Sustainability Report 2013 - Crown Relocations

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2013 marked a big first step for Crown in that we ... Having such a goal pulls us closer together in our ... focus – where society, environment, safety and ethics.
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Sustainability starts at home. Crown’s worldwide HQ, on Hong Kong’s densely populated, increasingly smogcovered island, is a good place to grasp the importance of environmental and community programs.

THE WORLD WE KNOW BEING ACCOUNTABLE OUR VISION TARGETS ENVIRONMENT COMMUNITY OUTREACH VOLUNTEERING TRANSFEREES AND COMMUNITIES HEALTH & SAFETY

THE WORLD WE KNOW

EcoVadis Silver rated for environmental and social practices

UK funded planting and care of 10,000 trees, Crown Thailand assisted planting All sites accredited for OHAS 18001

Collected 40 tons of food for redistribution

Recycling water saves 50,000 liters per year

EVERY CROWN OFFICE IS HELPING TO MAKE US A SUSTAINABLE BUSINESS

Providing transport of vitamins to remote locations 600 volunteer days for 44 causes

Introduced ECOCrates – recyclable and re-usable materials 12 employees raised US$30,000 for children’s charity by climbing Mt Kilimanjaro

Funded four school buildings

25% hybrid vehicles giving a 70% improvement in efficiency

BEING ACCOUNTABLE

For the first time, our managers around the world are being measured against a common goal.

A year of accountability

Putting passion into process

2013 marked a big first step for Crown in that we set our first global targets. For the first time, our managers around the world are being measured against a common worldwide goal for improvement. Having such a goal pulls us closer together in our CSR mission – to share successes with the world around us.

Developing our CSR efforts from a passionate – if random – cause to a more coherent program has been a big task. We want to keep our employees personally engaged, but also want to know exactly what is being done by our teams around the world.

We’re all fundamentally good. It’s so easy to celebrate this whole subject and overlook how we can improve our behavior. That may also describe Crown before 2008, when we first got serious about Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR). We probably started the same way as many companies, doing good things because it felt right. But it did not crystallize and become a corporate focus – where society, environment, safety and ethics are inseparable from business goals – until we began to be asked more questions by our clients. Those queries were eye-openers for Crown. We realized that much of what we had been doing was ad hoc; it was not coordinated, not adequately measured nor documented, and not central to how we did business.

To acquire that intelligence, we created shared databases that track activities then provide centralized reports. Those also help our efforts to improve environmental performance – a key component of sustainability. Our drive toward global ISO14001 accreditation – an internationally recognized standard – has been a valuable platform for that.

Safe and sound We are now driving a united approach to health and safety and corporate ethics. It helps keep stakeholders – our valued employees and customers – safe and fairly treated. Sharing and implementing such best practices across 60 countries has its challenges, for sure. But they are challenges worth confronting in our journey to best support our people and customers, today and every day.

Jennifer Harvey Director of CSR, Crown Worldwide Group

OUR VISION Our vision for a common future We relocate affluent assignees to impoverished markets, and protect valuable corporate information in cities experiencing turmoil. As a global business, we see firsthand how economic upheaval and natural disasters create dramatic contrasts in the health of communities. Such experiences make us grateful for Crown’s successes, and we want to help others achieve the same. But we don’t live in a vacuum – we work in a world that is interconnected. To thrive, our marketplace must also be healthy – environmentally, socially and financially. So it makes sense to recognize our impact on the world and find ways to mitigate it to the benefit of the communities in which we operate.

We reach out to customers, suppliers and partners to find opportunities to work together in support of communities.

Our aims are to understand our business processes, to conserve energy, reduce pollution and run more efficient and safer vehicles and facilities. We also reach out to customers, suppliers and partners to find opportunities to work together in support of communities. We seek to educate and positively influence all our stakeholders, because if we share a vision, we can achieve more. We are not perfect, but we work hard to be better every year. And the positive things we do earn us trust from the market and our own employees. The response to our CSR efforts has been positive in unexpected ways. We have stronger client relationships, closer partners, and – best of all – proud employees, empowered to make a difference.

