The Corporate Philanthropist: Pro Bono Service - Page 5
IBM: Implementing a Global Service Corps
CEO Perspective
The IBM Global Citizen’s Portfolio is aimed at enabling current and future IBMers to position themselves advantageously in a globally integrating economy and society. It is an important step in creating our vision of the Globally Integrated Enterprise.Through a suite of resources and programs that will grow over time, we provide opportunities for our people to acquire expertise and skills, to develop global leadership experience, and to equip themselves for transitions to service in the public sector — all to function successfully as global professionals and global citizens.
The Corporate Service Corps, one of the initial programs of the Portfolio, helps IBM develop leaders with new perspectives and enhanced skills and provides communities around the world with IBM talent and technology. Importantly, we believe this kind of experience broadens our people’s thinking and understanding — not only of diverse cultures but also of the broad global context in which business operates today.
The Global Citizen’s Portfolio is one among many examples of how we are empowering and enabling our people to make decisions and to act. We call this “lowering the center of gravity” of the company — that is, trusting IBMers and pushing decision-making authority
out and down. The design point here is a dual responsibility between the employee and management: management has to provide the tools, the mechanisms, and the funding, and the individual has to make use of them. This is a very mature relationship, one that we believe to be central for both business and society in the global reality of the 21st century.
IBM Offers Its Talents and Builds Global Leaders
In March 2008, IBM launched the Corporate Service Corps (CSC) program as part of IBM’s Global Citizen’s Portfolio. Designed both to drive the company’s pro bono service efforts and to develop global leaders, the Corporate Service Corps combines IBM employee expertise and professional client service management systems to tackle issues at the intersection of economic development and information technology in emerging markets.
IBM believes that business can lead efforts to improve the social and economic conditions of people living in developing countries through working partnerships with government and non-government organizations alike. IBM has created a program that allows it to leverage IBMers’ expertise to address communities’ needs in tangible ways while also providing significant benefit to the individual employees and the company at large.
How It Works
IBM employees from around the world were invited to participate in the Corporate Service Corps. Within a three-week period, nearly 5,500 employees applied for just 200 slots in the first round of this program. One hundred high-potential IBMers were selected, representing 33 different countries. IBM plans to expand the effort quickly, enlisting another 500 participants over the next three years.
Once chosen, employees are teamed with eight other colleagues from diverse technical and cultural backgrounds to work together on selected projects in developing countries. Initial project sites are in Romania, Turkey, Vietnam, the Philippines, Ghana, and Tanzania.
CSC participants receive extensive preliminary training online before their work begins. For three months prior to their departure, employee teams work together virtually, receiving language and cultural education for their destination countries. They also discuss program goals and socioeconomic challenges for the communities they will be working to help.
In a pro bono capacity, the groups then tackle a range of issues: from helping women-owned and small and medium-sized enterprises expand and increase jobs to assisting with market research and strategic planning for organizations and governments. The operational consulting IBM employees provide for these communities creates sustainable opportunities, fostering economic development and growth.
Through this program, employees not only offer their expertise to help the target communities solve real problems, they also acquire significant skills as part of their development as global business leaders. Participants are exposed to an international network of peers within the company and they can bring the insight and understanding gained in their CSC experience to add value to business decisions in their jobs and home countries.
Capturing the Learning
IBM is committed to instituting the same standards of service to community partners that are offered to its most prized business clients.
The company will gather feedback on the projects during and after implementation, serving as a foundation for future CSC teams. Using blogs, wikis, and other collaborative onlineresources, participants will draw from and add to the vast database of IBM experience.
In this way, IBM has established a powerful system for monitoring the effectiveness of the company’s work, capturing best practices and sharing them with employees and customers. Leveraging IBM’s business technology helps to improve the CSC beneficiaries’ future work and is essential to bringing the CSC program to scale.
Taking Risks
Given its scope, newness, and complexity, the CSC’s speed of execution is striking. Within just eight months of the announcement of this initiative, participants were in training for their tour of service. Of course, the program will likely face challenges as it grows to scale — but IBM decided to take the risk of launching this effort with the mindset that continual evaluations and fine-tuning were the best ways to build upon success.One reason why IBM could confidently launch the program was due to the company’s strong global presence, serving clients across 170 countries and having established relationships with key partners like the U.S. Agency for International Development and the World Bank. IBM’s own employees contributed on-the-ground knowledge of current needs and appropriate projects while partner agencies vetted potential NGOs and helped plan programs on a large scale.
The Triple Benefit
The Corporate Service Corps offers a triple benefit to the entities involved. First, IBM employees have the chance for a unique leadership development opportunity, building new skills, networks, and global awareness. Secondly, the program contributes real value to the emerging economies in which employees dedicate their time. Finally, it helps the company foster a network of global leaders who can prepare IBM for greater success in today’s globally integrated economy.
Stanley S. Litow is vice president of corporate citizenship and corporate affairs at IBM Corporation.
Lessons Learned
- Apply the same standards of corporate service to community partners that are offered to your most prized, paying business clients.
- Consider new applications for your products, services, and even business models that have the potential to transform civil society at its core. Re-think the process of collaboration to engage critical partners in this process.
- Integrate your program with your company’s business strategy. Otherwise, your corporate responsibility efforts will risk being marginalized and create a disconnect between you and the clients and communities where you are trying to build long-term relationships.
