Month of February, 2010

This report covers a comprehensive set of methods for water footprint accounting. It shows how water footprints cane be calculated for individual processes and products, as well as for consumers, nations and businesses. Besides, the report includes methods for water footprint sustainability assessment and a library of water footprint response options.

While environmental management used to be the province of specialists, responding to environmental challenges is now so fundamental to a company’s success that environmental knowledge cannot be isolated within an organization, but must be pervasive.

TEEB draws together experience, knowledge and expertise from all regions of the world in the fields of science, economics and policy. Its aim is to guide practical policy responses to the growing evidence of the impacts of ongoing losses of biodiversity and ecosystem services.

Corporate Social Responsibility [CSR] and Education for Sustainable Development [ESD] are closely related and complementary initiatives. CSR seeks to develop and expand the effectiveness of business contribution to our society. ESD seeks to provide all students [at all levels of learning] with the skills to incorporate socially responsible practice into their personal and professional lives. As such ESD is, in the long run, a major mechanism for the wide adoption of the responsible business practice. In the Asia Pacific region, developments in CSR and ESD are highly interconnected and interdependent.

To help LUNAR designers and engineers create more sustainable products, the LUNAR Elements^SM team researches and catalogs materials, processes and resources that will lessen the impact of products on our ecosystem.

While the world is acknowledging the success of Asian firms in generating impressive economic growth, Asian firms should also be fully alert that Asian businesses should also pay due attention to their broader social responsibilities toward the governments and societies in which they operate.

The study by the National Environmental Education Foundation (NEEF) finds that environmental and sustainability (E&S) employee education and engagement initiatives help companies achieve a range of business objectives from attracting and retaining employees to boosting the bottom line.

A company’s statement of its corporate values is a high level statement that describes how the company behaves. Corporate values are not a mission statement that describe what task the company aims to fulfil. Neither are they a set of commercial objectives.

A growing body of psychological research has focused on concepts of well-being, life satisfaction and workaholism. In his book, IESE Prof. Steven Poelmans considers how the research in this field has evolved, and he analyzes some of the key factors related to workplace psychological health.

Report for the UN into the activities of the world's 3,000 biggest companies estimates one-third of profits would be lost if firms were forced to pay for use, loss and damage of environment

There is a huge challenge for Russian business schools to educate managers in corporate social responsibility.

The author, F. M. Santos, proposes a theory aimed at advancing scholarly research in sovial entrepreneurship. By highlighting the free trade-off between value creation and value appropriation and explaining when situations of simultaneous market and government failure may arise, the author suggests that the social entrepreneurship is the pursuit of sustainable solutions to problems of neglected positive exernalities.

This article identifies how socially responsible distribution can be achieved by strategies that reduce costs, reinvent the distribution channel, or incorporate a long-term approach to investment.

Beth Kanter recently spoke at the Global CSR Conclave held at the NASSCOM India Leadership Forum 2010. Brian Pereira met Beth to discuss the approach that enterprises should take to forming social media strategies and policies for its employees

This guide is designed to empower current and aspiring social intrapreneurs to find ways to integrate sustainability into their day jobs. 

A hands-on guide for those who want to do Community Involvement better: What works? Who to partner with? How can we make a difference?

The Sustainability Yearbook 2010, published by SAM and PricewaterhouseCoopers, offers you an overview of the results of SAM’s 11th annual assessment of corporate sustainability practices, which provides the basis for the Dow Jones Sustainability Indexes

The purpose of this report is to help investors and companies understand how companies in vulnerable sectors are evaluating, managing, and disclosing water risks in their operations, supply chains, and products.

This Research Insight by NBS is based on the Journal article "Is It Really Worth It? Consumer Response to Ethical and Unethical Practices" by Trudel, R., & Cotte, J.

This second edition published by Forética highlights the current trends in CSR offered as a background research on the Socially Responsible Investment. 

This sustainable marketing publication is targeted at marketing professionals to help them to build sustainability into, rather than onto, their brands.

This Research Insight by NBS is based on the Journal article "Multinational Corporations and Local Communities: A Critical Analysis of Conflict" by Calvano, L.

This report looks at the role and responsibilities of those leading the corporate citizenship function and the competencies needed to succeed in this position. While created specifically for the senior leadership role, this competency model can also serve as a useful guide for development of corporate citizenship professionals at all levels as they work to improve performance and advance their careers.

