David Gonski:companies must care for all their stakeholders

David Gonski says he was ‘bowled over’ by the community work of individuals in last year’s crises of bushfires and COVID-19.

David Gonski.

David Gonski says he was “bowled over” by the community work of individuals in last year’s crises of bushfires and COVID-19.

The businessman and company chair with more than four decades of experience says: “You would expect maybe an older businessman not to have tears often but what they did to keep things going in the middle of the fires … It makes you feel frankly that human nature is fantastic.”

As chair of the judging panel for The Biggies awards launched by the Business Council of Australia, Gonski is excited about what the awards can do to inspire ­others to follow the leads of individuals and businesses in 2020.

Winners will be announced at the annual BCA dinner on Monday night and The Australian will publish a special issue of The Deal, celebrating the awards, on Tuesday.

Gonski is adamant that the awards are not window dressing.

“Over the past few years many parts of business have been either punished or criticised,” he says.

“This is not an attempt to suggest that business when it does something wrong should not be criticised.

“But business is people and most of us involved in business know that there are many in business who do incredible things and they do this often every day.”

The rationale for The Biggies is two-fold: “First to recognise those who go a bit further than the norm; and the second thing is ­aspirational. Obviously, if (winning an award) becomes something that is important … it can become aspirational. It stands as an aspiration for business to do good things.”

What of the argument that business needs to stick to the core business of making profits? Says Gonski: “The modern business person knows that shareholders are very important but to run a business in the long term you have to have wider stakeholders who include your staff, your communities and your customers.

“It may cost to do good things in the short term but often in the long term (it will be rewarded) whether it be through getting good employees who are proud to be part of the company or making sure you are in touch with your community and your community knows you care.”

He is hopeful the work done by business last year will help build trust in the corporate sector.

“The big supermarket chains, what they did keeping their stores open during the bushfires and also in COVID, keeping their stores stocked, open and operating, is an absolute testimony, not just to the companies but also to their employees.”

The banks also stepped up by giving customers some certainty that they would not be in trouble during the pandemic. Another example was the work done by airports to stay open.

“When you do something bad you deserve basically to be criticised but when you do something good also — I think it should be recognised when people go above and beyond,” Gonski says.

But will people be prepared to celebrate business after a year in which so many people were laid off by companies because of the pandemic?

“A lot of the companies that have done amazing things, didn’t let go staff,” Gonski says.

“Coles employed 12,000 more people. The fact is that many of them kept staff and many increased staff.

“Those that had to let people go, may also have felt an obligation to their communities. Yes, it’s terrible when they can’t afford to keep staff, but if they have commitment to their local areas as well, we shouldn’t forget that ­either.”

Gonski says a new generation of workers requires their employers to have a social conscience, and “therefore I am positive that whether we have further crises or not, business will continue to do good things. Staff require it, communities require it and I think even the customers require it.

“When I started in business 44 years ago, the concept of companies returning profits to their shareholders was paramount and there was a short-term view in relation to that,” he says.

“Today the good news is that we are starting to look a bit longer term and hopefully one of the good things to come out of COVID is that we need to look long term, we need to see what can happen and we need to prepare and, if we are looking longer term, there is a commitment on us to look more broadly than just the profits we return to our shareholders.

“Boards and companies have obligations to their shareholders but in the longer term, doing good things in the community produces an asset for the shareholder, rather than an expense.”

Are there gaps that companies still need to fill? Gonksi says companies “do an amazing amount” but he is a great advocate of mentoring, advising and assisting not just employees but customers and the broader community. The aim is to educate and assist customers to “break down barriers — I am a company, you are a customer. It’s about working together.”