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Responsible Med project

Users’ manual for the CSRself-evaluation tool

http://responsible-med.eu

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Contents

Cooperation for responsible competitiveness 5

Responsible Med CSR tool 6

Information 6

Contacts 6

Glossary 6

Responsible Med CSR tool – access to the self-evaluation tool 6

1. Register 7

2. Login 7

3. Update Profile 8

4. CSR self-evaluation tool 84.1 CSR survey 84.2 Ex-ante evaluation of CSR actions (simulator) 84.3 Ex-post evaluation of CSR actions 19

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Cooperation for Responsible Competitiveness

The Responsible Med project has promoted cooperation and exchange among 9 partners in terms of analysis and promotion of Corporate Social Responsibil-ity (CSR) as an essential strategy to increase competitiveness. The project tackles a series of key questions, for example:• How can we evaluate the link between CSR and SME competitiveness?• How can public politics promote CSR in SME, monitor it and improve it?• How can we use CSR to promote the corporate competitiveness?• How can interregional cooperation promote understanding of these issues?• How can interregional cooperation help development of new methods and

tools to handle these issues?Responsible Med has developed an evaluation tool thought for small and Medium-sized enterprises to measure and check the economic impact of CSR approach within their businesses.The performance of an enterprise in terms of CSR is analysed on the basis of 4 criteria: marketplace, workplace, community, environment.The Responsible Med tool helps to develop a strategic plan for CSR and to promote a better use of the available funds and opportunities. This tool can help SMEs to evaluate their performance in terms of CSR ac-tivities and to identify potential areas of improvement, thus reinforcing their competitiveness.In practical terms the Responsible Med tool enables users to:evaluate their own level of maturity, in terms of CSR; receive information on possible CSR strategies based on regional features

/ maturity level / activity sector This is a practical guide that will help users to use the tool step by step.

The self-evaluation tool was developed on the basis of the project methodol-ogy, freely available at this internet address:http://responsible-med.euIt is also possible to ask a copy to the following address: responsible-med@regione.toscana.it

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Responsible Med CSR tool

InformationThis section is visible for all users and gives general information about the Responsible Med project.

ContactsHere all the contacts of the projects’ partner are available.

GlossaryThis part informs you about the most frequently CSR related words used in this tool. The glossary provides an explanation for words you might have heard, but whose meaning is not always evident, e.g., Corporate Governance, Corporate Social Responsibility, Ethical Code are some of the expressions you may find.

Responsible Med CSR tool – access to the self-evaluation toolThis is the part dedicated to the CSR self-evaluation tool, reserved to regis-tered users.

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1. RegisterFill in this form to create your company profile. Whenever necessary this infor-mation can be updated (See chart 1, below).

Chart 1

This data are only requested the first time that you log in and register your company. It will not be requested in subsequent logins. The fields marked with an asterisk are compulsory. Once the data have been inserted, save by clicking “Save” button. Print or write down your username and password for a later login. You will receive a registra-tion confirmation e-mail with with your access codes.

2. LoginOnce registered, you can log in by inserting the e-mail address and password used in the Registration process and then clicking on “Access”. Now it is possible to:• update your profile in “update profile” section;• self assess your own CSR level in “CSR self-evaluation tools” section

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3. Update ProfileIn this section, you can complete the existing data by adding further information about your company. Although this is not compulsory, it is useful to define your com-pany profile better and, consequently, to evaluate your CSR strategy more precisely.

4. CSR self-evaluation ToolsIn this section, you can access to CSR self-evaluation tool, which is divided into three steps1. CSR survey;2. ex-ante evaluation of CSR actions;3. ex-post evaluation of CSR actions;

4.1. CSR surveyThis is a 32-question test aimed at checking your CSR maturity. It is divided into 4 categories: workplace, marketplace, environment and community. Questions should help you assess you current CSR status, in order to decide where to focus resources. Results are expressed as a percentage for each of the above mentioned cat-egories. Each category contains a set of suggestions and proposals for im-provement labeled as “suggested actions”. These CSR actions are accompa-nied with cases and good practices (Tools) based upon real experiences and obtained from companies involved in the development phase of the tool. These practices should help you as a source of inspiration in your own company. You can also find a set of relevant public CSR initiatives in your region. These initiatives are accompanied by fields of action covered, targets and contact persons able to support you in developing your own strategy. Companies seek-ing for support to launch their own CSR strategy can tap on these resources. The CSR maturity survey can also be displayed under the form of a pdf file. 4.2. Ex-ante evaluation of CSR actions (simulator)The ex-ante evaluation ranks CSR actions applicable to your company accord-ing to their contribution to competitiveness and their related costs. In this way, you can compare CSR actions and decide the best option to improve your competitiveness. This tool is a simulator conceived to help you make up your mind about different CSR actions. Results are based on a pool of 141 surveys conducted in 6 countries. These results match CSR actions against their contribution to a set of up to 13 com-petitive dimensions such as: employee connection to company, image of com-pany, recognition of company by society, community ties, innovation, improve-ment of management skills…belonging to 3 competitive categories, namely, Market competitiveness; Internal Competitiveness and Society/Community Recognition. See Table 1

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Competitivenesscategories

Competitivenessdimensions

MARKET COMPETITIVENESS

SOCIETY / COMMUNITY RECOGNITION

INTERNAL COMPETITIVENESS

Response to tender requirements of clients

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Image of company +Employee perception of company’s CSR-related internal values

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Recognition of company by society

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Anticipation and adaptation to new regulations

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Employee connection to company

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Community ties +Productivity +Product quality +Participation in R&D projects

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Entrance in new markets +Innovation +Improvement of management skills

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Table 1To access the Ex-ante evaluation tool, click “New” in “Ex-ante evaluation of CSR actions”.A new 7-step window will open (chart 2)

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Chart 2

Step 1The first step asks you to select a series of CSR actions (maximum 5). Some of these actions, according to the survey conducted in 6 countries, are especially linked to a certain competitive dimension. For instance, editing of social/sustainability and/or environmental annual reports has a very strong contribution to improvement of the image of Company, whilst Training activities have a smaller contribution.