What are corporate ethics? In the many countries where we do business, local laws and expectations vary – some are more stringent than others. So, in addition to adhering to legal requirements, we look further, to what is best for Crown and each community at large. When it comes to ethical issues, we expect our employees to work in the interest of and with fairness to our customers. We make our expectations clear through Crown’s written code of conduct. The code sets out global policies on conflict of interest, confidential client information, antitrust laws, employment policies and more. Our people agree to our code and are held accountable for adhering to it. Every multinational business encounters complex

ethical dilemmas, and Crown’s code of conduct provides the framework to make good decisions in such situations. The code also encourages employees to ask questions and seek guidance whenever necessary. Our behavior is our reputation – the good name that Crown has built up over the decades, across the globe. We work to uphold it, and to keep the trust of each community.

TARGETS

Our targets are set to achieve local and global ambitions. Each year, Crown managers around the world set CSR goals against which the performance of their operations are measured. These goals are unique to each market and address local areas for improvement. In addition to local targets, we now set global targets. These include objective measures on environmental performance, community outreach and employee volunteering. In previous years, obtaining global measures of some aspects had proved challenging. Following improvements to our reporting processes, we now have a much better understanding of this information, and can more easily set targets and measure achievements.

In addition to local targets, we now set global targets.

TARGETS TARGETS FOR ENVIRONMENT We aim to achieve 2% improvements in environmental efficiency (electricity, water and vehicle fuel) across all our operations in 2013 and 2014.

In 2013, we continued to increase the number of Crown branches that achieved the externally audited ISO 14001 environmental standard.

Now that we have established global environmental reporting and monitoring, we are working toward our first company-wide goals for improvement. 2013 was the first year to compare actual monthly results to a global goal.

This accreditation process ensures that each business carefully reviews its environmental impacts and finds ways to manage, monitor and continuously improve performance. In 2013, Crown achieved accreditation at nine additional businesses, with more planned for 2014.

A year of accountability

ISO-accredited offices 2011

2% improvement in efficiency

2012

TARGETS FOR HEALTH AND SAFETY

2013

We will give all of Crown’s worldwide teams access to the company’s Health and Safety guidelines, upholding the standards of OHSAS 18001. By the end of 2014, every Crown employee will be able to access the guidelines via the company’s intranet.

DO N O DRO T P TARGETS FOR VOLUNTEERISM Another global goal is to ensure implementation of the corporate volunteering policy in every one of our countries. This global policy allows every employee time to volunteer in the community. We aim to see this actively implemented everywhere by 2014.

Causes supported since January 2012 55% health 13% environment 12% education 10% children 10% other

FIND YOUR FEAT: It’s important to understand that volunteering is not one-size-fits-all. You have to pick activities based on local needs – but there is always something you can do to help in any community.

ENVIRONMENT

ADVANCING WITH TECHNOLOGY Every company has to make choices in new vehicle investment. New technologies make it possible to make the best choice for the environment.

We are keenly aware that Crown produces greenhouse gas emissions through vehicle fuel consumption and also through electricity use at its offices and facilities. A secondary but significant impact is found in sourcing, composition and waste management related to packing materials. The company collects data on all of the above areas in a natural resources consumption database. The database offers a consistent global view of business energy use and emissions with comparisons between locations, regions and seasons. This last aspect is the more meaningful because of the seasonality of some of Crown’s businesses.

OUR RED TRUCKS ARE GOING GREEN Although we have long operated low-emissions vehicles, our investment in a new, energy-efficient, hybrid fleet of trucks will bring further improvements in fuel use and reduced vehicle emissions.

The quality of the data held in the system has improved steadily, attributable to improvements in the system and training on correct reporting. In the third quarter of 2012, information from fully reporting businesses show an improved efficiency from 8% to 20% compared to the previous 12 months in the following areas: • • • •

Electricity use per square meter of facility space Vehicle fuel efficiency Office paper use per employee Water use per employee

lower fuel consumption

fewer emissions

ENVIRONMENT TRACKING PERFORMANCE A live, online tracking system reveals the truth about our progress toward group efficiency targets. On the facing page are screenshots of the Natural Resources Consumption (NRC) dashboard. This shows the data we record to monitor our environmental performance. Branch and country managers can select their branch or region to see a summary of their performance for any period of time. Managers can also drill down to see details about any of Crown’s specific areas of measurement: electricity, water, paper and vehicle fuel.

Summary view: the colored diagonal stripes in the background of each chart show the desired trend.

Detailed picture: fuel efficiency for Auckland fleet of cars.

ENVIRONMENT

ISO 14001 helps embed environmental processes, track performance and continuously improve.

