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

Business, Society and Planet: A comparison
Between Two Australian Companies on
Social responsibility and Sustainability
Programs
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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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