How do you use CSR programmes to boost morale and loyalty?

Most companies talk about the three P's - profit, planet and people. Our corporate vision - the "Good Company Concept" - is very similar: we aim at building a company which balances "strong", "kind" and "interesting". The first means financially strong for our stakeholders through delivering excellent products and services. The second means contributing to local and global communities through environmental conservation, ethics and corporate citizenship. At the same time, we want to be "interesting" as a workplace and a second home for our employees.  

Importance 

Although we are not a listed company, we care deeply about our environment and community. Our CSR initiatives stem from our company concept - we want to be kind to the environment and society and make the workplace more interesting, thereby boosting employee loyalty and engagement. We also support Fuji Xerox Group's corporate social responsibility (CSR) priorities, and "embed environmental awareness throughout all stages of a product's life cycle". Through our staff's CSR contribution, we create a giving and caring workplace where they feel at home. 

Programme  

Our programme is called Leafx, meaning "Love Earth Action Fuji Xerox" campaign. Launched by our headquarters in Japan in 2008 for the 14 Asia-Pacific countries where we are present, this is the framework behind our CSR work.

We see this as a platform for educating our staff about environmental values and volunteering. To start with, it is very important for us to be kind to the environment and lead a sustainable business. Otherwise, clients will soon find out that we are not taking care of the environment. Therefore, we provide green solutions and educate our staff to care. We get very strong support from staff.

For example, to make them more compassionate towards the environment, we have a competition on who can cut their household power consumption the most between July and September, compared with the same period in the previous year. We chose the hot months to encourage them to cut back on their use of air-conditioning. They show us their electricity bills if they want to qualify.  

Clients and stakeholders  

We are also involving our clients and stakeholders. On the one hand, we help our clients to be more environmentally friendly in various ways, such as cutting back on their use of printers, photocopiers and paper, as well as reducing their CO{-2} emissions. We also procure green services and products.

On the other hand, we work with our stakeholders on CSR activities. For example, we co-operated with Swire to take underprivileged children from Sham Shui Po for an educational tour of the Swire Institute of Marine Science at the University of Hong Kong. Guided by professionals, they participated in experiment demonstrations and specimen observations under the microscope. With HSBC Insurance and with the help of the Hong Kong Arts Centre, we had an event where children were encouraged to make three-dimensional art. We provided the copy machines for the event. 

The next generation  

Stakeholders also include the next generation. In October 2010 and February 2011, we called on secondary and university students to join a video competition on the environment. We had a website where they could upload their videos. To our surprise, 440 students joined with 135 videos - and we got 12,000 "likes". 

Other activities include blood donation, a marathon and organising flag days on behalf of charities. We have red days when we give to a charity and staff who have done so can wear red shirts. For these events, we give out specially designed badges and staff are very proud of their badge collections.

The key is senior management support. To engage staff to participate, senior management also gets involved. Collaborating this way, staff members develop mutual trust as they get to know each other better. It also lifts the mood when we get the whole gang together to collaborate on a project or to take photos of participants.

We also publish a "Hong Kong Sustainability Report" on the year's activities, including our corporate, environmental and social projects. 

Feedback and results  

The staff feedback has been very positive. We have up to 200 regular volunteers out of 800 staff in Hong Kong, and they offered close to 800 volunteer hours last year, exceeding the targeted 680 volunteer hours for the year.

We find voluntary work also brings staff together, promotes teamwork, boosts mutual understanding and strengthens engagement. Our employee motivation satisfaction survey shows that direction and communication have been the highest scoring module for the past six years, attaining 93 per cent.

Volunteer team work greatly contributes to good communication and staff confirmed that they were satisfied in this area. Valuing people, participation and involvement, and teamwork had a similarly high score at 83 per cent. Hence, we can conclude that our CSR efforts contributed strongly to this result.

Debby Chan, CSR chairman, Fuji Xerox (Hong Kong)