BITC: Responsible businesses recover quicker from crisis
Business in the Community (BITC) research released this month confirms for the second year running the statistically significant link between effective management of CSR issues and financial performance. The downturn has had a dramatic effect on the financial returns of companies, but FTSE 350 companies consistently managing and measuring their corporate responsibility did not fall as far and recovered more quickly than their FTSE 350 peers on total shareholder return in 2009 by an average of 10 percentage points. BITC first published this research in October 2008, when it showed that socially responsible companies outperformed their peers on total shareholder return in 2002-2007 by between 3.3% and 7.7% per year. Stephen Howard, Chief Executive, Business in the Community, said: “This research demonstrates that our assertion that responsible business is just good business is valid. Not only do responsible businesses fare better in strong economic times, but it seems that businesses who incorporate social and environmental factors into their core business are able to respond faster and, in this case, have bounced back from the financial crisis quicker.”
