Clarke visiting south Sudan

We believe that the great problems of the world require the combined efforts of all sectors: government, NGOs and the private sector. At Save the Children, we are committed to making those partnerships as effective as possible.

We welcome the growing engagement of the business world with organizations such as ours to achieve change for the better in our shared global society and environment.  Achieving successful and sustainable outcomes in these collaborations requires all partners to understand the motivations, needs and cultural behaviours of each other.

We recognize the importance of this two-way process. We have learned over many years of experience that the strongest relationships result from listening and understanding each other’s position and being clear about the end goals of the partnership.

In recent years, CSR policy and practice has advanced significantly, with organizations both in the NGO and corporate sectors developing strategies for constructive engagement based on practical experience.  The Millennium Development Goals have also helped to sharpen the focus for corporate partnerships with NGOs and have encouraged Save the Children to look for more innovative and flexible ways to collaborate. 

In Save the Children, we set out to establish what we and our partners expect from the relationship and to be clear about how we will work together. We agree on aims and measures of success so that we and our corporate partners can be fully accountable to our stakeholders.

Our priority is to promote children’s rights and better the lives of children around the world. With that in mind, we work in a transparent and accountable manner, ensuring that impact for children remains at the forefront of all our mutual partnership objectives. We ask our corporate partners to understand and work within universal principles and standards regarding the rights and livelihoods of children as expressed in the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child.

For Save the Children, the partnership process can involve helping our corporate partners to address challenges facing them, particularly on issues of supply chain scrutiny and child labour practices.  Our experiences with IKEA provide an encouraging example of what can be achieved through a strong and enduring NGO–business partnership. In 1994, Save the Children began a partnership with IKEA, with the objective of examining child labour issues and drawing up a new code of conduct for child rights within the company.

Today, the partnership with IKEA extends around the world and has led to initiatives for children globally, nationally and locally in approximately 20 countries.  The focus has broadened from child labour to a holistic approach on children’s rights.  In Kolkata, India, for example, the objective is to reduce violence and abuse of children working in home environments.  IKEA also supports our work against child trafficking.  These programmes are funded from IKEA’s soft toy campaign every Christmas. Last year, the campaign raised over €1 million for our work.

The Boston Consulting Group (BCG) has worked with Save the Children for 20 years to address strategic and organizational development issues, enabling us to perform more effectively and efficiently across the 110 countries in which we work.  Secondments of BCG personnel allow us to deepen the relationship and understand each other in greater depth.
 
A new partnership with KPMG, the global network of professional firms, has opened doors to fresh engagement opportunities – ranging from practical assistance in the orphanages supported by Save the Children Romania to helping Save the Children in our work to harmonize infrastructure and working practices in countries where we are unifying multiple field offices into a single country presence. 

Our partnership with leading executive search firm Egon Zehnder International has enabled us to identify and recruit the best people for the key jobs in our global organization.

In addition, partners have supported our efforts to reach hundreds of thousands of children in humanitarian crises through the coordination and distribution of gifts and services.  For example, after the 2004 Tsunami, IKEA donated urgently-needed bedding for displaced children and their families.  Over 10,000 corporations around the world have actively supported our work in the aftermath of the Tsunami and in other major emergencies since 2004. We see an increasing role for businesses to help us in emergency response and recovery work, particularly within the fields of logistics and communications.

At the 2007 Global Compact Leaders Summit, the message was clear: it is time to move from policy to action. It is time to act strategically and scale up if we are to collectively achieve the Millennium Development Goals. Save the Children is ready to do just that. We welcome new opportunities to work together with the United Nations, NGO and business communities to find common solutions to the challenges facing the world’s most vulnerable children.

Barry Clarke is Chair of the International Save the Children Alliance which comprises 28 national organizations working in 110 countries and spending over $900 million on programmes for children. He was formerly Chair of Save the Children UK. Barry is a partner in Change~Agency, a research and consultation firm advising companies on brand strategy and corporate social responsibility. He was previously chairman of Proximity London, one of the UK’s leading specialists in customer relationship management.