Analysis of Westpac Bank's Sustainability Management and Performance

This report provides a detailed analysis of Westpac Bank's sustainability efforts, focusing on its strategies, performance, and challenges. The report begins with an abstract and table of contents, followed by an introduction that highlights Westpac's commitment to sustainability and its position as a leading bank in Australia. The report then delves into the sustainability of the bank, examining community, customer, and stakeholder support. It discusses Westpac's community involvement through various foundations and partnerships, customer support initiatives, and stakeholder engagement. The report also analyzes the 2016 Sustainability Report, highlighting key performance indicators and achievements. It concludes by summarizing the bank's efforts to maintain its position in the industry and addresses the setbacks encountered in recent years. The references section provides a list of sources used in the report.

Running head: MANAGING FOR SUSTAINABILITY
Managing for Sustainability
Name of the Student
Name of the University
Author Note

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Abstract
The following paper is about the sustainability of the Westpac bank in Australia. This bank is
one of the oldest in Australia and they have been operating in the banking industry for a long
time. They have been awarded as the most sustainable bank on the global basis several times.
Lately, they have been losing some of their customers for many reasons. This has been the
reason they have felt the urge to apply some new methods and strategies in their operational
areas. This will be helpful to improve their business and sustainability will be restored. The
adoption of these strategies are also helpful to avoid the risks they will be facing and these things
have been discussed in the paper.

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Table of Contents
Introduction......................................................................................................................................3
Sustainability of the bank................................................................................................................3
Community support.....................................................................................................................3
Customer support.............................................................................................................................4
Stakeholder support.....................................................................................................................4
2016 Sustainability Report..............................................................................................................6
Sustainability performance..............................................................................................................7
Conclusion.......................................................................................................................................8
References........................................................................................................................................9

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Introduction
Westpac is one of the leading banks in Australia that has gained an immense popularity
with an increasing number of customers. Here the focus will be on the sustainability of Westpac
bank in order to achieve a good place in the list of the most sustainable organizations in the
world (Westpac.com.au 2017). The ways in which the bank has maintained its sustainability and
the policies they have taken to present themselves as one of the leading organizations in global
sustainability has a lot to do with the customer loyalty of the bank. This paper aims to provide a
brief outlook about the strategies the bank has taken to improve its services and the ways it has
been tryingto improve its brand reputation. Both the internal and external stakeholders have been
a part of this process of maintaining their sustainability. The different angles and views have to
be analyzed in this paper.
Sustainability of the bank
Westpac bank has been a leading organization has been providing a quality service for
years as the employees are completely dedicated to their responsibilities. They have a lot of
social responsibilities that they maintain with appropriateness (Westpac.com.au 2017).
Community support
The Westpac Bank has believed in some important ideals. They believe that they can be
able to prosper in this challenging business environment only if the community they are
operating in, prospers (Westpac.com.au 2017). Their organizational culture has supported the
ideal to support the community in a great extent over the years (Banks et al. 2013). This is their
philosophy and they have faith in it. They contribute to a lot many a social cause and many
social institutions. Like Westpac Foundation, St. George Foundation, BankSA Foundation, Bank

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of Melbourne Neighborhood Plan and others. They have contributed to natural disaster recovery
trusts as well. They provide microfinance opportunities for their customers as well. They have
built very strong community partnerships that help them to grow sustainable future for
themselves (Banks et al. 2013).
Customer support
They have been trying to present themselves in a simpler way for the customers and they
are trying their best so that the customers can improve in their transaction process (Weinstein
and Roy 2012). They have developed some products and services that have yielded to support
their customers in a large way. They have offered Disaster Relief Packages to the customers to
support them at the time of a critical financial crisis (Westpac.com.au 2017). They provide the
microfinance opportunities to their customers that help and encourage the new business owners
waiting for their start up. They have opened a special bank account only for the women business
enthusiasts in the country.
Stakeholder support
One of the most important services that they provide is the support to their internal and
external stakeholders (Wong et al. 2012). The support they provide to their customers, suppliers,
investors and other bodies is very important They have over a thousands of suppliers who
provide them with lot of important resources worth $5 billion annually, they are quite dedicated
to return the favor to them (Westpac.com.au 2017). The supply chain has a critical influence in
improving their services and bringing sustainability to their operations. This positive force and
opportunities will help to thrive for positive social and environmental change (Kasperson et al.
2012). They have maintained some long term relationships so that they can focus on socially

