Sustainability: the role of stakeholders

Corporate communication addresses two categories of stakeholders, current and potential customers and shareholders. Categories that fall under the definition of stakeholder, literally "to hold a stake" which means to carry or possess an interest understood as a right. The term stakeholder, therefore, refers to an individual, a group of people or an organisation with an interest in a business project that a company pursues and in the actions it takes to achieve it. The stakeholder holds a title to enter into a relationship with a company. Its opinions, decisions and attitudes may objectively favour or hinder the achievement of a company's objective such as that of sustainability.

If you want to lead your company to success, you have to create a fruitful dialogue with your stakeholders in order to turn uncertainties and business risks into factors for investment, consensus building and business stability. According to R. E. Freeman, creator of the Stakeholder Theory, management is tasked with identifying all the most important stakeholders and determining how the company's governance can be understood by them. The intent is to satisfy every participant in the company, the entire 'social context'. The most well-known tools used to inform and engage stakeholders arethe Social Report, the Integrated Report and the Sustainability Report.

Your company must take into account the ever-increasing expectations of stakeholders in terms of responsibility and transparency. You must consider that a company is no longer just an economic player in society but also a social institution. The requirement must respond to criteria far more general than a simple profit maximisation logic. Investors and consumers are making ever higher demands on a company's performance not only in relation to the economic result but to aspects such as quality, reliability, ethical responsibility and sustainability. Companies must show a willingness to effectively manage social and ethical impact issues both internally and in their business areas. In this context, 3Bee supports organisations and companies in the realisation of biodiversity regeneration projects, with the aim of structuring a pathway to achieve the ESG goals.

Defining sustainability strategies means creating a competitive advantage in the short and medium term while at the same time helping to create corporate value. The company must consider the interests of its stakeholders and build a relationship of trust by adopting responsible behaviour. If sustainable development is what stakeholders demand, action must be taken to meet that demand. Therefore, the way to manage three main aspects of sustainability, namely the environment, society and the people in its ecosystem, must be reconsidered. And while taking care of these areas and implementing functional innovations to execute sustainable strategies it will be crucial to involve all corporate stakeholders.

To strengthen links with stakeholders and help them understand the organisation's performance, it is necessary to focus on company reporting. The aim is to account for the non-financial impacts of the company, its focus on social, ethical and environmental issues. Stakeholders demand more information, more transparency and clarity. Consequently, it is necessary to evolve the reporting model in order to create more communication documents with stakeholders that can increase trust in the company. The Social Report to document social performance. The Sustainability Report to report on environmental and social impacts. The Integrated Balance Sheet to represent the company's value creation process. It is precisely the latter report that satisfies stakeholders the most, as it is a transparent tool reporting all the data needed to estimate the real value of the company.

To be sustainable, the company must produce value for the community. Sustainability is the basis for business success, but how to achieve it? By involving stakeholders and responding to their demands. Your intention must be to embark on a path of stakeholder engagement based on five pillars. Inclusiveness, proactive listening, mapping stakeholders and their requests, clarity of commitment (setting expectations and managing them wisely) and assertive, open and continuous communication. Thus how to measure eNPS to increase employee loyalty to the company, it is necessary to define stakeholder engagement strategies that allow for constant feedback, interface with stakeholders in real time by keeping them constantly updated, and collect data by cross-referencing stakeholder questions with those of company management.

Stakeholders must be involved, informed and supported with regard to sustainability issues by creating an ongoing communication channel. Companies can maximise stakeholder engagement by developing a methodology based on the concept of accountability. Transparent and trustworthy accountability on company activities will allow members of society to be more aware and free to evaluate the organisation's behaviour as well as its results. At the same time, accountability is an economic benefit for the entire business system as it rewards good behaviour, resulting in a long-term increase in stakeholder trust. In addition, it discourages unethical actions by reducing the costs associated with the occurrence of unethical and opportunistic behaviour that undermines the credibility of economic operators.

The importance of stakeholder involvement has grown in recent years as has the focus on sustainability, but the idea of a social contract with the company's stakeholders originated in 1998 with the Q-RES Project. This model identifies six instruments aimed at ethical-social quality management. The ethical corporate vision, i.e. the strategic definition of the corporate mission and values. The code of ethics, the representation of the set of rights, duties and responsibilities of the company towards its stakeholders. Ethics training to reinforce the values of the code of ethics in employees. The organisational implementation and control systems to improve ethical performance.The ethical-social reporting to identify relevant data to capture the impact of the company's activities on stakeholders' well-being. External verification by a third party to ascertain the compliance of the company's ethical-social responsibility instruments.

With a view to maximum transparency and guarantees for customers, suppliers and all interested parties, companies must use corporate management systems that follow an Environmental (environment) Social (society) and Governance (principles and rules relating to corporate governance) approach. This interest in improving ESG performance must concern not only large capitalisation or listed companies but also SMEs. these can take action to create an effective path to sustainability and thus define the ESG rating - a synthetic judgement certifying environmental, social and governance strength and commitment. The approach to ESG issues is divided into mandatory and voluntary.

Reports in the mandatory approach are governed by legislative decrees (criminal liability, non-financial reporting obligations, occupational safety to environmental offences, etc.). The voluntary approach, on the other hand, concerns a series of international norms or standards to which one voluntarily adheres (environmental and social certifications, legality ratings, sustainability reports). Adherence to the ESG models implies a shift from a system in which matter, time, skills, energy are consumed to one in which matter, energy, values are managed responsibly. Promoting business development with respect for stakeholders and all stakeholders will lead to greater acceptance in the market, more stability and guarantees for the future. Do you want to start a path towards biodiversity with your company and contribute to the achievement of sustainable development goals?



Article edited by Valentina Trogu