Skot Waldron:
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Hey everybody! Welcome to another episode of Unlocked, where we talk about unlocking the potential of people in order to unlock the potential of our organizations. Today, I have Sangeeta Waldron. Did you hear that name? Not to be confused with the Waldron that I am, although I wish I was related to Sangeeta because she's pretty awesome. And you're going to hear more about that here. She is an award-winning publicist and published author. She just released her second book called Corporate Social Responsibility is Not Public Relations and we're going to talk about that. Corporate social responsibility and what that means for you and for your business and why you should be interested in this and why you need to really, really pay attention to it. Even her 70 plus-year-old mother-in-law read the book and got something out of it. So I guarantee you'll get something out of it.
In this interview, we talk about that. We talk about the responsibility that we have as business owners and as businesses to invest in our people and invest in the environment and the globe to make sure that we are being people that have values, companies that have values. People that have... Companies that have purpose to draw in the people that we want to stay with us. So let's get on with this interview. Sangeeta, here we come!
Sangeeta! It is so good. Or should I call you Mrs. Waldron? Not to be related to, not my wife or my sister, or I don't know. Maybe we are related in some way, shape...
Sangeeta Waldron:
Maybe we are in some universe.
SKOT WALDRON:
Some universe somewhere, but it's awesome having you on the show today.
SANGEETA WALDRON:
Thank you. Thank you for having me.
SKOT WALDRON:
So, your book Corporate Social Responsibility is Not PR. It's released in the U.K. It's about to release here in the States. So by the time people hear this, it will probably be out.
SANGEETA WALDRON:
Be out.
SKOT WALDRON:
Glory, glory. So, let's talk about that. I would think, Because I've worked in this space of design and helping get messages out. Whether it's an annual report or a sustainability report or a social responsibility report or something. Right? So to me, I look at it and go, "well, it is kind of a PR thing." But you're saying no, it's not just PR.
SANGEETA WALDRON:
No, it's never been PR. It's never been PR. So corporate social responsibility or we'll call it, CSR for short, has always been the poor cousin in the corporate world. No one's ever really known where to put it. So it used to be sometimes stuck home within comms. Sometimes it used to be within human resources. No one really knew how to deal with it. Now corporate social responsibility is being really understood because there's so much research showing that consumers, employees, they want to work with businesses or they want to spend their money with businesses that are purpose led and or are authentic. They're doing the right thing by the planet. They're not just paying lip service to their CSR initiatives. So when your CSR is authentic, then your public relations, your publicity, your media coverage just flows effortlessly. You don't have to work hard at it.
We're living in a digital age at the moment where everything is online and when your CSR or you're going to be called out on not doing the right thing, then you were in crisis mode. That's when your crisis PR kicks in. So that's why CSR is so much more important than PR. Your PR, it's not built just around your brand, just around your product. It has to be built around your corporate social responsibility and your corporate social responsibility has to be baked into your business strategy at the heart of your brand.
SKOT WALDRON:
Okay. So let's back up and let's talk about what it is. What is corporate social responsibility for business? Let's just define that baseline for us.
SANGEETA WALDRON:
It's the values that you have within your organization and your commitment towards the planet. So some and... Any business... And whether you're a big business, small business, startup, established... You can all have a CSR values and you don't have to have many. You could have a minimum of one. So sorry, my phone is ringing. No one ever rings my land line.
SKOT WALDRON:
It's not me. Somebody's calling your landline.
SANGEETA WALDRON:
No one ever calls the landline.
SKOT WALDRON:
Only when you're on interviews.
SANGEETA WALDRON:
I'll just... Yeah. There's my voicemail.
SKOT WALDRON:
No problem. Should we all just listen and see what your voicemail has [crosstalk 00:06:08].
SANGEETA WALDRON:
They're not leaving a message.
SKOT WALDRON:
Cause nobody ever does that anymore either. Right?
SANGEETA WALDRON:
Who rings the landline? Anyways, so back to CSR. You can have as minimum of as one simple core value or as many as 10, but I always say have four or five things that you can actually deliver on. Because that's key. You don't just want to pay lip service to it. And there's a term now you might've heard call "green washing". Which, is where you're not really doing CSR. You're just doing CSR for the PR and that's not what it's about. It's not about the spin. So really the bottom line, it's the values you're working by.
