Redefining the Business Case for Worker Rights

Authors

Scott Chang, Former Manager, BSR

When I worked in San Francisco, I helped several companies develop codes of conduct for worker rights to ensure social compliance in their supply chains. When I lived in Guangzhou, I worked extensively to convince factory managers to implement these codes. In both places, I was always asked: "What is the business case for doing this work?" Or, in bolder terms, "How much more money can I make if I design or comply with a code of conduct?"

We set out to answer similar questions two weeks ago in Vietnam at a convening—facilitated by BSR—of Levi Strauss Foundation grantees (a set of global pioneering labor rights experts), senior members of the Levi Strauss & Co. Terms of Engagement team, and key staff from the Levi Strauss Foundation. In the past, I’ve tried to answer these questions with a business audience. However, with a set of practically minded and ideal-driven NGO leaders in the room, we were compelled to look at something larger: the vision behind our work.

With a more philanthropic lens, we pushed ourselves to think beyond auditing protocols, capacity building, and codes of conduct. Instead, we focused on the practical, strategic, and long-term ways in which we can really make a positive impact on both the business and the lives of workers.

I’m often so mired in making the “real business case” for social compliance—one that makes sense only if there are dollars and cents behind it—that it becomes the only framework I remember. But as one attendee pointed out, “We indeed need to speak the language of factory managers, but we also need to speak the language of basic human decency—the ‘moral case for CSR.’ The rights of workers is not an optional issue that is in any way contingent on whether there are dollars to be made or saved.”

After two days of facilitating and lots of airplane travel, I left Vietnam fired up instead of tired out. The experience was a great reminder of two things: First, I do this work to make a real difference in the way society runs; and second, thinking about labor compliance as a way to “change the world” doesn’t make my thinking idealistic and unrealistic, but all the more compelling and strategic.