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3 ways CSR professionals can ‘do more with less’
Updated: Mar 15, 2024
Social impact professionals have a lot on their plates. Not only are they tasked with aligning CSR and DEIB principles with their corporate values, but they are also responsible for orchestrating, planning, executing, and reporting on the impact of employee programming.
Through Visit.org’s many conversations with CSR, DEIB, HR, and ESG leaders, we know that social impact professionals are feeling like they need to “do more with less” in their roles.
They are under pressure to consistently exceed their key performance indicators (KPIs) while at the same time operate with fewer resources, such as reduced budget, fewer staff members dedicated to social impact, and more.
To help social impact professionals navigate this pressure to do more with less, we tapped the insights of three experienced CSR consultants. Here, these experts provide tips to prioritize programming for maximum impact, deepen workforce engagement, and appeal to all company stakeholders.
1. Inspire your workforce
“CSR is the original ‘influencer marketing’ job. You cannot be successful in this field by working alone or in a silo. Your job is to inspire individuals at every level in the company to join in the ownership and implementation of your work.
Use your passion and expertise to create that same drive in your partners across the company. Be a true influencer for CSR, bringing others to the table and letting go of the reins at times.
CSR cannot succeed when it is the job of one person or department, only when it is truly baked into a company’s DNA.” – Marcy Twete, Co-founder and CEO, Veerless
2. Focus on strategy
“My advice is to choose initiatives strategically. In other words, do the smartest things with available resources. The wins give you license to do more in the future.
Many companies follow what I call a 'kitchen sink' approach, doing lots of things that fit under broad pillars of sustainability focus. Instead, focus on priority (material) topics with goals and initiatives that best leverage the company's assets and relationships.
This will have measurable positive impacts and have broad stakeholder support.” – Nancy Himmelfarb, Principal, NJH Sustainability Consulting
3. Build social impact experiences with substance
“The adage ‘less is more’ is never more valuable in CSR practice than today. There is so much noise in the marketplace of how, when, and what CSR service looks like.
It is the quality of the interaction that will signal to your clients that you respect them, understand their needs, and seek solutions to the challenges they face while signaling your gratitude for their partnership.
Simplicity and substance delivered with humility and compassion builds the foundation for a memorable and consequential CSR practice which only requires the priceless expense of time.” – Deborah Macfarlan Enright, Ed. D., Founder, The Macfarlan Group
Learn how Visit.org can help your team “do more with less.” Schedule a call with a member of the Visit.org team today!
Your insights on helping CSR professionals achieve meaningful results with limited resources are practical and valuable. I especially appreciate the emphasis on strategic priorities, collaboration, and creating genuine social impact rather than simply doing more activities. I recently came across alamodtf while exploring related online discussions. Thank you for sharing useful guidance that encourages organizations to make their efforts more effective.
A 100-page sustainability report won't get a line manager to do anything. They are driven by how sustainability affects the pride of their team, keeping customers, or cutting costs driving directions To be successful, you need to find the areas where the company's goals and the KPIs or personal goals of people in different departments overlap.
The "do more with less" framing really hits home—especially the part about CSR folks being responsible for orchestrating, planning, executing, and reporting all while the budget shrinks. It's wild how much of the job ends up being about getting other people across the company to actually care and participate. Speaking of squeezing more out of limited time, I've been decompressing after work with krillion—it's a quick daily trivia thing with seven prompts that takes like 20 seconds each, pretty low-commitment. Not the same as CSR strategy obviously, but it's a nice reminder that small, consistent engagement beats one big push.
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'Do more with less' is definitely the reality for many CSR teams today. I shared this guide on LinkedIn and used an og image checker to ensure the link preview looked clean.