What is the guide of the organization aimed to answer?

Few companies are clear about how to manage what can be an amorphous collection of internal initiatives and external relationships on social, environmental and ethical issues. Probity and responsibility must be embedded in a company’s culture, strategy and operations from the top down. But how can this be done? A new guide from Business for Social Responsibility, a US non-profit research and advisory organization with 1,400 member companies and affiliates, attempts to answer this by taking the reader step by step through the process of designing a corporate social responsibility management system.
    Only a handful of companies have a full CSR management system in place, says the organization, which advises its members on how to make responsible practices integral to their strategy and operations. It has combined annual revenues of nearly US $2,000 billion with 6 million people employed. They include ABB, British Airways, Coca-Cola, Ikea, Unilever and Wal-Mart. The scandals in the US have underlined how "corporate responsibility task forces" and codes of conduct are not enough on their own and can sometimes be a smokescreen.
    "Creating and building a successful CSR management system is a complex, long-term project for any company," says the report. "It involves a shift in the way a company conducts business and can be likened to implementing other large-scale change initiatives such as total quality management."
    The guide runs through basics such as who currently has responsibility for CSR in the company, why a better management structure might improve things and what "hot-button" issues, for example, child labour and drug pricing face different sectors. It encourages companies to think hard about their stakeholders, what their concerns are, how credible and influential they are and whether they are a potential long-term partner or liability.