Simon Bussell, BKL’s Marketing and Business Development Director, has discussed our B Corp certification in an ICAEW article on the B Corporation movement.
“We’d been working for several years to ensure we created a diverse, inclusive place to work where everyone’s voice can be heard. In that time, we’d embedded diversity and inclusion (D&I) practices deeply into our systems to build a culture of innovation and creative ideas. Plus, we’d set up the BKL Foundation, which allocates a percentage of our profits to charity. So, as part of our ongoing efforts to make a positive impact through our business, B Corp felt like a natural next step for us.”
“At the questionnaire stage, “we’d said that we were working with a social mobility charity [LTSB] to represent underserved populations. So we had to provide data around that – including figures about our employees’ backgrounds, age range and salaries.”
“The whole certification process took 14 months,” Bussell says. “We passed first time, with a score of 83.6 points, and were awarded a very rare Impact Business Model for our work with people.”
“If we hadn’t already put so much work into how we support and develop our people and create an inclusive environment where everyone has a voice, I don’t think we’d have done as well as we did.”
“Part of threading an ESG approach through every aspect of the business involves helping clients with their own responsibilities and questions, plus helping other firms and our people. It’s about using our standing as a business in the market we’re in to share what we’ve learned and keep doing more.”
“We’re already finding that potential employees are interested in and excited to know more about our B Corp status. On the commercial side, meanwhile, we’ve noticed that it’s opened doors to opportunities we wouldn’t otherwise have had from our existing client base – as well as from external clients coming to us independently.”
Also in the article are insights from Joanna Adjetey, Customer Success Coordinator at B Lab UK: the organisation that oversees the certification of B Corps in the UK.
The article is available to read on the ICAEW website here.
If you’d like to discuss B Corp certification and how to approach it for your businesses, our ESG specialists would be happy to help. Please get in touch using our enquiry form.
You can also learn more in this video, where Simon Bussell chats to our Head of ESG Myfanwy Neville: