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Enterprise Excellence 3
Stories of Excellence 
Safe water - add powder Procter & Gamble is one of the world's leading suppliers of toiletries and cleaning products. In the 'Values Added' section of this edition of Enterprise Excellence, we showcase the company's purpose and values. But this company is also significant in terms of enterprise solutions to poverty, not least because of its Children's Safe Drinking Water programme, which utilizes simple, water purification technology known as PUR™. Proctor and Gamble has committed itself to long-term, not-for-profit provision of PUR in the developing world in an effort to reduce illness and death, particularly in children. A packet of PUR weighing just four grams treats ten litres of water, effectively killing all bacteria and viruses. Tests reveal that this treatment can cut diarrhoeal illness in children by half. In collaboration with partners, Children's Safe Drinking Water has provided PUR for emergency relief in nearly every major natural disaster in the last three years, including the Southeast Asia tsunami and the hurricanes in the Caribbean. Children's Safe Drinking Water works with partners to establish social markets, a key component of which is education about the importance of safe drinking water. Efforts are focused on schools and health clinics, the aim being to stimulate long term behaviour change. More...
British businessman Mike Causey reflects on his experience of working as a financial consultant for one of the world's largest oil companies. The media has it figured: big oil, big profits, big environmental impact - big business is bad. But my experience of working several months for one of the world's largest oil companies challenged these preconceptions. For sure there was a veneer of wealth - nice offices, well-dressed employees, and Porsches. But my lasting impression is of a different form of wealth - relational capital. My role was to help ensure compliance to financial regulations designed to prevent another Enron. Even in this high risk area, the company invested amazingly levels of trust in me. It is only natural, of course, that if a company employs you to perform a role, it trusts your ability to do it. But this company gave me all the necessary tools and resources before holding me accountable. It placed a particularly high onus on building relationships of trust through face-to-meetings. I was therefore encouraged to eschew web conferencing in favour of 48-hour overseas trips. These would be long enough to allow time for conversation in meeting rooms and in restaurants. But they would be short enough to minimize absence from my family. I conclude from my experience that big business has some important benefits that are overlooked by the critics. Among these is the ability to bring people of different cultures and languages together in contexts that encourage the flourishing of relationships. In a world threatened by clashes between people of different cultures, the importance of this mediatory role cannot be overemphasized. Business in the fight against AIDS Three British Members of Parliament (MPs) travelled to South Africa as guests of the business coalition Business Action for Africa (website here) to learn more about what private enterprise is doing to help address the effects of HIV and AIDS. They found that large corporations such as Anglo American, SABMiller and Merck Sharp & Dohme are running occupational health programmes for their employees and that they are taking HIV/AIDS through comprehensive prevention, treatment and care programmes that reach beyond the workplace into the broader community. The companies are discovering which policies are the most effective in reducing infection rates and ensuring access to treatment for all those who need it. 
Anglo American employee Nombuyiselo But they also found that such good practice needs to be extended to other employers, particularly in SMEs, which employ a large proportion of the workforce. The three large companies just named are not typical - most companies operating in South Africa lack the resources, know-how or moral conviction to implement effective programmes. The MPs concluded in their report on the trip that strategic public-private partnerships and dynamic business associations are an important means for good practice to spread - isolated actors cannot respond effectively to the high levels of HIV infection and AIDS mortality rates that exist in South Africa. When the MPs presented their report to John Hutton, the Secretary of State for the Department of Business, Enterprise and Regulatory Reform, and to Andrew Mitchell, the Shadow Secretary of State for International Development, they both expressed strong support for the report's conclusions. Mr Mitchell said, 'By investing in poor countries, business plays a part in tackling poverty by creating jobs, bringing much-needed capital, and sharing technology. It is clear too that business has a vital role to play in tackling HIV/AIDS: looking after employees is 'good business' in both senses of the word. The companies identified in this report should be commended for the lead they have taken.' |
Big Bad Business?