Sunrise Movement members, advocating for their call for “green jobs for all.” Ideally, in coming years, all three groups of business, politics, and social movements will work together, rather than against each other, to cause a paradigm shift in sustainability in the worldwide market, governments, and societies, in order to prevent the disasters that climate change threatens to wreak havoc on them all.

References

AASHE. (2018). Attend the Annual AASHE Conference & Expo & Advance Sustainability.

Retrieved December 7, 2018, from http://www.aashe.org/conference/

Karen Collins. (2017). Exploring Business. Boston, MA: FlatWorld

Hoffman, A. J. (2018, Spring). The Next Phase of Business Sustainability (SSIR). Retrieved

December 5, 2018, from

 https://ssir.org/articles/entry/the_next_phase_of_business_sustainability