Being Socially Responsible

I live in Mumbai and am not sure where all of you on this call live. When I travel in Mumbai, especially coming to a busy signal, invariably there are beggars who come asking for help. I have found that I am able to spot them in my peripheral vision and then can make sure that I am looking in the opposite direction so that I don't need to engage with them. I see them but don't see them. I hear their cries for alms but I don't listen to them. I treat them as if they are not there. I realize how adept I have become at seeing only what I want to see and disregarding the rest of the sights that are out there in front of me.

Almost 20 years ago, I had been out of the country for a spell of 4 years without returning. When I did return, I remember being appalled at the amount of poverty there was in terms of homeless people sleeping on the pavements, stacked like sardines. Because I had come back with 'fresh lenses', I was able to see things that for years I had completely blanked out. Nowadays it is getting so easy to not look at the things that can be disconcerting or can trouble us or make us want to engage in things that we don't want to.

In 1992, the Heads of States of the world came together at Rio, Brazil for the Earth Summit. What they basically said was that they needed to make sure that sustainable development is about a society growing in such a way that future generations are not compromised, and have access to the same resources that we have. Out of that summit, discussions started and companies got involved and governments began to change and take different stands. Ten years later, a World Summit for Sustainable Development took place and they focused on partnerships.

Dr. Paul Toyen wrote, "There appeared to be a role for everyone; governments to provide fair and socially-just laws, businesses to behave responsibly and consumers to think about their actions by reducing waste or asking questions about how and where their goods came from." Thus CSR came into existence – Corporate Social Responsibility. Do corporate have a responsibility to society? The answer is "Yes". Even beyond profitability, there must be a way to touch society and lift up society.

David Livermore writing an article 'Lessons from India: Social Profitability' says, "Take for example, the long time commitment from Indian businesses to serve others while also being financially profitable. While 'corporate social responsibility', 'creative capitalism' and the 'triple bottom line' are relatively new trendy ideas in the West, many Indian businesses have long measured their success by how they care for their most important asset – their people. A recent study among the 100 businesses in India found that social mission trumped shareholder value for every executive surveyed – a result that would be unthinkable among their American counterparts."

"Quoting ITC, a leading multi-business conglomerate involved in the study said, 'Envisioning a larger societal purpose has always been a hallmark of ITC, the company sees no conflict between the twin goals of shareholder value enhancement and societal value creation.'"

Basically saying that while CSR is a fairly new idea in the West, probably 5-7 years old; it has been integral to Indian businesses for many years. And while that may be true, isn't it a crueler fact that it's not enough? We still look around and find needs that are so huge, so vast that sometimes our gut response or our instinct is to turn away because the need is so great.

Yet again, I am reminded of the story I shared with you many Tuesdays ago, about the boy standing on the sea shore throwing star fish back into the ocean.

A man passing by asked him, "What are you doing?"

The boy replied, "These starfish will die if they are on the beach and I am throwing them back so they will live."

The man looked at him and said, "Have you not seen the thousands of starfish that are here? You are not going to make any difference."

And the boy picked up one starfish and threw it back and said, "Yes sir, but for this starfish, it made a difference."

This story keeps reminding me that we have a responsibility. Even though the task is huge, for the one thing that we can do, it makes a difference for that one person.

Maybe today your company is CSR compliant and you and your company are doing something. But I challenge you to get involved, to shape it, to mould it, to take direction, to see what can be done.

About a year back, I got a call from the GM of a multinational company who had heard that we were doing work with HIV-AIDS infected and affected people and wanted to come and have a chat with us. So we had someone go and do a presentation for them and the people were so challenged that they asked if they could help with anything that we had coming up. We had organized a picnic for about 100 of these HIV-AIDS infected people so that they could have a good time and forget some of the woes that surrounded their daily lives. Two of the managers came with us and it changed their lives.

One of the rules in the company was that the company would match whatever the employees managed to raise for social issues. These 2 men talked to their company and raised a significant amount which their company then matched. They were able to do their bit for the HIV-AIDS widows; women who did not know what was hitting them when their husbands came home and gave them this particular disease, gave it to their children as well. It made a difference.

Maybe your company is not yet CSR-compliant. I think if you can't be CSR, you can at least be MSR. What is My Social Responsibility? What can I do to bring about some kind of change?

Sometimes we need to focus on the things that we have rather than the things that we don't have, because what we don't have is what fuels our energies most of the time. Yet, sometimes we fail to realize that we have so much, so much more than people around us.

One of my favorite songs goes like this:

"Count your blessings, name them one by one

And it will surprise you what the Lord hath done."

Look around you my friends, at what you have rather than what you don't have, and it will surprise you.

Last week I got a letter from a friend who has an NGO that is working at rebuilding Latur, and has been there for years since the earthquake. This letter which was so sad, it made me grieve, was about someone working for him who has 2 children. He wanted his daughter to go to nursing school. Unfortunately nursing school costs Rs.48,000/year, which is about Rs.4000 a month. But the sad part was that this man was earning Rs. 4500/month. How was he going to do anything for his girl? Yet I thought to myself that 4500/month is a pittance, not only for many of us, but even for companies to pick up the tab. Rs.48,000 a year is nothing to help somebody who is giving his heart for an NGO, not getting paid too much, to be able to put his girl into the nursing profession.

A couple of centuries ago, John Wesley, a religious leader said, "There is not holiness like social holiness." And if we are a godly people, then our touch with God must touch humanity, the people around us who have needs.

The Bible says (Matthew 25:40) "Whenever you did one of these things to someone who was overlooked or ignored, that was for me." That's a beautiful thought. Even as we help brothers and sisters around us, we are actually doing it for God.

That's my challenge for you this Tuesday. If your company is CSR compliant, then get involved, do something, shape it, mould it, don't let it become a statistic in the company. Bring change, stimulate change. And if it's not, then find out what you can do yourself, because what you do will affect somebody and that's what you are doing it for.

God Bless You All.