On May 8, 2019, in our strategy to promote the Corporate Social Responsibility, we join the global network of AIM2Flourish, an international initiative of the Fowler Center for Business as an Agent of World Benefit at the Weatherhead School of Management.
In an interview with AIM2Flourish, we discussed INCYMA's vision and commitment to the Social Responsibility.
Incyma is a consulting firm located in Badajoz, Spain, with 12 years of experience and a commitment to Corporate Social Responsibility as a competitive strategy. This commitment empowers clients to implement best practices that benefit society and the environment. Incyma contributes to gender equality, quality education, decent work and economic growth, and responsible production and resource management.
Innovation
Every day, news reports emerge about environmental degradation. Just this past July 29th, Earth Overshoot Day was reached, the earliest date in the planet's history. This means that by that day, the natural resources allocated for 2019 had already been exhausted, according to the Global Footprint Network. At the same time, social breakdown is a daily topic of discussion, with such deplorable issues as mass shootings in shopping malls, human rights violations, femicides, and appalling working conditions.
Traditionally, businesses have had a single purpose: to make money, disregarding both human beings and nature in the process. Fortunately, companies have emerged that are committed to changing this paradigm by adopting practices that balance business operations with environmental stewardship and the well-being of their employees.
One of these companies is Incyma, an acronym for Innovation, Quality, and Environment, with a focus on social responsibility, promoting best practices both within the organization and among its clients. It is located in Badajoz, in the Science and Technology Park of Extremadura, the most vulnerable autonomous community in Spain. Extremadura is located in the southwest of the Iberian Peninsula and has the lowest Gross Domestic Product in the country.
Incyma's main goal is to bring corporate social responsibility (CSR) practices closer to small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs), which make up the vast majority of businesses in the region (99%), so that they gradually adopt them and a greater change is seen in the long term. “In Extremadura, with the regional standard, there are 14 companies certified in CSR, and Incyma has helped them pass the verification process. However, there are other international standards such as the Global Reporting Initiative (GRI), RS10, and many others, including the UN Global Compact, which is also a tool you can join but isn't certifiable; it provides you with resources,” stated Ana Ruano.
“In Spain there are already quite a few, not many, not as many as internationally, for example in South America where these CSR issues are much more developed than here. In the Nordic countries it's also noticeably more developed, but well, little by little everything is catching up. In Extremadura, a big push is still needed, because 14 companies with the regional standard is very few. We are pioneers in the area; there are companies that do things, but on a larger scale, let's say. We are already very well positioned in this sector,” he stated.
Incyma is an innovative company that also offers its clients services related to quality, environmental, risk, and safety management systems, as well as food safety and hygiene. In addition, it provides services in research, development, and innovation (R&D&I) management, strategic consulting, and training.
Inspiration
Incyma was founded by Ana Belén Ruano Durán and Natalia Cilleros Torres in 2007, just as the economic crisis was beginning in Spain. Initially, the company focused solely on implementing regulatory systems such as ISO standards, quality systems, and food safety systems. However, the crisis hit them hard. “Suddenly, in about a year, everything started to collapse. And since we specialize in implementing voluntary standards, when everything really slows down, naturally, that's the first thing they cut,” explains Ana Ruano. Currently, in addition to the two founders, Inmaculada Piñero Carretero collaborates with them, making the company a three-woman operation.
However, crises also present opportunities for growth, and that's precisely what Incyma decided to do. In the words of its director, “It was a very difficult time, but it helped us reinvent ourselves; it was then that we said, wow, we have to think about how we can position ourselves to do something that society truly needs, so we don't find ourselves in a situation like the one we've just been through.” It was then that they began training in Corporate Social Responsibility with various national and international organizations when it was still a relatively new concept in Spain, and now they are the pioneering consultancy in this area in the Extremadura region.
The concept of corporate social responsibility began to gain traction in 2010 and was primarily applied by large corporations. However, following the economic crisis, the paradigm that companies exist solely to generate profits for shareholders was reconsidered, and companies began to address other issues. “It’s clear that companies aren’t NGOs; they have to generate profits, but that doesn’t preclude them from also generating social and environmental benefits for the surrounding community, their employees, and all stakeholders,” stated Ruano Durán.
