I Hate Orphans

By Scott Lewis
Managing Director, Willard PR

When I told my colleague how I feel about orphans, she reacted as though I had admitted to engaging in cannibalism.  Like most caring, compassionate people, she can't comprehend what kind of monster could hate orphans, much less be dumb or callous enough to admit that they hated orphans.

Though some segments of society may hold a morbid fascination with latter-day cannibals, there is little sympathy for orphan-haters.

But I said it, and I felt better for having said it.  Before you get angry with me, allow me to explain. It's true that there are too many orphans in Ukraine, and that the government and private charities are ill-equipped to care for them.  Addressing the problems that create orphans - like poverty, alcoholism, and drug abuse - would go a long way toward reducing the number of future orphans.  Please understand, though, that it isn't the kids that I can't stand, it's what orphans, as a group, represent in the business world. 

I hate orphans because they - more than pensioners or veterans of the Great Patriotic War or any other group I can think of in contemporary Ukraine - are an easy and often picturesque excuse for lazy, unimaginative company managers looking for a 'corporate social responsibility' project.

If you suggest CSR to a multi-national doing business in Ukraine, they will point to the orphanage dormitory that employees painted one spring day. Or to the three cases of disposable diapers that were delivered one year. Or to the cash that was presented to the orphanage's thankful administrator to be used at her discretion.

These are easy programs, but they have loads of problems.  They are not well thought through, they are sporadic, and they do nothing for the donor except apply a little balm to the corporate conscience.  Sometimes - as in the case of cash and donated products - they do no good at all, except for the administrator, who pockets the money or resells the donated products at the local market.

These foolish efforts can be almost comical in their good-hearted incompetence. One company was determined to share its environmental message with the residents of a local orphanage.  They planned to involve employees and the kids in a series of educational games, then to present each child with a gift at days' end.  The gift that company managers felt most appropriate was a ceramic coffee mug bearing the corporate logo and a motto urging conservation.  

Ignore for a moment that your average orphan has already had his fill of recycling: His clothes, toys and books are all "pre-owned". Yet I can still envision the happy youngsters at the end of their busy day - wearing tattered clothes, living in a drafty dormitory, eating dull institutional food and with few toys.  Yesterday, these boys and girls had nothing to call their own, but tonight, as they nestle into their beds, they'll be happily clutching a pamphlet on composting and a ceramic coffee mug.

Someone has to urge managers to get real, and the company's public relations staff or consultants should lead the charge. Tossing a figurative bone to the local orphans is paternalism defined. Send the managing director over in a Ded Moroz costume at Christmas to hand out candy, or load the kids on to a bus and treat them to a day at the zoo if you like, but don't call it CSR.  To check that box off your list you need to satisfy a few tough criteria.

A good CSR program should be relevant to your business, it should result in a measurable benefit to the public and it should be sustainable.  A sustainable program not only can be repeated, but must be repeated at a regular interval, to ensure that funds are likely to be available beyond the end of the fiscal year.

Ultimately, a CSR program should be creative as well - a one-of-a-kind solution to a social problem or need that the public will associate with your company. Remember, that's why we're really doing this. If you want to make an anonymous gift, do it with your personal wealth, not with company funds. CSR is all about showing the public what a great corporate citizen your firm is.

Cash donations - especially to third-party donors or intermediaries - will rarely, if ever, meet the criteria for a genuine CSR program because the recipient will logically associate the aid with the immediate benefactor, rather than the principal donor.

If you want to work with orphans, make it relevant to your business and useful to the orphans.  A company that manufactures kitchen fixtures might renovate and equip orphanage kitchens, and use the 'before' and 'after' photographs in advertising.

If you really want to help an orphan, adopt one.  He'll bring his own ceramic coffee mug.