Comparison of Social Responsibility and Sustainability Programs of Coles Group and Commonwealth Bank

This report compares the social responsibility and sustainability programs of Coles Group and Commonwealth Bank in Australia. It analyzes their business profiles, social reports, and stated values, and evaluates their accomplishments in relation to Sustainable Development Goals. The report also discusses the sustainability phases of the two companies and provides a reflection on their social responsibility efforts.

Business, Society and Planet: A comparison
Between Two Australian Companies on
Social responsibility and Sustainability
Programs
Student Name :
Student Id :
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Table of Contents
Introduction.................................................................................................................................................3
Company History and business profile........................................................................................................3
Coles Group, Australia.............................................................................................................................3
Commonwealth Bank, Australia..............................................................................................................4
Comparison of social reports of two companies.........................................................................................4
Social accomplishment of Coles and Commonwealth bank in respect of Sustainable................................5
Sustainability phases –Coles Group and Commonwealth Bank...................................................................6
Social Reports of the companies and their stated values............................................................................7
Coles Group.............................................................................................................................................7
Commonwealth Bank..............................................................................................................................8
Conclusion- A reflection report...................................................................................................................8
Bibliography...............................................................................................................................................10
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Introduction
This report will project two Australian companies in respect of their business status, their
corporate social responsibility program and sustainability program. Critical analyses on these
two domains will be the prime area of this report. The companies selected for this discussion are
Coles Group, Australia and Commonwealth Bank, Australia. With different credible sources, the
information about those two issues is gathered and critical analyses are done with brief history
and present business scenario of these two companies. For this purpose, annual reports of these
two companies are considered with the views of the Board along with scholarly articles
published for these issues.
Company History and business profile
Coles Group, Australia
This company was established in 1914 by young entrepreneur, G. J. Coles and had already
crossed 100 successful years of its operation. (Coles, n.d) Coles Group is engaged in the business
of supermarket-chain all over Australia. Right from inception, the company has insisted on the
core value of serving the society with the objective of sustainable business. The company’s
insistence on the issues of quality maintenance, service to the society and corporate value for
ethical business has made this organization different from others. This company is enlisted in
ASX with the issuer code COL since 21st November, 2018. (ASX, n.d) The annual report of the
company for 2018 had shown revenue as 39,388 million AUD with EBIT 1,500 million AUD
(Wesfarmer, 2019). This financial achievement projects financial stability of the organization.
The company is part of Wesfarmer Group. Coles Group had been acquisitioned by Wesfarmer
Group in 2007. (Wesfarmers, nd) Annual report of this group has projected the annual report of
Coles Group, too with projection its different corporate features like corporate governance, social
responsibility programs activities towards sustainability etc, which are normally featuring in the
annual report of a company.
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Commonwealth Bank, Australia
This bank was established in 1911 by The Government of Australia and then converted to public
ownership in 1996. Commonwealth bank is serving the nation for more than 100 years. It is one
of the big four banks of Australia. The reach of this bank in respect of business is extended to
overseas with major countries like New Zealand, UK, Asia and USA. It is one of the biggest
financial corporation of Australia in the domain of financial services like retail banking, business
and industrial banking, superannuation, fund management, insurance etc. The bank is reckoned
as biggest financial corporation listed in ASX with its effective year of listing in ASX as 1991.
Commonwealth Bank is known as CBA as its ASX code. (Board, n.d) The financial
performance of this bank projects total net income as 14,400 (approx) Million AUD and net
profit after taxes as 9,375 million AUD. (Bank, 2019) This bank has wide range of corporate
social responsibility and sustainability program, which are reported in the annual report of the
bank.
