Happy Computers' social impact
Check out the companies listed by Business in the Community as 'Meeting the Challenge' of corporate social responsibility.
Can Business Have a Positive Social Impact?
This is an area of the site that will develop further soon. For now here is some information on the social audit that was carried out on us, to help us discover what our social impact is.
What is a Social Audit?
The Social Audit is a result of a comprehensive assessment of Happy Computers' social performance, externally verified by the New Economics Foundation. It is based on establishing how well the company is meeting the needs of its key stakeholders and then on publishing this information openly. Just as the financial audit demonstrates a company's financial well being, the social audit is designed to reflect a company's social well-being in terms of those most directly affected by its actions.
Happy Computers' Statement
Happy Computers has, like all companies, a wide range of stakeholders, including staff, clients, investors and suppliers. And we have a statement of principles about how we treat people. When we were offered the chance to carry out a social audit, leading to the production of this Social Statement, we realised this was a chance to find out if we are putting these principles into practice. At one level it is simply a comprehensive organisational review that enabled us to examine every part of our business. At another level, by working from the point of view of the stakeholder, it shows exactly how we affect those we come into contact with.
It also fulfils our belief in transparency. All information, particularly the detailed financial results, is shared throughout the company. In choosing to publish this Social Statement we are laying open how we perform as a company and exactly what our stakeholders think of us, including any criticisms.
When I founded Happy Computers I was told a lot of things by people with more business experience than me: I was told that business was a serious thing, that we couldn't succeed with such a silly company name, that work couldn't be fun, that you had to put profit first and that you had to keep careful control of your staff or they would take advantage.
This social audit confirms to me that this advice was wrong. The fun, positive approach of the company is one of its key advantages: It attract freelance trainers (often earning less than elsewhere), motivates the staff, is seen as vitally important by clients and, most importantly makes it easier to learn about computers (our core job). The wider principles are just as crucial. A key conclusion I draw from the audit is that people want to do business with, and work for, organisations they can feel good about.
One remarkable finding was that 54% of clients responding stated that simply taking part in the social audit had made them more likely to book with Happy Computers. It is impossible to measure the precise benefit of this but growth has been substantial in the year since the audit. Bookings in January & February 1996 were respectively 66% and 80% above the 1995 levels and Happy Computers has doubled in staff during this period.
Happy Computers is a commercial company. We aim to grow and expand and we aim to make substantial profit in the future. The key lesson of this audit is that having clear principles and looking after the interests of all the stakeholders, even above short-term profit, is not only a nice thing to do but presents a competitive advantage in today's market.
Research in the United States has compared companies that put short-term financial results first with those that emphasised the importance of the interests of all their stake holders. Those with the wider vision did better in the long-term (over a 30 year period) in terms of their growth and profits and not by a small amount: they beat the average stock market company seven-fold.
Happy Computers is not unique in its approach and there are many companies that we learn from. We are seeking to be, in the words of one of our shareholders, a '21st century company'. We believe those companies that will succeed in the next decades will be those, whether large or small, who serve the interests of all those they work with.
We have learnt a lot from this audit and have implemented a wide range of changes, detailed in this report. We have already received a lot of positive feedback but I look forward to the next social audit, where we will find to exactly what extent these changes have met the needs of our stakeholders.
We will continue to seek to make our work and our service as fun as possible. We will continue to reach for the skies in what we can achieve in terms of empowerment and fulfilling people's potential. We will continue to seek to live by clear principles. We believe that, like other companies that are following the same route, Happy Computers will grow and prosper as a result.
Henry Stewart
Founder of Happy Computers.
Download a copy of our Audit
The Social Audit is a 23 page report. It's a pdf format (Adobe Acrobat) file. Note that the pdf format file does not include a cover.
The Audit is also available in Adobe Pagemaker format, with cover included. This file is a zip file, so it will need to be extracted before you can read it.