As part of Incyma's mission and vision, innovation is fundamental to introducing new improvements and adapting to the needs of its clients and society, as they believe that otherwise, the company is destined to fail. "Let's just say that innovation is something that any company, whether an SME or a micro-SME, has to have ingrained in its very being to succeed in the long term. It's clearly one of our core values, and we absolutely must maintain it.".
General Impact
Ana Ruano recounts that Incyma was also born from the intention to do things differently. After two years working in the private sector, they didn't like the way things were done there. “We worked in a company where employee training wasn't valued, where the only important thing was putting in the hours without having any kind of personal life. I lasted two years, my colleague Natalia stayed a little longer, but after two years I said: I need to go freelance because I saw that the clients trusted me, that I could run the company on my own.”.
Thus, Incyma has been active for 12 years, having advised more than 500 clients, especially small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs), where they seek to create the greatest impact. While much remains to be done regarding Corporate Social Responsibility in Extremadura, given that only 14 companies are certified and there are no metrics to determine the impact of Incyma's work in collaborating with some of them to achieve certification, those within the organization strive to instill a culture of social responsibility through training.
“What we’ve tried to do is raise awareness of the world of CSR; we organize many conferences, we’ve been holding high-level conferences since 2010, bringing in important speakers… I think in that sense it’s been an achievement for us that we manage to attract people who are interested and attend the conferences; so, our impact is to spread awareness and promote CSR in a community where it’s arriving slowly, but well, we’re helping it take root in the business world. That’s fundamentally our mission,” revealed Ana Ruano, the company’s director, in an interview.
Business Profit
Since Ruano Durán and Cilleros Torres decided to specialize in CSR, they have had many more job opportunities, from implementing GRI protocols and RS10 standards to auditing non-financial information reports for large companies. “For me, that has been one of my greatest professional achievements so far: to start seeing an opportunity in something that was truly needed in the world, and for that to help us develop professionally in something that motivates and excites us. For me, that has been one of my greatest professional achievements to date,” explains Ana Ruano.
Since the two partners decided to make Incyma a thriving company, looking beyond just making monetary gains, they have managed to stay in the market for more than 10 years, in addition to becoming a benchmark in the region.
Being an innovative company allows them to have their offices in the Extremadura Science and Technology Park, located within the University of Extremadura, where companies developing innovations with nuances different from what already exists on the market are located. “This gives you the possibility of establishing synergies with other organizations of different types and, ultimately, presenting collaborative projects, and everyone benefits in many ways. It creates a collaborative network both nationally and internationally because they have links with the European Union, and at the South American level there are also Horizon 2020 projects that ultimately establish links with other countries. It's very positive from that point of view,” commented the Director of Incyma.
Social and Environmental Benefit
Extremadura has the Extremadura Corporate Social Responsibility Strategy so that companies can build economic, environmental and social value, where competitiveness goes hand in hand with sustainability; supported by Law 15/2010 of December 9, on Corporate Social Responsibility in Extremadura and Decree 110/2013, which establishes conditions and measures to achieve these objectives.
The government understood that, faced with the economic and global crisis, a different approach was needed to achieve positive results. Therefore, this law mandates audits by independent, specialized entities to ensure that companies comply with the requirements and that these requirements are standardized both nationally and internationally.
Incyma anticipated this reality and, as a result, prepared itself years in advance. It is now one of the companies authorized to provide Corporate Social Responsibility Certification by the Regional Government of Extremadura, in accordance with its legislation, and is also a company certified under the Regional Government's own model. Therefore, it aims to guide businesses by offering them options for adopting these measures, which will benefit not only their companies in the future, but also the region and the world at large.
Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) aims to ensure that businesses are in balance with the environment and society, being profitable and ethical, acquiring a commitment to the environment by adopting measures to achieve sustainable development, labor inclusion, equal opportunities and transparency.
To see the entire interview, click here. Click here.
Source: AIM2Flourish. By Eloisa García Landero.
