Procter & Gamble ranked fourth and Cummins Inc. of Columbus, Ind. ranked second on Business Ethics magazine's top 100 corporate citizens list for 2003. Procter has placed in the top five all four years of the annual evaluation, and took top spot in 2001.
P&G has been so near automatic that the publication didn't go into specifics why the consumer goods giant won again. Business Ethics is especially high on corporations that hire minorities and women, volunteer in the community and look out for overseas stakeholders. Sounds like P&G. The company's lowest score is usually in the category on environmental performance. Procter also has been a target for animal rights activists.
The magazine's corporate social responsibility report does go into some detail on Cummins engine and other companies in the top 100. Cummins is applauded for its response to poor, unschooled kids who used to burrow under the fence at Cummins' plant in Brazil to steal metal they could sell. Cummins funded construction of a local school that now serves 800 students by day and schools the parents at night. Cummins workers were so pleased with the community's gratitude that they also built a community health center.
Business Ethics rates corporations for their performance on the environment, community relations, employee relations, diversity and customer relations.
The magazine praised Hewlett-Packard of Palo Alto (No. 6) for its use of volunteers to advance its new corporate goal of becoming "the recognized leader in inventing environmentally sound and sustainable solutions for the common good." Green Mountain Coffee Roasters of Waterbury, Vt., (No. 8 and a newcomer to the rankings) was hailed for fair dealing with suppliers. CEO Robert Stiller visited Green Mountain's coffee-growing sites and wanted to do something about the poverty he saw. Green Mountain now pays small farmer cooperatives above the market price for their coffee beans - a minimum of $1.26 per pound for conventional coffee and $1.41 for organically grown. Green Mountain also makes about a quarter of its purchases through a "farm direct" program that eliminates middlemen to channel higher prices directly to the farmers.
After the corporate scandals of the past year, such examples of best practices offer some counterbalance and inspirational models for other companies to follow.
