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The CSR Academy may extend its reach by licensing its training materials for use worldwide.
The academy, established last year by the UK government to improve CSR education and training in Britain, is in talks with an international training company that wants to buy a licence to use its competency framework. The framework outlines the skills and competencies required by managers and other staff with CSR responsibilities.
The company is likely to run training sessions based on the framework similar to those run by the academy’s UK partners. Andrew Dunnett, the academy’s director, told EP: ‘I anticipate that in the not too distant future the master-classes model will be repeated in another location in the world. We’re planning a small six-month pilot with a large, respected training company with a view to then rolling it out to other parts of the world.’
The academy was set up with UK companies in mind, but Dunnett said the interest shown by the training organization ‘has prompted us to look at the idea of licensing’ and the deployment of the framework abroad ‘would be a natural extension of what we’re trying to do’.
Licensing would generate income for the academy, whose £300,000 ($566,000) funding from the UK government runs out on 24 July. ‘If the framework is transferable to other geographical locations, then we must look at the idea, because whatever revenue streams we can create from that will enable us to develop further products,’ said Dunnett.
The academy believes further government funding is now more likely after strong demand for its programmes, which include regional seminars for small businesses, master-classes for large companies and roadshows for CSR and human resources professionals.
Most of the events have been fully booked or are nearly full, taking between 50 and 70 delegates each, even though Dunnett says marketing has been limited. Extra dates have been added.
In addition, 20 business schools – one in five of the UK total – have now said that this year they will use the academy’s framework in their executive education programmes, mainly MBAs. Business schools in other countries too have requested copies of the framework.
A CSR Academy award is to be presented for the first time at Business in the Community’s Awards for Excellence in July. The winner will be the company judged to have most successfully integrated the academy’s framework into its training and development programme.
Training on the AA1000 Assurance Standard has been extended to cover Japan and South Africa. The Institute of Social and Ethical Accountability, which set up the verification standard in 2002, is holding two one-day training courses in Tokyo this month, and one in Johannesburg. Isea says that the courses, financially supported by PricewaterhouseCoopers, are intended for corporate social responsibility managers, internal auditors and external assurance providers. Attendance will help individuals to qualify as Sustainability Assurance Practitioners within the certification programme recently instituted by London-based Isea and the International Register of Certified Auditors (EP6, issue 7, p6). The scheme seeks to raise sustainability reporting standards.
The academy, established last year by the UK government to improve CSR education and training in Britain, is in talks with an international training company that wants to buy a licence to use its competency framework. The framework outlines the skills and competencies required by managers and other staff with CSR responsibilities.
The company is likely to run training sessions based on the framework similar to those run by the academy’s UK partners. Andrew Dunnett, the academy’s director, told EP: ‘I anticipate that in the not too distant future the master-classes model will be repeated in another location in the world. We’re planning a small six-month pilot with a large, respected training company with a view to then rolling it out to other parts of the world.’
The academy was set up with UK companies in mind, but Dunnett said the interest shown by the training organization ‘has prompted us to look at the idea of licensing’ and the deployment of the framework abroad ‘would be a natural extension of what we’re trying to do’.
Licensing would generate income for the academy, whose £300,000 ($566,000) funding from the UK government runs out on 24 July. ‘If the framework is transferable to other geographical locations, then we must look at the idea, because whatever revenue streams we can create from that will enable us to develop further products,’ said Dunnett.
The academy believes further government funding is now more likely after strong demand for its programmes, which include regional seminars for small businesses, master-classes for large companies and roadshows for CSR and human resources professionals.
Most of the events have been fully booked or are nearly full, taking between 50 and 70 delegates each, even though Dunnett says marketing has been limited. Extra dates have been added.
In addition, 20 business schools – one in five of the UK total – have now said that this year they will use the academy’s framework in their executive education programmes, mainly MBAs. Business schools in other countries too have requested copies of the framework.
A CSR Academy award is to be presented for the first time at Business in the Community’s Awards for Excellence in July. The winner will be the company judged to have most successfully integrated the academy’s framework into its training and development programme.
Training on the AA1000 Assurance Standard has been extended to cover Japan and South Africa. The Institute of Social and Ethical Accountability, which set up the verification standard in 2002, is holding two one-day training courses in Tokyo this month, and one in Johannesburg. Isea says that the courses, financially supported by PricewaterhouseCoopers, are intended for corporate social responsibility managers, internal auditors and external assurance providers. Attendance will help individuals to qualify as Sustainability Assurance Practitioners within the certification programme recently instituted by London-based Isea and the International Register of Certified Auditors (EP6, issue 7, p6). The scheme seeks to raise sustainability reporting standards.Super Featured
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