“An investment in knowledge pays the best interest.” ~ Benjamin Franklin

Corporate citizenship is a unique field in that, through its practice, we seek to address an enormous range of issues—from water stewardship to employee wellness to access to education.

Our mission of employing each company’s specific capabilities to provide quantifiable value to both business and society demands much of us as corporate citizenship professionals. To achieve it, each of us must have a thorough understanding of our company’s social and environmental impacts, an awareness of our stakeholders’ needs and interests, a strategy that addresses the issues that are material to our business and which our firm’s capabilities are best suited to tackle, and a way to measure and evaluate our impact.

With emerging regulations, evolving technologies, and rapidly shifting demands affecting our programs, we must look to the horizon to prepare for new challenges and opportunities. How can we accomplish all this? By looking to our networks—and our resources—for help. Like Benjamin Franklin, whose accomplishments range from inventing the lightning rod to negotiating the Treaty of Paris, we must remain curious—and must never stop learning.

Here at the Boston College Center for Corporate Citizenship, we work to provide as many resources as possible to advance this important work by capturing insights from the latest research and access to experts from around the world, while also offering new ways to tap into the expertise and experience of your peers. In this issue of The Corporate Citizen, you will hear about some of these experiences, in many cases, directly from our members themselves.

You’ll also find a complete catalog of Center education offerings. We continually expand and update our course content and advisory products, and provide expert guidance on a wide range of topics and tools in an effort to provide value to the full range of corporate citizenship professionals— whether you’re beginning your educational journey, want to round out your skills, are in need of a refresher, or are well on your way to earning one of our three certificates.

As part of the Carroll School of Management at Boston College, we have the assets of a great university supporting our work and more than three decades of experience in the practice—experience that has continually reinforced the vital role of learning in our collective efforts to create a sustainable and prosperous future. We encourage you to continue to challenge yourself and grow by participating in at least one of our programs in the coming year. It will be only by learning—from experts in the field and from each other—that we will achieve the true objective of corporate citizenship: a world in which we both want to do business, and in which we want to live.