SKOT WALDRON:
I was going to say that same thing. Being in the space and seeing that every... People are going to look out there and go, "Oh, everybody's doing this. Oh, people are only going to spend money with businesses that do it. Oh, businesses are only going to work with businesses that do it. I guess we better do it." They just kind of do it reluctantly, just to be compliant, just to get some kind of thing out there to look like they truly believe in it. What's the difference between those companies that do it with a soul and a purpose and those that are just doing it to just do it.
SANGEETA WALDRON:
They're not sustainable. They'll get caught out and we're living in a digital age right now. Once that spotlight is on you and you're not doing the right thing, your own consumers, even your own employees will call you out. I always think of this song. I won't sing it, but it's...
SKOT WALDRON:
Come on! Oh, you can do it.
SANGEETA WALDRON:
There's no where to run, you know? That song always echoes in my mind when people say we'll just do CSR just to tick a box. You can't be ticking a box anymore.
SKOT WALDRON:
Well, let's talk about that in relation to maybe this whole thing that happened with 2020 here in the States with a lot of the racial disparities that came up and conflict and with COVID that happened globally. What did we see there? What did the companies that do CSR right, how did they come out of that situation versus the ones that were being called out... Versus the companies that were being the employees were coming out saying, "Ah, yeah. I don't know. I know you say that you're inclusive and that you love diversity, but not so much." Right? Did we see any examples of that?
SANGEETA WALDRON:
Yeah. Just on that, the issues that were happening in America on race, they affected not just America. There were conversations that we were having here too. And we are still having those conversations. They're conversations that are relevant to everyone around the world, to all companies that are operating because when are no longer living in something called local, it's global. Companies are affected by all these kinds of conversations. Those companies that have done really well, yes. We've also had the pandemic, the global pandemic, which has had not just a financial loss, but an emotional and well-being loss to everyone, including organizations and companies.
I read recently that Nike, that got it right on diversity and inclusion during that time last year. While they weren't... They were also in a lock down, they couldn't sell as much. But what they did see was a spike in their social media. There was a spike in their engagement. When they did reopen, they had the consumers coming in. Those organizations that didn't do so well on that, they've lost that engagement. They've also had to firefight some of that crisis online. They've had to spend time to counteract some of those conversations that were happening.
SKOT WALDRON:
What is this hashtag, #PRfail? What's the idea behind that?
SANGEETA WALDRON:
Crisis management. When your CSR is not authentic or you're online and you're being canceled, there's now... We're seeing this cancel culture, that's your PR fail. That's when you've got to then think about how you're going to be responding to these allegations or to these criticisms. What are you going to do to protect your brand and your reputation? Because you need to protect your brand, you need to protect your reputation if you want to collaborate. Whether you want to continue in the business world, whether you want to continue engaging consumers. That's what we're talking about with a PR fail.
There's a really good example that I can give you from here in the UK. We had... It's still operating. It's an online fast fashion company called boohoo.com. It made all the national news here. During the pandemic last year, when the UK went into its first lockdown in March, that company was found to have not been treating its employees very well. They weren't even paying them the minimum wage. They were working in very close proximity and they were doing all the wrong things. When they were called out, boohoo.com saw that it's share value went down and investors started to pull out. That is the repercussions of a PR fail.
SKOT WALDRON:
Okay. That could have been prevented with an authentic CSR. [crosstalk 00:12:02]
SANGEETA WALDRON:
Yeah. And doing the right thing. Why wouldn't you want to do the right thing by your employees? Why wouldn't you want to produce authentically, work with authentic suppliers? Why wouldn't you want to put back into the planet that we're all taking from and living on? Doing the right thing by your community? It just doesn't add up. Why, why wouldn't you?
SKOT WALDRON:
I know, I know. It's in this day and age, understanding that people are the drivers behind all profitability. Right? In essence, right? Yeah, yeah. You've got manufacturing, you've got production, you've got all those things that go into play, but the people are always going to be behind the machine. The people are always going to be what drives this. So let's talk about the people angle and CSR, because when you look at CSR, some people will say, "Well, CSR, that's the values, that's kind of the... It's a PR thing. It's a branding thing. It's a messaging thing. It's a cultural thing." Right? But how do people fit into that? And what does it benefit? With the premise of the show, how does it unlock the potential of people by having a solid CSR strategy?
SANGEETA WALDRON:
Well, CSR is a people thing. Again, in the book, I've outlined that. This year alone, there has been so many surveys and data showing that employees want to work for purpose driven companies. They want to work with businesses, organizations that are making a difference. They want to feel valued. If they don't feel the company is delivering on real, authentic CSR, they're leaving. So if you have strong CSR values, you're going to attract talent. You're going to keep talent. You'll attract the best talent in the marketplace.
