I have excellent news to report about a project I have been working on for the past 2 years as a member of Vermont Businesses for Social Responsibility (VBSR).   I have been leading a discussion group (a Circle, in VBSR parlance) discussing how businesses that are not inherently socially responsible by virtue of their products or services can strive to be more socially responsible within our business models. Seventh Generation comes to mind as a business that is inherently socially responsible by virtue of their products. But what about the rest of us?

We have been working on a self-assessment tool for businesses to identify our baseline level of social responsibility and identify areas for improvement.   When I formed the Circle 2 years ago we focused on educating ourselves about the various components of socially responsible business.  As part of our self-education we thought we could search online and find an assessment tool for small businesses to evaluate the social responsibility of our respective businesses.  But to our surprise, we didn't find any self-assessment tool already out there.  Through the staff at VBSR we confirmed that such a tool did not exist to their knowledge.  So we decided to make one ourselves, for our own use, and share our work with the VBSR membership.  We have been working on the self-assessment tool for the past 12 months.  Now our self-assessment tool is complete and we are working with VBSR toward online implementation to go live in early 2009 on the VBSR web site. 

Our friends at several VBSR member businesses have completed the self-assessment to give us comments on how it worked for their businesses (Business Interiors, LightWorks, LineSync Architecture, Green Mountain Power, Ben & Jerry's, and my firm).   (Folks from Business Interiors, LightWorks and Ben & Jerry's were active participants in the Circle).  A common theme in their comments is that one of the most powerful results of completing the self-assessment is learning what a business can do, seeing the many options available to be more socially responsible as a business in small and large ways, and identifying "low hanging fruit" where sensible and cost effective efforts can be adopted quickly and easily with immediate results.

Going into this project, I shared a strong sense in our firm that we are a socially responsible business - but like others, we had trouble articulating the ways in which our firm is socially responsible.  After educating myself about socially responsible business and working with the Circle to create the self-assessment tool, I now have a very clear idea about the many ways in which our firm is a socially responsible business and the ways in which we could improve, some of which are incredibly easy and inexpensive to adopt.  I look forward to sharing this self-assessment with other VBSR member businesses.

By the way, Vermont can be very proud of VBSR, which is a leading and innovative organization among its peer organizations in other U.S. states.   The "Vermont" brand is valuable in a number of business sectors, including specialty foods, green business, and also social responsibly business.  With the current breakdown of our financial system caused largely by greed and irresponsible lending practices, the issue of social responsibility in business is gaining attention.  Social responsibility is an area in which Vermont businesses are leaders nationally. Socially responsible practices may be an important component of success for the Vermont business community, and economic development in Vermont, in difficult economic times.