Comparison of social reports of two companies
Main objectives of social activities of Coles Group are to ensure ethical and responsible sourcing
of products, maintenance of environment, waste management and the commitments of the
company towards society. (ColesGroup, 2019) (Williams, Memery, Meggicks, & Morrison,
2010)
Commonwealth Bank is exercising their social activities in three major domains- education,
innovation and good business practices. (Commbank, 2017) (Jain, Keneley, & Thompson, 2015)
From the above two significant domains chosen by the two companies for social responsibility,
it is evident that Coles Group is more insisted on the issues of environment management and the
provision of fresh products to the customers. (Keith, 2011) They have social commitments,
which they want to comply with the commitment with specific timeframe. Commonwealth bank
is more interested in the domains of education, innovation and good business practices. While
education drive is meant for global audience with the financial restriction to avail this facility,
innovation is towards serving the stakeholder community through enhancement of financial
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service globally. Good business practice would endorse the concept of proper funding for the
community with employment to people of special needs, special emphasis on women workforce
enhancement, contribution towards limitation of global climate change with special attention to
Australian emission control and community investment program. (Reinig & Tilt, 2008)
The basic difference of social activities of these two companies are depending upon the business
activities and the stakeholder-size o the companies. Basic objective of these two companies is to
serve the society, but decided as per the need of the domestic or global stakeholders for their
wellbeing.
Social accomplishment of Coles and Commonwealth bank in respect of
Sustainable Development Goals
Sustainable Development Goals or SDG is a United Nations concept to identify the objectives of
any entity towards fixation of sustainable practices in their activities. This fixation of goals is
part of UN Development Program. (Sonett, Brown, & Naboni, 2019) There are seventeen
identified goals globally as fixed by UN Development Program, which would cover the
sustainability practices of any global and domestic business entity in respect of their
sustainability program. (UNDP, 2019)
The social responsibility program of Coles Group has three major aspects of social responsibility
program related to Australia and its community. (Wesfarmergroup, 2018) They are sourcing of
saleable goods with ethical and responsible attitude, environment maintenance, proper
management of waste and commitments to the society by providing food to the people of needs.
These steps are endorsing different SDGs like Zero Hunger (2), Good health and Well-Being (3),
Sustainable Cities and Community (11), Responsible Consumption and Production (12), Climate
and Action (13) and Partnership for the Goals (17). These SDGs are addressed by the company
in respect of CSR and sustainability reports of the company by addressing explicitly or
implicitly. Explicit addresses by Coles Group are with Zero hunger, Good health and well being,
responsible consumption and production, climate and action through different activities taken up
by the company, with implicit addresses are with Sustainable cities and community, and
partnership for the goals.
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The social responsibility program of Commonwealth Bank is explicitly addressing the goals of
Quality Education (4) by providing education to the people with financially handicapped, Gender
Equality (5) by providing the employment to the women, Affordable and Clean Energy (7)
through their environmental activities, industry Innovation and infrastructure (9) by introducing
different financial services innovated by the bank for their customers. (Worldbank, 2018) The
socially responsible programs of the bank are implicitly addressing the goals of Decent Work
and Economic growth (8), Reduced Inequalities (10), Peace, Justice and Strong Institutions (16),
and Partnerships for the Goals (17) with the global stakeholders.
The above discussion identifying the SDGs in the social reports of Coles and Commonwealth
Bank can earmark their priorities in social responsibility programs adopted by them as corporate
strategies.
Sustainability phases –Coles Group and Commonwealth Bank
Refer to the study of Dunphy, Griffiths and Benn regarding the leadership program for
organizational change, these analyses will highlight in which phase these two companies fall. It
is indicated by the work of these three writers, that there are six phases mentioned to prove the
phase of sustainability position for the entities. They are- rejection, non-responsiveness,
compliance, efficiency, strategic pro-activity and the sustaining corporation. (Dunphy, Griffiths,
& Benn, 2003)
Coles Group is engaged in supermarket business by selling different products to the customers.
As a seller, the company has to ensure the quality of the products with ethical and responsible
sourcing, mitigating the bad impacts on environment by using vulnerable packaging materials,
avoidance of green gas emission, provision of foods for the needy people of Australia and
recycling process of perishable products. With their sustainability program, they are to be placed
in compliance phase related to different activities. The company can realize the need of
sustainability programs and has taken proper steps as per the benchmark set globally. The
activities of the company had provided these identified scopes for the company to excel in the
domain of corporate responsibility towards society through different sustainability programs
taken up by Coles.
