• Home
• Responsibility
• CR Report 2005
• Managing Corporate Responsibility

Managing Corporate Responsibility

Corporate responsibility supports our business strategy by preparing us to meet future expectations, protecting our reputation and helping us to reduce business risk. See Why CR is important to GSK. So it is important that management of CR issues is integrated into our day-to-day operations.

This section explains how we manage CR including our CR principles and the verification process for this report.

Our approach to CR is informed by frequent discussions with a range of stakeholders, including employees, shareholders, patients, doctors, governments and NGOs. For information on our engagement process and the feedback we have received, see Stakeholder engagement and Government and external affairs.

CR governance
GSK’s Corporate Responsibility Committee consists of non-executive directors and provides a Board-level forum for reviewing external issues with the potential to impact on GSK’s business and reputation. It provides high-level guidance on our approach to all CR issues. Members of the corporate executive team , including the CEO, also attend CRC meetings.

The Committee meets four times a year to review our policies and progress on our CR principles. Policies and activities relating to four of the principles - access to medicines, standards of ethical conduct, research and innovation and global community partnerships – are reviewed annually. Other principles are discussed regularly, at least once every three years. The Committee’s findings are reported to the Board.

During 2005 the Committee met four times and reviewed our activity in a number of areas including:

• Access to medicines
• Animal testing
• Clinical trials in developing countries
• Community partnerships
• Corporate responsibility reporting including final sign-off of the CR report
• Reputation management

Management of significant business risks is coordinated by the Risk and Oversight Compliance Council (ROCC). The ROCC also considers reputational and corporate responsibility risks.

For more background information on the CRC and ROCC, see Risk management and compliance.

Management structure
We believe that day-to-day management of CR issues and performance is done most effectively within our business operations, where experts on all our CR issues work.

Coordination is provided by a cross-functional team, made up of representatives from key business areas. These representatives are senior managers and have direct access to the appropriate Executive Team member. Their role is to oversee development, implementation and communication of CR policy across GSK. This ensures a comprehensive and consistent approach is taken throughout the organisation.

We also have a small CR team that co-ordinates policy development, reporting, and communication with socially responsible investment analysts.

For details of our Environment Health and Safety management see EHS management.

GSK's CR Committee

Sir Christopher is the former Chief Executive Officer of Vodafone Group Plc. He is a non-executive director of Lehman Brothers Holdings Inc; a director of the International Advisory Board of Hakluyt & Co; and is a Senior Adviser at Bain and Co.

Sir Ian was formerly a non-executive Director of SmithKline Beecham Plc. He was Chairman and Chief Executive of Bass plc (latterly InterContinental Hotels plc) and Chairman of the World Travel and Tourism Council. He is non-executive Deputy Chairman of BP plc and a non-executive director of Sara Lee Corporation. He is also a member of the CBI President's Committee.

Dr Shapiro is Ludwig Professor of Cancer Research in the Department of Developmental Biology and Director of the Beckman Center for Molecular and Genetic Medicine at the Stanford University School of Medicine. She holds a PhD in molecular biology from Albert Einstein College of Medicine.

Back to top