How to blend business ethics and New Year's resolutions

It might seem odd to think of setting New Year's resolutions as business goals, but businesses offer a platform for improvement just as much as your personal life does. Plus, social corporate responsibility gives businesses the opportunity to give back to the community while genuinely improving their brand image.

Corporate social responsibility, business ethics, social corporate responsibility: these are more than just popular buzzwords. They are the future of business. Customers want to do business with ethical companies, and governments are starting to require better ethics in some areas of business.

Plus, you can use the implementation of your company's socially responsible New Year's resolutions as part of a cost-cutting budgeting tool and cost-effective marketing tool if handled properly.

More than anything, though, opting for socially and ethically positive business practises is practically a necessity for businesses that want long term success in our era of 24/7 communication.  Word travels even faster these days, so why let word of your company be about unethical practices?

Base year-end resolutions for a business around one of two main approaches: changes you would like to see within the company, and changes in the way end-users interact with your products and your company.

Goals for changes within the company should focus on things like reducing waste by a specific percentage each month, recycling a certain percentage of waste that normally goes to the landfill each month or setting up a program to contribute to the community such as giving employees a paid day off to do community service each month.

Goals for improving the way end-users interact with your product or business could be things like offering incentives to recycle packaging from your products or making a certain amount of progress each month toward setting up and running a cause-based marketing fund that gives a percentage of the sales from each item purchased to a cause that fits with your company's ethical directives.

Adding ethical practises to your business goals doesn't have to cost your company a lot — it can even save you money. Be sure to take advantage of press releases to publicize your company's philanthropic efforts that develop as a result of implementing ethical goals in your business.

Your company will be giving back to the community, but you will also benefit from the positive view that potential customers will come to have of your company when you openly focus on being ethical as a business.