Essential pointers for raising Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) funding and being appointed CSR implementation partners
Inclusion of the CSR mandate in the Companies Act 2013 is only the first step towards seeding welfare based development in the country. While private enterprise has been legislated into the fold, it is just as important for civil society to gear up and be a more effectual conduit between business and the under-served.
If we are to fully realize the benefits of corporate social responsibility and ensure its trickle down is both emphatic and visible, implementation agencies need to adapt to this change and exhibit both impact and accountability in their implementation.
CSR is now an integral part of most Indian businesses and the emerging trends from corporate India’s CSR activities in 2017 indicate that many companies rely on external implementation partners. The benefits for companies to adopt the external implementation agency model over the in-house approach (depending on the identified cause and easy access to implementation partners) include gaining instant grass-root level access and achieving higher economic and operational efficiencies.
While many NGOs run remarkable programs and are staffed with passionate and dedicated people, they often struggle with comprehensive reporting and accountability requirements of the corporate world. This post intends to be a guidance on measures and practices that can be easily adopted by social organizations in order to raise program funding and be better equipped as CSR implementation partners.
Organizational level compliance – It is important to know and be current and updated on all registrations, licenses and reporting applicable to your organization and its activities. Don’t stop at just the incorporation and tax compliance, look deeper into all applicable laws and regulations for your activities and structure. Ensure to be compliant with employment and labour laws and this should reflect in your HR policies on hiring and separation, leaves and redressal of sexual harassment at the workplace. An organisation that does ‘good’ needs to itself be ‘good’!
Competency – Underscore competency of your organization in undertaking the activities and achieving the desired impact and scale of an intervention, traditionally this is illustrated through the strength of your team and their subject-matter expertise but also look at highlighting your unique competency in terms of established access and ties with communities, collaborations with other enterprises and partners that both deepen and widen your reach.
Accountability and transparency – Ensure you institute and closely follow processes and mechanisms that promote transparency. Often the challenge for organisations that undertake grass-root level work is adopting technological solutions for monitoring and reporting on operations. Develop and adopt simple but effective measures record team movement, activities and feedback received on a real time basis. Instituting these processes can go a long way in demonstrating to corporates that your organisation upholds accountability as part of your day-to-day functioning.
Project Proposals – This is the key document that presents your organisation, its work and capabilities to donor companies. Make sure its comprehensive and covers not just the scope of work you undertake but also capture your organisation’s culture and the value you add to the lives of all your stakeholders – beneficiaries, employees, volunteers, government/local administration personnel etc. Include a section on well-thought out monitoring and reporting processes and indicate the supporting documents you can submit on a periodic basis towards project progress and implementation milestones. Suggest inspection and audit processes that the donor company can adopt for on-ground checks and observation of project implementation.
Project implementation agreements – Pay attention to implementation agreements or other documentation that will govern the project implementation. It is advisable to develop and have your own standard implementation documents that can be offered as an option to donor companies to sign. If companies are insistent on taking the lead in setting out the documentation, do not hesitate to discuss and negotiate on the drafts, with the intention that your organisation agrees to terms that are actually achievable rather than agree to unfeasible terms that are out of touch with ground realities and will only result in delays or non-fulfillment of project objectives.
Set the tone for your organisation to be partners in the CSR journey of a Company by demonstrating credibility, accountability and proactive initiative in every stage of interaction with the company. This attitudinal shift will enable you to get a seat at the strategy table rather than be treated as a vendor providing services against a certain fee.
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