Growing with your surroundings

By: Eng Medhat Stefanos

Dina Bateson writes from Morocco: “Working in the steel industry I meet many members of the community that surround me. I feel like the business should be integrated within the community it lives in, nevertheless keep my eye on the business bottom line. How do you strike a balance?”

Eng Medhat Stefanos writes: The challenge is one that many organizations face every day. Many industries working in developing countries have a challenge with their corporate social responsibility management and implementation.

There are two approaches to serving your community. One being the philanthropy (monetary donations) approach and the other is community-based development approach.

If your approach to your corporate social responsibility is philanthropy then you need to actually work in a developed and educated environment and finding the right strategic partner that would be able to best utilize your donations.

Having said that, we at Titan Cement Egypt don’t believe that philanthropy is the best approach to actually develop your business while growing your community.

Directing your corporate social responsibility towards a community-based development approach has proven to truly make an evident impact on the community, the working environment and the business bottom line.

We at Titan Cement Egypt look at the community-based development approach as an opportunity to improve our bottom line rather than a setback. The impact of developing the surrounding community has shown an impressive impact on our business.

The key to developing your surrounding community is to truly understand their needs and the relationship they have with your business. They are your team members, your suppliers, your distributors and your customers. Their problems directly impact your production optimization, your sales volume and your overall efficiency.

The impact you do to your community does not have to always directly affect the individuals. Maintaining a clean environment, providing a safe workplace, or even growing your business to provide job opportunities has an intangible impact that is sensed by the surrounding.

On a different level, teaching and developing your working surrounding builds a level of ownership within your community that has a high impact on your product preference and hence your bottom line.

Part of our responsibility to our community is supporting their interests. Like sponsoring their local activities or helping them celebrate their social and religious events. That provides your organization with a sense of personality to a corporate face.

At Titan Cement Egypt we pay a lot of attention to our community, our environment, and the people that surround us. We have built into our culture a level of awareness to how our decisions impact the people and the planet as well as the profit. Once the values were established within all of our organization, the balance has become a very unproblematic task.

It is important to note that our contribution to our community is not a compromise against our bottom line. Truly making correct business decisions, one has to look at all dimensions and the impact that decision will make. And your community is one of the aspects that need to be considered while making your decisions.

To truly utilize your corporate social responsibility to everyone’s’ best interest, learn more about your surroundings, understand their needs, link them back to your business, and find the window where you will be best able to contribute and get back in return. That window is where you will best be utilized, where you will always want to give more because you actually get back more.

Architect Medhat Stefanos is currently residing as group commercial director of one of Titan’s largest business units, Titan Cement Egypt. For more than 25 years, Arch. Medhat Stefanos has been one of the founders and shapers of the construction material industry in Egypt. Through his career he has managed to enhance the performance of the overall industry to become one of business bench markers for the region.