None can deny the critical importance of China’s market to global corporations and their leadership. With a population of over 1 billion consumers, China has become a proving ground for CEOs, an integral influencer in the international stock market, and the country where corporations learn to prototype innovate products for a massive, diverse base of customers and clients. Above all, China's hi…
One of the major issues that I have been speaking about is the fact in outsourced supply chains accountability and responsibility have been largely independent. That when things went wrong on the factory floor, the brand could hold itself above the issue by saying that it was their suppliers who were the ones who were legally responsible for the failures. A position that many consumers, particu…
Garment factory collapse could leave reputations in tatters. Here are seven principles that foreign companies operating in low-cost, outsourced production markets should follow to better protect their reputations: 1. If the workplace health, safety and environmental regulatory framework of your sourcing market is less stringent than in your home country, find suppliers that are prepared to acce…
Over the last few months, I have begun to sense a change in the way that firms view sustainability at the strategic level. It is a sense that comes from the firms that I have been speaking with, but also in the depth of conversations that we have begun to have about how to move their firms forward in the face of the challenges they face. To give you an example, I received the following email fr…
Over the last 2-3 years, one of the more interesting developments in China's philanthropic landscape has been the explosion of foundations that have come onto the scene. Interesting because as the number of foundations, and the number of celebrities/ CEOs opening their own foundation, grew there was a general belief that this would improve the mechanisms for giving, transparency, and impact. Ho…
Through the recently released China Charity Donation Report 2010, released by the China Charity & Donation Information Center, the issues of NGO transparency were once again highlighted. An ongoing issue for many, the main data point that was highlighted almost all the coverage was that 90% of the public was not satisfied with the current levels of information being released. Something…
In an Charlie Rose interview, Jack Ma is asked - and speaks extensively - on CSR and philanthropy in China. Interviewed before the now famous Gates and Buffet dinner, the interview couldn't have come at a better time. Founder of Alibaba and Taobao (two of China's most trafficked e-commerce platforms), Jack Ma holds a god like status in China. His voice on the matters of CSR and philanthropy…