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Commonwealth Bank is engaged in financial services for the community in global aspect. The
company has taken up different activities towards its social responsibility program. These
programs are divided into three broad-spectrum domains- Education, Innovation and Good
Business practices. Analyzing these activities of the bank as their sustainability program, they
can be placed in Efficiency phase. The bank is more interested to enhance the socio-economic
condition of the global stakeholders by providing education, serving the customers through
innovative ideas and ensuring good business practices to fight against climate change and
environment maintenance with activities and funding.
Social Reports of the companies and their stated values
Coles Group
The company has distinct mission statement, which is consisting of vision, mission, corporate
objective and values. (COLESGROUP, nd)
The values stated in the mission statement are:
 Respecting internal stakeholders in the form of employees and external stakeholders in
the form of customers, suppliers and community;
 Performing social responsibility program with the objective of becoming leader in the
domain of corporate social responsibility;
 Continuous approach to the customers and communities with different strategic
partnership, sponsorship and community events;
 Investment in innovation.
Different social responsibility activities of the company insists on the core issues of ethical and
responsible sourcing, reduction of vulnerable package materials, control of green gas emission,
waste management, provision of food for the needy people ,etc. These activities highlight the
needs of the communities. Social responsibility programs are mainly featuring the need of the
global environment, which demands different effective steps by the companies to ensure
maintenance and betterment of the climate. The corporate values of the company are ensuring
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their effort towards provision for such options, which can ensure proper actions for compliance
of these needs.
Commonwealth Bank
The corporate values of Commonwealth Bank have clear indication of how they want to achieve
their vision. The bank has clearly mentioned their accomplishment of corporate objectives
through their declaration in annual report of 2018. The bank is keener to build simple and more
focus-oriented activities of banking and financial services to meet the needs of the customers,
empowered by strong risk management and continuous process of innovation to ensure comfort
zone for the stakeholders. (CBAGROUP, nd) The bank is focusing on the purpose of improving
the life style of the customers and the communities by providing better financial services. The
bank has declared corporate values as:
 The action of the bank is right;
 The bank is accountable for their deliverables;
 The bank is dedicated to the service for customers and community;
 The bank ensures pursuance of excellence;
 The deliverables are complied.
As per earlier discussion on the social responsibility program of the bank, they are focused with
the social responsibility objectives and adopt proper path to ensure compliance of the promise to
the society. Their three domains of social responsibility are education, innovation and good
business practices. To exercise social responsibility in these three domains with clear
identification of target audience and extending service to them through different activities, the
bank is complying with the corporate values, as declared by them in their mission statement.
Conclusion- A reflection report
This project is part of group assignment. Individual assignment is directed towards comparison
of two Australian companies in respect of their social responsibility program and their evaluation
as per identification of SDG and phase as enumerated by Dunphy, Griffiths and Benn. The social
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responsibility programs taken up by Coles Group is to mitigate the environmental footprint by
adopting sustainable business practice through ethical and responsible sourcing of products and
packing materials, effective waste management and other activities to facilitate the community
by feeding the needy people. Commonwealth Bank is engaged in social responsibility program
with broad spectrum objective by extending education to the needy people, innovation for
stakeholders and exercising good business practices to ensure serving the community. As per the
different nature of business of these two companies, they have framed their social responsibility
activates in order to serve the society in best possible way to ensure better future global
environment for the next generation with better livable condition. It may be argued about the
adoption of SCR domain by the companies, but their efforts are to be greeted with positive
outcome expected from the activities, with more suggestions from the stakeholders on this field
for further betterment of social responsibility programs.
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Bibliography
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Bank, C. (2019). Annual Reprot 2018. Retrieved April 24, 2019, from Commonwealth Bank website:
https://www.commbank.com.au/content/dam/commbank/about-us/shareholders/pdfs/results/fy18/
cba-annual-report-2018.pdf
Board, A. S. (n.d). Commonwealth Bank of Australia, Details. Retrieved April 24, 2019, from Commonwealth
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https://cbagroup.com/mission-and-vision/
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https://www.coles.com.au/corporate-responsibility/sustainability/commitments
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