We also need to be thinking about the next generation and the next generation are already looking where they want to work, what companies are doing. They already have that relationship with brands because they're the consumer right now but one day they're going to be your potential employee. So if you haven't got these things lined up, you're not going to be attracting the right talent at all. Talent, it's about wellbeing in the workplace. That's something this pandemic has shown us. It's about wellbeing in the workplace. It's about working from home. How do you make that possible? Is there flexibility? All these things are about unlocking people's potential to work better. People thrive when they feel valued and they'll give more. They'll give the extra.
SKOT WALDRON:
So true. So true. We've seen that. We saw I think a lot of the, in my opinion, some of the fallout from pandemic times, right? It was pretty immediate. It was pretty fast that this whole, the whole lockdown came in and layoffs happened. There was a huge spike in unemployment across the world. All these things were happening. The time to incorporate a CSR strategy was not in March of 2020, right? Being a proactive organization investing in that years ahead of time and is where the fruits of that would have shown up, in March of 2020, right? Or April. That's when the fruits of that would have shown up. Your share price would have gone up. Your people would have been... Felt invested in.
People get it, right? They're like, "Oh, times are hard. Oh, [inaudible 00:15:59] companies need to be... I get it that I'm laid off for a certain reason, but the way I've been treated, the way I've been..." I get it, right? As opposed to, "Wow! Those people have treated me horribly for the past little while. Now they're saying all these things, but they're not really that." So there's a lot of that going on. The investment that we make ahead of time is where that's really going to come into play.
SANGEETA WALDRON:
Pays, off, yes. It pays off. Also, what we saw during the pandemic, especially here in the UK, those shops on our high streets that are allowed to be remain open, which was supermarkets, those supermarkets that weren't valuing their own employees, the public who were going into shop, they were calling them out on social media. So again, employees working there was saying that, "We're not being treated very well here." Again, it comes down to this digital age we're living in. When employees are not happy, they'll call you out too.
SKOT WALDRON:
You've seen that. You've seen a lot of that chatter with the Amazon people, right? I mean, we saw a huge spike obviously in Amazon's profitability and Amazon's just business model. I mean, everybody's at home. Home delivery spiked. But you saw a lot of the employees calling them out on certain things within that space.
SANGEETA WALDRON:
Yeah. They weren't feeling safe. They were not happy. And that's... Happiness is a benchmark. Happiness cannot be measured at work. These are all... Before they were all considered fluffy, hippie, but now they are metrics within organizations. I think the... While the pandemic has been really tough, it's also accelerated a lot of these positives that we're looking for within workplaces. If the pandemic has given us anything positive, I would say that would be one of those things.
SKOT WALDRON:
Right on. I agree completely. So the book. Why did you decide to write this book?
SANGEETA WALDRON:
For many reasons. I think the main reason is I've been over 30 years in public relations and along the way, I've worked with some very big corporates, smaller organizations, and I've seen some of them not always do the right thing. Pay lip service to their CSR. So, I wanted to show that there is a better way of doing your corporate social responsibility. Also, the business world is so important. We rely on the business world to operate well. I wanted to show businesses there is a very easy way to build in corporate social responsibility within their business strategies and do the right thing by the planet.
We started 2020, believe it or not last year... It wasn't the pandemic we were watching on our news. It was about the Bush fires in Australia. It was about the plastic pollution. Those were some of the issues that I thought, "Wow, if I could just play a very small part in getting people to think differently, then that's a positive." I wanted to write a book that wasn't full of business jargon. That was just very simple to read, easy to understand so we can all do it. It's just to do it, to get on and do it.
SKOT WALDRON:
Okay. Who's this book for and what will they... What will kind of... How's it structured? How...what will I get out of it?
SANGEETA WALDRON:
Well, the book is for anyone. It's for anyone interested in how to do business better. So whether you're a startup, whether you're about to... Whether you're a going business, you've got an idea for a business and you haven't yet started, you're in public relations and marketing, you're a CEO of an organization. My own mother-in-law. She read it. She's in her 70s. And she said, "Wow! I knew a lot of this stuff. I didn't realize what it was." So this is a book for everyone and it's been written in that style.
