External Stakeholders

A Commission secretariat (in DG Sanco) runs administration and helps coordinate and supervise the three scientific committees. This secretariat has an important function as a link between the scientists and the Commission. The secretariat is also a point of contact for external stakeholders. In addition, an inter-committee coordination group has been set up in order to manage overlapping issues and to avoid contradictory advice. 

External stakeholders such as stockholders, advocacy organizations, and the community can and do use regulatory compliance and industry-provided performance data to evaluate the performance of individual facilities, companies, and whole industries. Stakeholders hold the industry accountable for process safety performance and, when they perceive performance to be lacking, will use the information to advocate improvement. Regulators may also use such information to make decisions on how to focus their enforcement and regulatory efforts. 

While the use of centralized data management systems and dashboard displays are generally for internal purposes, companies and organization may one day develop public dashboards that would allow external stakeholders to track performance. 

On one hand, Responsible Care is seen as compliance focused and, while considered a component of sustainability, does not currently offer the platform for embracing all of the concepts of sustainability (focus groups above Sustain Ability, 2004). Responsible Care is viewed as a sector-specific collaborative initiative, whereas sustainability broadly encompasses issues of competitive positioning and business growth, which involve full engagement of internal and external stakeholders. Even as Responsible Care expands focus to include more sustainability parameters, it is not (seen as) sufficient to drive an overall sustainability program, performance, and the business value derived from sustainable development (Savitz, Chapter 8, Section 8.2). 

Obtain external stakeholder expectations of chemical industry performance ... 

S P) Standard and Poors, http //www.spglobal.com/. Accessed October 2004. SustainAbility, External Stakeholder Survey. Final Report for the Global Strategic Review of Responsible Care. SustainAbility, Washington D.C., February 2004. 

Characterize the degree of external stakeholder scrutiny to which your organization is subject ... 

Employee 1 Response to pressures Res pond to stakeholder pressures related to employee External Stakeholder... 

How do companies manage the control issue when often reputation - so critical to brand - is in the hands of external stakeholders ... 

Net Impact for the Forum for Corporate Conscience, Communications with Internal and External Stakeholders, Forum in Action Workshop, May 19 -20, 2004. 

Once the financial, environmental, and social indicators and associated metrics have been developed, they may be used to assess an organization s sustainability performance through a sustainability audit, either internally by the organization, or by external stakeholders such as shareholders or environmental nongovernmental organizations (NGOs).25... 

It is critical that key senior officials actively participate on the steering committee and perhaps in the audit process itself. This will help ensure their buy-in of the process and motivate them to implement the resulting recommendations. Involving external stakeholders assures an increased level of objectivity in the process and can begin to build mutually beneficial relationships where they did not exist. 

Greater external stakeholder participation in government and corporate decision-making... 

Focus Group Perspective 5 Need for a Standardized Reporting Framework. Chemical companies are constantly bombarded by investors and other stakeholders seeking sustainability-related information. Most stakeholders do not understand or appreciate the cost of this effort, or the limitations on what companies can provide. Companies, the industry as a whole, and external stakeholders would each benefit from a standardized approach or format for tracking and reporting sustainability related information. 

Building social capital is about engaging with external stakeholders, such as local communities, and supporting employees. Examples include a job creation program at Berre, where site facilities were offered for use by start-up companies to create new jobs, and the promotion of diversity among employees. 

One of the key changes that a commitment to SD has delivered is an acceptance that it is necessary to involve external stakeholders in dialog and the decision-making process right from the start of a project. That involvement varies from specific engagement on the particular implications of a new project, to work on overall policy themes such as human rights. 

Stakeholder involvement. Inputs from internal and external stakeholders, which are critical to continuous improvement and continued success of the company. 

Input from internal and external stakeholders is also critical to continuous improvement and our continued success. GSK actively seeks stakeholder involvement for its Plan for Excellence and its Corporate Social Responsibility initiatives. In addition, customer feedback is routinely obtained and helps to focus attention on issues that affect the public through the consumption of GSK products. GSK has also published reports of its EHS performance since 1992 and has continued to develop and enhance its reporting to align with many of the features recommended by the Global Reporting Initiative. 

The global chemical industry will extend existing local, national and global dialogue processes to enable the industry to address the concerns and expectations of external stakeholders to aid in the continuing development of Responsible Care. 

Jane and Maureen anticipated the needs of various interested audiences-teach-ers, students, scholars, professionals, and external stakeholders. They anticipated and constructed what Ruth Ray (1993) coined "local knowledge,...knowledge for the community of teachers within one s department, school, community, district, or state" (86), and "global knowledge,...knowledge...for the field of composition" (90). Stations... 

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