Trust is one of those things companies want and stakeholders give sparingly. And trust is being granted even more sporadically today given ample evidence, for example, of a cavernous spin-reality gap in the social performance of some companies.

For companies wanting to assess how likely it is they will win trust, here is a simple graphic against which to chart their performance on the actions and values that are the simple building blocks of trust, credibility and belief.

I had coffee yesterday morning with David Bornstein, author of How to Change the World and other books, who will soon be launching a news platform to get stories out about solutions to environmental, economic and social problems at dowser.org (still in beta although launching soon).

The emphasis here is on solutions . . . what is being done to fix things. David believes too much energy (and media attention) is spent on complaining about what's wrong and not enough on profiling successful social change programs. When live, 'dowser' will help right the balance by providing news stories about positive illustrations of social entrepreneurship and innovation. It will, as a note on the beta site says, "(T)ell stories about people who are creatively attacking social problems and show how achievable it is to make an impact."

Apparently indefatigable, sometime in the next couple of weeks David will also be releasing another book co-authored with Susan Davies called Social Entrepreneurship: What Everyone Needs to Know published by Oxford University Press. Part of the book focuses on a theme we talked about over espresso (me) and croissant (David), the need for "journalists who are both good storytellers and familiar with the challenge of social problem solving."

I haven't read David's books yet. But this call for more forward-looking storytelling is likely to be the toughest proposition on the social entrepreneurship agenda. The goal of dowser.org is a refreshed narrative archetype: I'll be cheering for David and dowser.org.

Anyone who has followed my posts on apologies will know how important I feel they are as a way to manage reputation in a crisis. (Forgive the self-reference, but two of the most recent posts can be found here and here.)

A colleague in my firm's Seattle office, Drew Arnold, sent me an article from the Oregon Business Journal referencing a June 2009 discussion paper called 'The Power of Apology' from the University of Nottingham's Centre for Decision Research and Experimental Economics.

Here is the paper's abstract:

After an unsatisfactory purchase, many firms are quick to apologize to customers. It is, however, not clear why they should do that. As the apology is costless, it should be regarded as cheap talk and thus ignored by the customer. In this paper, we test in a controlled field experiment whether apologizing influences customers' subsequent behaviour. We find that apologizing yields much better outcomes for the firm than offering monetary compensation."

Based on a study of customers using eBay in Germany, the study found among other results:

1. "Customers who receive an apology instead of a monetary compensation are more than twice as likely to withdraw a (negative) evaluation."
2. "When money is offered, a higher purchase price makes it less likely that a customer withdraws his (negative) evaluation. An apology works independent of the level of the purchase price."

Why then can't we assume that the propensity to consider legal action when harm has been caused by an accidental event, even if negligence is involved, just might be mitigated by a genuine (and the key here is the word 'genuine') apology?

The Economist, not normally a booster of corporate social responsibility (CSR) or sustainability as it  tends to be known in Europe, this week has a piece on CSR that hits the mark. The author concludes that corporate philanthropy (contributions to charitable causes) is being cleaved but the attention being paid to behaviour -- ethics and governance in particular -- is holding steady, as it should.

There is one other important reason for thinking that companies will maintain their commitments to sustainability through the downturn and beyond: the  need to restore confidence in business. The financial crisis was triggered by a bout of corporate social irresponsibility on a massive scale that has tarnished the reputations of even the bluest of blue-chip companies. Now corporate leaders have a chance to show that they are not just motivated by short-termism after all."  

 As Intel (a client) says in the management analysis and strategy
portion of its 2008 corporate responsibility report (Note . . . I agree with ridding CSR of its restrictive 'S')

"By incorporating corporate responsibility directly into our strategy and objectives, we manage our business more effectively and understand our impact on the world more clearly."

Corporate or 'strategic' philanthropy is a programmatic means by which a company contributes to its community. Philanthropy evidences a corporate recognition that profits are derived from the community and that a return to the community in the form of wages paid for labor and consistent dividend payments to shareholders as well as steady share price growth is -- at least in terms of today's social expectations -- insufficient.

Communities expect companies to give back, and companies have obliged either through random acts of kindness or more structured investments in causes which match company values or business goals.

But let's be honest. Philanthropy is unlikely to define or affect company behaviour when it comes to choosing business strategy, rewarding employees, managing supply chain relationships, committing to respectful and sensitive business principles and overseeing board and C-suite conduct. 

A generous philanthropy program, and commitment to a cause, can comfortably sit side-by-side with dishonest accounting, excessive senior executive compensation, autocratic and harsh management, deferential governance, poor labour and sourcing practices, and denial of environmental impact. Philanthropy provides a reputational sheen, but it doesn't de facto require ethical conduct or a socially astute business strategy. Philanthropy buys goodwill but it doesn't drive responsible behaviour nor build social trust.

If The Economist is right, and I think it is, and the decline in spending on smoke-screen philanthropy is NOT being matched by a retreat from investment (time, focus, intensity) in better behaviour, then maybe out of the current crisis we will see a steady push-back within companies against insular corporate boards, inappropriate rock star-like CEO salaries, and short-sighted and opaque business strategies.

Spirited debates happen all the time when people talk about corporate responsibility (CR) especially now that our economies are stumbling along and evidence continues to leak out about the governance missteps that led to egregious examples of greed-driven shortsightedness.

Research studies and white papers on the subject also proliferate, at least as fast and as often as politicians blaming their predecessors for current problems.

Here are a few that have made their appearance recently:

• The Conference Board released the results of a survey yesterday on the future of corporate giving programs. Corporate giving officers are noticing their companies are concerned about their overall financial health when considering the allotment of their philanthropy dollars. Not surprising. But remember, public expectations about behavior -- and the punishment it inflicts on transgressors -- are not significantly influenced by random acts of kindness no matter how generous or strategic.

• Yesterday, the Rotman/AIC Institute for Corporate Citizenship also released what it calls "a real-world guide that helps business leaders understand
  and prioritize key social and environmental issues and identify
  opportunities as well as potential risks." Called 'What's a CEO to do?", it is described as a toolkit and is built on a model introduced by Rotman School of Management dean, Roger Martin, called the "virtue matrix" which he wrote about in HBR a few  years ago. I haven't had a chance yet to do a deep dive into it, but Rotman often produces worthwhile management frameworks. (Disclosure . . . I have an M.B.A. from Rotman.)

• The third is truly timely . . . an article in the Deloitte Review called "The Responsible and Sustainable Board. (Sorry I can't find a link to it but it is Issue #4, 2009). It includes a warning to boards of directors that "Even if your organization is disinclined to tackle CR&S issues voluntarily, you may ultimately have no choice if, as expected, regulatory requirements take hold." 

Maybe there will be some kind of retrenchment back into the philosophy of 'the business of business is business'. (Simply wishful thinking on the part of cave-dwellers?) Evidently though it doesn't stop the think tanks from thinking about it.