The Chronicle of Philanthropy recently ensured its place in the annals of headline caution when it ran with the following lede: “Some Big Charities Favor Cash Handouts to Aid Pakistanis.” For years, non-profits have been urging charitably minded individuals and companies to send cash, as opposed to product donations. 

But attitudes within the corporate community are rapidly evolving away from cash and toward contributions that showcase unique competencies.

BCLC has directly experienced this sea-change. Lockheed Martin hosted and ran our annual disaster exercise at its Center for Innovation in Suffolk.  This contribution was priced at a value of over $250,000, and Commonwealth of Virginia representatives told us that the exercise directly contributed to their preparedness for this upcoming hurricane season (potentially starting with Earl this week). 

Deloitte arranged for the California Endowment to host our West Coast resilience workshop.  FedEx is helping us map charitable logistics challenges in Haiti, while Microsoft is working on software to make the whole process of coordination more transparent.  While there might be cash components in some of these cases, the real value is being driven by their unique competencies, connections, and experience. 

What are the factors contributing to these changes? 

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By Stephen Jordan and Gerald McSwiggan

The last few weeks, BCLC has fielded inquiries about what different companies are doing to help the Gulf Coast recover from the most recent crisis. Corporate citizenship managers report that employees want to help the region recover from the oil spill. 

However, there has been some reticence on the part of management to get involved, in part because companies don’t want to get in the way of BP’s efforts and also because they are not sure exactly who is doing what, in terms of the different government agencies, non-profit organizations, and other volunteer groups. 

On the other hand, local chambers from across the region are concerned about the confluence of large, complicated issues. The St. Tammany West Chamber, Greater New Orleans Inc., and the Houma-Terrebonne Chamber organized a series of meetings to put information out there to help companies better understand the situation.  The following is a brief report on what the chambers presented.

The Situation

If there is one take away from the region, it is that the Deepwater Horizon spill itself is not the main issue. 

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Ah, summer time.  It’s a great time to relax, reflect and wonk out (if you are so inclined.)  This column is an abbreviated version of a paper I’ve been working on for some time, and would welcome your comments to see if this rings true with your experience.

Have you ever wondered how companies determine their public affairs budgets?    Why does one company in an industry devote 1.4% of pre-tax profits, while another sets aside $2 million, regardless of its profits, versus another, which doesn’t have any specific line item at all?  What is the business basis for pricing external affairs?  Or is there one at all?

One way of looking at this is how do you monetize your opportunities and threats?  SWOT analyses are a favorite of management consultants, but almost everyone naturally gravitates to looking at strengths and weaknesses and not opportunities and threats.  It’s just human nature to be more comfortable with the things that you can control.  So companies fiddle the dials with their marketing budgets or inventory or HR or finances with a fair degree of confidence.  They like the idea of having strengths aka “core competencies” to deploy.  Read more…

We live in a society where civility is in dangerous decline, but one bright light is the philosophy of customer service.  In fact, not only do we as customers appreciate it, but the stock market appreciates it, and even employees appreciate it.  People like to join organizations that put people first.

I was reminded of this first hand, this past week on an Alaska Airlines flight.  A man and his wife had both been booked in middle seats, and he was desperately looking for volunteers to either switch with him or his wife so that they could sit together.  For ten minutes, as people filed on board, no one took the offer until one gentleman agreed to give up his aisle seat for them.  The airline attendant noticed this act of generosity, and comped the Good Samaritan his meal and video for the flight.  Both passenger and employee were class acts. 

You see this over and over again.  My good friend, Arunas Chesonis, started Paetec on the simple premise that customer service just might be a selling point in the telecom world.  In little more than a decade Paetec has gone from zero to being a Fortune 1000 company.  Nordstrom is legendary for their service, and the company has long enjoyed a stock market premium and outsized brand loyalty.  Caterpillar will send out a repair crew to repair any one of their machines anywhere in the world within 24 hours.  Xerox has lived on its reputation for legendary service for decades. Read more…

An Open Letter to the Washington Post in Response to the Question “Where Have the Corporate Heroes Gone?”

The July 26 “On Leadership” column posed the question: “Tony Hayward, once credited for BP’s “green” turnaround, is forced to resign. Michael Dell, the revolutionary high-tech entrepreneur, is sanctioned for misleading investors. Wall Street titans, once lionized, are reviled. Where have all the CEO heroes gone?”

First of all, they are still there. Search the internet for Dr. Jim Goodnight (SAS Institute), Kent Thirry (Da Vita),  Steve Miller (Dillon Gage),  Rick Arquilla (Roto-Rooter),   Maura Donahue (DonahueFavret),  Matt Rose (Burlington Northern), and  Tim Brown (Ideo) some time. 

