Valoración pre y post intervención

In this section, the survey questions addressing the following two research questions posed in this study, Research Question 2: Do mining companies engage NGOs to identify their social and environmental information needs? and Research Question 3: What methods do mining companies utilise in engaging with NGOs in order to identify their social and environmental needs? will be developed.

Stakeholder engagement has become a practice increasingly adopted by many companies (Andriof and Waddock, 2002; Burchell and Cook, 2006a,b, 2008; van Huijstee and Glasbergen, 2008; Manetti, 2011; Kaur and Lodhia, 2014; Manetti and Bellucci, 2016). Practices companies utilise vary and include, but are not limited to, strategic alliances and partnerships, social partnerships and multi-sector collaborations (Andriof and Waddock, 2002, p.20). Firms adopt various methods of engagement such as one-to-one dialogues, working groups, roundtables, conferences, committees, focus groups, forums, interviews, questionnaires or surveys (van Huijstee and Glasbergen, 2008; Habisch et al, 2011); workshops, online feedback, online discussion and ballots (Accountability et al, 2005). Additionally, companies can use electronic or ordinary mail, telephonic contacts, direct meetings, road shows, panels, public meetings, partnerships, and talking to local representatives (Manetti, 2011).

Choice of the engagement practice depends on several factors considered separately or together by a company. These factors are:

1) Purpose of the engagement (Van Huijstee and Glasbergen, 2008),

2) Desired level of involvement of stakeholders in corporate decision-making (Cumming, 2001; Green and Hunton-Clarke, 2003; Morsing and Schultz, 2006), 3) Communication flow between companies and stakeholders (Morsing and

Schultz, 2006),

4) Nature of the relationship between companies and stakeholders (AccountAbility et al, 2005)27_.

An example of the choice of engagement practice based on the purpose of the engagement is illustrated in Van Huijstee and Glasbergen (2008). They showed that one-to-one dialogues are used primarily for building relationships with stakeholders;

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whilst working groups are used in order to gain their knowledge and opinion on a particular issue. Roundtables which are usually held at the level of an industry or a sector are used to tackle issues which a whole industry faces. Conferences which are normally multi-stakeholder events are adopted for either building relationships with stakeholders or continuing a dialogue with them.

One of the purposes of the engagement between companies and NGOs is the identification of NGOs social and environmental information needs, which is the focus of this study. The literature has shown that companies invite a range of stakeholders, including NGOs, in order to explore what social and environmental information they wished to see covered in corporate reports (Gray et al, 1997; O’Dwyer, 2005; Manetti, 2011). Further studies, for example, Gao and Zhang (2001) have also investigated the nature of engagement practices as utilised by British Telecom (BT), The Co-operative Bank and Vancouver City Savings Credit Union (VanCity) to explore stakeholders’ information needs. BT employed focus groups discussions and one-to-one interviews to identify what their stakeholders, with NGOs among them, perceive to be the social effects and impacts of BT. The Co-operative bank used a ‘partnership ballot’ to collect data on stakeholder opinions on specific issues. VanCity invited members, employees, community organisations and credit unions to participate in focus group discussions. These are examples of some of the practices used to consult stakeholders.

A number of companies have sought to not only consult their stakeholders but to directly involve them in the preparation of the corporate social and environmental report. For example, Cooper and Owen (2007) found that some companies have arranged for their stakeholders to be represented in corporate governance arrangements (BHP Billiton’s Forum on Corporate Responsibility, British Telecom’s Advisory Panel for Social Responsibility and Camelot’s Stakeholder Advisory Panel). The purpose of these panels was to identify the social and environmental information stakeholders were interested in having within company reports and subsequently to produce the reports. Stakeholders invited included representative of the management, leaders of several NGOs and community opinion leaders.

Further, Morsing and Schultz (2006) found that stakeholders of Novo Nordisk and Vodafone were also directly involved in preparation of social and environmental reports. They had an opportunity to directly include their comments and critique on issues of importance with respect to their relationship with the company and other issues of

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concern in corporate reports. Among stakeholders were representatives of NGOs, managers, employees, customers, opinion makers, capital markets representatives and the public. Thus, NGOs may be approached by companies for the purpose of identifying their information needs, and a number of different practices appear to be utilised in the engagement such as one-to-one dialogues, working groups, roundtables, conferences, committees, focus groups, forums, interviews, questionnaires or surveys. There are, however, more practices available for the companies to adopt when engaging with their stakeholders. For example, focusing specifically on the mining industry, studies have shown that companies employ such methods as media, conferences, government workshops, community forums or town events (such as town meetings, charity fund raisers or sporting matches) (Murguía and Böhling, 2013; Dobele et al, 2014).

The following survey questions have been developed to address Research Question 2: “Do mining companies engage NGOs to identify their social and environmental information needs?” and Research Question 3: “What methods do mining companies adopt to engage and identify the social and environmental needs of NGOs?”

Survey Questions:

 At any time, have mining companies approached NGOs to explore reporting of social and environmental information?

 In what ways have mining companies engaged with NGOs in order to explore the types of social and environmental information NGOs would like to see reported?

 Which methods have proved to be the most successful in allowing NGOs to communicate information needs to mining companies?

The preceding discussion has explored company engagement with their stakeholders to explore their social and environmental information needs. However, stakeholders can also approach companies if they wish to communicate their concerns to the management. The following section addresses the next two research questions posed in

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this study which are focused on whether and how NGOs engage with mining companies in order to inform them of their information needs.

5.4. Development of the Survey Questions to Explore NGO Engagement with