Companies with the best CSR Reputations in the world

Yesterday when my colleague Fred signed onto the Google homepage he was met with an invitation to donate to the international migrant crisis. Google would match his contribution dollar for dollar. How could he say no, thought Fred, and he gave $25.

Google’s refugee fundraising effort, launched on Sept. 15, has already raised $9 million for four organizations—Doctors Without Borders, The International Rescue Committee, Save the Children and the UN High Commissioner for Refugees. (Read a compelling Google blog post about the campaign here.)

That kind of good will gesture is one of many reasons Google has landed for the second year in a row at the top of a list of companies considered to have the best reputations for corporate social responsibility in the world, says Brad Hecht, a vice president at Reputation Institute, the 18-year-old Boston and Copenhagen-based consulting firm that measures corporate reputations around the globe. In second place: BMW. The German carmaker is known for suffusing its manufacturing, research and development with efforts to make them more sustainable. In Leipzig, BMW is using a wind turbine to power the factory that makes its i-3 electric car.

The “Global CSR RepTrak 100” is a subset of the annual “Global Reptrak 100,” which I covered here. That list of 100 companies comes from a three-month-long survey RI conducted from January through March, of 61,000 people in 15 countries: Australia, Brazil, Canada, China, France, Germany, India, Italy, Japan, Mexico, Russia, South Korea, Spain, the U.K. and the U.S. It started with a list of the world’s 500 largest companies by revenue, then culled that to 150, using reputation lists it’s put together over time. To be considered, a company had to be well known in the countries surveyed and have revenues of more than $6 billion in the U.S. and $1 billion globally.

RI showed each respondent a list of 20 companies and asked if the person was familiar or very familiar with them. If the person knew a firm, then RI offered four basic statements. To gauge CSR, which accounted for 40% of the reputation score, it got respondents’ reaction to the statement, “I trust this company.” Delving deeper, it asked about whether the company was acting as a good citizen by supporting good causes, exerting positive societal influence, and displaying environmental responsibility. Then it asked about governance, including whether the company was open and transparent, behaved ethically and was fair in the way it did business. Finally it asked about whether the company rewarded employees fairly, took care of employee well-being and whether it offered equal opportunities.

Google scores high on every measure, including environmental responsibility, says Hecht. The company has been carbon neutral since 2007, invested in energy-reduction programs in its data centers, which the company says use half the energy of comparable centers, and it’s agreed to fund $2 billion in renewable energy projects. In the workplace category, Google has promised to increase diversity at the company, setting goals each year to hire more women and people of color. “Google has been one of the leaders in the tech space,” says Hecht.
After BMW comes The Walt Disney Company, Microsoft, Daimler and Lego. Hecht says that Lego offers another example of a company making strides toward being more responsible. The Danish maker of plastic building bricks has even said it wants to start to use “a new, safer and more environmentally friendly material.” Hard to imagine, in a company that makes every single toy out of brightly colored plastic, but Hecth says, “they are trying to find a sustainable alternative to plastic.” Lego has also significantly cut down on the volume of paper and cardboard in its packaging, purporting to save 6,000 tons of materials a year. Lego is also perceived as an educational toy and it works with educators to encourage them to weave Lego products into a creative learning program. “The core of what they do is all about making a positive impact on society,” says Hecht.

Top 100 Global CSR Rank

This article was taken from here.