Published 10-17-07
Submitted by The CRO
Monsanto, Marathon Oil, Bank of America, Walt Disney and Entergy Take
No. 1 Positions in their Respective Industries
GE Corporate Responsibility Officials Respond to Stakeholder Criticisms, Revealing Planned New Facets of the Company’s 2008 Citizenship Report
NEW YORK - October 17, 2007 - Monsanto, Marathon Oil, Bank of America, Walt Disney and Entergy headed their sectors as CRO Magazine introduced "CRO's 10 Best Corporate Citizens by Industry 2007" in the publication's just-released September-October issue.
In this Part 1 of CRO (Corporate Responsibility Officer) Magazine's "CRO's 10 Best," the bimonthly publication contracted with IW Financial, a Portland, Maine-based research firm specializing in environmental, social and governance issues, to analyze the citizenship efforts of large-cap, publicly traded companies in the Chemical, Energy, Financial, Media and Utilities industries. As will be done for additional industries in Part 2 of "CRO's 10 Best" in the magazine's upcoming November-December issue, CRO and IW Financial assess these corporations' environmental, social, governance and financial performance, and measure their track records against industry peers.
CRO and IW Financial evaluated the most influential U.S. public companies, drawn predominantly from the Russell 1000 Index, through the lens of eight categories: Environment, Climate Change, Human Rights, Employee Relations, Corporate Governance, Lobbying, Philanthropy and Financial. The category rankings were then averaged to determine the "CRO's 10 Best" companies for each industry.
"Using these eight categories of corporate citizenship allowed us to do a truly comparative rating of the whole company, finding the best overall package according to the criteria, and not blacklisting a company because it has one weak spot in its citizenship profile," explained Mark Bateman, Director of Research at IW Financial. "It also means that a company that is the 11th best in every category would probably do very well compared to its peers."
As the industry lists in the pages of CRO Magazine show, corporations navigated various routes to secure a place in "CRO's 10 Best." Walt Disney, for example, benefited from its top mark in Climate Change among "CRO's 10 Best Media" companies because of factors including its submission of data to the Carbon Disclosure Project, a nonprofit that facilitates dialogue between shareholders and corporations on climate-change issues.
And, in "CRO's 10 Best Financial," Bank of America distinguished itself as the largest total giver in Philanthropy, while the bank's subsidized childcare benefits helped push it to third in Employee Relations among financial companies.
"We saw this exercise as a valuable way to decipher companies' performance on things like governance and sustainability issues, especially when looking at how they did when measured against the companies that they duke it out with in the marketplace," said CRO Editor-In-Chief Dennis Schaal. "So, for example, Google scored No. 2 in our 'CRO's 10 Best Media' list. And, Google, which has a reputation for keeping things very close to the vest, scored the lowest among companies in "CRO's 10 Best Media" on Corporate Governance issues, but bested companies like The New York Times, Yahoo and DirectTV Group in the Human Rights and Employee Relations categories."
"CRO's 10 Best Corporate Citizens by Industry 2007" expands upon CRO's annual "100 Best Corporate Citizens," which will appear in CRO's January-February 2008 issue.
"The two reasons behind 'CRO's 10 Best,' in addition to the '100 Best Corporate Citizens,' are, first, that comparing peer companies makes for a better gauge of performance," said Jay Whitehead, Publisher of CRO Magazine. "And second, the '100 Best' list methodology sometimes excludes industries such as energy and utilities for the sake of brevity, which we think often obscures the work of some important companies."
Among other highlights of the 'CRO' magazine's September-October issue:
In the Cover Story, written by CRO's Schaal, the GE tandem also expand on a revelation in the company's 2007 citizenship report that its due diligence on its own citizenship efforts led to the discovery that a business unit was manufacturing a sensor that a customer was placing in cluster bombs. That violated a prior pledge that "GE is not involved in any way in land mine or cluster bomb production..."
About The CRO: The CRO is the only membership media platform for Corporate Responsibility practitioners, and the professional service providers and non-profit influencers that serve them. The CRO publishes the 20,000-subscriber 'CRO' Magazine and TheCRO.com, bi-weekly e-newsletters, and produces the twice-annual CRO Conferences, webinars and video events. With more than 120 members including leading companies Sara Lee, Amtrak, IBM, Citigroup, Chubb Insurance, Mattel, Intel, Dell, Pepsi, Home Depot, Starbucks, Avon, Gap, State Street, Xerox, leading providers such as Deloitte, Baker & McKenzie, SAP, Hogan & Hartson, Grant Thornton, Golin Harris, Ketchum, Cone, LRN, Integrity Interactive, and nonprofits including Stanford University, Boston College, UCLA, and Harvard. Corporate membership information can be found at TheCRO.com, or by calling 646-213-0067 ext 107. Subscription and Advertising correspondence should be directed to: CRO, 103 Eisenhower Parkway, 2nd Floor, Roseland, N.J., 07068, (646) 213-0067 ext. 107, subscription@thecro.com or advertising@thecro.com.
About IW Financial: IW Financial is a leading provider of objective research and technology solutions that help financial professionals evaluate the environmental, social, and governance performance of companies. IW Financial's solutions help organizations identify risks, enhance productivity, provide higher levels of service, increase revenues, and retain productive advisors. IW Financial's clients include investment firms, banks, endowments, religious organizations, universities, and advisors. Portfolio managers, research analysts, marketing and customer service professionals, compliance professionals, and investment committees at these organizations rely on IW Financial for in-depth and actionable information.
Launched August 1, 2006 by business media veterans Jay Whitehead, CEO and Michael Connor, Editor and Publisher, The CRO is the leading corporate membership media platform in corporate responsibility. The CRO's media products include CRO Magazine, TheCRO.com, CRO Conference and webinars. The CRO covers governance, compliance, ethics, corporate social responsibility, investor relations, citizenship, socially responsible investing, sustainability, philanthropy and related topics. Members include 100+ corporations including IBM, Pepsi, Citigroup, Avon, Mattel, Washington Mutual, Stanford, Harvard, UCLA, Columbia, OCEG, LRN, OPI, and others. Headquartered in New York City and Roseland, NJ. More information at www.The CRO.com.
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