This past Wednesday, Canadian Consulate General and Canadian Chamber of Commerce in Shanghai organized a CSR Roundtable Workshop at Waldorf-Astoria Hotel on the Bund where guests representing a wide range of industries, and charities, were invited to learn about building a CSR program with impact.
As part of this event, Charlie Mathews, Director of Corporate Advisory at Collective Responsibility, spoke about sustainability in China and led a roundtable session on “Engaging Stakeholders through CSR in China” where we looked to help participants understand how to create better targeted CSR programs by:
- Identifying five most relevant CSR issues for their industry
- Identifying three most critical stakeholders to engage with
- Mapping and aligning the significance of issues to stakeholder expectations
Grouped by industries, participants shared some CSR programs they thought were optimal for their respective industries based on the stakeholder matrix they developed, and what became clear was that each industry was not only exposed to different issues but were exposed to an even wider set of stakeholders.
Differences that highlighted the fact that for a CSR program to provide the maximum level of impact, firms need to better invest their time and resources to fully understand the issues, map their stakeholders, and then develop programs that align their brand, and stakeholders, to an issue. A process that was highlighted through a case study about the work we did with the Abbott Foundation to bring their Science Education program to China.
Should you wish to invite Collective Responsibility for keynote speeches, workshops, please reach out to [email protected].