Olympic Legacy: The role of Business

Can Business Help to Build Help to Build an Enduring Legacy?

There are no more superlatives left with which to describe the Games; the organisation, the performances, the volunteers and spectators have all been rightly praised. Even business has come out of the process with an enhanced reputation for the ability to manage such a major multifaceted project and deliver it on time and largely on budget. The last few weeks have demonstrated the power of sport to electrify people and countries, to bring out the very best, both in the arena and around the country. Capturing that has to be our first priority.

But before the final curtain came down commentators were already focusing on ‘legacy’ thatill-defined but key component of the UK’s success in winning the Games for London. How can business benefit from and help to create a lasting legacy and rebuild trust?

Legacy is one of those things like ‘Britishness’, beloved of politicians and commentators, that means different things to different people depending on your point of view. So as with Britishness there will be as many interpretations of legacy as there are stakeholders – and we are all in some way stakeholders.

The legacy issues that have been most talked about are sports and buildings, but when sport is the issue do we mean elite sport, school sport, community sport, women’s sport, disabled sport, general health and well being or all of the above? And what of the elderly? And then the money issue; how much gets spent and where; who pays and who distributes? Above all who measures and who is ultimately responsible?

This is a great challenge with huge opportunities and some risk, but the risk is mainly in not availing ourselves of the opportunity, of retreating into our self-deprecating, but somewhat defeatist mode, and not maintaining the pressure and the capability to do something exceptionally well. It’s great to see the London Legacy Development Corporation in place and to see that the Prime Minister has appointed Lord Coe as his legacy advisor.

Over the past few years I have spoken to sponsors, businesses, academics, institutions, politicians and others, but whilst everyone agreed it was important, no one really wanted to get involved; partly because they didn’t know who was in charge or what role they might play. Business now needs to step up and take additional responsibility. Taking the initiative and developing legacy linked objectives and programmes will help repair the trust in business that has been so badly tarnished in the past few years.

There have been calls for wealthy business people to sponsor elite sport, for more Government money, for schools and teachers to make greater commitments, for more general participation in sport. Business should focus on the benefits of creating a sporting legacy as part of their Corporate Responsibility objectives, not as a charitable objective, but in terms of developing talent, creating positive role models and relationships, boosting well being and self esteem. Camilla Batmangheldjh (founder of the charity Kids Company) has written about the exclusion of marginalised kids from the whole Olympic process and how tapping their potential through sport can give them a route back into society and confidence in their abilities and potential.

 Many great schemes exist, but we need to raise their profile and make the information more widely available to everyone. This great national success, in which business has played a vital role, must not be allowed to dissipate into our preferred news media role and national characteristic of carping and criticism that is so damaging to confidence and self esteem. We should not forget, in heaping justifiable praise on the volunteers, that McDonald’s provided the training for 70,000 volunteers!

We have previously suggested that a Legacy Management framework needs to be put in place to enable business and other stakeholders to understand their position and what they can contribute in the overall scheme of things and have those efforts recognised. There will inevitably be stakeholders who will find their interests marginalised; a clear framework will enable them to fight their case better or understand why the overall priorities may not align with their’s.

The 2012 Olympic Games came alive not just because of great performances but because so many people took such great delight in participating, volunteering in huge numbers, turning out in all weather to see the flame cross the country and watching at venues, giant screens and on TV. This great sense of commitment to doing something brilliantly well is the true legacy that we need to keep alive! The Paralympics has already begun and interest in them has never been so great; this is another legacy that we can celebrate.

So, if you are feeling critical, hold your thought; talk upside not down and enjoy the moment and think of ways in which your business can contribute. Consult your staff – ask ‘what can we do locally to keep the flame burning? ‘They will love being involved, as will your customers and other stakeholders. See what the spirit of the Olympics can do to enhance your business, its reputation and esteem. Capture the moment, the enthusiasm and energy, and plan your own legacy. There has never been a better time to make your mark.

 

Your views

We have developed an on-line survey, which can be accessed via our website, www.enactconsulting.com, seeking your views about Olympic Legacy and how business can benefit. We would be grateful if you would take a few moments to give us your views and you can also use the survey to seek the views of your staff and other stakeholders to decide how best you might create your own Olympic Legacy.

Ethics and CSR

Ethics and CSR

I was at a talk at the Institute of Business Ethics a couple of weeks ago, where the discussion was about Ethics and the City. It focused naturally on the events of the last 4 years and the poor performance of City management in showing leadership and ethics. Unlike Enron which managed to suspend its Ethics policy before it went bust, this financial mismanagement  happened in spite of every large bank having CSR reports winning plaudits and awards from bodies like BiTC, of which all the major banks just happen to be members.

The speaker suggested that the fault lay with light government regulation and what we needed was heavier regulation and greater enforcement; time to see the guilty in prison. A vote winning proposal to be sure!

But the presumption of more regulation is that regulation itself and the regulators themselves are ethical: more ethical than bankers perhaps, but sufficiently ethical to change the way business is done?

Governments do not command any great respect, so there seems to be a fallacy in this argument. How can CSR help to remedy this situation? CSR has had many detractors, who suggest that it is simply window dressing, and events like the banking crisis go a long way to proving them right. CSR practitioners have to take much of the blame for having allowed reporting to become the standard by which all CSR activity is judged, rather than looking more deeply at the structure of CSR. By considering corporate CSR objectives, strategy and management, looking beyond the big consulting firms cosy ‘assurance’ reports, it is possible to get a clearer picture of what is actually happening and how in tune management is with its stakeholders.

How many companies do we see developing new values, signed off by the CEO, for the workers to read on the walls of the office to make them better people! And these values only resonate if we see those same people living those values. If there are real values in an organisation they rarely emanate from the top, more often coalescing from the core beliefs of the silent majority who work in the company. They can be reinforced by good leadership, but are not created by it, with some notable exceptions.

Shareholders are guilty too, pushing for ever greater returns, focusing on quarterly results, churning stocks and failing to look at long term value and corporate objectives.

We need to articulate what we really mean by ethics; it’s a complex subject, but one which receives little priority in education at a time when the role of religion in setting the ethical framework has all but disappeared. It is becoming more complex, particularly at the frontiers of science where immensely complex ethical problems are being forced upon us. The business issues are relatively straightforward but we need to address them with rigour and CSR practitioners should be at the forefront of this debate.

 

Tom Peyton