This paper addresses the two questions at the heart of the business and human rights field: What are the human rights obligations of business, and how far do these obligations extend?

This handbook provides guidance material and tools for employers and business to strengthen their capacity to address the risk of forced labour and human trafficking in their own operations and in global supply chains

This Economist Intelligence Unit report discusses why firms are embracing sustainable practices, how companies are embedding corporate social responsibility into their businesses, and how they are gauging and reporting their success.

This report will look at how to enhance SME competitiveness in developing and transition economies in a globalizing world, with a particular focus on what governments, development partners, and SMEs need to do to: i) build local SMEs’ capacities to trade and take up expanding regional and international trade opportunities, and ii) strengthen SMEs’ linkages with foreign investors and thus enhance FDI benefits to the local economy.

Relying on institutional theory, agency rationale and environmental management research, the authors hypothesize that, in polluting industries, good environmental performance increases CEO pay; that environmental governance mechanisms strengthen this linkage; that pollution prevention strategies affect executive compensation more than end-of-pipe pollution control; and that long-term pay increases pollution prevention success.

This Research Insight by NBS is based on the Journal article "Environmental performance and executive compensation: An integrated agency-institutional perspective" by Berrone, Pascual, & Gomez-Mejia, Luis.

Vision 2050, with its best-case scenario for sustainability and pathways for reaching it, is a tool for thought leadership, a platform for beginning the dialogue that must take place to navigate the challenging years to come.

When exploring accounting, reporting and tax considerations with respect to carbon emissions programs in the US, companies should use a comprehensive approach to comply with current regulations and potential future legislation.

This Research Insight by NBS is based on the Journal article "Does it pay to be different? An analysis of the relationship between corporate social and financial performance" by Brammer, Stephen, & Millington, Andrew

The aim of the survey and resulting report is to gain a better understanding of how and where investors invest in emerging markets and to help both companies and investors analyze the current level of investment in emerging markets by responsible investors.

This paper estimates a three-equation structural model based on a theory that relates corporate financial performance (CFP), corporate social performance (CSP), and social pressure.

In 2002, a promising new nonprofit that wanted to link school teachers in search of basic classroom supplies with willing donors nearly collapsed because of potential backers' concerns that despite having a worthwhile goal, the organization itself would not be able to execute its mission competently. What a difference a few years can make.

This report by Forum for the future explains how to conduct innovation driven by environmental and social responsibility and why it makes good business sense.

This research focuses on the role of the Socio-economic Sciences and Humanities within European research and which is directed at creating more wealth while consuming fewer resources.

This study explores corporate social responsibility (CSR) by conducting a cross-cultural analysis of communication of CSR activities in a total of 16 U.S. and European corporations.

This study investigates determinants of the agent-principal relationship that private equity partnerships seek with their portfolio companies, and in so doing identifies corporate governance lessons that can be more generally applied.

This report aims to present a constructive series of practical and concrete recommendations that will increase the capacity of off-site auditing to contribute to social development.

This book is based on the results of the extensive research done with seven Swiss firms and shows managers in a very hands-on manner how they can identify their stakeholders and cooperate with them in a mutually successful and satisfying way.

The present work embarks from the diagnosis that we are currently in a time of shifting societal values towards a greater balance between economic, social, and environmental concerns and that this shift has accelerated through various excesses of the economic system both on macro and micro levels.

Does lobbying have a legitimate role in our 21st century world? Is "responsible lobbying" a contradiction in terms? If lobbying can be made responsible, how will this happen?

This paper provides an overview of environmental (green) supply chain management. The overview includes a categorization of research and practice in purchasing, manufacturing, outbound, and reverse logistics dimensions.

This publication presents some corporate case studies on land use and climate change. The various cases demonstrate that t here is no single, globally applicable sustainable management solution for land use. Business is only part of the solution and must work with governments, civil society and others to develop a range of land-use approaches that tackle climate change.

This publication by United Nations Global Compact features more than 30 examples of best and emerging practices in seven topical areas that relate to food sustainability: water management; agricultural inputs and infrastructure; financial mechanisms and risk management instruments; nutrition; energy and biofuels; the role of information and communication technology; and job opportunities for rural low-income populations

It's time to inject a dose of reality and integrity into corporate social responsibility and sustainability reports, argues Prakash Sethi