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responsible and sustainable business practices all over. The important thing that has been
identified in this aspect that their moral, social and environmental sustainability has depended a
lot on the activities of themselves that are conjugated with their supplier as well. Their ethical
responsibilities have driven them to maintain a strong relationship as well.
They have focused on their investors as well. They have opted for some strategies that
will guide them to combat against the risk situations by a strong relationship as well. They have
maintained some policies, frameworks and perspectives that could guide them to avoid the risk
situations. The issues and opportunities that are present in front of them should be dealt with
firmness and positivity (Bushee and Miller 2012). Their governance framework is very
supportive that works in positive them to maintain their social responsibilities. They maintain the
strategy that they keep regular and transparent reporting so that their reporters are able to
compare their performance on annual basis.
However, their strategies and policies to maintain the sustainability in their organizations
have not catered to satisfying the needs and expectations from their stakeholders like the internal
management, employees, investors, NGOs and the corporate peers who work as key people
behind their success in the global sphere (Thomas and Lamm 2012). In the following segment,
the awards and acknowledgements that the bank has received can be underlined to have a better
look at this scenario.
 The predecessor of Westpac, Bank of NSW has launched the very first disaster relief
fund in Australia in 1817 (Luis, Dolinskaya and Smilowitz 2012).
 They are one of the nine founding members of the United Nations Environment Program
Finance Initiative (UNEPFI) in 1991 (Westpac.com.au 2017).

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 They are the first bank in Australia to launch an environmental policy in 1992.
 They are the first Australian bank and one of the very first organizations who have
established a formal community volunteering scheme in 1997.
 They first awarded the Federal Government ‘Employer of Choice for Women’ in 1996
(Westpac.com.au 2017).
 They had enhanced the family-friendly policies, including the doubling of paid parental
leave in 2005.
 They had endorsed the United Nations Principles for the Responsible Investment.
2016 Sustainability Report
Their sustainability report for the year 2016 has shown that the growth rate of their
sustainability has not been so progressive as in the previous years. However, they have been
named as the most sustainable bank in the world despite some challenges, global issues and
overcoming them at last. Their Reconciliation Action Plan has thrived for the indigenous
Australians and helps them to progress in their economic development. They have participated in
a lot of global forums and activities that have helped them to gain new experiences about the
economic development of the people (Leigh and Blakely 2016). They have identified that the
governments, social enterprises and business authorities should be working together a lot to
achieve the goal of economic development and cater to the United Nations Sustainable
Development Goal. They have really responded well to the challenging issues over the years and
this has yielded them the global leading position. They are concentrating on the Sustainable
Strategy invented by them that would be ending in the year 2017 (Westpac.com.au 2017).

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Sustainability performance
Westpac Bank has launched many policies and frameworks to motivate the performance
of the sustainability in the bank. There have been noticed many issues to cater to the needs and
requirements of the customers and the other stakeholders.
 They have invested in the extra dedicated resources to counter the new and emerging
threats.
 They have to enhance the resiliency of the security systems.
 The availability of the customers’ data has to be made safe as they have lost many of
their customers because of being victims of cybercrime.
 The global research house has ranked the Westpac’s mobile banking platform
Westpac.Live.
 They have been able to introduce 188 new features in their various digital banking
platforms.
 They have also invested their money in the innovative product design (Malarkey 2014).
 They have launched a new facility of services in the St. George.
 They have invested an amount of $278 million to strengthen and enhance the processes
that already exist (Westpac.com.au, 2017).
 They have begun a new Group-wide Product and Service Lifecycle Policy because they
want to strengthen the sustainability criteria and fairness to customers (Hepperle et al.
2012).
 They have participated in the industry initiatives very actively that has helped them to get
a new place in the list of sustainable organizations. They have done it as their
responsibility to ABA 6 Point Plan.

