Business Ethics has named Apple as one of the top 100 “Best Corporate Citizens.”
Business Ethics is an organization designed “to promote ethical business practices, to serve the growing community of professionals striving to live and work in responsible ways, and to help create financially healthy companies in the process”
The organization began ranking the 100 Best Corporate Citizens in 1996, using data collected in-house. Their definition of good corporate citizenship means serving a variety of stakeholders (those who have a stake in or are impacted by a firm’s activities).
“There is no single indicator of good citizenship,” said Business Ethics in their list. “It must be measured through lenses representing various viewpoints. Corporate citizenship is thus based on the nature and quality of various stakeholder impacts, and the practices companies use to develop relationships with stakeholders.”
Apple placed 32nd in the list. The top five companies, in order, are Procter & Gamble; Hewlett-Packard; Fannie Mae; Motorola; and IBM. Because methodology was changed to include more stakeholder groups, thirty-one companies dropped off the list from last year, including Anheuser-Busch; Campbell Soup; Coca-Cola; Washington Post; and Wal-Mart, according to Business Ethics. Apple is new to the list, as are companies such as Freddie Mac; Corning; McDonald’s; Dow Jones; Eastman Kodak; and H.B. Fuller
“Among the benefits good corporate citizens enjoy are attracting the best employees, winning deep-seated customer loyalty, minimizing lawsuits, and possibly lowering the cost of capital,” according to the report. (Thanks to MacCentral reader Ron Carlson for the heads-up on this news item.)
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