What are the best practices for banks to communicate their social and environmental impact?

1 Define your purpose

Before you communicate your impact, you need to define your purpose. What is your vision, mission, and values as a bank? How do they align with the global challenges and opportunities that matter to your stakeholders? How do you measure and manage your performance against your purpose? Having a clear and consistent purpose will help you articulate your impact story and differentiate yourself from your competitors.

2 Choose your channels

Once you have your purpose, you need to choose the right channels to communicate your impact. Depending on your audience, you may use different formats and platforms, such as annual reports, sustainability reports, websites, social media, newsletters, podcasts, webinars, or events. You should also consider the frequency, tone, and style of your communication. For example, you may want to use more formal and detailed language for your reports, but more casual and engaging language for your social media posts.

3 Provide evidence and context

To communicate your impact credibly, you need to provide evidence and context. Evidence means using data, facts, figures, and examples to back up your claims and show your progress and outcomes. Context means explaining why your impact matters, how it relates to the broader issues and trends, and how it compares to your peers and benchmarks. You should also be transparent about your challenges, risks, and trade-offs, and how you address them.

4 Involve your stakeholders

To communicate your impact effectively, you need to involve your stakeholders. Stakeholders are the people and groups that affect or are affected by your activities, such as customers, employees, suppliers, regulators, investors, and communities. You should engage them in a dialogue, listen to their feedback, answer their questions, and invite their participation. By involving your stakeholders, you can build trust, loyalty, and collaboration.

5 Showcase your stories

To communicate your impact emotionally, you need to showcase your stories. Stories are the narratives that illustrate how your impact makes a difference in the lives of people and the planet. Stories can be told through words, images, videos, or audio, and they should highlight the challenges, solutions, and benefits of your impact. Stories can also feature the voices of your stakeholders, such as customers, employees, or beneficiaries, to show their perspectives and experiences.

6 Learn and improve

To communicate your impact continuously, you need to learn and improve. Communication is not a one-time activity, but an ongoing process that requires monitoring, evaluation, and adaptation. You should track and analyze the results and impacts of your communication, such as the reach, engagement, feedback, and behavior change of your audience. You should also identify the gaps, strengths, and weaknesses of your communication, and use the insights to improve your strategy and tactics.

7 Here’s what else to consider

This is a space to share examples, stories, or insights that don’t fit into any of the previous sections. What else would you like to add?