Thumbs Down Deutsche Telekom

This follows on from my post about Deutsch Telekom's 2010 Corporate Reponsibility Report and allegations of anti-union practices. As I usually do, because I believe we have a responsibility to dialogue with companies and engage with them on their reporting, I wrote to the Deutsche Telekom to ask for some clarification. You never know, perhaps it's all a storm in a tea-cup.

My e-mail to the address indicated in the report bounced back. Dud e-mail address. It happens.

I then filled in the online form on the Deutcshe Telekom website. This resulted in a standard response advising me that they "appreciate my interest in Deutsche Telekom" and that I can find all "public informations" on their website.

Ok, I thought, maybe I need to fill in the online contact form speficially on the CR website repeating my request for specific information on a specific subject. I did. This was the response:

Frankly, I have nothing more to say.

elaine cohen is co-founder and co-CEO of Beyond Business, a leading social and environmental consulting and reporting firm. Visit our website at www.b-yond.biz/en

What is Deutsche Telekom's report worth ?

I was disturbed to read about the criticism by its own employees of Deutsche Telekom's alleged unionbusting practices in the USA and commented on this in my blog on CSR and HR practices, with reference to Human Resources practices of this company. Clearly, this backlash was timed to conincide with the publication of Deutche Telekom's  2010 Corporate Responsibility Report , announced earlier this week, and forms part of an ongoing and well-planned campaign which includes a report called "Lowering the Bar" published by Dr John Logan of San Fransisco University, a seemingly credible figure, a website, and many interventions  on Facebook and social media. An organized campaign designed to enable Deutsche Telekom's employees at T-Mobile in the USA to unionize and discredit the Company for allegedly not allowing them to do so. 

Why would employes have to resort to this sort of campaign for unionization? Freedom of association is one of the fundamental principles of the International Labor Organization and the United Nations Global Compact which Deutcshe Telekom declare support for. The German employee population are unionized and enjoy a strong position. What's the big deal here? Where is the truth ?

The Press Release for the 2010 report on EthicalPerformance.com stated:

The report, titled 'We take responsibility', claims that Deutsche Telekom is well on the way to adopting an international leadership role on sustainability and corporate responsibility and 'is making it easier for customers and suppliers to participate in modern everyday life with sustainable and international products, processes and services'..........The report has also been checked by the Global Reporting Initiative (GRI) for an A+ application level against the GRI G3 reporting framework. 

In this report, despite the GRI index, and UNGC communication on progress, I couldnt find any reference to labour disbutes in the USA. The most that Deutsch Telekom says in the report is this:

I wondered how materiality was assessed and if the Assurance process for this for the A+ report  touched on these issues.

Re Materiality - there is a nice materiality matrix which shows Employee Satisfaction and "Employee codedetermination and labor rights" in the top right segments, indicating high importance for the Company and for stakeholders, but, beyond the paragraph captured above, no further information. There is refererence to Group wide employee safisfaction but no disclosure of results.  

Re Assurance - PWC's pathetic assurance statement says "Based on our limited assurance engagement, nothing has come to our attention that causes us to believe that the data of the CR Report for the calendar year 2009 marked with the check symbol ( v) has not been prepared, in all material respects, in accordance with the GRI criteria." This limited, partial assurance, covering a small section of the report data , is not worth the paper it is written on.

Now, what conclusions can we draw from this?  One the one hand, a seemingly perfect and transparent performance by Deutsche Telekom in its reporting. On the other hand, a massive campaign which completely discredits the company's labour relations and human rights activities in the USA. Who should we believe ?

The point is, really, that it is of no consequence who we believe. I am sure there are two sides to every story and I learnt many many years ago that things are not always what they seem, so on the issue of labour rights, I suspend comment and judgement. But on the issue of reporting, I believe Deutsche Telekom is abusing the system. This is clearly a visible and higly material issue. Even if Deutche Telekom believe they are squeaky clean in this respect, they should have made reference and provided a response in their 2010 report, in the name of transparency, and fair and balanced representation of their sustainability performance. Equally, the Assurance statement, which does not cover employee issues, is a farce. If you are a stakeholder  in Deutsche Telekom, you should be bombarding the Company with requests for detailed information on labour practices. As I complete this post, I will also be writing to them to ask for their position on this issue. After all, what is sustainability reporting all about if not issues such as these? And what other issues are hidden behind the glossy texts ?

