My name is Nick Ball and I’m group quality manager for G4S Technology, which is part of
G4S plc. It’s a massive organisation that operates across six continents and employs 625,000 staff worldwide.
These sorts of numbers bring to mind a huge corporation that you’d imagine would have a far from local focus – but I’ve seen the way an effective CSR policy can have an impact on a local scale.
Getting to grips with CSR can be overwhelming at times as it covers a wide remit. The premise boils down to recognising that our customers, suppliers and the local community are affected by our business and our products, and the way we make them has an impact on the environment.
At G4S Technology we believe that sound and demonstrable performance in relation to corporate social responsibility is a fundamental part of business success.
Comprehensive but realistic
In practical terms, establishing a comprehensive but realistic CSR policy and then selecting appropriate programmes aligned to meeting that policy is an important first step.
From there, involving all employees to participate in the individual CSR-related programmes is critical to success.
Taking this approach, one such programme is waste management, where we have reduced our landfill waste volume by 90% in under two years.
This has not only has a positive environmental impact, but also has introduced cost savings to the company, a true “win win” outcome.
Over the next few articles I will be sharing suggestions and providing real life examples of how simple concepts can have a significant impact and make a real difference.
CSR is not a marketing opportunity; it’s a culture for organisations to live by.