November 2017

What does the future hold for CSR
and community impact reporting?
p East of England’s joint chief executives Minnie Moll, Doug Field, Nick Denny, Mark O’Hagan and Roger
Grosvenor launch the society’s Small Things, Big Difference community impact capaign
ALISON FREEMAN:
CSR is a dated concept. All businesses, government
bodies and charities create social impact. Similarly,
all capital has a social return, not just impact funds.
There is a very fast maturation in the business world
of the ideas around non-financial reporting. This
is where CSR will ultimately end up – with chief
financial officers. Businesses, especially co-ops,
know that the social context in which they work is
make-or-break for their survival. So investors are
now looking to businesses to tell them how they
are creating shared value, meaning value which is
good for communities and for the long-term survival
of the business. While many businesses still have
community teams, in the future I think these will
become individuals who have specialist social
impact skills who are integrated across functions.
Integrated reporting will be the norm, with social
and environmental profit and loss accounts being
published alongside financial accounts.
MARCUS HULME:
We need better transparency and standardisation
of impact reporting where possible. For example,
when you write a report, I believe it’s important that
you write a method statement to say where the data
has come from. I think there will probably come
a point where there’s better peer-to-peer scrutiny
of a report. You don’t see a lot of critique at the
moment. Perhaps we’ll see increased accreditation
standards for impact measurement in the future. If
there was a Quality Mark, or Charter Mark, people
would know that what they were reading meets a
certain standard.
ALYSON SLATER:
There are three big trends we are seeing at GRI when
it comes to the future of reporting. One is a shift to
digital reporting, which opens up the possibility for
more timely reporting and greater accessibility of
reported information. Another trend is the demand
for data through value chains. Firms at the top of
supply chains are now gathering information from
their first-tier suppliers and beyond, in response
to the customer, investor and regulatory demands
that they have more accountability for impacts
occurring in the value chain. Finally, we are seeing
the need to more proactively communicate business
contributions to the SDGs, as a trend that will shape
reporting over the coming decade.
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NOVEMBER 2017 | 39