For Immediate Release
Office of the Press Secretary
June 13, 2002
Businesses Strengthening America
Corporate Leaders Plan for Answering the President's Call to Service
Today's Action
Today a group of 18 corporate leaders representing a variety of
industries announced at a meeting with President George W. Bush that
they have come together to create Businesses Strengthening America -- a
self-directed, long-term effort to engage hundreds of America's
business leaders in helping corporations, employees and consumers
answer the call to service President Bush made during his State of the
Union Address.
Businesses Strengthening America is based on the premise that a
strong commitment to volunteering and civic responsibility serves
corporate interests as well as community, national, and global needs by
increasing employee productivity and employee, consumer, and
shareholder loyalty.
When asked about community involvement, American workers cite their
work schedule as among the barriers they face to getting involved,
according to a Social Capital Community Benchmark Survey conducted by
Robert Putnam of Harvard University in July and August 2000.
Corporate-led efforts to enable and encourage Americans to get involved
in volunteer service will help to break down those barriers and to
foster a culture of citizenship, service and responsibility in
America's communities.
Basic Principles and Accountability for Results
The group of 18 corporate leaders who met with President Bush today
at the White House outlined their plans to determine how corporations
can lead a campaign to strengthen America by encouraging increased
service and citizenship, including a commitment to:
- Create institutional changes in how corporate support for
service and participation is encouraged, rewarded and measured.
- Create a set of principles that can guide how companies of
any size, in any industry, can develop their own policies and programs
to foster service and citizenship.
- Recruit hundreds of corporate leaders for a fall Business
Leadership Conference on Service, and develop results-oriented programs
and policies that adhere to the principles.
###
|