|
Our community investment is driven by the belief that we have both a responsibility and the opportunity to assist in the growth and development of the local communities where our people and customers live and work.
Our CCI objectives and principles
In 2005, our Board endorsed five key objectives to guide our Corporate Community Investment (CCI). These objectives are:
-
build reputation - improve stakeholders' view of the organisation
-
improve employee engagement
-
increase market share - increase the attractiveness of doing business with us
-
leverage resources - use our limited resources effectively to meet targeted community and business needs
-
provide private resources for public good - this is based on a genuine desire to make a meaningful contribution to society.
We also have a set of Group-wide set of community principlescommunity investment principles. Our Australian business has also developed a set of community principles, with the help of its Community Advisory Council, (CAC).
These CCI objectives and principles enable our businesses to develop strategies and the programs that reflect the needs and issues of their local communities.
Our medium-term objective is to increase our community investment to 1% of the Group's cash earnings before tax.
Measuring our community investment
In 2006, we developed a manual to help our businesses measure and report on our community investment. Relevant employees now receive training to ensure they understand how to implement the guidelines and requirements in our CCI manual.
In 2007, NAB became a member of the London Benchmarking Group (LBG). LBG provides a standard methodology and best practice benchmark for reporting and measuring our corporate community investment against our peers in the financial services sector and other leading companies. Our CCI manual reflects the requirements of the LBG methodology.
The LBG breaks down community investment into the following categories:
-
charitable gifts and donations - these gifts are typically in response to an appeal and tend to be one-off. Example - bushfire relief.
-
in-kind gifts - this could include the provision of office space to charities, or the donation of equipment or other goods.
-
volunteering - the value of volunteer time used by employees under company approved volunteering policies.
-
community investments - informally we also call these 'community partnerships'. These contributions are longer term (3-5 years or more) and address specific community issues in partnership with one or more non-profit and/or other funding organisations. They normally involve a formal memorandum of understanding or agreement and specific targets for success for all partners.
-
community sponsorships - called 'commercial initiatives in the community' under the LBG definitions. These contributions are monies associated with a business or marketing spend, but which also have a community benefit. Only the portion of spending directly benefiting the community is claimed.
-
management costs - costs to support CCI efforts are included as a separate category.
Further information on the LBG is available at: www.lbg-australia.com
In addition to reporting the standard LBG categories, we include foregone revenues as a CCI item when we waive fees or charges on products or services we provide to disadvantaged communities. The reason for this is that we believe waiving these fees (or paying interest on accounts that would not otherwise receive it) is donating a product in a similar way to a manufacturer or retailer that supports the community through the donation of physical products it makes or sells.
|
