An interesting shift is taking place in the way companies promote themselves and social media is playing a huge part. Companies are starting to take corporate responsibility very seriously as they recognise that building their brand’s reputation means being seen to act. A great way to showcase what a company is doing is to use social media to communicate and promote their socially responsible activity. An integral part of this is how companies utilize their employee’s.  Last month I blogged about the work done by Kraft which encouraged employees to play a role in a week long set of activities but this employee engagement seems to be part of a growing trend…

A great example is Intel who recently announced wide ranging initiatives to support the activities of Kiva.org (a microloan organization) and Save the children. This work is promoted via active blog pages and facebook pages. But more importantly is probably Intels whole corporation approach to social media which means that many of their employee’s blog about what they are doing and what they believe in . Their approach is open and transparent and builds on Intels corporate responsibility message.

This comes through in their social media policy:

“The choice to participate in social media is yours. If you do, please follow these guiding principles:
• Provide unique, individual perspectives on what’s going on at Intel and in the world.
• Post meaningful, respectful comments – in other words, no spam and no remarks that are off-topic or offensive.
• Reply to comments quickly, when a response is appropriate.”

On transparency Intel were early adopters of the policy to disclose :“If you are blogging about your work at Intel, use your real name, identify that you work for Intel, and be clear about your role. If you have a vested interest in something you are discussing, be the first to point it out.”

Our own ethical policy here at SociaLNK has always followed this open and transparent line.

Nike – who have not always been seen as the most ethical of companies have also been working hard to change this view. They have recently launched an internal portal called “We Portal” which is a platform which allows employees to post opportunities where NIKE employees can engage with the community and brainstorm about how the company can be more sustainable. “We’re not trying to dictate to them [employees] what they should be doing,” declared Adams. “We just want to give them a platform to elevate the work that they’re doing and amplify the impact that they’re creating.”

The key here is that corporate responsibility is no longer just donating money to worthy causes. There is a proactive element to how companies are engaging. The common aspect of these three examples they are all trying to utilise their employees in innovative ways to expand their reach. They are becoming listening organisations both internally and externally. By trusting employees and engaging with customers through them and working on ideas that both groups think are important they will be hard pressed not to build their brand reputation!