What will you learn out of it? You'll learn how to book put CSR within your business strategy. What makes a good brand? You'll learn about how investment... Investors and are looking at companies to see where they're going to put their money and how good a company is. You learn about ESGs. You will learn about the future of CSR, what's going on. You'll learn... And also I've got a special chapter in India. The reason why I chose India, because we have this misnomer here in the West that we're always going to teach the East, but actually there's a lot that the East can teach us. India is the first country in the world to have implemented a mandatory corporate social responsibility law in 2014. I think that's pretty amazing. So I have a whole chapter there on India and also have yoga can create a sustainable mindset. So there's every... There's something in there for everyone.
SKOT WALDRON:
Wow.
SANGEETA WALDRON:
Yeah. And I've also done 15 global interviews from around the world. So I've spoken to entrepreneurs in America, Africa, India, Europe, where they've all shared their CSR knowledge. Some of the things that worked for them. So I think we all learned from the power of storytelling. So there are those 15 different interviews.
SKOT WALDRON:
Well, it sounds like a lot went into this, so that's really cool. If a 70 plus-year-old mother-in-law can get something out of this, I think we all can. So where can we get ahold of this book?
SANGEETA WALDRON:
You can get a hold of the book, it's on Amazon. It's right in here in the UK. It's an all in all good book shops. That doesn't help you guys where you are, but it is available on Amazon. Book Depository is sending the book is posting the book without any postal charges. So, if you are... And it's sending the book globally. So yes, and it will be in the U.S. in all good bookshops coming to you. I can't even say that! Coming to you soon. That's why I'm not in advertising.
SKOT WALDRON:
It's so good. It's so good. So not only do you have the smartest name of anybody I've ever interviewed, right?
SANGEETA WALDRON:
Wow. Yeah. I'll take that.
SKOT WALDRON:
Of course.
SANGEETA WALDRON:
I'll take that. I'm owning it, I'm owning it.
SKOT WALDRON:
Yeah, do it, do it. You seem very smart in your approach to how you want to educate the world about CSR and what that has to do with being a profitable business And increasing market share and investing in your people.
SANGEETA WALDRON:
Yeah. You've just said something there that you just reminded me, which is really key to this, is there is, again, this kind of myth that if you are CSR led, you cannot be profitable. That's not true. When you have CSR at the heart of your brand, you attract talent, you keep your staff so you're not constantly retraining. You attract investors. You attract consumers. And in fact, you don't really have to do your marketing because everyone's doing the marketing for you because they're talking about you, how great you are. Why you need to be buying from this brand, and there is nothing like that. You also have loyal consumers. There's a lot to be said about loyalty these days, because it's been on the decline.
SKOT WALDRON:
I talk about loyalty all day, every day, especially when I... Coming from the brand and marketing world of creating customer loyalty. Now I talk about creating leadership, loyalty, employee loyalty, and organizational loyalty inside your teams. It's got to be there. That's the ultimate. Once you get that, there is no other, so thanks for sharing that.
SANGEETA WALDRON:
Yeah. Then you'll just coasting. You don't really have to work hard at it because you're doing the doing. You might have to invest a little bit in the beginning in corporate social responsibility, but all the good things you have to work hard at. Then you'll see your garden of fruits just there and it will just self multiply.
SKOT WALDRON:
Right on. Sangeeta, this has been awesome. I've loved this conversation. Been looking forward to it for months now. Thanks for being on the show and good luck on the book launch and everything else you're doing over there.
SANGEETA WALDRON:
Thank you. Thank you for having me.
SKOT WALDRON:
I hope now that you're able to recognize just a little bit more of the importance of having a corporate social responsibility strategy in place and what that means for your organization and what that means for your people. Diversity, equity and inclusion is part of having a CSR strategy, is part of that whole CSR movement and statistics. And Sangeeta told me this, I don't know if she said it in the interview, but she said it before, when we were talking, 67% of companies are... Our goal... Are going to work with other companies that have a DEI plan in place. 67% said that they will only work with companies that have a DEI plan in place. Did I say that clear the second time? I think I did. That is a big deal. Having that... Being intentional about having that is going to go a long way for you and your future and the people that you are investing in everyday to help run your company. So thank you Sangeeta for being here. Good luck with the book launch.
If you want to find out more about me, you can go to skotwaldron.com Go visit my YouTube channel. Like, subscribe, comment. There's a bunch of interviews there. I have a bunch of free tools about leadership, about team communication, about unlocking the potential of you and your people. I appreciate it. LinkedIn, follow me there. Connect with me there. Let's do it. Thank you everybody for being here again. This has been an episode of Unlocked and I'll see you next time.
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