GIVINGtrax Filling a CSR Need

Check out this new, Tacoma startup that is working to link the intentions of business with the efforts of nonprofits and the power of consumers.  GIVINGtrax™ uses the power of technology to enable companies to begin measuring the impact of community engagement in a tangible way. 

I have heard from many business owners, especially small businesses, that they are committed to supporting worthy community organizations, but they really don’t have a sense of how their contributions are making a difference for their communities or their bottom line. This new tool offers firms of all sizes the opportunity to leverage technology to begin making the link between the two.

There used to be an argument that the social responsibility of business is to maximize value (profits) for owners. There are two problems with this argument: 1) it assumes an either/or position that is patently false and, 2) it takes a short-term approach to value.

“For decades, business leaders felt that they had to make tradeoffs, balancing between being sustainable and socially responsible or being profitable.  Well that dog don’t hunt for business.  You basically have to have the opposite.  You have to be profitable by being socially responsible and sustainable.”

Sally Jewell, President & CEO
REI

The new paradigm for business is that the two are critically linked.  A firm's social responsibility has a dramatic effect on its reputation and reputation is the single most important driver of long-term value.  Successful business leaders of tomorrow will not measure success by the next quarterly report.  They will use a new kind of measurement that accounts for the value of very tangible, but difficult to measure, factors like reputation.

GIVINGtrax™  is going to be a useful tool for calculating that value.