COMPANY FOCUS
ALLIANZ SOCIAL OPEX MUNICH, GERMANY Allianz Social OPEX is a unique global talent development programme that nurtures top employees, while addressing operational challenges in social enterprises. To succeed in this changing economy, companies need to understand the social dimensions of doing business, gather insight from working with leading innovators, and deliver products and services with limited resources. Through the talent development programme, Allianz employees develop their leadership skills, and have the opportunity to create innovative solutions to emerging problems, understand new markets and experience, first-hand, new ways to do business. As part of the initiative, 120 employees spent a week working alongside social entrepreneurs from over 50 projects globally, to achieve set tasks. For example, financial education organisation MyBnk, was guided through the process of securing £150,000 in funding by Allianz employees. On the programme, staff benefit from experience and gain qualifications – at the end of the course they are awarded a Certification in the Social OPEX methodology. The programme has been received very positively, earning it a net promoter score of 87 percent, placing it in the ‘World Class Loyalty’ group.
ENDING MYOPIA We are witnessing an increasing shift towards ‘longterm capitalism’ and a move away from quarterly profit reporting. In 2009, Unilever, under CEO and B Team Member Paul Polman, dropped quarterly reporting and launched an ambitious growth plan. In an interview with Harvard Business Review he commented that it “has allowed us to focus…on a mature discussion with the market about our long-term strategy”. Similarly, the European Union passed a directive requiring Member States to end, by November 2015, the obligation for public firms to release interim management statements – something the UK has already done. Taking a longer-term approach is likely to favour purpose-driven organisations, giving them the time and space to flourish. As Polman explained in an article for Mckinsey, if profit and quarterly reporting is no longer the primary business driver, organisations can radically reframe management incentives for the long term, and invest heavily in R&D and innovation. This may include minimising resources in production, developing ‘closeloop’ systems so one organisation’s waste becomes another’s raw material, or simply developing a product that makes people’s lives better.
www.allianz.com
FIND OUT MORE Cone Communications & Echo Global, Global CSR study, 2013 Deloitte, The millennial survey 2011, 2011 Deloitte & Economist Intelligence Unit, Societal Purpose: A journey in its early stages, 2012 Havas Media, Meaningful Brands, 2013
McKinsey & Company, Long-term capitalism series Rajendra S.Sisodia, David B. Wolfe & Jagdish N. Sheth, Firms of endearment: How World-Class Companies Profit from Passion and Purpose, 2nd Edition (Pearson FT Press, 2014) Rosabeth M. Kanter, How great companies think differently, Harvard Business Review, 2011
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