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Step 2A new window will open which contains three categories of an enterprise’s competitiveness. (see chart 3) :1. Market (in black);2. Community recognition (in blue);3. Internal Competitiveness (in yellow)The simulator allows users to customise competitive categories according to users’ needs by weighting their importance. Calculations are made accordingly.

Chart 3The results of the simulator show which of the above mentioned CSR actions have a stronger influence on competitiveness. Results are expressed as a Competitiveness/Cost ratio.

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Step 3In this phase, the three abovementioned categories are sub-divided (see chart 4). It is possible to customise competitive dimensions and, as in Step 2, calcula-tions are then made accordingly.For instance, in the macro-category “Market Competitiveness”, you must as-sign the relative wieght to each sub-category (Response to tender require-ments of clients and so on), according to your company’s needs and in relation to the macro-category affiliation.This way, depending on the relative weight assigned to each sub-category, you can obtain a costs/benefits ratio for each CSR action chosen in Step 1.

Chart 4

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Step 4Calculation results are portrayed in a table. Results show the most performing CSR Actions in terms of competitiveness/cost ratio according to your weight-ing. The highest values indicate the highest performance. See Chart 5.

Chart 5The simulator also allows us to edit results, by clicking on the numbers and introducing different values (see chart 6). However, this is not advisable unless you are an expert on CSR.

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Chart 6

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Step 5As a final step, the simulator weights the money allocation for CSR actions (for design, for implementation or for operational cost). For example, a phil-anthropic action will have low costs of design and operation compared to the implementation costs, while a management system standard has higher costs of design.

Chart 7

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Step 6Step 6 is about evaluating performance that you expect from each CSR action related to design, implementation and operational costs, according to the table mechanism explained in step 4. As in other steps, results can be based on default figures or can be custom-ised to your needs (See Chart 8). However, it is not advisable to adapt the figures unless you are an expert in CSR.

Chart 8

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Step 7Step 7 shows results. They can be expressed as a bar chart or as an x/y chart. See Chart 9 and Chart 10. At this stage, you should remember that, in addition to concrete figures, given a set of different CSR Actions, the simulator will help you to choose the most performing ones in terms of competitiveness/cost ratio. You will have thus a criterion to decide which particular action to test in your own company.

Chart 9

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Chart 10

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4.3. CSR Ex-post evaluation of CSR actionsThe ex-post evaluation assesses the impact of your CSR action(s) on the per-formance of your company in terms of Competitiveness/Cost ratio. Best re-sults emerge from this tool if your CSR strategy has been running for at least 2 years. For many SMEs Ex-post evaluation is not as critical as CSR Maturity test and Ex-ante evaluation. Ex-post evaluation should support companies in keeping track of different key-performance indicators on CSR and thus integrating CSR within the companies’ strategy.To access ex-post evaluation tool, click “New” button in the “Ex-post evaluation of CSR actions” section.Also here, a 7-step window will open (See Chart 11).

Chart 11

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Step 1In this first step, you must select the indicators you want to use to evaluate the implemented CSR strategy performance. The rationale behind ex-post is for you to assess progresses on CSR in a 2-years period. As a result, you should keep a record of different indicators (as per expressed in Chart 11) to see their evolution. The simulator provides expla-nations on the different indicators available by clicking on the question mark. Consider that some indicators are pre-selected in order to assure the coher-ence with the strategy that you are evaluating.You must assign a value for each chosen indicator before and after CSR strat-egy implementation.To be able to assign an ex-ante value to an indicator, it is necessary to click the cell in “before” column and press up and down arrows to choose a number.To be able to assign an ex-post value to an indicator, the user you must click the cell in “after” column and press up and down arrows to choose a number (See Chart 12).

Chart 12

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Step 2 This step allows you to assign the relative weight to each of the three com-petitiveness categories below, by shifting the square buttons using the mouse. The value is decreased if the button is moved to the left and increased if it is moved to the right (See Chart 13).

Chart 13

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Step 3As in Ex-ante, it is possible to customise Competitive Categories and Competi-tive Dimensions (see Chart 14).

Chart 14

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Step 4 This step allows you assign the relative weight of the selected competitiveness indicators, with regards to the related competitiveness dimension. In Chart 15 you see how New markets entered and Export Intensity (competitive indicators which correspond to choices made on Step 1) can be weighTed against a given competitive dimension, namely Entrance in new markets.

Chart 14

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Step 5 This step allows you assign the relative weight to each of the three cost catego-ries: design, implementation and operational costs. See Chart 16

Chart 16

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Step 6 This step assesses the performance in terms of the cost indicator under the related cost category for the “before” and “after” scenario. Figures can be customised according to your experience (see Chart 17).

Chart 17

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Step 7 This final step shows the results obtained and expressed as a bar chart or as x/y chart (see Charts 18 and 19). These results are based upon data intro-duced in Step 6, 5, 4, 3 and 2. Whenever changes are made, final results are modified accordingly.

Chart 18

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Chart 19

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