I could list many more extraordinary, inspirational business leaders, but the question and the responses in the Post raise several issues beyond the fact that there are many heroes scattered throughout American industry who are inspiring their people, creating great products and services, and making a difference to society. 

What does it mean to be a business hero? Is there a difference between being a business hero and being a corporate hero? What is the role of the media in raising awareness about heroes?

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The last two weeks have been illuminating in terms of the challenges companies face when dealing with community development and disaster recovery. Both of these buckets are diffuse, abstract, and not easy to grasp.

We need to get our arms around different community support functions like education, health care, housing, and small business cultivation.  Then, we need to figure out how they relate to each other and how businesses can make the most difference.

Two weeks ago in Suffolk, Virginia, the U.S. Chamber BCLC convened 80 experts to look at how disaster response leaders hand off their tasks to community recovery leaders.  The answer is: not very well.

BCLC convened 80 experts to look at how disaster response leaders hand off their tasks to community recovery leaders.  The answer is: not very well. 

Most states and the federal government have 15 to 18 emergency support functions.  These emergency support functions are represented at FEMA’s field headquarters or the state’s headquarters in order to improve coordination.  For example, when someone has an issue getting emergency medical aid somewhere because the roads are down, they can report the issue to their health care coordinator in headquarters who can then relay the message to the transportation emergency support function to fix it. 

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Last week, the U.S. Chamber hosted a jobs summit, and it couldn’t have been more timely.  We are still stuck with double digit unemployment in many parts of the country.  The Midwest continues to go through a wrenching transition.  The drilling moratorium is jeopardizing 140,000 jobs in the Gulf Coast region.  California is so broke that state employees are looking at minimum wages.  Not only do we have to replace the jobs that have been lost, but we also have to generate new jobs for the people coming into the workforce. 

For many communities the best thing companies can do is to help them jump-start their economies.  This made me wonder – do any companies have concerted CSR programs to promote entrepreneurship and help small and medium-sized businesses start-up, stay up, and grow up?

Interestingly enough, many new-economy companies create eco-systems around themselves.  Apple, eBay, Microsoft, Intel, Cisco, Google, Nintendo, Sony, and Yahoo are like aircraft carriers at the heart of armadas of smaller companies.   University towns also seem to be adept at spinning off these new economy eco-systems.  Witness the growth around Raleigh-Durham, Boston, and Austin. 

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A grim anniversary for Haiti … hat’s off to Chile … cautious optimism in the Gulf … determination to improve public-private partnerships …

Haiti.  If you are in the disaster recovery or community development business, watching Anderson Cooper isn’t just depressing, it’s masochistic.  He is in Haiti right now, marking the six-month anniversary of the January 12 earthquake, shining his spotlight on the IDP (internally displaced persons) camps and the lack of progress, and asking important questions about the flow of aid.  

Apparently, only 2% of the pledged aid has actually been disbursed.  The hard truth is that the lack of real governance, coordination, and direction are acting as powerful deterrents.  Many companies are begging us to do something about the customs situation, but the Haitian government doesn’t have full control over their own people.  We are waiting for the Interim Haiti Reconstruction Commission to start having real teeth. 

In the interim, BCLC is working with Executives without Borders, CHF International and a number of companies to develop four projects where we think we can move the needle.  For more info, contact Taryn Bird.

Chile.  This is a country that was rocked by an earthquake 500 times more forceful than the Haiti quake. 

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Stephen Jordan is the executive director of the U.S. Chamber BCLC.

There’s nothing like being out of the country for practically a month to make you appreciate how great the United States is. Independence, and the desire to preserve it, has been at the core of the American experience for the last 234 years and one of the primary goals of the nation’s development. 

In many ways, aiding and abetting this objective is a core part of many corporate social responsibility programs, as well.

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This past week, I was invited by several regional governments in the north of Argentina to discuss how public-private partnerships contribute to economic development.  As I’ve learned more about the situation in Argentina, I realize that one of the biggest issues countries face is how the past can either enable or stymie the future.

In the late 19^th and early 20^th century, Argentina was one of the richest countries in the world.  Fewer than 10% of its people were considered poor.  Blessed with the fertile Pampas, it was as much a breadbasket as the U.S.  At that time, the principal export markets were all in Europe so the country developed a radial pattern of development around the Atlantic ports.  In short, all roads (and railroads) led to Buenos Aires. 

Sound familiar?  The same thing happened in the U.S. in successive waves.  Pre-Civil War, the south was mainly agricultural and rural and sent raw materials up to the north for manufacturing and consumption or export through the great ports stretching from Baltimore to New York and Boston.  Likewise, in the manufacturing era that took off after 1870, Kentucky, West Virginia, Pennsylvania and Tennessee either sent their goods up to Cleveland, Detroit and Michigan or south to New Orleans.  Patterns of development emerged that made sense in an agricultural context and in an industrial context. 

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