Shannon Schuyler, Managing Director of Corporate Responsibility for PricewaterhouseCoopers (PwC), is concerned about doing the right things for a sustainable future. Sustainability is a hot topic at corporations everywhere. Shannon tells us about the initiatives she is working on:
"I come from a family of teachers and school administrators—I grew up hearing the passions and frustrations of people who were committed to developing the next generation of leaders despite lacking the resources and financial support. Their dedication and influence to youth advancement and empowerment has been with me throughout my career.
Two years ago, I felt the need to make a greater impact on society and the marketplace, both personally and professionally. I wanted to harness all of the great things that PwC was doing, fill in the gaps and create a compelling story to lead to a more sustainable business, marketplace and future. I developed a short white paper outlining how we could create a more formalized Corporate Responsibility (CR) platform for PwC and sent it to senior leadership. I was then asked to spearhead the effort.
In my role as the Managing Director of CR, I focus on developing linkages between our four CR pillars: Marketplace, People, Community and Environment. I work on creating sustainable programs, initiatives and partnerships that build integrity, leadership skills and behavioral change. This is critical to embedding CR activities into our everyday work. Our commitment to this has allowed us to come a long way in a short amount of time. Some of our accomplishments include:
-Developing a Summer of Community Service program that allows PwC’s 31,000 U.S. employees to take part in paid-time off to volunteer and give back to communities nationwide through firm-sponsored volunteerism. The firm also provides 10 hours of paid time off for staff to engage in discretionary volunteer opportunities
-Creating a national partnership with Be The Change Inc., a leading public policy and advocacy nonprofit that helped found and lead the ServiceNation campaign, aimed at inspiring a new era of voluntary citizen service
-Making a commitment to reduce the carbon footprint of PwC’s US operations by 20% by 2012
-Released the first vendor assessment survey that is aligned with the Code of Conduct we developed for our suppliers. The Code of Conduct outlines the ethical business practices that PwC expects from its suppliers and has shaped our procurement strategy
-Signing the UN Global Compact, the framework for businesses that are committed to aligning their operations and strategies with ten universally accepted principles around human rights
-Creating IMPACT, an educational outreach program that mentors talented African-American students through the complicated and rigorous college application process
As the economic downturn continues, brand and reputation will become all the more important to companies and thus the focus on CR efforts to drive loyalty and confidence will escalate. The strategic link between doing good for society and doing good for the business will blur even more. My vision is to integrate CR into all facets of the PwC culture and how we do work and to make it a part of the overall experience that we deliver to our people, clients and the marketplace. It is with this focus—a focus on our future—that we align our investments in corporate responsibility with our business strategy and work to communicate with confidence our contributions to a sustainable future."
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