ElectricAid spreads its net

I REMEMBER a phone call a few years ago from a jovial marketing manager with some bad news: "Sorry, Gerry, but it looks like we'll have no more rugby trips, though, if you like golf, we might fix up something."

It transpired that the company had a new chairman whose main pastime was playing golf. It was a lesson that what passes for corporate hospitality and sponsorship is often dictated by personal whims at the top.

Much the same often happens when it comes to Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR), a rather American notion which has crossed the Atlantic. Sometimes it leads to little more than a photo-opportunity of a grinning managing director plonked behind an oversized cardboard cheque. The beneficiary "good cause" is often some project favoured by the boardroom boss or his spouse.

In the ESB, they have done it very differently, encouraging staff participation to ensure that their CSR programme provides sustained support in targeted areas. It grew out of the employees' ElectricAid started in the mid-1980s around the time of the LiveAid events initiated by Bob Geldof. ESB employees opted for a payroll deduction scheme which has now developed into a €1.5 million annual programme.

Five years ago it was a fairly typical, if well-organised, staff overseas aid programme with an annual turnover of €250,000. The company matched staff donations on a €2 for every €3 basis. When he took over at the helm, chief executive Padraig McManus decided it would be a good platform from which to build a serious domestic CSR programme with a commitment to provide €1 million a year.

One of the company's most innovative human resource managers, James Foley, was chosen to drive the initiative which was grafted on to ElectricAid as ESB-ElectricAid Ireland.

ESB-ElectricAid Ireland is now the largest funder of suicide prevention and awareness in the State and directly funds some key housing accommodation for homeless people. All employees were invited to select two areas for support out of five broad headings with homelessness and suicide coming out clear winners over education and disability support.

Now 2,750 staff and retired employees contribute through payroll deduction. This is matched on a two-thirds basis by the company up to a ceiling of €300,000. As each personal contribution exceeds the €250 revenue cut-off for an income tax rebate it means that ElectricAid can turn a standard €260 employee contribution into €614.

The original ElectricAid funds 170 projects, mainly in Africa, to support basic infrastructure like rainwater harvesting, solar power and clean wells.

In addition, the ESB has decided to provide €500,000 this year for a school project in a slum area of Accra in Ghana as part of a wider €1.4 million two-year education project in the city.

On the home front, Foley says: "Over the past three years we have provided €1.53 million towards suicide awareness, research, publicity and counselling, making us the main source of finance for most of the 149 projects we are involved with throughout Ireland."

A further €1 million has gone to the homelessness funding - not so much on construction but rather on supporting homeless people to make the transition from the street and hostels into sheltered or support accommodation and then tenancies or independent living.

One of the more innovative projects has been funding a river patrol and rescue boat on the River Foyle in Derry which is Northern Ireland's "suicide capital". The city's taxi-drivers have also been given 20-metre rescue throw-lines. "We were rather chuffed with one recent incident where a taxi driver helped rescue a young lad in the water and he was then picked up by the river boat we also funded," Foley said.

With a potential ElectricAid membership of 6,000 staff and pensioners, Foley says there is still potential for new developments but he stresses the importance of personal involvement by staff in projects that are not just "frothy PR".

The ESB approach to CSR seems to ensure that changes at the top will not lead to the embarrassing policy shifts suffered by my marketing friend, having to swap rugby matches for corporate golf outings.

• Gerald Flynn is an employment specialist with Align Management Solutions in Dublin.