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CR May-June 2013

CRO Association Our mission is to accelerate the profession of corporate responsibility.

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Responsible CEO In that sense, you're supporting your employees' individual contributions. Yes, but within our coporate efforts, we've stopped trying to be all things to all 22,000 people. So eight years ago, when I became deputy chairman, we asked how can we keep that spirit while creating more focus for the organization. Because, if you looked at what we were doing, we were providing support to social agencies or networks, say helping the Red Cross. And we were also in the arts. And also in disease research. And education was the other, largely through our foundation. Which continues to be a major focus. A lot of people care about the problems and challenges of the education system in the country. It's also more core to our organization and what our people do than some other causes. We're not just using our people's manpower but the skills that they deploy for our clients. So, yes, some of our people are out there buidling houses, but education leverages our talent, our brainpower not just our muscle. So that became our institutional Our commitment to measurement, accountability, diversity, and inclusion is light years ahead of where it was just three years ago. I want a partnership that's 30 percent diverse by 2015, which would be up from 25 now. Easier said than done, but we've established measurable criteria across 150 leaders throughout the organization. focus. And we asked ourselves, 'Where are the gaps?' And we sought a holistic view. Now the effort literally runs from preschool through the Ph.D project. The foundation focus is just at the university and post-graduate level. At the high school level, we have an association with Junior Achievement that puts our people in the classroom. We also have an association with the National Academies Foundation, which focuses more specifically on financial literacy at the pre-high school level. And then the cornerstone of our efforts is the Families for Literacy program, which is really and not because this is a family picnic. This brings a true sense of connection to the firm. Families have all bonded from doing events, distributions, and readings. We work our people pretty hard. So when they're getting home late, their spouse is likely to be more tolerant of any demands from the whole organization. It makes it all feel a lot more normal. You've been at this a while. Have you noticed a change in the demographics? focused on those early childhood interventions—new books in the Oh yes. In our generation, there was a sense that parents were hands of kids who have never had a book or access, plus active maybe more struggling. This generation is more fortunate. And intervention in reading and teaming with schools in poverty- look how many grade schools today have community service. So are stricken areas. Our idea is that if we want them to be readers, they Millenials more committed to community service? Absolutely. Does better have access to books. This worked with our desire to have it help us attract and retain talent? Absolutely. I do a lot of college more of the KPMG family involved in what we're doing, which is events, and at one a year ago, the first question from a candidate where the name comes from. But anyway we were very intentional was around community involvement. And it turned out she'd been in each city, that the effort would be headed by the spouses. So an intern in the Families for Literacy program, and she went on for it's not in the foundation, which is about allocating capital and at least five minutes. She literally couldn't contain herself. distributing funds, but rather about engaging our people directly in our communities. And once again there have been all kinds That's one measure. But what about numbers? of unintended upsides, because you find teachers who stopped When it comes to giving, metrics can be important. But it's also working to raise their families or attorneys who did the same important not to get carried away. So we've given out a lot of thing—this incredible wealth of engaged, bright, articulate people. books, often to kids who will tell us the only book they have at I'm guessing this has improved retention as well? home is a phone book. And we'll give them a couple of books and have them write their names in them. Have we folllowed that by Absolutely. The most engaged employees have the strongest ties to measuring how many of them reach some new level of literacy? We the organization, their spouses feel part of KPMG like never before, haven't, and I don't think we will. We'll just keep doing it. MAY/JUNE 2013 | www.thecro.com [11]

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