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IHG achieves Silver in Business in the Community's 8th Corporate Responsibility Index

By: InterContinental Hotels Group |  3 Shares     92 Reads

June 08, 2011 // Franchising.com // IHG (InterContinental Hotels Group) the world's largest hotel group by number of rooms, today announces that it's achieved Silver in Business in the Community's (BITC) 2011 Corporate Responsibility Index (CRI), the UK's leading voluntary benchmark of Corporate Responsibility. This achievement further cements IHG's place as an industry leader in the field of sustainability and highlights the company's firm commitment to acting responsibly.

The CRI helps companies to integrate and improve corporate responsibility throughout their business operations, by providing a systematic approach to managing, measuring and reporting on business impacts in society and on the environment.

Achieving Silver means that IHG conducts effective stakeholder engagement, has the right processes in place in order to identify and manage risks and opportunities. IHG also has reliable baseline data which enables us to demonstrate both management and performance improvement.

Corporate Responsibility is central to the way IHG does business. Acting responsibly creates value for our brands while helping our hotels manage costs, drive revenue and be prepared for the future. It also keeps the organisation in tune with the thinking of our stakeholders and supports our mission to champion and protect IHG's trusted reputation. Doing the right thing reinforces trust in IHG's brands, builds competitive advantage and strengthens our corporate reputation. Achieving Silver in the CRI demonstrates IHG's commitment to CR and the high quality management of our responsible business practices.

Stephen Howard, Chief Executive, Business in the Community said: "I congratulate IHG on achieving Silver in the 2011 BITC Corporate Responsibility Index. It is a challenging time, but the results of this year's Index demonstrate that companies are still focused on transforming their businesses in order to have a positive impact on society. All the companies who participated this year are at different stages in their responsible business journey, but they are all taking these issues seriously and are prepared to lead by example."

The full results of the 2011 CRI, including commentary and analysis, are published in the Financial Times Responsible Business supplement today (8 June 2011).

Notes to Editors:

InterContinental Hotels Group (IHG) [LON:IHG, NYSE:IHG (ADRs)] is a global company operating seven well-known hotel brands including InterContinental® Hotels & Resorts, Hotel Indigo®, Crowne Plaza® Hotels & Resorts, Holiday Inn® Hotels and Resorts, Holiday Inn Express®, Staybridge Suites® and Candlewood Suites®. IHG also manages Priority Club® Rewards, the world's first and largest hotel loyalty programme with 58 million members worldwide.

IHG is the world's largest hotel group by number of rooms and IHG franchises, leases, manages or owns, through various subsidiaries, a portfolio of over 4,400 hotels and more than 652,000 guest rooms in 100 countries and territories around the world.

IHG has more than 1,200 hotels in its development pipeline and expects to recruit around 160,000 people worldwide over the next few years.

InterContinental Hotels Group PLC is the Group's holding company and is incorporated in Great Britain and registered in England and Wales.

IHG offers information and online reservations for all its hotel brands at http://www.ihg.com/ and information for the Priority Club Rewards programme at http://www.priorityclub.com/. For our latest news visit www.ihg.com/media, Twitter www.twitter.com/ihgplc or YouTube http://www.youtube.com/ihgplc

ABOUT THE CR INDEX

Please note: We would like to make you aware of our decision to call this year's Index the CR Index 2011, rather than the CR Index 2010, which would have followed on from last year's survey. This decision brings the CR Index cycle and ranking in line with the year of publication, rather than the year of survey submission.

Business in the Community's CR Index is the UK's leading voluntary benchmark of corporate responsibility (CR). It helps companies to integrate and improve CR throughout their operations by providing a systematic approach to managing, measuring and reporting on business impacts in society and on the environment.

For the past seven years the CR Index has inspired and challenged over 350 companies to continuously improve their impact on society and the environment. This year we expect to have more than 100 companies participate publicly and use our tool to both improve their management practices and communicate to stakeholders how seriously they take their CR agenda.

The Index bandings explained:

Platinum Plus

Platinum Plus was a new process introduced in 2009 to evaluate the extent to which the commercial business strategy is underpinned by thinking around long term sustainability.

Platinum 2009

These are companies who attained Platinum Status in the CR Index 2009. They have been able to retain Platinum band for the next two subsequent years, subject to the company holding same business structure.

Platinum

Companies achieving the Platinum performance band tend to have corporate responsibility (CR) integrated into their business model and clear CR responsibilities and incentive structures at both board and operational levels. These companies have a structured approach to data collection and social and environmental impact assessment. They can demonstrate 3-4 years of performance improvement across their keys impacts. They act and report with a high level of transparency and stakeholder engagement, and the materiality, completeness and responsiveness of their CR reporting and published data is often third party assured.

Gold

Companies that have achieved the Gold performance band tend to be able to demonstrate openness and transparency through effective public reporting of their material environmental and social issues, CR programmes and performance. They also expand and adapt their risk management processes by incorporating relevant aspects of corporate responsibility risk and opportunity, and their CR strategy is articulated in an effective manner, including clear and measurable targets.

Silver

Companies that have achieved the Silver performance band tend to conduct effective stakeholder engagement, having the right processes in place in order to identify and manage social and environmental risks and opportunities. They also tend to have reliable baseline data which enables them to demonstrate both management and performance improvement.

Bronze

Companies achieving the Bronze performance band tend to be at the early stages of environmental and social data collation as well as public reporting. A clear outline of their mission, values and corporate responsibility principles tends to be manifest, with clear roles and responsibilities being allocated across the business.

ABOUT BUSINESS IN THE COMMUNITY

Business in the Community stands for responsible business.

BITC is a business-led charity with a growing membership of 850 companies, from large multinational household names to small local businesses and public sector organisations.

They advise, support and challenge our members to create a sustainable future for society and to improve business performance.

Their members work with them to define what responsibility looks like in the workplace, marketplace, community and the environment - and they share what they learn about driving performance through responsible business practice.

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