CSR (Corporate Social Responsibility) is increasingly finding its way onto companies' agendas, and fleet management activities are directly affected. In its 2022 Green Skills survey[1], LinkedIn also mentions the role of fleet manager as one of the professions that will require increasingly extensive CSR expertise in the future.
What is the link between CSR and fleet management? What do companies actually gain from committing to it?
This article answers these questions and sheds light on the best practices to follow to make fleet management part of CSR by means of on-board telematics, a far cry from superficial greenwashing.
The role of CSR managers is to promote awareness of environmental and social issues to a company’s stakeholders: employees, customers, investors, regulators, suppliers, etc. These themes are becoming increasingly important within companies, and transport is no exception. The major trends in the last few years include:
France is one of the strictest countries in the world when it comes to CSR. Under the 2019 PACTE Law, all French companies with more than 500 employees must produce a report explaining how they are taking account of social and environmental issues. In parallel, environmental regulations are being made tighter, particularly with the Climate and Resilience Law and the Mobility Orientation Law, which are having a direct impact on fleet management. Transport is responsible for one third of greenhouse gas emissions in France[1] and is therefore the subject of targeted regulatory measures to reduce its impact.
[1] https://www.flotauto.com/gestion-flotte-levier-rse-20220516.html
Employees are increasingly concerned about what their employers are doing about environmental and social issues: working conditions (well-being at work, health and safety), the company’s efforts to reduce its environmental impact, etc. CSR is now a factor of employer brand image and a company’s attractiveness is judged on the basis of its efforts in this regard, particularly by the younger generation.
Investors are increasingly looking at companies’ performance on ESG (Environmental, Social and Governance) criteria, the pillars of responsible investment, which are used to assess how well sustainable development is being taken into account by a company.
The aspects of management under the control of fleet managers are often those that have an impact on the environmental and social factors taken into account in a CSR policy. Many of these actions may reduce a company’s environmental impact through its transport policy and offer working conditions that ensure the health, safety and well-being of its workers. The main areas for action include:
Training employees in eco-driving has an effect on two levels:
The new legal obligations for mobility (Mobility Orientation Law, Climate Law, etc.) come with different incentive measures for companies, such as the creation of the sustainable mobility allowance for employees, and new tax rules and obligations to green up fleets.
In parallel with these actions on the ground, reviewing your company’s car policy is a means of:
As CSR policies become more common, so do accusations of greenwashing by companies. Greenwashing means promoting the benefits associated with a company’s actions on social, societal or environmental factors in a misleading or clumsy way. Why and how should this be avoided? And how can on-board telematics solutions help?
The mission of a CSR department is to meet the expectations of stakeholders on these social and environmental issues as effectively as possible. With greenwashing, the risk is that the actions taken by a company are ‘burnished’ and/or the results overstated through a desire to offer a more attractive image to stakeholders. This type of communication devalues genuine efforts made by companies.
Stakeholders are increasingly attentive to greenwashing techniques: consumers, associations and the public are not hesitating to call out companies suspected of greenwashing on social media. Friends of the Earth, an association working on these issues, has created the Pinocchio Awards[2] to highlight greenwashing practices by large companies.
[2] https://www.amisdelaterre.org/campagne/prix-pinocchio/
Transport is not exempt from the risk of greenwashing. Here are some examples of communication practices that can lead to confusion:
[3] wedemain.fr/dechiffrer/neutralite-carbone-un-decret-pour-limiter-le-greenwashing-mais/
As well as acting as a copilot for fleet managers and drivers, on-board telematics solutions are proven tools for helping with CSR policy.
To avoid the pitfalls of greenwashing, fleet management practices must be based on transparency, which requires measurable data that can be compared over time.
Onboard telematics can thus assist with responsible fleet management by supporting the following:
By consolidating your fleet’s performance data over time within a centralised software solution, on-board telematics can also support the setting and monitoring of measurable targets in the priority areas identified for your vehicle fleet. Here are some examples of targets that can be monitored by a fleet management solution:
Onboard telematics tools can also support the implementation of action plans. For example, the Ocean fleet management solution includes the following features:
Using data transmitted by onboard telematics ensures that the information is traceable and enables you to communicate on your targets. This information can be used in CSR communications prepared for stakeholders, such as the company’s sustainable development report. Here are some examples:
–
Mid-caps and SMEs are also working on CSR. 90% of business leaders say that they are engaged in CSR actions, 50% as part of a structured approach, according to a BPI study in 2018[4].
SMEs are also taking action on the energy transition and greening up their fleets, and are ‘sometimes able to adapt quicker than certain large accounts’, Flotauto recently reported[5].
Engaging in a responsible fleet management policy is therefore not the sole preserve of large companies, but an ambition within the reach of all, which a string of regulations has prompted us to prioritise.
[1] https://www.flotauto.com/gestion-flotte-levier-rse-20220516.html
[2] https://www.amisdelaterre.org/campagne/prix-pinocchio/
[3] wedemain.fr/dechiffrer/neutralite-carbone-un-decret-pour-limiter-le-greenwashing-mais/
[4] https://www.cddd.fr/rse-tpe-pme-eti-francaises-enquete-bpifrance/
[5] https://www.flotauto.com/transition-energetique-tpe-pme-20210426.html