Consulting


EthixAdvice offers consulting and strategic advice on business ethics and intercultural communication. Our expertise embraces the following areas:

 

Corporate Social Responsibility strategy and reporting

A clear CSR strategy and reporting win and keep customers’ trust in the long term. CSR helps your organization to place the balance between profit and social responsibility in a long-term perspective. By connecting and responding to society's needs, CSR provides an essential tool for innovating existing business models. It is a window to the sustainable future by learning from the past (reports and evaluations) and improving the present (interventions in management strategy, supply chains, labor conditions and environmental issues).

EthixAdvice can support your company in developing a coherent CSR vision and implementation. Transparency and trust are the key goals of our advice. A CSR vision starts within formulating you core values and ambitions. This normative vision needs to be further translated into a set of quantitative indicators formulated by international communities on non-financial reporting (UN Global Compact, GRI, KPMG, etc.). A new goal of combining financial and non-financial data is upcoming in the sphere of CSR reporting. This is exactly what EthixAdvice wants to achieve - a new balance between measurable benefit and extra-mathematic value of trust. This creates transparency for investors and stakeholders, and makes the ethical profile of your company understandable for society and customers.

 

Stakeholder dialog and interactions with civil society

Civil society has become a key player in global economy alongside businesses and governments. In the contemporary world of accessible information, civil society has acquired an unprecedented controlling power and impact. As a result, business companies cannot evade reacting to the growing influence of civil society and should be ready to engage in a reciprocal stakeholder dialog.

EthixAdvice can help your company engage in a meaningful two-way stakeholder dialog and integrate stakeholder interests in your business strategy. We have an understanding of what civil society is and how it works. We take into consideration the power of contemporary well-informed and conscious customers and the resonance of public opinion. Accountability and delivery are the priorities of stakeholder dialog. Accountability in communicating with diverse civil society organizations, understanding their needs and delivering results will contribute to the positive public image of your company.

 

Intercultural communication with East-European partners

In the context of a globalizing economy, international partnership is essential. Dealing with Eastern Europe, Western companies should take into consideration typical non-Western realities: the requirement of cross-participation, political and social challenges (human rights, the rule of law, anti-corruption strategy, ethnical conflicts) and post-Soviet economic legacies (intersection of private and public, weak CSR and citizens’ engagement).

EthixAdvice can support your company in diplomatic relations and intercultural communication with East-European partners. Our advice can be pivotal in bridging interests and business environments of different strategic partners. Growth and innovation are the underlying objectives in overcoming arising challenges. For instance, East European investors are increasingly interested in opportunities in Western markets, whereas Dutch companies are concerned about ‘Holland branding’ and sustainability policy in East European market.

 

Societal trends and corporate strategy

Globalization of business produces new risks but also offers immense opportunities. It complicates business activities by interconnecting environmental, social, political and cultural issues. A timely insight into possible social and political risks can turn these risks into opportunities.

EthixAdvice can be pivotal in identifying mayor societal trends, which are relevant for your business, and adjusting your corporate strategy. Managing social and political risks, insight into public attitudes and monitoring changing regulations provide new prospects for improving your business strategy.

 

Corporate governance and organizational culture

Efficient and prudent governance builds on trust. Organizational trust is a universal corporate value: it moves top-down starting from leaders’ ethical reasoning in decision-making and it grows bottom-up promoting employees' accountability and integrity. Thus trust creates a culture of horizontal accessibility and participation. This means that employees need to trust themselves, trust the leaders and trust each other.

With the aid of EthixAdvice, your company can gain a better insight into its governance and culture and learn about ways to measure and enhance trust. We suggest ways to mend corporate apathy, employees’ alienation from participation, ineffective channels of communication between leaders and employees, and inability to manage diverse interest groups. We think that inclusivity and acceptance of internal stakeholder interests are the main tools to manage the growing diversification of interests. Trust symbols can improve channels of communication between leaders and employees, whereby a structural feedback is essential.