elaine cohen is co-founder and co-CEO of Beyond Business, a leading social and environmental consulting and reporting firm. Visit our website at www.b-yond.biz/en

When CSR reporting is a waste of paper

CSR reports, aka Sustainability Reports, are supposed to be sustainable, right? That means no printed copies, right ? Wrong. Sustainability reports are business documents, and, like any other important business document,  it is ok to print them but. Print them but. This means that, as with any aspect of CSR and sustainability, we must exercise restraint and consideration of all stakeholders in how we do what we do. So in printing CSR reports, I might expect a Company to consider:

• Printing on recycled paper or environmentally friendly paper (see previous post on paper made from all-sorts-of-animal-excrement).
• Printing a short summary with the bulk of the report online(see Nexxar for best CSR online reporting).
• Printing a small number of copies for those who really want or should read the report.

I confess. I like to see something in print. Gives me a feel for the Company. Allows me carry reports around and read them when i can. (Ask my hub about how many reports i take to bed with me!!) (well, on second thoughts, don't ask him). Perhaps this is hypocritical ? A sustainability consultant who likes to read printed reports? Perhaps but.

The but is that what really REALLY annoys me is unconsidered wasteful ways of sending CSR reports through the mail. I have mentioned this before in a different previous post, and now i will mention it again. (consistency is a virtue)

The following picture is of 9 one-side-printed separate pieces of paper that accompanied the delivery of the 2009 CR Report from .. and this time i will name names ... Deutsche Telekom. Delivered by DHL which is a Deutche Post Company.

Here's that consistency thing again: 9 separate one-side-printed pieces of paper. Why would you need 9 pieces of paper to go with the delivery of one slim report?

Deutsche Telekom's 2009 CSR report is  online and a 68 page PDF download. It is a well written report at GRI-checked  A+ reporting level. This is what DT have to say about saving paper:

(page 41) "Thanks to innovations such as “Paper, Pen & Phone,” customers can significantly reduce their own paper consumption and the resulting environmental pollution. The special pen developed by T-Systems records all the special characteristics of a signature via an integrated camera, thereby enabling digital identification and processing of documents signed by hand. Compared to the former archiving process, paper consumption is thus reduced by up to 50 percent, and costs are reduced by as much as around 70 percent. In order to exploit this savings potential in our own Group as well, we have launched “Paper, Pen & Phone” in around 800 Telekom Shops in Germany since February 2009."

And more (page46 ) "We succeeded in winning over almost one third of T-Home customers for our online billing. This helps us and our customers in contributing to environment protection by reducing paper consumption by over 1,500 tons".

But what about shipping CSR reports? What super innovations have been developed to ensure that paper consumption is reduced in this process?

Which brings me to another point: INDIRECT REPONSIBILITY .

It is possible that Deutche Telekom have no idea that DHL uses 9 separate one-side-printed pieces of paper for each report they deliver. Maybe this is standard DHL procedure. The kind of standard procedure that no-one ever thinks to question because that's just the way its done. But doesn't Deutsche Telekom have an indirect reponsibility for the actions of their suppliers engaged in providing products or services on their behalf?

Actually, in the DHL (Deutche Post AG)  2009 self-declared B+ report I couldn't find anything relating to paper consumption reduction, only references to sustainable paper sourcing. I couldn't find a figure for how many tons of paper consumption DHL or Deutsche Post have reduced in the reporting period. Maybe that's because they havent. However, a target area for Deutsche Post is " Mobilizing our employees: Raising awareness of climate protection and broader environmental issues, and enabling our employees to minimize our company’s environmental impact through their everyday actions." Like shipping CSR reports.

So who should we take issue with here ?

(1) DHL for using 9 pieces of paper

(2) Deutsche Telekom for letting them

(3) Me, for wanting to read the printed report in the first place ?  (hint: dont pick this option)

But the point of this post is that : i would expect that people in a company where CSR is truly embedded at all levels of the organization would pick this up.  I believe that employees at all levels  should recognize  environmental waste in  the system, assuming they had been made aware of its importance to the Company. 

These day-to-day almost-unnoticed actions can  be very important. They can also point to the degree to which each employee in any business takes personal responsibility for all aspects of the Company's CSR behaviour.

elaine cohen is the joint CEO of BeyondBusiness, a leading reporting and social-environmental consulting firm . Visit our website at: www.b-yond.biz/en