Raising the standard

BCD Travel maintains top corporate social responsibility rating to rank among top 1 percent of all suppliers

BCD Travel has earned a gold ranking in an independent assessment measuring its corporate social responsibility performance — the only travel management company to achieve the top rating for two consecutive years.

The ranking places BCD Travel in the top 1% of all suppliers assessed by EcoVadis, the world’s leading platform for CSR ratings for global supply chains. In achieving its gold CSR ranking, BCD Travel improved upon its previous year’s score by 15%.

“We’re extremely proud of achieving top recognition by EcoVadis for two consecutive years, because it affirms our long-term commitment as an organization to operating responsibly and sustainably,” said Kathy Jackson, BCD Travel’s executive vice president of global program management and executive chair of corporate social responsibility.

BCD’s year-over-year improvement was driven by a handful of key initiatives, including:

·      Establishment of a new sustainability reporting format

·      Defined quantitative objectives

·      Detailed Global Reporting Initiative (GRI) reporting

·      Implementation of a certified global management system for environmental, health & safety

The EcoVadis methodology examines 21 criteria across four themes of Environment, Fair labor practices, ethics/fair business practices, and supply chain. Based on international CSR standards, the methodology includes the Global Reporting Initiative, the United Nations Global Compact, and the ISO 26000, covering 150 spend categories and 140 countries. GRI is the world’s most widely used sustainability framework. More than 30,000 companies use EcoVadis to reduce risk, drive innovation and foster transparency and trust between trading partners.

“This is an impressive achievement,” said David McClintock, Marketing Director at EcoVadis. “Generally, as a company’s CSR program matures, it becomes more challenging to make incremental improvements in the EcoVadis rating. The work BCD Travel invested in its CSR program over the past 12 months has paid off with a solid 15% improvement. Their dedication sets a great example, even for the most mature programs to keep striving for excellence."

More than 150 leading multinationals worldwide, including Verizon, Nestlé, Johnson & Johnson, Heineken, Coca-Cola Enterprises, Nokia, L’Oréal, Bayer, Alcatel-Lucent, ING Bank, Air France-KLM, Centrica/British Gas, BASF, and Merck use EcoVadis to monitor the CSR performance of their supply chains.

Rather than approaching corporate social responsibility as an independent set of goals, BCD regards CSR as an underlying component of everything it does, Jackson said. “It’s part of who we are as an organization. In addition to bolstering our reputation as a great company to do business with, that approach has also won us recognition as one of the best employers to work for.”

In late August, BCD Travel became the first travel management company to reach for and achieve silver accreditation from Investors in People, a globally recognized workplace ratings firm. The GBTA Foundation’s Project ICARUS recognized BCD Travel as recipient of the Sustainability Outstanding Achievement Award in the Travel Intermediary category twice for its sustainability efforts. BCD Travel also is partnering with GBTA in building a new self-assessment tool that will allow corporate travel buyers to benchmark the maturity level of their company’s sustainability program

Exciting times ahead ! #loveyourtravelers #travelsmart #proud2beBCD