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 They have also set up some Product Governance Committees to review the design and
seek the opinions of their customers.
 The Westpac branch teller incentives have been reviewed so as to focus on the customer
based strategies.
 They have delivered a very good performance with a 14% cash equity return that has
supported them for a good business growth (Westpac.com.au 2017).
 They have assessed climate based reports as well because it is very important to review
the climatic conditions in which they are operating.
 They have continuously applied the Group’s Sustainability Risk Management Framework
so that the sustainability risks could be identified, assessed and managed properly.
These are the few ways the organization has attempted to recover the fallouts that have
taken place in the last year to improve the conditions to prevent their loss of customers. The
reports in the earlier years have to be brought back into practice to bring back the sustainability
in the organization.
Conclusion
The paper can be concluded by saying that Westpac has been trying to bring back their
old glory because they have suffered some setbacks in the recent years. Their sustainability
efforts have also not been up to the mark that had been the benchmark in the industry quite a few
years ago. However, they have managed to keep their position in the first place in the
sustainability reports by the global organizations. They have planned to gain more sustainability
into their organizations by applying more methods and strategies.

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References
Banks, S., Butcher, H.L., Orton, A. and Robertson, J. eds., 2013. Managing community practice:
Principles, policies and programmes. Policy Press.
Bushee, B.J. and Miller, G.S., 2012. Investor relations, firm visibility, and investor
following. The Accounting Review, 87(3), pp.867-897.
Hepperle, C., Orawsk, R., Nolte, B.D., Mörtl, M. and Lindemann, U., 2012, October. An
integrated lifecycle model of product-service-systems. In Proceedings of the 2nd CIRP IPS2
Conference 2010; 14-15 April; Linköping; Sweden (No. 077, pp. 159-166). Linköping University
Electronic Press.
Kasperson, J.X., Kasperson, R.E., Turner, B.L., Hsieh, W. and Schiller, A., 2012. Vulnerability
to global environmental change. In The Social Contours of Risk: Volume II: Risk Analysis,
Corporations and the Globalization of Risk. Taylor and Francis.
Leigh, N.G. and Blakely, E.J., 2016. Planning local economic development: Theory and
practice. Sage Publications.
Luis, E., Dolinskaya, I.S. and Smilowitz, K.R., 2012. Disaster relief routing: Integrating research
and practice. Socio-economic planning sciences, 46(1), pp.88-97.
Malarkey, A., 2014. Business model innovation: Game-changing the future. Government
News, 34(4), p.563.
Thomas, T.E. and Lamm, E., 2012. Legitimacy and organizational sustainability. Journal of
business ethics, 110(2), pp.191-203.

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Weinstein, A. and Roy, K., Sequent Software Inc., 2012. System and method for increasing
security in internet transactions. U.S. Patent Application 13/669,006.
Westpac.com.au. (2017). Westpac - Personal, Business and Corporate Banking. [online]
Available at: https://www.westpac.com.au/ [Accessed 3 Sep. 2017].
Westpac.com.au. (2017). Westpac Annual report. [online] Available at:
https://www.westpac.com.au/content/dam/public/wbc/documents/pdf/aw/ic/
2016_Westpac_Annual_Report [Accessed 3 Sep. 2017].
Wong, C.W., Lai, K.H., Cheng, T.C.E. and Lun, Y.V., 2012. The roles of stakeholder support
and procedure-oriented management on asset recovery. International journal of production
economics, 135(2), pp.584-594.