On Friday, March 6, I attended a press event for the CRO’s release of its 2009 list of 100 Best Corporate Citizens. The room was filled with CRO people and representatives of companies that made the list, including IBM, Hess, Verizon, Avon, Entergy, General Mills, and Bristol-Myers Squibb. I attended on behalf of Symantec, which was ranked 23rd on this year’s list, and I was surprised to find myself pleased that four of our current clients are ranked among the top 40.
Why was I surprised? Mainly because I have an innate suspicion of these kinds of lists; they are often based on arbitrary scoring systems and murky methodologies. What’s more, those methodologies can change at the drop of a hat. This year, the CRO abandoned lobbying and CEO compensation—a key governance indicator (in this economic environment, given all that’s transpired in the past year?)—altogether as scoring criteria rather than refining and explaining their weightings. For example, last year a company was penalized for lobbying, regardless of whether it was lobbying for tougher safety regulations or for drilling on protected lands.
The result of these changes was that some companies dropped down or off the list while others moved up, some precipitously. In fact, about half of the companies on CRO’s 2009 list are new to it—which means that approximately half dropped off altogether. Are we to assume that the companies that disappeared also fell off in their sustainability efforts? Are we also to assume that a company that moved up by seventy points is suddenly hitting on all cylinders? Perhaps if the CRO were truly transparent about and consistent with its methodology, these leaps would be less puzzling—or nonexistent.
But it’s more than suspect methodologies. My big concern is that some companies that rank high on the list will, in essence, “believe their own press” and relax: CEOs thrilled at high placement will feel no pressure to be more transparent and will simply coast. What’s more, there is an element of cognitive dissonance to watch out for. I would guess that those who rank higher are less likely to question the methodology than those who rank lower or not at all. (In fairness, however, some of the top-ranked companies at the press event openly questioned the methodology.)
Do these lists have any value at all? Absolutely. If your company is newly ranked or moves up the list, you can promote its sustainability efforts both internally and externally and boost morale, especially in this dark and dreary economic climate. And whether you ranked high, low, or not at all, you can—and should—use the list to help push for more resources to move sustainability forward in your organization. Wherever you end up, recognize the list for what it is and use it however you can.