INTERNATIONAL CARBON COOPERATION Through a partnership with Plant a Tree Today, Crown in the UK and Ireland maintains carbon neutrality. The Crown Switzerland team offset almost 5,000 metric tons of carbon by planting over 10,800 trees in Thailand. Employees of Crown Thailand played their part in the conservation effort by planting trees in Khao Yai National Park, a UNESCO World Heritage site filled with diverse and endangered plant and animal life. As an additional benefit, maintaining the trees creates jobs for an underserved rural community.

ISO 14001 Environmental Accreditation Accredited operations: • • • • • • • • •

Bahrain Canada France Ireland Netherlands Qatar UAE UK USA

Crown’s global environment management system is the basis for the group’s aim to achieve ISO 14001 accreditation throughout its operations. Achieving this required detailed research into local operational practices, suppliers and environmental legislation. Each of our accredited operations has an environmental committee. Implementing ISO 14001 helps them to embed environmental awareness into processes, to make plans and track performance. To align with Crown’s global ISO 14001 environment management system, these businesses have to document regular internal audits, comply with current environmental legislation and conduct regular management reviews. All of these steps help ensure that Crown will continuously improve its environmental performance. Additional offices are preparing for accreditation in 2014.

10,800

trees planted in Thailand

COMMUNITY OUTREACH

Name: Ronan Kelly, Regional Managing Director for Malaysia and the Philippines (Managing director North America) Project: Lighthouse Children’s Home, Kuala Lumpur About the project Lighthouse Children’s Welfare Home is a safe home for vulnerable children. Some of the children are from families with alcohol or drug problems, or may have suffered abuse, and others come from poverty-stricken or singleparent homes.The Home has adopted a family concept rather than being institutional, like other children’s homes.

How is Crown involved? Our office supports the Home with services and with time.We’ve donated moving services between homes, and collected and delivered donated furniture.We also sponsored a book publicizing the Home, which we distribute to

incoming transferees and clients – and that’s resulted in an uplift in financial support from more donors. Finally, and more personally, our team organizes visits to the Home to help the children learn or simply to play.

How would you describe the effects of the project? The effort had a massive impact for the cause. Volunteerism helps you realize how much difference you can make as an individual. It has a shared benefit for Crown as staff attitudes are affected and you can see the effect it has on a team.You see staff who have perhaps not done so really embrace a goal and see it through – hugely rewarding for all concerned.

A healthy, sustainable local community boosts the local economy and might therefore be regarded as an investment from Crown’s point of view. We aim to do business in a way that benefits our corporate performance and the local community. This concept is known as “shared value.” The community benefits of a shared value approach to business in local markets are self-evident. Less obviously, it results in a “healthier” marketplace, more trusting customers and loyalty among local employees. We track our community activities around the world in an attempt to quantify the value of such approaches and set goals for improvement. Our CSR database records details about each activity and its estimated financial equivalent value to the community. We also track whenever Crown partners with an external stakeholder. The information, which is accessible to all employees, is a source of continuing inspiration and idea-sharing between worldwide business locations. It also helps Crown teams to create local community activity targets.

Great ways to support local communities are also shared on Crown’s internal news network. This news regularly features Crown’s CSR activities, which encourages teams everywhere.

Volunteerism helps you realize how much difference you can make as an individual.

VOLUNTEERING

Name: Simy Matthews, Middle East Quality & CSR Manager Project: Delivering Aid to Needy Foreign Workers About the project Angel Appeal and Helping Hands provide relief for neglected foreign workers. One group they help are those on abandoned vessels, left without adequate food, water or means of communication. They also help foreign construction workers and other laborers.

How is Crown involved? In Dubai, Crown was the first company to help abandoned seafarers, quickly gathering cartons of supplies for the workers. In Bahrain, the team gathered and also helped distribute food, supplies and a few rare treats to construction workers living in cramped, dirty accommodation and earning below minimum wage.

Through a partnership with Take My Junk, Crown is encouraging customers to donate furniture and household items they no longer want to these very needy foreign workers.

What did you achieve? We have helped improve lives in tangible ways through our efforts, and by raising about US$40,000, so that the workers can have even the most basic comforts, like taking a shower or speaking to their families back in their home country. Finding new homes for unwanted goods also helps the environment by reducing waste. We continue to support this group by donating a percentage of proceeds to the aid organizations.

Employee engagement Volunteering is a positive way to encourage teambuilding and a genuine source of personal pride for our employees – they really put their heart and muscle into their volunteering work. The types of activities and causes are as diverse as the employees. Crown supports this variety because individual communities have different needs and individual employees have unique passions. Both are critical to engaging employees to positively impact local communities.

