25 Years of Business Excellence
Welcome to November's edition of Scottish Business in the Community's e-Bulletin, our monthly newsletter for staff, member companies and partner organisations.
The first two weeks of November were jam packed with events at SBC. It was a very exciting time for everyone here and we were pleased to see so many of our member companies and partner organisations represented at each event.
On Wednesday 7th November, we welcomed over 100 of Scotland's top companies to HRH The Prince of Wales's Business Summit on Climate Change. By pledging to take action and committing to reporting progress against its pledges, 87% of companies attending the Summit agreed to join the May Day Network – a nationwide business movement on climate change. These "May Day companies" will now be supported with a range of follow-up activity provided by SBC and the Carbon Trust (Scotland). Progress on the pledges, case studies, sources of advice and information on how companies can get involved is available via our May Day website – www.sbcscot.com/mayday
As soon as the Business Summit was over we were busy arranging 3 further flagship events. The culmination of our 25th anniversary year was an evening reception hosted by the First Minister, Alex Salmond at Edinburgh Castle on Wednesday 14th November. The event was a great success consisting of drinks and canapés, with light entertainment and addresses from George Borthwick (Chairman of SBC), Sandy Crombie (Group Chief Executive of Standard Life and HRH Ambassador for CSR in Scotland) and First Minster, Alex Salmond.
Two days later, we held the first HRH Ambassador Business Breakfast before our Annual General Meeting on the topic of "Education to Employability". You can view a full event report on the Events page of the e-Bulletin. Youth Employability and supporting those young people who require More Choices and More Chances is a key priority for SBC and our members. In his position as our Amabassador for 2007-2008, Sandy Crombie has made youth employability and education a priority for his term. His passion for this area will build on the current SBC commitment to engaging more businesses in this agenda. Lara Friedman, our Youth Employabilty Manager, is currently working on a piece of research which will inform this agenda and SBC will be holding a Working Lunch on this very topic in February next year - contact events@sbcscot.com if you are interested in getting involved!
As well as these exciting events, November has also seen loads of great news stories across our Network groups, Programmes and member companies. Visit the News Page to keep up to date with all the latest in Corporate Responsibility across Scotland!
Also, check out this month's Guest Opinion page of the e-Bulletin for an interesting read. Lisabeth Robertson, HR Administrator at Redeem, asks the challenging question "Would you employ an ex-offender, if not, why not?".
We are now gearing up for 2008 and look forward to working with our member companies and partner organisations on a whole host of exciting projects!
The SBC office shuts down between Christmas and New Year so the e-Bulletin will be taking a break until January 2008!
Until then,
Best Wishes & Seasons Greetings,
The SBC Team
