by Jeff Swartz, CEO and President of the Timberland Corporation.
Jeff Swartz spoke on “Commerce and Justice” at CSV’s annual Edith Kahn Memorial Lecture, hosted by Lord Brooke of Alverthorpe on Tuesday 25 April 2006 atPortcullis House, House of Commons.
Timberland, a major US-based international clothing and footwear corporation has long been at the forefront of CSR and has prided itself on being different from other companies. Initiatives have included its Path of Service™ program which gives Timberland employees 40 hours of paid time-off to serve in their communities and paid service sabbaticals.
“In Boston, the city I call home and where I try to raise my children, 20 years later, there is more violence on our streets and more murders last year of young people than ever before.”
Swartz believes that business simply funding isolated ‘linear’ community programmes is not enough to make significant change and that the many different programmes aimed at helping society need to work together more effectively:
“Turns out, if you build affordable housing and there are no jobs, the system doesn’t sustain. Turns out, if you build emergency food networks and the schools don’t teach, you feed children who live trapped in poverty for another generation. Turns out, if you create after school programmes but don’t do effective community policing, kids get shot on the way home after the school programmes.”
“I am not criticising investments in programmes – I am for good programmes. But we should create interconnected networks of powerful partners that yield three dimensional, sustainable solutions, social problem solving ecosystems, rather than linear programmes. Instead of un-connected programmes overlapping with each other, some powered by business, others barely getting by, we can create a whole cloth of social leadership. This is what I mean by getting beyond funding programmes and beginning to build sustainable solutions.
“I believe passionately that for profit business leaders are exactly the kind of leaders who can cause networks to be configured, can drive those networks and can create sustainable solutions through time. This is what we do all day in our boardrooms, when we plan and execute our efforts in the marketplace. We need to be more than programme funders, we have to become solution builders at the highest level – not autocratically, but in active collaboration with other leaders in the civic square.”
Swartz goes further and warns that although welcome, cause-related marketing only goes so far in truly engaging people, including consumers, in making a difference. He issues this challenge:
“No more being satisfied with cause related marketing. No more thinking we’ve done our jobs, if we wear a ribbon of one colour or another – the AIDS epidemic is not slowing, and so while I thank God for all the money raised by selling ribbons, or yellow bracelets to combat cancer, you and I know that cause related marketing doesn’t even come close to going far enough in terms of raising a voice, telling a story or compelling consumers to commit themselves.”
Swartz also pointed out that enabling employees to take part in CSR programmes makes a company more attractive to work for.
Click here for a full transcript of Jeff Swartz's lecture.