We currently track all volunteering activities in our CSR activities database. As an example of the breadth of activities, the dataset shows 249 employee-led, community support and volunteering activities from May 2012 - April 2013. That’s roughly one for every office across our global business – not a bad starting point. Teams report activities, involvement and impact. They can even upload photos from an event, helping inspire other employees around the world.

During 2012, Crown employees engaged in over 200 charitable projects around the world to support local communities.

200+

Charitable projects around the world

We’ve helped improve lives in tangible ways.

TRANSFEREES AND COMMUNITIES

Jim Thompson, Crown Chairman, with one of the orphans for whom Crown helped fund school facilities in Cambodia.

As employees of a global business, Crown’s people see how some communities have much less than others. We have learned that by working with local community groups and organizations we can help them to achieve more – by donating time, money or other resources. We also recognize that helping underserved groups to sustain themselves makes the entire community stronger.

Transferring expatriates Through our global mobility management and relocations businesses, Crown brings together people of every culture and socio-economic background. Not surprisingly, many client assignments entail economically and socially privileged transferees moving to developing markets. These transferees may have nice homes, schools and health care in a city where many people do not. This disparity need not be a bad thing, especially if some transferees become involved in helping the community. It is Crown’s goal to encourage and provide tools that enable client employers and transferees to do this.

Stakeholder engagement Working with partners offers an important, indirect contribution to our CSR goals. Although activities vary between countries, the basic principles are the same: to extend our influence to stakeholders outside our business, encouraging others to share our aims of improving the communities we operate in, however long we’re there. The initiative has two strands: firstly, information provision to relocating employees, and secondly, charity donations from departing families. Transferees arriving in new countries often suffer a culture shock if ill-prepared for the transition. To aid transferees in their integration, Crown provides

cultural awareness and adaptability training through a program of intercultural services. In similar fashion to our cultural training, we provide a guide to being a good member of the local community as a transferee. That guidance covers local practices, environmental awareness, and recycling practicalities and even advice on shopping: for example, where to buy local or organic produce. The second half of our stakeholder engagement effort is tied to transferees’ departures. However wellplanned your stay, it is highly likely that you’ll get to the end of an assignment having accumulated things you don’t intend on taking home when you leave. Transferees normally leave behind unused food and unwanted clothing. Occasionally they leave furniture or decorative objects acquired while on assignment. In most cases, these items can be collected and redistributed or recycled within the local community. In both the above ways Crown is influencing its stakeholders in line with its sustainability program. Although it’s common for companies to use their position of strength in a supply chain to influence suppliers, it is less common to find that influence spreading in the other direction, toward clients. Since beginning to encourage stakeholders, we have steadily grown the number of clients who wish to take part. In the last year, we have worked increasingly with clients, inviting them to join Crown’s efforts or working together to support their own CSR goals. One client has now formally integrated Crown’s CSR programs into transferee counseling at the start and end of an assignment.

HEALTH & SAFETY

STANDARDS PRACTICE Nations vary widely in their attitudes to health and safety at work. As a global employer, we believe it is important to promote a consistently high standard of safe working practices throughout our business divisions and across the many different nations and cultures that make up Crown.

SAFE CONDUCT Investing in the welfare of our employees is an essential element in creating a sustainable business. Promoting health and safety at work helps boost the physical and mental well-being of Crown’s people. Employees who are healthy are good for the business, and have better home lives, too. Like other elements of CSR, in health and safety, “good” is good for everyone. We take steps to provide services in a way that protects our employees and won’t harm people in the communities where we operate. We aim to eliminate work-related accidents and absenteeism due to work-related poor health. Equally, we actively seek to prevent any harm to customers during the course of our business with them, and to the community at large.

Achieving a standard for the safety of our business means being aware of all the risks in what we do. We mitigate those risks to minimize harm throughout the business, at the office, in the warehouse, in customers’ premises, or on the road. As we are a global employer, we have to comply with local health and safety legislation around the world. Crown has achieved and aims to exceed the requirements of the OHSAS 18001 health and safety standard. Today, more than 30 Crown teams around the world hold this or similar health and safety accreditations. Our achievements in safety around the world inspired a company-wide initiative to improve the ways we communicate health and safety guidelines to all Crown employees. It ensures our people everywhere clearly understand how best to protect customers and work safely themselves.